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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/15205-8.txt b/15205-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..185e9b5 --- /dev/null +++ b/15205-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,13821 @@ +Project Gutenberg's The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems, by H. L. Gordon + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems + +Author: H. L. Gordon + +Release Date: February 28, 2005 [EBook #15205] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS *** + + + + +Produced by Eric Eldred, Susan Skinner and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. Produced from images generously made available +by the Canadiana.org. + + + + + + + +[Illustration: H. L. Gordon] + + +THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS + +AND OTHER POEMS + +BY + +H.L. GORDON + + + _I had rather write one word upon the rock + Of ages, than ten thousand in the sand._ + + +Entered according to act of Congress in the year 1891 by H.L. GORDON in +the office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D.C. + + + + +TABLE OF CONTENTS + +Address to the Flag +A Million More +An Old English Oak +Anthem +Betzko +Beyond +Byron and the Angel +Change +Charge of the "Black-Horse" +Charge of Fremont's Body-Guard +Charity +Chickadee +Christmas Eve [Illustrated] +Daniel +Do They Think of Us? +Dust to Dust +Fame +Fido +Gettysburg: Charge of the First Minnesota +Heloise +Hope +Hurrah for the Volunteers! +Isabel +Lines on the Death of Captain Coats +Love will Find +Mauley [Illustrated] +Men +Minnetonka [Illustrated] +Mrs. McNair +My Dead +My Father-Land +My Heart's on the Rhine +Night Thoughts +New Years Address, 1866 [Illustrated] +O Let Me Dream the Dreams of Long Ago +Only a Private Killed +On Reading President Lincoln's Letter +Out of the Depths +Pat and the Pig +Pauline [Illustrated] +Poetry +Prelude--The Mississippi +Sailor Boy's Song +Spring [Illustrated] +Thanksgiving +The Devil and the Monk [Illustrated] +The Draft +The Dying Veteran +The Feast of the Virgins [Illustrated] +The Legend of the Falls [Illustrated] +The Minstrel +The Old Flag +The Pioneer [Illustrated] +The Reign of Reason +The Sea-Gull [Illustrated] +The Tariff on Tin [Illustrated] +To Mollie +To Sylva +Twenty Years Ago [Illustrated] +Wesselenyi [Illustrated] +Winona [Illustrated] + + + + +PREFACE + +At odd hours during an active and busy life I have dallied with the +Muses. I found in them, in earlier years, rest from toil and drudgery +and, later, relief from physical suffering. + +Broken by over-work and compelled to abandon the practice of my +profession--the law, I wrote _Pauline_ after I had been given up to die +by my physicians. It proved to be a better 'medicine' for me than all +the quackeries of the quacks. It diverted my mind from myself and, +perhaps, saved my life. When published, its reception by the best +journals of this country and England was so flattering and, at the same +time, the criticisms of some were so just, that I have been induced to +carefully revise the poem and to publish my re-touched _Pauline_ in this +volume. I hope and believe I have greatly improved it. Several of the +minor poems have been published heretofore in journals and magazines; +others of equal or greater age flap their wings herein for the first +time; a few peeped from the shell but yesterday. + +I am aware that this volume contains several poems that a certain class +of critics will condemn, but they are my "chicks" and I will gather them +under my wings. + +"None but an author knows an author's cares, +Or Fancy's fondness for the child she bears."--_Cowper._ + +Much of my life has been spent in the Northwest--on the frontier of +civilization, and I became personally acquainted with many of the chiefs +and braves of the Dakota and Ojibway (Chippewa) Indians. I have written +of them largely from my own personal knowledge, and endeavored, above +all things, to be accurate, and to present them true to the life. + +For several years I devoted my leisure hours to the study of the +language, history, traditions, customs and superstitions of the Dakotas. +These Indians are now commonly called the "_Sioux_"--a name given them +by the early French traders and _voyageurs_. "Dakota" signifies +_alliance_ or _confederation_. Many separate bands, all having a common +origin and speaking a common tongue, were united under this name. See +"_Tah-Koo Wah-Kan,_" or "_The Gospel Among the Dakotas,_" by Stephen R. +Riggs, pp. 1 to 6 inc. + +They were but yesterday the occupants and owners of the fair forests and +fertile prairies of Minnesota--a brave, hospitable and generous +people--barbarians, indeed, but noble in their barbarism. They may be +fitly called the Iroquois of the West. In form and features, in language +and traditions, they are distinct from all other Indian tribes. When +first visited by white men, and for many years afterwards, the Falls of +St. Anthony (by them called the _Ha Ha_) was the center of their +country. They cultivated corn and tobacco, and hunted the elk, the +beaver and the bison. They were open-hearted, truthful and brave. In +their wars with other tribes they seldom slew women or children, and +rarely sacrificed the lives of their prisoners. + +For many years their chiefs and head men successfully resisted the +attempts to introduce spirituous liquors among them. More than a century +ago an English trader was killed at Mendota, near the present city of +St. Paul, because he persisted, after repeated warnings by the chiefs, +in dealing out _mini wakan_ (Devil-water) to the Dakota braves. + +With open arms and generous hospitality they welcomed the first white +men to their land, and were ever faithful in their friendship, till +years of wrong and robbery, and want and insult, drove them to +desperation and to war. They were barbarians, and their warfare was +barbarous, but not more barbarous than the warfare of our Saxon, Celtic +and Norman ancestors. They were ignorant and superstitious. Their +condition closely resembled the condition of our British forefathers at +the beginning of the Christian era. Macaulay says of Britain: "Her +inhabitants, when first they became known to the Tyrian mariners, were +little superior to the natives of the Sandwich Islands." And again: +"While the German princes who reigned at Paris, Toledo, Aries and +Ravenna listened with reverence to the instructions of bishops, adored +the relics of martyrs, and took part eagerly in disputes touching the +Nicene theology, the rulers of Wessex and Mercia were still performing +savage rites in the temples of Thor and Woden." + +The days of the Dakotas are done. The degenerate remnants of that once +powerful and warlike people still linger around the forts and agencies +of the Northwest, or chase the caribou and the elk on the banks of the +Saskatchewan, but the Dakotas of old are no more. The brilliant defeat +of Custer, by Sitting Bull and his braves, was their last grand rally +against the resistless march of the sons of the Saxons. The plow-shares +of a superior race are fast leveling the sacred mounds of their dead. +But yesterday, the shores of our lakes and our rivers were dotted with +their _teepees,_ their light canoes glided over our waters, and their +hunters chased the deer and the buffalo on the sites of our cities. +To-day, they are not. Let us do justice to their memory, for there was +much that was noble in their natures. + +In the Dakota Legends, I have endeavored to faithfully present many of +the customs and superstitions, and some of the traditions, of that +people. I have taken very little 'poetic license' with their traditions; +none, whatever, with their customs and superstitions. In my studies for +these Legends I was greatly aided by the Rev. S.R. Riggs, author of the +_"Grammar and Dictionary of the Dakota Language" "Tah-Koo Wah-Kan,"_ +&c., and for many years a missionary among the Dakotas. He patiently +answered my numerous inquiries and gave me valuable information. I am +also indebted to the late Gen. H.H. Sibley, one of the earliest +American traders among them, and to Rev. S.W. Pond, of Shakopee, one of +the first Protestant missionaries to these people, and himself the +author of poetical versions of some of their principal legends; to Mrs. +Eastman's _"Dacotah,"_ and last, but not least, to the Rev. E.D. Neill, +whose admirable _"History of Minnesota"_ so fully and faithfully +presents almost all that is known of the history, traditions, customs, +manners and superstitions of the Dakotas. + +In _Winona_ I have "tried my hand" on a new hexameter verse. With what +success, I leave to those who are better able to judge than I. If I have +failed, I have but added another failure to the numerous attempts to +naturalize hexameter verse in the English language. + +It will be observed that I have slightly changed the length and the +rhythm of the old hexameter line; but it is still hexameter, and, I +think, improved. + +I have not written for profit nor published for fame. Fame is a coy +goddess that rarely bestows her favors on him who seeks her--a phantom +that many pursue and but few overtake. + +She delights to hover for a time, like a ghost, over the graves of dead +men who know not and care not: to the living she is a veritable _Ignis +Fatuus_. But every man owes something to his fellowmen, and I owe much. + +If my friends find half the pleasure in reading these poems that I have +found in writing them, I shall have paid my debt and achieved success. + +H.L. GORDON. + +Minneapolis, November 1, 1891. + + + + + +PRELUDE + + +THE MISSISSIPPI + +The numerals refer to _Notes_ in appendix. + + +Onward rolls the Royal River, proudly sweeping to the sea, +Dark and deep and grand, forever wrapt in myth and mystery. +Lo he laughs along the highlands, leaping o'er the granite walls; +Lo he sleeps among the islands, where the loon her lover calls. +Still like some huge monster winding downward through the prairied plains, +Seeking rest but never finding, till the tropic gulf he gains. +In his mighty arms he claspeth now an empire broad and grand; +In his left hand lo he graspeth leagues of fen and forest land; +In his right the mighty mountains, hoary with eternal snow, +Where a thousand foaming fountains singing seek the plains below. +Fields of corn and feet of cities lo the mighty river laves, +Where the Saxon sings his ditties o'er the swarthy warriors' graves. + +Aye, before the birth of Moses--ere the Pyramids were piled-- +All his banks were red with roses from the sea to nor'lands wild, +And from forest, fen and meadows, in the deserts of the north, +Elk and bison stalked like shadows, and the tawny tribes came forth; +Deeds of death and deeds of daring on his leafy banks were done, +Women loved and men went warring, ere the siege of Troy begun. +Where his foaming waters thundered, roaring o'er the rocky walls, +Dusky hunters sat and wondered, listening to the spirits' calls. +"_Ha-ha!_"[76] cried the warrior greeting from afar the cataract's roar; +"_Ha-ha!