Stephen Vincent Benét

It's a story they tell in the border country,
where Massachusetts joins Vermont and New
Hampshire.

Yes, Dan'l Webster's dead--or, at least, they
buried him. But every time there's a thunder
storm around Marshfield, they say you can hear
his rolling voice in the hollows of the sky. And
they say that if you go to his grave and speak
loud and clear, "Dan'l Webster--Dan'l Webster!"
the ground'll begin to shiver and the trees
begin to shake. And after a while you'll hear a
deep voice saying, "Neighbor, how stands the
Union?" Then you better answer the Union
stands as she stood, rock-bottomed and copper
sheathed, one and indivisible, or he's liable to
rear right out of the ground. At least, that's
what I was told when I was a youngster.

- Stephen Vincent Benét, (from The Devil
and Daniel Webster)

Stephen Vincent Benét, (1898-1943). American poet, novelist, and short story writer. Interested in fantasy and American themes. His best known works are John Brown's Body (1928), a narrative poem of the American Civil War, awarded the Pulitzer prize in 1929, and The Devil and Daniel Webster, a short story first published in the Saturday Evening Post which became very popular and was later made into a one act opera, with libretto by the author and music by Douglas Moore, and into a motion picture.