_" rolled the answer beating down the rock-ribbed leagues of shore. +Now, alas, the bow and quiver and the dusky braves have fled, +And the sullen, shackled river drives the droning mills instead. + +Where the war-whoop rose, and after women wailed their warriors slain, +List the Saxon's silvery laughter, and his humming hives of gain. +Swiftly sped the tawny runner o'er the pathless prairies then, +Now the iron-reindeer sooner carries weal or woe to men. +On thy bosom, Royal River, silent sped the birch canoe +Bearing brave with bow and quiver on his way to war or woo; +Now with flaunting flags and streamers--mighty monsters of the deep-- +Lo the puffing, panting steamers through thy foaming waters sweep; +And behold the grain-fields golden, where the bison grazed of eld; +See the fanes of forests olden by the ruthless Saxon felled. +Plumèd pines that spread their shadows ere Columbus spread his sails, +Firs that fringed the mossy meadows ere the Mayflower braved the gales, +Iron oaks that nourished bruin while the Vikings roamed the main, +Crashing fall in broken ruin for the greedy marts of gain. + +Still forever and forever rolls the restless river on, +Slumbering oft but ceasing never while the circling centuries run. +In his palm the lakelet lingers, in his hair the brooklets hide, +Grasped within his thousand fingers lies a continent fair and wide-- +Yea, a mighty empire swarming with its millions like the bees, +Delving, drudging, striving, storming, all their lives, for golden ease. + +Still, methinks, the dusky shadows of the days that are no more, +Stalk around the lakes and meadows, haunting oft the wonted shore: +Hunters from the land of spirits seek the bison and the deer +Where the Saxon now inherits golden field and silver mere; +And beside the mound where buried lies the dark-eyed maid he loves, +Some tall warrior, wan and wearied, in the misty moonlight moves. +See--he stands erect and lingers--stoic still, but loth to go-- +Clutching in his tawny fingers feathered shaft and polished bow. +Never wail or moan he utters and no tear is on his face, +But a warrior's curse he mutters on the crafty Saxon race. + +O thou dark, mysterious River, speak and tell thy tales to me; +Seal not up thy lips forever--veiled in mist and mystery. +I will sit and lowly listen at the phantom-haunted falls +Where thy waters foam and glisten o'er the rugged, rocky walls, +Till some spirit of the olden, mystic, weird, romantic days +Shall emerge and pour her golden tales and legends through my lays. + +Then again the elk and bison on thy grassy banks shall feed, +And along the low horizon shall the plumed hunter speed; +Then again on lake and river shall the silent birch canoe +Bear the brave with bow and quiver on his way to war or woo: +Then the beaver on the meadow shall rebuild his broken wall, +And the wolf shall chase his shadow and his mate the panther call. +From the prairies and the regions where the pine-plumed forest grows +Shall arise the tawny legions with their lances and their bows; +And again the cries of battle shall resound along the plain, +Bows shall twang and quivers rattle, women wail their warriors slain; +And by lodge-fire lowly burning shall the mother from afar +List her warrior's steps returning from the daring deeds of war. + + +[Illustration: THE GAME OF BALL] + + +THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS[1] + +A LEGEND OF THE DAKOTAS + + +In pronouncing Dakota words give "a" the sound of "ah",--"e" the sound +of "a",--"i" the sound of "e" and "u" the sound of "oo;" sound "ee" as +in English. The numerals refer to _Notes_ in appendix. + + +THE GAME OF BALL[2] + +Clear was the sky as a silver shield; +The bright sun blazed on the frozen field. +On ice-bound river and white-robed prairie +The diamonds gleamed in the flame of noon; +But cold and keen were the breezes airy +_Wa-zi-ya_[3] blew from his icy throne. + +On the solid ice of the silent river +The bounds are marked, and a splendid prize, +A robe of black-fox lined with beaver, +Is hung in view of the eager eyes; +And fifty merry Dakota maidens, +The fairest-molded of womankind +Are gathered in groups on the level ice. +They look on the robe and its beauty gladdens +And maddens their hearts for the splendid prize. +Lo the rounded ankles and raven hair +That floats at will on the wanton wind, +And the round, brown arms to the breezes bare, +And breasts like the mounds where the waters meet,[4] +And feet as fleet as the red deer's feet, +And faces that glow like the full, round moon +When she laughs in the luminous skies of June. + +The leaders are chosen and swiftly divide +The opposing parties on either side. +Wiwâstè[5] is chief of a nimble band, +The star-eyed daughter of Little Crow;[6] +And the leader chosen to hold command +Of the band adverse is a haughty foe-- +The dusky, impetuous Hârpstinà,[7] +The queenly cousin of Wâpasà.[8] + +_Kapoza's_ chief and his tawny hunters +Are gathered to witness the queenly game. +The ball is thrown and a net encounters, +And away it flies with a loud acclaim. +Swift are the maidens that follow after, +And swiftly it flies for the farther bound; +And long and loud are the peals of laughter, +As some fair runner is flung to ground; +While backward and forward, and to and fro, +The maidens contend on the trampled snow. +With loud "_Ihó!--Itó!--Ihó_!"[9] +And waving the beautiful prize anon, +The dusky warriors cheer them on. +And often the limits are almost passed, +As the swift ball flies and returns. At last +It leaps the line at a single bound +From the fair Wiwâstè's sturdy arm +Like a fawn that flies from the baying hound. +The wild cheers broke like a thunder storm +On the beetling bluffs and the hills profound, +An echoing, jubilant sea of sound. +Wakâwa, the chief, and the loud acclaim +Announced the end of the hard-won game, +And the fair Wiwâstè was victor crowned. + +Dark was the visage of Hârpstinà +When the robe was laid at her rival's feet, +And merry maidens and warriors saw +Her flashing eyes and her look of hate, +As she turned to Wakâwa, the chief, and said: +"The game was mine were it fairly played. +I was stunned by a blow on my bended head, +As I snatched the ball from slippery ground +Not half a fling from Wiwâstè's bound. +The cheat--behold her! for there she stands +With the prize that is mine in her treacherous hands. +The fawn may fly, but the wolf is fleet; +The fox creeps sly on _Magâ's_[10] retreat, +And a woman's revenge--it is swift and sweet." + +She turned to her lodge, but a roar of laughter +And merry mockery followed after. +Little they heeded the words she said, +Little they cared for her haughty tread, +For maidens and warriors and chieftain knew +That her lips were false and her charge untrue. + +Wiwâstè, the fairest Dakota maiden, +The sweet-faced daughter of Little Crow, +To her _teepee_[11] turned with her trophy laden, +The black robe trailing the virgin snow. +Beloved was she by her princely father, +Beloved was she by the young and old, +By merry maidens and many a mother, +And many a warrior bronzed and bold. +For her face was as fair as a beautiful dream, +And her voice like the song of the mountain stream; +And her eyes like the stars when they glow and gleam +Through the somber pines of the nor'land wold, +When the winds of winter are keen and cold. + +Mah-pí-ya Dú-ta[12], the tall Red Cloud, +A hunter swift and a warrior proud, +With many a scar and many a feather, +Was a suitor bold and a lover fond. +Long had he courted Wiwâstè's father, +Long had he sued for the maiden's hand. +Aye, brave and proud was the tall Red Cloud, +A peerless son of a giant race, +And the eyes of the panther were set in his face: +He strode like a stag, and he stood like a pine; +Ten feathers he wore of the great _Wanmdeè_;[13] +With crimsoned quills of the porcupine +His leggins were worked to his brawny knee. +The bow he bent was a giant's bow; +The swift, red elk could he overtake, +And the necklace that girdled his brawny neck +Was the polished claws of the great _Mató_[14] +He grappled and slew in the northern snow. +Wiwâstè looked on the warrior tall; +She saw he was brawny and brave and great, +But the eyes of the panther she could but hate, +And a brave _Hóhè_[15] loved she better than all. +Loved was Mahpíya by Hârpstinà +But the warrior she never could charm or draw; +And bitter indeed was her secret hate +For the maiden she reckoned so fortunate. + + +HEYOKA WACIPEE[16] + +THE GIANT'S DANCE. + +The night-sun[17] sails in his gold canoe, +The spirits[18] walk in the realms of air +With their glowing faces and flaming hair, +And the shrill, chill winds o'er the prairies blow. +In the _Tee[19] of the Council_ the Virgins light +The Virgin-fire[20] for the feast to-night; +For the _Sons of Heyóka_ will celebrate +The sacred dance to the giant great. +The kettle boils on the blazing fire, +And the flesh is done to the chief's desire. +With his stoic face to the sacred East,[21] +He takes his seat at the Giant's Feast. + +For the feast of _Heyóka_[22] the braves are dressed +With crowns from the bark of the white-birch trees, +And new skin leggins that reach the knees; +With robes of the bison and swarthy bear, +And eagle-plumes in their coal-black hair, +And marvelous rings in their tawny ears +That were pierced with the points of their shining spears. +To honor _Heyóka_ Wakâwa lifts +His fuming pipe from the Red-stone Quarry.[23] +The warriors follow. The white cloud drifts +From the Council-lodge to the welkin starry, +Like a fog at morn on the fir-clad hill, +When the meadows are damp and the winds are still. + +They dance to the tune of their wild "_Há-há_" +A warrior's shout and a raven's caw-- +Circling the pot and the blazing fire +To the tom-tom's bray and the rude bassoon; +Round and round to their heart's desire, +And ever the same wild chant and tune-- +A warrior's shout and a raven's caw-- +"_Há-há,--há-há,--há-há,--há!_" +They crouch, they leap, and their burning eyes +Flash fierce in the light of the flaming fire, +As fiercer and fiercer and higher and higher +The rude, wild notes of their chant arise. +They cease, they sit, and the curling smoke +Ascends again from their polished pipes, +And upward curls from their swarthy lips +To the god whose favor their hearts invoke. + +Then tall Wakâwa arose and said: +"Brave warriors, listen, and give due heed. +Great is _Heyóka_, the magical god; +He can walk on the air; he can float on the flood. +He's a worker of magic and wonderful wise; +He cries when he laughs and he laughs when he cries; +He sweats when he's cold, and he shivers when hot, +And the water is cold in his boiling pot. +He hides in the earth and he walks in disguise, +But he loves the brave and their sacrifice. +We are sons of _Heyóka_. The Giant commands +In the boiling water to thrust our hands; +And the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire +_Heyóka_ will crown with his heart's desire." + +They thrust their hands in the boiling pot; +They swallow the bison-meat steaming hot; +Not a wince on their stoical faces bold, +For the meat and the water, they say, are cold: +And great is _Heyóka_ and wonderful wise; +He floats on the flood and he walks on the skies, +And ever appears in a strange disguise; +But he loves the brave and their sacrifice, +And the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire +Heyóka will crown with his heart's desire. + +Proud was the chief of his warriors proud, +The sinewy sons of the Giant's race; +But the bravest of all was the tall Red Cloud; +The eyes of the panther were set in his face; +He strode like a stag and he stood like a pine; +Ten feathers he wore of the great _Wanmdeé_,[13] +With crimsoned quills of the porcupine +His leggins were worked to his brawny knee. +Blood-red were the stripes on his swarthy cheek, +And the necklace that girdled his brawny neck +Was the polished claws of the great Mató[14] +He grappled and slew in the northern snow. +Proud Red Cloud turned to the braves and said, +As he shook the plumes on his haughty head: +"Ho! the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire +_Heyóka_ will crown with his heart's desire!" +He snatched from the embers a red-hot brand, +And held it aloft in his naked hand. +He stood like a statue in bronze or stone-- +Not a muscle moved, and the braves looked on. +He turned to the chieftain--"I scorn the fire-- +Ten feathers I wear of the great _Wanmdeé_; +Then grant me, Wakâwa, my heart's desire; +Let the sunlight shine in my lonely tee.[19] +I laugh at red death and I laugh at red fire; +Brave Red Cloud is only afraid of fear; +But Wiwâstè is fair to his heart and dear; +Then grant him, Wakâwa, his heart's desire." +The warriors applauded with loud "_Ho! Ho!_"[24] +And he flung the brand to the drifting snow. +Three times Wakâwa puffed forth the smoke +From his silent lips; then he slowly spoke: +"Mâhpíya is strong as the stout-armed oak +That stands on the bluff by the windy plain, +And laughs at the roar of the hurricane. +He has slain the foe and the great _Mató_ +With his hissing arrow and deadly stroke +My heart is swift but my tongue is slow. +Let the warrior come to my lodge and smoke; +He may bring the gifts;[25] but the timid doe +May fly from the hunter and say him no." + +Wiwâstè sat late in the lodge alone, +Her dark eyes bent on the glowing fire: +She heard not the wild winds shrill and moan; +She heard not the tall elms toss and groan; +Her face was lit like the harvest moon; +For her thoughts flew far to her heart's desire. +Far away in the land of the _Hóhè_[15] dwelt +The warrior she held in her secret heart; +But little he dreamed of the pain she felt, +For she hid her love with a maiden's art. +Not a tear she shed, not a word she said, +When the brave young chief from the lodge departed; +But she sat on the mound when the day was dead, +And gazed at the full moon mellow-hearted. +Fair was the chief as the morning-star; +His eyes were mild and his words were low, +But his heart was stouter than lance or bow; +And her young heart flew to her love afar +O'er his trail long covered with drifted snow. +She heard a warrior's stealthy tread, +And the tall Wakâwa appeared, and said: +"Is Wiwâstè afraid of the spirit dread +That fires the sky in the fatal north?[26] +Behold the mysterious lights. Come forth: +Some evil threatens, some danger nears, +For the skies are pierced by the burning spears." + +The warriors rally beneath the moon; +They shoot their shafts at the evil spirit. +The spirit is slain and the flame is gone, +But his blood lies red on the snow-fields near it; +And again from the dead will the spirit rise, +And flash his spears in the northern skies. + +Then the chief and the queenly Wiwâstè stood +Alone in the moon-lit solitude, +And she was silent and he was grave. +"And fears not my daughter the evil spirit? +The strongest warriors and bravest fear it. +The burning spears are an evil omen; +They threaten the wrath of a wicked woman, +Or a treacherous foe; but my warriors brave, +When danger nears, or the foe appears, +Are a cloud of arrows--a grove of spears." + +"My Father," she said, and her words were low, +"Why should I fear? for I soon will go +To the broad, blue lodge in the Spirit-land, +Where my fond-eyed mother went long ago, +And my dear twin-sisters walk hand in hand. +My Father, listen--my words are true," +And sad was her voice as the whippowil +When she mourns her mate by the moon-lit rill, +"Wiwâstè lingers alone with you; +The rest are sleeping on yonder hill-- +Save one--and he an undutiful son-- +And you, my Father, will sit alone +When _Sisóka_[27] sings and the snow is gone. +I sat, when the maple leaves were red, +By the foaming falls of the haunted river; +The night-sun was walking above my head, +And the arrows shone in his burnished quiver; +And the winds were hushed and the hour was dread +With the walking ghosts of the silent dead. +I heard the voice of the Water-Fairy;[28] +I saw her form in the moon-lit mist, +As she sat on a stone with her burden weary, +By the foaming eddies of amethyst. +And robed in her mantle of mist the sprite +Her low wail poured on the silent night. +Then the spirit spake, and the floods were still-- +They hushed and listened to what she said, +And hushed was the plaint of the whippowil +In the silver-birches above her head: +'Wiwâstè, the prairies are green and fair +When the robin sings and the whippowil; +But the land of the Spirits is fairer still, +For the winds of winter blow never there; +And forever the songs of the whippowils +And the robins are heard on the leafy hills. +Thy mother looks from her lodge above-- +Her fair face shines in the sky afar, +And the eyes of thy sisters are bright with love, +As they peep from the _tee_ of the mother-star. +To her happy lodge in the Spirit land +She beckons Wiwâstè with shining hand.' + +"My Father--my Father, her words were true; +And the death of Wiwâstè will rest on you. +You have pledged me as wife to the tall Red Cloud; +You will take the gifts of the warrior proud; +But I, Wakâwa,--I answer--never! +I will stain your knife in my heart's red blood, +I will plunge and sink in the sullen river +Ere I will be wife to the dark Red Cloud!" + +"Wiwâstè," he said, and his voice was low, +"Let it be as you will, for Wakâwa's tongue +Has spoken no promise;--his lips are slow, +And the love of a father is deep and strong. +Be happy, Micúnksee;[29] the flames are gone-- +They flash no more in the northern sky. +See the smile on the face of the watching moon; +No more will the fatal, red arrows fly; +For the singing shafts of my warriors sped +To the bad spirit's bosom and laid him dead, +And his blood on the snow of the North lies red. +Go--sleep in the robe that you won to-day, +And dream of your hunter--the brave Chaskè." + +Light was her heart as she turned away; +It sang like the lark in the skies of May. +The round moon laughed, but a lone, red star,[30] +As she turned to the _teepee_ and entered in, +Fell flashing and swift in the sky afar, +Like the polished point of a javelin. +Nor chief nor daughter the shadow saw +Of the crouching listener, Hârpstinà. + +Wiwâstè, wrapped in her robe and sleep, +Heard not the storm-sprites wail and weep, +As they rode on the winds in the frosty air; +But she heard the voice of her hunter fair; +For a fairy spirit with silent fingers +The curtains drew from the land of dreams; +And lo in her _teepee_ her lover lingers; +In his tender eyes all the love-light beams, +And his voice is the music of mountain streams. + +And then with her round, brown arms she pressed +His phantom form to her throbbing breast, +And whispered the name, in her happy sleep, +Of her _Hóhè_ hunter so fair and far: +And then she saw in her dreams the deep +Where the spirit wailed, and a falling star; +Then stealthily crouching under the trees, +By the light of the moon, the _Kan-é-ti-dan_, [31] +The little, wizened, mysterious man, +With his long locks tossed by the moaning breeze. +Then a flap of wings, like a thunder-bird, [32] +And a wailing spirit the sleeper heard; +And lo, through the mists of the moon, she saw +The hateful visage of Hârpstinà. + +But waking she murmured--"And what are these---- +The flap of wings and the falling star, +The wailing spirit that's never at ease, +The little man crouching under the trees, +And the hateful visage of Hârpstinà? +My dreams are like feathers that float on the breeze, +And none can tell what the omens are---- +Save the beautiful dream of my love afar +In the happy land of the tall _Hóhè_---- +My handsome hunter--my brave Chaskè." + +[Illustration: BUFFALO CHASE] + +_"Ta-tánka! Ta-tánka!"_[33] the hunters cried, +With a joyous shout at the break of dawn +And darkly lined on the white hill-side, +A herd of bison went marching on +Through the drifted snow like a caravan. +Swift to their ponies the hunters sped, +And dashed away on the hurried chase. +The wild steeds scented the game ahead, +And sprang like hounds to the eager race. +But the brawny bulls in the swarthy van +Turned their polished horns on the charging foes +And reckless rider and fleet footman +Were held at bay in the drifted snows, +While the bellowing herd o'er the hilltops ran, +Like the frightened beasts of a caravan +On Sahara's sands when the simoon blows. +Sharp were the twangs of the hunters' bows, +And swift and humming the arrows sped, +Till ten huge bulls on the bloody snows +Lay pierced with arrows and dumb and dead. +But the chief with the flankers had gained the rear, +And flew on the trail of the flying herd. +The shouts of the riders rang loud and clear, +As their foaming steeds to the chase they spurred. +And now like the roar of an avalanche +Rolls the bellowing wrath of the maddened bulls +They charge on the riders and runners stanch, +And a dying steed in the snow drift rolls, +While the rider, flung to the frozen ground, +Escapes the horns by a panther's bound. +But the raging monsters are held at bay, +While the flankers dash on the swarthy rout: +With lance and arrow they slay and slay; +And the welkin rings to the gladsome shout---- +To the loud _Iná's_ and the wild _Ihó's_, [34] +And dark and dead, on the bloody snows, +Lie the swarthy heaps of the buffaloes. +All snug in the _teepee_ Wiwâstè lay, +All wrapped in her robe, at the dawn of day, +All snug and warm from the wind and snow, +While the hunters followed the buffalo. +Her dreams and her slumber their wild shouts broke; +The chase was afoot when the maid awoke; +She heard the twangs of the hunters' bows, +And the bellowing bulls and the loud _Ihó_'s, +And she murmured--"My hunter is far away +In the happy land of the tall _Hóhè_---- +My handsome hunter, my brave Chaskè; +But the robins will come and my warrior too, +And Wiwâstè will find her a way to woo." + +And long she lay in a reverie, +And dreamed, wide-awake, of the brave Chaskè, +Till a trampling of feet on the crispy snow +She heard, and the murmur of voices low:---- +Then the warriors' greeting--_Ihó! Ihó!_ +And behold, in the blaze of the risen day, +With the hunters that followed the buffalo---- +Came her tall, young hunter--her brave Chaskè. +Far south has he followed the bison-trail +With his band of warriors so brave and true. +Right glad is Wakâwa his friend to hail, +And Wiwâstè will find her a way to woo. + +Tall and straight as the larch-tree stood +The manly form of the brave young chief, +And fair as the larch in its vernal leaf, +When the red fawn bleats in the feathering wood. +Mild was his face as the morning skies, +And friendship shone in his laughing eyes; +But swift were his feet o'er the drifted snow +On the trail of the elk or the buffalo, +And his heart was stouter than lance or bow, +When he heard the whoop of his enemies. +Five feathers he wore of the great Wanmdeè +And each for the scalp of a warrior slain, +When down on his camp from the northern plain, +With their murder-cries rode the bloody _Cree_.[35] +But never the stain of an infant slain, +Or the blood of a mother that plead in vain, +Soiled the honored plumes of the brave _Hóhè_. +A mountain bear to his enemies, +To his friends like the red fawn's dappled form; +In peace, like the breeze from the summer seas---- +In war, like the roar of the mountain storm. +His fame in the voice of the winds went forth +From his hunting grounds in the happy North, +And far as the shores of the _Great Medè_ [36] +The nations spoke of the brave Chaskè. + +Dark was the visage of grim Red Cloud, +Fierce were the eyes of the warrior proud, +When the chief to his lodge led the brave _Hóhè_, +And Wiwâstè smiled on the tall Chaskè. +Away he strode with a sullen frown, +And alone in his _teepee_ he sat him down. +From the gladsome greeting of braves he stole, +And wrapped himself in his gloomy soul. +But the eagle eyes of the Hârpstinà +The clouded face of the warrior saw. +Softly she spoke to the sullen brave: +"Mah-pí-ya Dúta--his face is sad; +And why is the warrior so glum and grave? +For the fair Wiwâstè is gay and glad; +She will sit in the _teepee_ the live-long day, +And laugh with her lover--the brave _Hóhè_ +Does the tall Red Cloud for the false one sigh? +There are fairer maidens than she, and proud +Were their hearts to be loved by the brave Red Cloud. +And trust not the chief with the smiling eyes; +His tongue is swift, but his words are lies; +And the proud Mah-pí-ya will surely find +That Wakâwa's promise is hollow wind. +Last night I stood by his lodge, and lo +I heard the voice of the Little Crow; +But the fox is sly and his words were low. +But I heard her answer her father--'Never! +I will stain your knife in my heart's red blood, +I will plunge and sink in the sullen river, +Ere I will be wife to the dark Red Cloud!' +Then he spake again, and his voice was low, +But I heard the answer of Little Crow: +'Let it be as you will, for Wakâwa's tongue +Has spoken no promise--his lips are slow, +And the love of a father is deep and strong.' + +"Mah-pí-ya Dúta, they scorn your love, +But the false chief covets the warrior's gifts. +False to his promise the fox will prove, +And fickle as snow in _Wo-kâ-da-weè_, [37] +That slips into brooks when the gray cloud lifts, +Or the red sun looks through the ragged rifts. +Mah-pí-ya Dúta will listen to me. +There are fairer birds in the bush than she, +And the fairest would gladly be Red Cloud's wife. +Will the warrior sit like a girl bereft, +When fairer and truer than she are left, +That love Red Cloud as they love their life? +Mah-pí-ya Dúta will listen to me. +I love him well--I have loved him long: +A woman is weak, but a warrior is strong, +And a love-lorn brave is a scorn to see. + +"Mah-pí-ya Dúta, O listen to me! +Revenge is swift and revenge is strong, +And sweet as the hive in the hollow tree; +The proud Red Cloud will avenge his wrong. +Let the brave be patient, it is not long +Till the leaves be green on the maple tree, +And the Feast of the Virgins is then to be-- +The Feast of the Virgins is then to be!" + +Proudly she turned from the silent brave, +And went her way; but the warrior's eyes-- +They flashed with the flame of a sudden fire, +Like the lights that gleam in the Sacred Cave[38], +When the black night covers the autumn skies, +And the stars from their welkin watch retire. + +Three nights he tarried--the brave Chaskè; +Winged were the hours and they flitted away; +On the wings of _Wakândee_[39] they silently flew, +For Wiwâstè had found her a way to woo. +Ah little he cared for the bison-chase, +For the red lilies bloomed on the fair maid's face; +Ah little he cared for the winds that blew, +For Wiwâstè had found her a way to woo. +Brown-bosomed she sat on her fox-robe dark, +Her ear to the tales of the brave inclined, +Or tripped from the _tee_ like the song of a lark, +And gathered her hair from the wanton wind. +Ah little he thought of the leagues of snow +He trod on the trail of the buffalo; +And little he recked of the hurricanes +That swept the snow from the frozen plains +And piled the banks of the Bloody River.[40] +His bow unstrung and forgotten hung +With his beaver hood and his otter quiver; +He sat spell-bound by the artless grace +Of her star-lit eyes and her moon-lit face. +Ah little he cared for the storms that blew, +For Wiwâstè had found her a way to woo. +When he spoke with Wakâwa her sidelong eyes +Sought the handsome chief in his hunter-guise. +Wakâwa marked, and the lilies fair +On her round cheeks spread to her raven hair. +They feasted on rib of the bison fat, +On the tongue of the _Ta_[41] that the hunters prize, +On the savory flesh of the red _Hogan_,[42] +On sweet _tipsanna_[43] and pemmican +And the dun-brown cakes of the golden maize; +And hour after hour the young chief sat, +And feasted his soul on her love-lit eyes. + +The sweeter the moments the swifter they fly; +Love takes no account of the fleeting hours; +He walks in a dream 'mid the blooming of flowers, +And never awakes till the blossoms die. +Ah lovers are lovers the wide world over-- +In the hunter's lodge and the royal palace. +Sweet are the lips of his love to the lover-- +Sweet as new wine in a golden chalice +From the Tajo's[44] slope or the hills beyond; +And blindly he sips from his loved one's lips, +In lodge or palace the wide world over, +The maddening honey of Trebizond.[45] + +O what are leagues to the loving hunter, +Or the blinding drift of the hurricane, +When it raves and roars o'er the frozen plain! +He would face the storm--he would death encounter +The darling prize of his heart to gain. +But his hunters chafed at the long delay, +For the swarthy bison were far away, +And the brave young chief from the lodge departed. +He promised to come with the robins in May +With the bridal gifts for the bridal day; +And the fair Wiwâstè was happy-hearted, +For Wakâwa promised the brave Chaskè. +Birds of a feather will flock together. +The robin sings to his ruddy mate, +And the chattering jays, in the winter weather, +To prate and gossip will congregate; +And the cawing crows on the autumn heather, +Like evil omens, will flock together, +In common council for high debate; +And the lass will slip from a doting mother +To hang with her lad on the garden gate. +Birds of a feather will flock together-- +'Tis an adage old--it is nature's law, +And sure as the pole will the needle draw, +The fierce Red Cloud with the flaunting feather, +Will follow the finger of Hârpstinà. + +The winter wanes and the south-wind blows +From the Summer Islands legendary; +The _skéskas_[46] fly and the melted snows +In lakelets lie on the dimpled prairie. +The frost-flowers[47] peep from their winter sleep +Under the snow-drifts cold and deep. +To the April sun and the April showers, +In field and forest, the baby flowers +Lift their blushing faces and dewy eyes; +And wet with the tears of the winter-fairies, +Soon bloom and blossom the emerald prairies, +Like the fabled Garden of Paradise. + +The plum-trees, white with their bloom in May, +Their sweet perfume on the vernal breeze +Wide strew like the isles of the tropic seas +Where the paroquet chatters the livelong day. +But the May-days pass and the brave Chaskè [17] +O why does the lover so long delay? +Wiwâstè waits in the lonely _tee_. +Has her fair face fled from his memory? +For the robin cherups his mate to please, +The blue-bird pipes in the poplar-trees, +The meadow lark warbles his jubilees, +Shrilling his song in the azure seas +Till the welkin throbs to his melodies, +And low is the hum of the humble-bees, +And the Feast of the Virgins is now to be. + + +THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS + +The sun sails high in his azure realms; +Beneath the arch of the breezy elms +The feast is spread by the murmuring river. +With his battle-spear and his bow and quiver, +And eagle-plumes in his ebon hair, +The chief Wakâwa himself is there; +And round the feast, in the Sacred Ring,[48] +Sit his weaponed warriors witnessing. +Not a morsel of food have the Virgins tasted +For three long days ere the holy feast; +They sat in their _teepee_ alone and fasted, +Their faces turned to the Sacred East.[21] +In the polished bowls lies the golden maize, +And the flesh of fawn on the polished trays. +For the Virgins the bloom of the prairies wide-- +The blushing pink and the meek blue-bell, +The purple plumes of the prairie's pride,[49] +The wild, uncultured asphodel, +And the beautiful, blue-eyed violet +That the Virgins call "Let-me-not forget," +In gay festoons and garlands twine +With the cedar sprigs[50] and the wildwood vine. +So gaily the Virgins are decked and dressed, +And none but a virgin may enter there; +And clad is each in a scarlet vest, +And a fawn-skin frock to the brown calves bare. +Wild rose-buds peep from their flowing hair, +And a rose half blown on the budding breast; +And bright with the quills of the porcupine +The moccasined feet of the maidens shine. + +Hand in hand round the feast they dance, +And sing to the notes of a rude bassoon, +And never a pause or a dissonance +In the merry dance or the merry tune. +Brown-bosomed and fair as the rising moon, +When she peeps o'er the hills of the dewy east, +Wiwâstè sings at the Virgins' Feast; +And bright is the light in her luminous eyes; +They glow like the stars in the winter skies; +And the lilies that bloom in her virgin heart +Their golden blush to her cheeks impart-- +Her cheeks half-hid in her midnight hair. +Fair is her form--as the red fawn's fair-- +And long is the flow of her raven hair; +It falls to her knees and it streams on the breeze +Like the path of a storm on the swelling seas. + +Proud of their rites are the Virgins fair, +For none but a virgin may enter there. +'Tis a custom of old and a sacred thing; +Nor rank nor beauty the warriors spare, +If a tarnished maiden should enter there. +And her that enters the Sacred Ring +With a blot that is known or a secret stain +The warrior who knows is bound to expose, +And lead her forth from the ring again. +And the word of a brave is the fiat of law; +For the Virgins' Feast is a sacred thing. +Aside with the mothers sat Hârpstinà; +She durst not enter the Virgins' ring. + +Round and round to the merry song +The maidens dance in their gay attire, +While the loud _Ho-Ho's_ of the tawny throng +Their flying feet and their song inspire. +They have finished the song and the sacred dance, +And hand in hand to the feast advance-- +To the polished bowls of the golden maize, +And the sweet fawn-meat in the polished trays. + +Then up from his seat in the silent crowd +Rose the frowning, fierce-eyed, tall Red Cloud; +Swift was his stride as the panther's spring, +When he leaps on the fawn from his cavern lair; +Wiwâstè he caught by her flowing hair, +And dragged her forth from the Sacred Ring. +She turned on the warrior, her eyes flashed fire; +Her proud lips quivered with queenly ire; +And her sun-browned cheeks were aflame with red. +Her hand to the spirits she raised and said: +"I am pure!--I am pure as the falling snow! +Great _Tâku-skán-skán_[51] will testify! +And dares the tall coward to say me no?" +But the sullen warrior made no reply. +She turned to the chief with her frantic cries: +"Wakâwa,--my Father! he lies,--he lies! +Wiwâstè is pure as the fawn unborn; +Lead me back to the feast or Wiwâstè dies!" +But the warriors uttered a cry of scorn, +And he turned his face from her pleading eyes. + +Then the sullen warrior, the tall Red Cloud, +Looked up and spoke and his voice was loud; +But he held his wrath and he spoke with care: +"Wiwâstè is young; she is proud and fair, +But she may not boast of the virgin snows. +The Virgins' Feast is a sacred thing; +How durst she enter the Virgins' ring? +The warrior would fain, but he dares not spare; +She is tarnished and only the Red Cloud knows." + +She clutched her hair in her clinchèd hand; +She stood like a statue bronzed and grand; +_Wakân-deè_[39] flashed in her fiery eyes; +Then swift as the meteor cleaves the skies-- +Nay, swift as the fiery _Wakinyan's_[32] dart, +She snatched the knife from the warrior's belt, +And plunged it clean to the polished hilt-- +With a deadly cry--in the villain's heart. +Staggering he clutched the air and fell; +His life-blood smoked on the trampled sand, +And dripped from the knife in the virgin's hand. + +Then rose his kinsmen's savage yell. +Swift as the doe's Wiwâstè's feet +Fled away to the forest. The hunters fleet +In vain pursue, and in vain they prowl +And lurk in the forest till dawn of day. +They hear the hoot of the mottled owl; +They hear the were-wolf's[52] winding howl; +But the swift Wiwâstè is far away. +They found no trace in the forest land; +They found no trail in the dew-damp grass; +They found no track in the river sand, +Where they thought Wiwâstè would surely pass. + +The braves returned to the troubled chief; +In his lodge he sat in his silent grief. +"Surely," they said, "she has turned a spirit. +No trail she left with her flying feet; +No pathway leads to her far retreat. +She flew in the air, and her wail--we could hear it, +As she upward rose to the shining stars; +And we heard on the river, as we stood near it, +The falling drops of Wiwâstè's tears." + +Wakâwa thought of his daughter's words +Ere the south-wind came and the piping birds-- +"My Father, listen--my words are true," +And sad was her voice as the whippowil +When she mourns her mate by the moon-lit rill, +"Wiwâstè lingers alone with you; +The rest are sleeping on yonder hill-- +Save one--and he an undutiful son-- +And you, my Father, will sit alone +When _Sisóka_[53] sings and the snow is gone." +His broad breast heaved on his troubled soul, +The shadow of grief o'er his visage stole +Like a cloud on the face of the setting sun. + +[Illustration] + +"She has followed the years that are gone," he said; +"The spirits the words of the witch fulfill; +For I saw the ghost of my father dead, +By the moon's dim light on the misty hill. +He shook the plumes on his withered head, +And the wind through his pale form whistled shrill. +And a low, sad voice on the hill I heard, +Like the mournful wail of a widowed bird." +Then lo, as he looked from his lodge afar, +He saw the glow of the Evening-star; +"And yonder," he said, "is Wiwâstè's face; +She looks from her lodge on our fading race, +Devoured by famine, and fraud, and war, +And chased and hounded by fate and woe, +As the white wolves follow the buffalo;" +And he named the planet the _Virgin Star_.[54] + +"Wakâwa," he muttered, "the guilt is thine! +She was pure--she was pure as the fawn unborn. +O why did I hark to the cry of scorn, +Or the words of the lying libertine? +Wakâwa, Wakâwa, the guilt is thine! +The springs will return with the voice of birds, +But the voice of my daughter will come no more. +She wakened the woods with her musical words, +And the sky-lark, ashamed of his voice, forbore. +She called back the years that had passed, and long +I heard their voice in her happy song. +O why did the chief of the tall _Hóhè_ +His feet from _Kapóza_[6] so long delay? +For his father sat at my father's feast, +And he at Wakâwa's--an honored guest. +He is dead!--he is slain on the Bloody Plain, +By the hand of the treacherous Chippeway; +And the face shall I never behold again +Of my brave young brother--the chief Chaskè. +Death walks like a shadow among my kin; +And swift are the feet of the flying years +That cover Wakâwa with frost and tears, +And leave their tracks on his wrinkled skin. +Wakâwa, the voice of the years that are gone +Will follow thy feet like the shadow of death, +Till the paths of the forest and desert lone +Shall forget thy footsteps. O living breath, +Whence are thou, and whither so soon to fly? +And whence are the years? Shall I overtake +Their flying feet in the star-lit sky? +From his last long sleep will the warrior wake? +Will the morning break in Wakâwa's tomb, +As it breaks and glows in the eastern skies? +Is it true?--will the spirits of kinsmen come +And bid the bones of the brave arise? +Wakâwa, Wakâwa, for thee the years +Are red with blood and bitter with tears. +Gone--brothers, and daughters, and wife--all gone +That are kin to Wakâwa--but one--but one-- +Wakínyan Tânka--undutiful son! +And he estranged from his father's _tee_, +Will never return till the chief shall die. +And what cares he for his father's grief? +He will smile at my death--it will make him chief. +Woe burns in my bosom. Ho, warriors--Ho! +Raise the song of red war; for your chief must go +To drown his grief in the blood of the foe! +I shall fall. Raise my mound on the sacred hill. +Let my warriors the wish of their chief fulfill; +For my fathers sleep in the sacred ground. +The Autumn blasts o'er Wakâwa's mound +Will chase the hair of the thistles' head, +And the bare-armed oak o'er the silent dead, +When the whirling snows from the north descend, +Will wail and moan in the midnight wind. +In the famine of winter the wolf will prowl, +And scratch the snow from the heap of stones, +And sit in the gathering storm and howl, +On the frozen mound, for Wakâwa's bones. +But the years that are gone shall return again, +As the robin returns and the whippowil, +When my warriors stand on the sacred hill +And remember the deeds of their brave chief slain." + +Beneath the glow of the Virgin Star +They raised the song of the red war-dance. +At the break of dawn with the bow and lance +They followed the chief on the path of war. +To the north--to the forests of fir and pine-- +Led their stealthy steps on the winding trail, +Till they saw the Lake of the Spirit[55] shine +Through somber pines of the dusky dale. +Then they heard the hoot of the mottled owl;[56] +They heard the gray wolf's dismal howl; +Then shrill and sudden the war-whoop rose +From an hundred throats of their swarthy foes, +In ambush crouched in the tangled wood. +Death shrieked in the twang of their deadly bows, +And their hissing arrows drank brave men's blood. +From rock, and thicket, and brush, and brakes, +Gleamed the burning eyes of the "forest-snakes."[57] +From brake, and thicket, and brush, and stone, +The bow-string hummed and the arrow hissed, +And the lance of a crouching Ojibway shone, +Or the scalp-knife gleamed in a swarthy fist. +Undaunted the braves of Wakâwa's band +Leaped into the thicket with lance and knife, +And grappled the Chippeways hand to hand; +And foe with foe, in the deadly strife, +Lay clutching the scalp of his foe and dead, +With a tomahawk sunk in his ghastly head, +Or his still heart sheathing a bloody blade. +Like a bear in the battle Wakâwa raves, +And cheers the hearts of his falling braves. +But a panther crouches along his track-- +He springs with a yell on Wakâwa's back! +The tall chief, stabbed to the heart, lies low; +But his left hand clutches his deadly foe, +And his red right clinches the bloody hilt +Of his knife in the heart of the slayer dyed. +And thus was the life of Wakâwa spilt, +And slain and slayer lay side by side. +The unscalped corpse of their honored chief +His warriors snatched from the yelling pack, +And homeward fled on their forest track +With their bloody burden and load of grief. + +The spirits the words of the brave fulfill-- +Wakâwa sleeps on the sacred hill, +And Wakínyan Tânka, his son, is chief. +Ah soon shall the lips of men forget +Wakâwa's name, and the mound of stone +Will speak of the dead to the winds alone, +And the winds will whistle their mock regret. + +The speckled cones of the scarlet berries[58] +Lie red and ripe in the prairie grass. +The _Si-yo_[59] clucks on the emerald prairies +To her infant brood. From the wild morass, +On the sapphire lakelet set within it, +_Magâ_ sails forth with her wee ones daily. +They ride on the dimpling waters gaily, +Like a fleet of yachts and a man-of-war. +The piping plover, the light-winged linnet, +And the swallow sail in the sunset skies. +The whippowil from her cover hies, +And trills her song on the amber air. +Anon to her loitering mate she cries: +"Flip, O Will!--trip, O Will!--skip, O Will!" +And her merry mate from afar replies: +"Flip I will--skip I will--trip I will;" +And away on the wings of the wind he flies. +And bright from her lodge in the skies afar +Peeps the glowing face of the Virgin Star. +The fox-pups[60] creep from their mother's lair, +And leap in the light of the rising moon; +And loud on the luminous, moonlit lake +Shrill the bugle-notes of the lover loon; +And woods and waters and welkin break +Into jubilant song--it is joyful June. + +But where is Wiwâstè? O where is she-- +The virgin avenged--the queenly queen-- +The womanly woman--the heroine? +Has she gone to the spirits? and can it be +That her beautiful face is the Virgin Star +Peeping out from the door of her lodge afar, +Or upward sailing the silver sea, +Star-beaconed and lit like an avenue, +In the shining stern of her gold canoe? +No tidings came--nor the brave Chaskè: +O why did the lover so long delay? +He promised to come with the robins in May +With the bridal gifts for the bridal day; +But the fair May-mornings have slipped away, +And where is the lover--the brave Chaskè? + +But what of the venomous Hârpstinà-- +The serpent that tempted the proud Red Cloud, +And kindled revenge in his savage soul? +He paid for his crime with his own heart's blood, +But his angry spirit has brought her dole;[61] +It has entered her breast and her burning head, +And she raves and burns on her fevered bed. +"He is dead! He is dead!" is her wailing cry, +"And the blame is mine--it was I--it was I! +I hated Wiwâstè, for she was fair, +And my brave was caught in her net of hair. +I turned his love to a bitter hate; +I nourished revenge, and I pricked his pride; +Till the Feast of the Virgins I bade him wait. +He had his revenge, but he died--he died! +And the blame is mine--it was I--it was I! +And his spirit burns me; I die--I die!" +Thus, alone in her lodge and her agonies, +She wails to the winds of the night, and dies. + +But where is Wiwâstè? Her swift feet flew +To the somber shades of the tangled thicket. +She hid in the copse like a wary cricket, +And the fleetest hunters in vain pursue. +Seeing unseen from her hiding place, +She sees them fly on the hurried chase; +She sees their dark eyes glance and dart, +As they pass and peer for a track or trace, +And she trembles with fear in the copse apart, +Lest her nest be betrayed by her throbbing heart. + +Weary the hours; but the sun at last +Went down to his lodge in the west, and fast +The wings of the spirits of night were spread +O'er the darkling woods and Wiwâstè's head. +Then slyly she slipped from her snug retreat, +And guiding her course by Wazíya's star,[62] +That shone through the shadowy forms afar, +She northward hurried with silent feet; +And long ere the sky was aflame in the east, +She was leagues from the spot of the fatal feast. +'Twas the hoot of the owl that the hunters heard, +And the scattering drops of the threat'ning shower, +And the far wolf's cry to the moon preferred. +Their ears were their fancies--the scene was weird, +And the witches[63] dance at the midnight hour. +She leaped the brook and she swam the river; +Her course through the forest Wiwâstè wist +By the star that gleamed through the glimmering mist +That fell from the dim moon's downy quiver. +In her heart she spoke to her spirit-mother: +"Look down from your _teepee_, O starry spirit. +The cry of Wiwâstè. O mother, hear it; +And touch the heart of my cruel father. +He hearkened not to a virgin's words; +He listened not to a daughter's wail. +O give me the wings of the thunder-birds, +For his were wolves[52] follow Wiwâstè's trail; +And guide my flight to the far _Hóhè_-- +To the sheltering lodge of my brave Chaskè." + +The shadows paled in the hazy east, +And the light of the kindling morn increased. +The pale-faced stars fled one by one, +And hid in the vast from the rising sun. +From woods and waters and welkin soon +Fled the hovering mists of the vanished moon. +The young robins chirped in their feathery beds, +The loon's song shrilled like a winding horn, +And the green hills lifted their dewy heads +To greet the god of the rising morn. +She reached the rim of the rolling prairie-- +The boundless ocean of solitude; +She hid in the feathery hazel-wood, +For her heart was sick and her feet were weary; +She fain would rest, and she needed food. +Alone by the billowy, boundless prairies, +She plucked the cones of the scarlet berries; +In feathering copse and the grassy field +She found the bulbs of the young _Tipsânna_,[43] +And the sweet _medó_ [64] that the meadows yield. +With the precious gift of his priceless manna +God fed his fainting and famished child. + +At night again to the northward far +She followed the torch of Wazíya's star; +For leagues away o'er the prairies green, +On the billowy vast, may a man be seen, +When the sun is high and the stars are low; +And the sable breast of the strutting crow +Looms up like the form of the buffalo. +The Bloody River [40] she reached at last, +And boldly walked in the light of day, +On the level plain of the valley vast; +Nor thought of the terrible Chippeway. +She was safe from the wolves of her father's band, +But she trod on the treacherous "Bloody Land." + +[Illustration] + +And lo--from afar o'er the level plain-- +As far as the sails of a ship at sea +May be seen as they lift from the rolling main-- +A band of warriors rode rapidly. +She shadowed her eyes with her sun-browned hand; +All backward streamed on the wind her hair, +And terror spread o'er her visage fair, +As she bent her brow to the far-off band. +For she thought of the terrible Chippeway-- +The fiends that the babe and the mother slay; +And yonder they came in their war-array! + +She hid like a grouse in the meadow-grass, +And moaned--"I am lost!--I am lost! alas, +And why did I fly from my native land +To die by the cruel Ojibway's hand?" +And on rode the braves. She could hear the steeds +Come galloping on o'er the level meads; +And lowly she crouched in the waving grass, +And hoped against hope that the braves would pass. + +They have passed; she is safe--she is safe! +Ah no! They have struck her trail and the hunters halt. +Like wolves on the track of the bleeding doe, +That grappled breaks from the dread assault, +Dash the warriors wild on Wiwâstè's trail. +She flies--but what can her flight avail? +Her feet are fleet, but the flying feet +Of the steeds of the prairies are fleeter still; +And where can she fly for a safe retreat? + +But hark to the shouting--"_Ihó!--Ihó!_"[22] +Rings over the wide plain sharp and shrill. +She halts, and the hunters come riding on; +But the horrible fear from her heart is gone, +For it is not the shout of the dreaded foe; +'Tis the welcome shout of her native land! + +Up galloped the chief of the band, and lo-- +The clutched knife dropped from her trembling hand; +She uttered a cry and she swooned away; +For there, on his steed in the blaze of day, +On the boundless prairie so far away, +With his polished bow and his feathers gay, +Sat the manly form of her own Chaskè! + +There's a mote in my eye or a blot on the page, +And I cannot tell of the joyful greeting; +You may take it for granted, and I will engage, +There were kisses and tears at the strange, glad meeting; +For aye since the birth of the swift-winged years, +In the desert drear, in the field of clover, +In the cot, in the palace, and all the world over-- +Yea, away on the stars to the ultimate spheres, +The greeting of love to the long-sought lover-- +Is tears and kisses and kisses and tears. + +But why did the lover so long delay? +And whitherward rideth the chief to-day? +As he followed the trail of the buffalo, +From the _tees_ of _Kapóza_ a maiden, lo, +Came running in haste o'er the drifted snow. +She spoke to the chief of the tall _Hóhè_: +"Wiwâstè requests that the brave Chaskè +Will abide with his band and his coming delay +Till the moon when the strawberries are ripe and red, +And then will the chief and Wiwâstè wed-- +When the Feast of the Virgins is past," she said. +Wiwâstè's wish was her lover's law; +And so his coming the chief delayed +Till the mid May blossoms should bloom and fade-- +But the lying runner was Hârpstinà. + +And now with the gifts for the bridal day +And his chosen warriors he took his way, +And followed his heart to his moon-faced maid. +And thus was the lover so long delayed; +And so as he rode with his warriors gay, +On that bright and beautiful summer day, +His bride he met on the trail mid-way. + +God arms the innocent. He is there-- +In the desert vast, in the wilderness, +On the bellowing sea, in the lion's lair, +In the mist of battle, and everywhere. +In his hand he holds with a father's care +The tender hearts of the motherless; +The maid and the mother in sore distress +He shields with his love and his tenderness; +He comforts the widowed--the comfortless-- +And sweetens her chalice of bitterness; +He clothes the naked--the numberless-- +His charity covers their nakedness-- +And he feeds the famished and fatherless +With the hand that feedeth the birds of air. +Let the myriad tongues of the earth confess +His infinite love and his holiness; +For his pity pities the pitiless, +His mercy flows to the merciless; +And the countless worlds in the realms above, +Revolve in the light of his boundless love. + +And what of the lovers? you ask, I trow. +She told him all ere the sun was low-- +Why she fled from the Feast to a safe retreat. +She laid her heart at her lover's feet, +And her words were tears and her lips were slow. +As she sadly related the bitter tale +His face was aflame and anon grew pale, +And his dark eyes flashed with a brave desire, +Like the midnight gleam of the sacred fire. [65] +"_Mitâwin,_"[66] he said, and his voice was low, +"Thy father no more is the false Little Crow; +But the fairest plume shall Wiwâstè wear +Of the great _Wanmdeè_ in her midnight hair. +In my lodge, in the land of the tall _Hóhè_, +The robins will sing all the long summer day +To the happy bride of the brave Chaskè.'" + +Aye, love is tested by stress and trial +Since the finger of time on the endless dial +Began its rounds, and the orbs to move +In the boundless vast, and the sunbeams clove +The chaos; but only by fate's denial +Are fathomed the fathomless depths of love. +Man is the rugged and wrinkled oak, +And woman the trusting and tender vine +That clasps and climbs till its arms entwine +The brawny arms of the sturdy stock. +The dimpled babes are the flowers divine +That the blessing of God on the vine and oak +With their cooing and blossoming lips invoke. + +To the pleasant land of the brave _Hóhè_ +Wiwâstè rode with her proud Chaskè. +She ruled like a queen in his bountiful _tee_, +And the life of the twain was a jubilee +Their wee ones climbed on the father's knee, +And played with his plumes of the great _Wanmdeè_. +The silken threads of the happy years +They wove into beautiful robes of love +That the spirits wear in the lodge above; +And time from the reel of the rolling spheres +His silver threads with the raven wove; +But never the stain of a mother's tears +Soiled the shining web of their happy years. +When the wrinkled mask of the years they wore, +And the raven hair of their youth was gray, +Their love grew deeper, and more and more; +For he was a lover for aye and aye, +And ever her beautiful, brave Chaskè. +Through the wrinkled mask of the hoary years +To the loving eyes of the lover aye +The blossom of beautiful youth appears. + +At last, when their locks were as white as snow, +Beloved and honored by all the band, +They silently slipped from their lodge below, +And walked together, and hand in hand, +O'er the Shining Path[68] to the Spirit-land, +Where the hills and the meadows for aye and aye +Are clad with the verdure and flowers of May, +And the unsown prairies of Paradise +Yield the golden maize and the sweet wild rice. +There, ever ripe in the groves and prairies, +Hang the purple plums and the luscious berries, +And the swarthy herds of the bison feed +On the sun-lit slope and the waving mead; +The dappled fawns from their coverts peep, +And countless flocks on the waters sleep; +And the silent years with their fingers trace +No furrows for aye on the hunter's face. + + + + +To the memory of my devoted wife dead and gone yet always with me I +dedicate + +PAULINE + +The Flower of my heart nursed into bloom by her loving care and ofttimes +watered with her tears + +H.L.G. + + + + +PAULINE + +_PART I_ + + +INTRODUCTION + +Fair morning sat upon the mountain-top, +Night skulking crept into the mountain-chasm. +The silent ships slept in the silent bay; +One broad blue bent of ether domed the heavens, +One broad blue distance lay the shadowy land, +One broad blue vast of silence slept the sea. +Now from the dewy groves the joyful birds +In carol-concert sang their matin songs +Softly and sweetly--full of prayer and praise. +Then silver-chiming, solemn-voiced bells +Rung out their music on the morning air, +And Lisbon gathered to the festival +In chapel and cathedral. Choral hymns +And psalms of sea-toned organs mingling rose +With sweetest incense floating up to heaven, +Bearing the praises of the multitudes; +And all was holy peace and holy happiness. +A rumbling of deep thunders in the deep; +The vast sea shuddered and the mountains groaned; +Up-heaved the solid earth--the nether rocks +Burst--and the sea--the earth--the echoing heavens +Thundered infernal ruin. On their knees +The trembling multitudes received the shock, +And dumb with sudden terror bowed their heads +To toppling spire and plunging wall and dome. + +So shook the mighty North the sudden roar +Of Treason thundering on the April air-- +An earthquake shock that jarred the granite hills +And westward rolled against th' eternal walls +Rock-built Titanic--for a moment shook: +Uprose a giant and with iron hands +Grasped his huge hammer, claspt his belt of steel, +And o'er the Midgard-monster mighty Thor +Loomed for the combat. + + Peace--O blessed Peace! +The war-worn veterans hailed thee with a shout +Of Alleluias;--homeward wound the trains, +And homeward marched the bayonet-bristling columns +To "_Hail Columbia_" from a thousand horns-- +Marched to the jubilee of chiming bells, +Marched to the joyful peals of cannon, marched +With blazing banners and victorious songs +Into the outstretched arms of love and home. + +But there be columns--columns of the dead +That slumber on an hundred battle-fields-- +No bugle-blast shall waken till the trump +Of the Archangel. O the loved and lost! +For them no jubilee of chiming bells; +For them no cannon-peal of victory; +For them no outstretched arms of love and home. +God's peace be with them. Heroes who went down, +Wearing their stars, live in the nation's songs +And stories--there be greater heroes still, +That molder in unnumbered nameless graves +Erst bleached unburied on the fields of fame +Won by their valor. Who will sing of these-- +Sing of the patriot-deeds on field and flood-- +Of these--the truer heroes--all unsung? +Where sleeps the modest bard in Quaker gray +Who blew the pibroch ere the battle lowered, +Then pitched his tent upon the balmy beach? +"Snow-bound," I ween, among his native hills. +And where the master hand that swept the lyre +Till wrinkled critics cried "Excelsior"? +Gathering the "Aftermath" in frosted fields. +Then, timid Muse, no longer shake thy wings +For airy realms and fold again in fear; +A broken flight is better than no flight; +Be thine the task, as best you may, to sing +The deeds of one who sleeps at Gettysburg +Among the thousands in a common grave. +The story of his life I bid you tell +As it was told one windy winter night +To veterans gathered around the festal board, +Fighting old battles over where the field +Ran red with wine, and all the battle-blare +Was merry laughter and the merry songs-- +Told when the songs were sung by him who heard +The pith of it from the dying soldier's lips-- +His Captain--tell it as the Captain told. + + +THE CAPTAIN'S STORY + +"Well, comrades, let us fight one battle more; +Let the cock crow--we'll guard the camp till morn. +And--since the singers and the merry ones +Are _hors de combat_--fill the cups again; +Nod if you must, but listen to a tale +Romantic--but the warp thereof is truth. +When the old Flag on Sumter's sea-girt walls +From its proud perch a fluttering ruin fell, +I swore an oath as big as Bunker Hill; +For I was younger then, nor battle-scarred, +And full of patriot-faith and patriot-fire. + +"I raised a company of riflemen, +Marched to the front, and proud of my command, +Nor seeking higher, led them till the day +Of triumph and the nation's jubilee. +Among the first that answered to my call +The hero came whose story you shall hear. +'Tis better I describe him: He was young-- +Near two and twenty--neither short nor tall-- +A slender student, and his tapering hands +Had better graced a maiden than a man: +Sad, thoughtful face--a wealth of raven hair +Brushed back in waves from forehead prominent; +A classic nose--half Roman and half Greek; +Dark, lustrous eyes beneath dark, jutting brows, +Wearing a shade of sorrow, yet so keen, +And in the storm of battle flashing fire. + +"'Well, boy,' I said, 'I doubt if you will do; +I need stout men for picket-line and march-- +Men that have bone and muscle--men inured +To toil and hardships--men, in short, my boy, +To march and fight and march and fight again.' +A queer expression lit his earnest face-- +Half frown--half smile. + + "'Well _try_ me.' That was all +He answered, and I put him on the roll-- +_Paul Douglas, private_--and he donned the blue. +Paul proved himself the best in my command; +I found him first at _reveille_, and first +In all the varied duties of the day. +His rough-hewn comrades, bred to boisterous ways, +Jeered at the slender youth with maiden hands, +Nicknamed him 'Nel,' and for a month or more +Kept up a fusillade of jokes and jeers. +Their jokes and jeers he heard but heeded not, +Or heeding did a kindly act for him +That jeered him loudest; so the hardy men +Came to look up to Paul as one above +The level of their rough and roistering ways. +He never joined the jolly soldier-sports, +But ever was the first at bugle-call, +Mastered the drill and often drilled the men. +Fatigued with duty, weary with the march +Under the blaze of the midsummer sun, +He murmured not--alike in sun or rain +His utmost duty eager to perform, +And ever ready--always just the same +Patient and earnest, sad and silent Paul. + +"The day of battle came--that Sabbath day, +Midsummer.[A] Hot and blistering as the flames +Of prairie-fires wind-driven, the burning sun +Blazed down upon us and the blinding dust +Wheeled in dense clouds and covered all our ranks, +As we marched on to battle. Then the roar +Of batteries broke upon us. Glad indeed +That music to my soldiers, and they cheered +And cheered again and boasted--all but Paul-- +And shouted _'On to Richmond!'_--He alone +Was silent--but his eyes were full of fire. + +[A] The first battle of Bull Run, July 21, 1861. + +"Then came the order--_'Forward, double quick!'_ +And we rushed into battle--formed our line +Facing the foe--the ambushed, deadly foe, +Hid in the thicket, with the Union flag-- +A cheat--hung out before it--luring us +Into a blazing hell. The battle broke +With wildest fury on us--crashed and roared +The rolling thunder of continuous fire. +We broke and rallied--charged and broke again, +And rallied still--broke counter-charge and charged +Loud-yelling, furious, on the hidden foe;-- +Met thrice our numbers and came flying back +Disordered and disheartened. Yet again +I strove to rally my discouraged men, +But hell was fairly howling;--only Paul-- +Eager, but bleeding from a bullet-wound +In the left arm--came bounding to my side. +But at that moment I was struck and fell-- +Fell prostrate; and a swooning sense of death +Came on me, and I saw and heard no more +Of battle on that Sabbath. + + "I awoke, +Confined and jolted in an ambulance +Piled with the wounded--driven recklessly +By one who chiefly cared to save himself. +Dizzy and faint I raised my head: my wound +Was not as dangerous as it might have been-- +A scalp-wound on the temple; there, you see--" +He put his finger on the ugly scar-- +"Half an inch deeper and some soldier friend, +Among the veterans gathered here to-night, +Perchance had told a briefer tale than mine. + +"In front and rear I saw the reckless rout-- +A broken army flying panic-struck-- +Our proud brigades of undulating steel +That marched at sunrise under blazoned flags, +Singing the victory ere the cannon roared, +And eager for the honors of the day-- +Like bison Indian-chased on windy plains, +Now broken and commingled fled the field. +Words of command were only wasted breath; +Colonels and brigadiers, on foot and soiled, +Were pushed and jostled by the hurrying hordes. +Anon the cry of _'Cavalry!'_ arose, +And army-teams came dashing down the road +And plunged into the panic. All the way +Was strewn with broken wagons, battery-guns, +Tents, muskets, knapsacks and exhausted men. +My men were mingled with the lawless crowd, +And in the swarm behind us, there was Paul-- +Silent and soldier-like, with knapsack on +And rifle on his shoulder, guarding me +And marching on behind the ambulance. +So all that dark and dreadful night we marched, +Each man a captain--captain of himself-- +Nor cared for orders on that wild retreat +To safety from disaster. All that night, +Silent and soldier-like my wounded Paul +Marched close behind and kept his faithful watch. +For ever and anon the jaded men, +Clamorous and threat'ning, sought to clamber in; +Whom Paul drove off at point of bayonet, +Wielding his musket with his good right arm. +But when the night was waning to the morn +I saw that he was weary and I made +A place for Paul and begged him to get in. +'No, Captain; no,' he answered,--'I will walk-- +I'm making bone and muscle--learning how +To march and fight and march and fight again.' +That silenced me, and we went rumbling on. +Till morning found us safe at Arlington. + +"A month off duty and a faithful nurse +Worked wonders and my head was whole again-- +Nay--to be candid--cracked a little yet. +My nurse was Paul. Albeit his left arm, +Flesh-wounded, pained him sorely for a time, +With filial care he dressed my battered head, +And wrote for me to anxious friends at home-- +But never wrote a letter for himself. +Thinking of this one day, I spoke of it:-- +A cloud came o'er his face. + + "'My friends,' he said, +'Are here among my comrades in the camp.' +That made a mystery and I questioned him: +He gave no answer--or evasive ones-- +Seeming to shrink from question, and to wrap +Himself within himself and live within. + +"Again we joined our regiment and marched; +Over the hills and dales of Maryland +Along the famous river wound our way. +On picket-duty at the frequent fords +For weary, laggard months were we employed +Guarding the broad Potomac, while our foes, +Stealthily watching for their human game, +Lurked like Apaches on the wooded shores. +Bands of enemy's cavalry by night +Along the line of river prowled, and sought +To dash across and raid in Maryland. +Three regiments guarded miles of river-bank, +And drilled alternately, and one was ours. +Off picket duty, alike in fair or foul, +With knapsacks on and bearing forty rounds, +From morn till night we drilled--battalion-drill-- +Often at double-quick for weary hours-- +Bearing our burdens in the blazing sun, +Till strong men staggered from the ranks and fell. +Aye, many a hardy man in those hard days +Was drilled and disciplined into his grave. Arose +Murmurs of discontent, and loud complaints +Fell on dull ears till patience was worn out +And mutiny was hinted. As for Paul +I never heard a murmur from his lips; +Nor did he ask a reason for the things +Unreasonable and hard required of him, +But straightway did his duty just as if +The nation's fate hung on it. I pitied Paul; +Slender of form and delicate, he bore +The toils and duties of the hardiest. +Ill from exposure, or fatigued and worn, +On picket hungered, shivering in the rain, +Or sweltering in full dress, with knapsack on, +Beneath the blaze of the mid-summer sun, +He held his spirit--always still the same +Patient and earnest, sad and silent Paul. + +"We posted pickets two by two. At night, +By turns each comrade slept and took the watch. +Once in September, in a drenching storm, +Three days and nights with neither tent nor fire +Paul and a comrade held a picket-post. +The equinox raged madly. Chilling winds +In angry gusts roared from the northern hills, +Dashing the dismal rain-clouds into showers +That fell in torrents over all the land. +In camp the soldiers crouched in dripping tents, +Or shivered by the camp-fires. I was ill +And gladly sought the shelter of a hut. +Orders were strict and often hard to bear-- +Nor tents nor fire upon the picket-posts-- +Cold rations and a canopy of storms. +I pitied Paul and would have called him in, +But that I had no man to take his place; +Nor did I know he took upon himself +A double task. His comrade on the post +Was ill, and so he made a shelter for him +With his own blankets and a bed within; +And took the watch of both upon himself. +And on the third night near the dawn of day, +In rubber cloak stole in upon the post +A pompous major, on the nightly round, +Unchallenged. All fatigued and drenched with rain, +Still on his post with rifle in his hand-- +Against a sheltering elm Paul stood and slept. +Muttering of death the brutal major stormed, +Then pitiless pricked the comrade with his sword, +And from his shelter drove him to the watch, +Burning with fever. There Paul interposed +And said: + + "'I ask no mercy at your hands; +I shall not whimper, but my comrade here +Is ill of fever; I have stood his watch: +Sir, if a human heart beats in your breast, +Send him to camp, or he will surely die.' + +"The pompous brute--vaingloriously great +In straps and buttons--haughtily silenced Paul, +Hand-bound and sent him guarded to the camp, +And the poor comrade shivering stood the watch +Till dawn of day and I was made aware. +Among the true were some vainglorious fools +Called by the fife and drum from native mire +To lord and strut in shoulder-straps and buttons. +Scrubs, born to brush the boots of gentlemen, +By sudden freak of fortune found themselves +Masters of better men, and lorded it +As only base and brutish natures can-- +Braves on parade and cowards under fire. + +"I interceded in my Paul's behalf, +Else he had suffered graver punishment, +But as himself for mercy would not beg-- +'A stubborn boy,' our bluff old colonel said-- +To extra duty for a month he went +Unmurmuring, storm or shine. When the cold rain +Poured down most pitiless Paul, drenched and wan, +Guarded the baggage and the braying mules. +When the hot sun at mid-day blazed and burned, +Like the red flame on Mauna Loa's top, +Withering the grass and parching earth and air, +I often saw him knapsacked and full-dressed, +Drilling the raw recruits at double-quick; +And yet he wore a patient countenance, +And went about his duty earnestly +As if it were a pleasure to obey. + +"The month wore off and mad disaster came-- +Gorging the blood of heroes at Ball's Bluff. +'Twas there the brave, unfaltering Baker fell +Fighting despair between the jaws of death. +Quenched was the flame that fired a thousand hearts; +Hushed was the voice that shook the senate-walls, +And rang defiance like a bugle-blast. +Broad o'er the rugged mountains to the north +Fell the incessant rain till, like a sea, +Him and the deadly ambush of the foe +The swollen river rolled and roared between. +Brave Baker saw the peril, but not his +The soul to shrink or falter, though he saw +His death-warrant in his orders. Forth he led +His proud brigade across the roaring chasm, +Firm and unfaltering into the chasm of death. +From morn till mid-day in a single boat +Unfit, by companies, the fearless band +Passed over the raging river; then advanced +Upon the ambushed foe. We heard the roll +Of volleys in the forest, and uprose, +From out the wood, a cloud of battle-smoke. +Then came the yell of foemen charging down +Rank upon rank and furious. Hand to hand, +The little band of heroes, flanked and pressed, +Fought thrice their numbers; fearless Baker led +In prodigies of valor; front and flank +Volleyed the deadly rifles; in the rear +The rapid, raging river rolled and roared. +Along the Maryland shore a mile below, +Eager to cross and reinforce our friends, +Ten thousand soldiers lay upon their arms; +And we had boats to spare. In all our ranks +There was not one who did not comprehend +The peril and the instant need of aid. +Chafing we waited orders. We could see +That Baker's men were fighting in retreat; +For ever nearer o'er the forest rolled +The smoke of battle. Orders came at last, +And up along the shore our regiment ran, +Eager to aid our comrades, but too late! +Baker had fallen in the battle-front; +He fought like Spartan and like Spartan fell +Defiant, clutching at the throat of fate. +Their leader lost, confusion followed fast; +Wild panic and red slaughter swept the field. +Powerless to saves we saw the farther shore +Covered with wounded and wild fugitives-- +Our own defeated and defenseless friends. +Shattered and piled with wounded men the boat +Pushed off to brave the river, while the foe +Pressed on the charge with fury, and refused +Mercy to the vanquished. Officers and men, +Cheating the savage foemen of their spoils, +Their flags and arms into the gurgling depths +Despairing hurled, and following plunged amain. +As numerous as the wild aquatic flocks +That float in autumn on Lake Nepigon, +The heads of swimmers moved upon the flood. +And still upon the shore a Spartan few-- +Shoulder to shoulder--back to back, as one-- +Amid the din and clang of clashing steel, +Surrounded held the swarming foes at bay. +As in the pre-historic centuries-- +Unnumbered ages ere the Pyramids-- +Whereof we read on pre-diluvian bones +And fretted flints in excavated caves, +When savage men abode in rocky dens, +And wrought their weapons from the fiery flint, +And clothed their tawny thighs in lion-skins-- +Before the mouth of some well-guarded cave, +Where smoked the savory flesh of mammoth, came +The great cave-bear unbidden to the feast. +Around the monster swarm the brawny men, +Wielding with sinewy arms and savage cries +Their flinty spears and tomahawks of stone. +Erect old bruin growls upon his foes, +And swings with mighty power his ponderous paws-- +Woe unto him who feels the crushing blow-- +Till, bleeding from an hundred wounds and blind, +With sudden plunge he falls at last, and dies +Amid the shouts of his wild enemies. +So fought the Spartan few, till one by one, +They fell surrounded by a wall of foes. +The river boiled beneath the storm of lead; +Weighed down with wounded comrades many sunk, +But more went down with bullets in their heads. +O! it was pitiful. The outstretched hands +Of men that erst had faced the battle-storm +Unshaken, grasping now in wild despair, +Wrung cries of pity from us. Vain our fire-- +The range too long--it fell upon our friends; +At which the foemen yelled their mad delight. +A storm of bullets poured upon the boat, +Mangling the mangled on her, till at last, +Shattered and over-laden, suddenly +She made a lurch to leeward and went down. + +"A shallow boat lay moored upon the shore; +Our gallant Colonel called for volunteers +In mercy's name to man it and push out. +But all could see the peril. Stout the heart +Would dare to face the raging flood and fire, +And to his call responded not a man-- +Save Paul and one who perished at the helm. +They went as if at bugle-call to drill; +Their comrades said, 'They never will return.' +Stoutly and steadily Paul rowed the boat +Athwart the turbid river's sullen tide, +And reached the wounded struggling in the flood. +Bravely they worked away and lifted in +The helpless till the boat would hold no more; +Others they helped to holds upon the rails, +Then pulled away the over-laden craft. +We cheered them from the shore. The maddened foe +With furious volleys answered--hitting oft +The little craft of mercy--hands anon +Let go their holds and sunk into the deep. +And in that storm Paul's gallant comrade fell. +Trimming his craft with caution Paul could make +But little headway with a single oar-- +Clutched in despair and madly wrenched away +By drowning souls the other. Firm and cool +Paul stood unscathed; then fell a sudden shower +That broke his bended oar-stem at the blade. +Down to the brink we crept and stretched our hands, +And shouted, 'Overboard, Paul! and save yourself.' + +"He stood a moment as if all were lost, +Then caught the rope, and stretching forth his hand, +Waved to the foe and plunged into the flood. +Slowly he towed the clumsy craft and swam, +Down-drifting with the rapid, rolling stream. +Cheering him on adown the shore we ran; +The current lent its aid and bore him in +Toward us, and beyond the range at last +Of foemen's fire he safely came to land, +Mooring his boat amid a storm of cheers. + +"Confined in hospital three days he lay +Fatigued and feverous, but tender hands +Nursed and restored him. Our old Colonel came +And thanked him--patting Paul paternally-- +And praised his daring. 'My brave boy,' he said, +'Had I a regiment of such men, by Jove! +I'd hew a path to Richmond and to fame.' +Paul made reply, and in his smile and tone +Mingled a touch of sarcasm: + + "'Thank you, sir; +But let me add--I fear the wary foe +Would nab your regiment napping on the field. +You have forgotten, Colonel--not so fast-- +I am the man that slept upon his post.' +Our bluff old Colonel laughed and turned away; +Ten minutes later came his kind reply-- +A basketful of luxuries from his mess. + +"Paul marched and fought and marched and fought again, +Patient and earnest through the bootless toils +And fiery trials of that dread campaign +Upon the Peninsula. 'Twas fitly called +'Campaign of Battles.' Aye, it sorely pierced +The scarred and bleeding nation, and drew blood +Deep from her vitals till she shook and reeled, +Like some huge giant staggering to his fall-- +Blinded with blood, yet struggling with his soul, +And stretching forth his ponderous, brawny arms, +Like Samson in the Temple, to o'erwhelm +And crush his mocking enemies in his fall. + +"Ah, Malvern! you remember Malvern Hill-- +That night of dreadful butchery! Round the top +Of the entrenchèd summit, parked and aimed, +Blazed like Vesuvius when he bellows fire +And molten lava into the midnight heavens, +An hundred crashing cannon, and the hill +Shook to the thunder of the mighty guns, +As ocean trembles to the bursting throes +Of submarine volcanoes; and the shells +From the embattled gun-boats--fiery fiends-- +Shrieked on the night and through the ether hissed +Like hell's infernals. Line supporting line, +From base to summit round the blazing hill, +Our infantry was posted. Crowned with fire, +And zoned by many a burning, blazing belt +From head to foot, and belching sulphurous flames, +The embattled hill appeared a raging fiend-- +The Lucifer of hell let loose to reign +Over a world wrapt in the final fires. + +"In solid columns massed our frenzied foes +Beat out their life against the blazing hill-- +Broke and re-formed and madly charged again, +And thundered like the storm-lashed, furious sea +Beating in vain against the solid cliffs. +Foremost in from our veteran regiment +Breasted the brunt of battle, but we bent +Beneath the onsets as the red-hot bar +Bends to the sledge, until our furious foes-- +Mown as the withered prairie-grass is mown +By wild October fires--fell back and left +A field of bloody agony and death +About the base, and victory on the hill. + +"I lost a score of riflemen that night; +My first lieutenant--his last battle over-- +Lay cut in twain upon the battle-line. +With lantern dim wide o'er the slaughter-field +I searched at midnight for my wounded men, +But chiefly searched for Paul. An hour or more +I sought among the groaning and the dead, +Stooping and to the dim light turning up +The ghastly faces, till at last I found +Him whom I sought, and on the outer line-- +Feet to the foe and silent face to heaven-- +Death pale and bleeding from a ragged wound +Pleading with feeble voice to let him be +And die upon the field, we bore him thence; +And tenderly his comrades carried him, +Sheltered with blankets, on the weary march +At dead of night in dismal storm begun. +We made a stand at Harrison's, and there +With careful hands we laid him on a cot. +Now I had learned to prize the noble boy; +My heart was touched with pity. Patiently +I watched o'er Paul and bathed his fevered brow, +And pressed the cooling sponge upon his lips, +And washed his wound and gave him nourishment. +'Twas all in vain, the surgeon said. I felt +That I could save him and I kept my watch. +A rib was crushed--beneath it one could see +The throbbing vitals--torn as we supposed, +But found unwounded. In his feverish sleep +He often moaned and muttered mysteries, +And, dreaming, spoke in low and tender tones +As if some loved one sat beside his cot. +I questioned him and sought the secret key +To solve his mystery, but all in vain. +A month of careful nursing turned the scale, +And he began to gain upon his wound. +Propt in his cot one evening as he sat +And I sat by him, thus I questioned him: +'There is a mystery about your life +That I would gladly fathom. Paul, I think +You well may trust me, and I fain would hear +The story of your life; right well I know +There is a secret sorrow in your heart.' + +[Illustration: STOOPING AND TO THE DIM LIGHT TURNING UP THE GHASTLY +FACES, TILL I AT LAST I FOUND HIM WHOM I SOUGHT.] + +"He turned his face and fixed his lustrous eyes +Upon mine own inquiringly, and held +His gaze upon me till his vacant stare +Told me full well his thoughts had wandered back +Into the depth of his own silent soul; +Then he looked down and sadly smiled and said: + +"'Captain, I have no history--not one page; +My book of life is but a blotted blank. +Let it be sealed; I would not open it, +Even to one who saved a worthless life, +Only to add a few more leaves in blank +To the blank volume. All that I now am +I offer to my country. If I live +And from this cot walk forth, 'twill only be +To march and fight and march and fight again,' +Until a surer aim shall bring me down +Where care and kindness can no more avail. +Under our country's flag a soldier's death +I hope to die and leave no name behind. +My only wish is this--for what I am, +Or have been, or have hoped to be, is now +A blank misfortune. I will say no more.' + +"I questioned Paul and pressed him further still +To tell his story, but he only shook +His head in silence sadly and lay back +And closed his eyes and whispered--'All is blank.' +That night he muttered often in his sleep; +I could not catch the sense of what he said; +I caught a name that he repeated oft-- +_Pauline_--so softly whispered that I knew +She was the blissful burden of his dreams. + +"Two moons had waxed and waned, and Paul arose, +Came to the camp and shared my tent and bed. +While in the hospital he helpless lay-- +To him unknown, and as the choice of all-- +Came his promotion to the vacant rank +Of him who fell at Malvern. But, alas, +Say what we would he would not take the place. +To us who importuned him, he replied: +'Comrades and friends, I did not join your ranks +For honor or for profit. All I am-- +A wreck perhaps of what I might have been-- +I freely offer in our country's cause; +And in her cause it is my wish to serve +A private soldier; I aspire to naught +But victory--and there be better men-- +Braver and hardier--such should have the place.' + +"His comrades cheered, but Paul, methought, was sad. +One evening as he sat upon his couch, +Communing with himself as he was wont, +I stood before him; looking in his face, +I said, '_Pauline_--her name is then, _Pauline_.' +All of a sudden up he rose amazed, +And looked upon me with such startled eyes +That I was pained and feared that I had done +A wrong to him whom I had learned to love. +Then he sat down upon his couch and groaned, +Pressing his hand upon his wound, and said: +'Captain, I pray you, tell me truthfully, +Wherefore you speak that name.' + +"I told him all +That I had heard him mutter in his dreams. +He listened calmly to the close and said: +'My friend, if you have any kind regard +For me who suffer more than you may know, +I pray you utter not that name again.' +And thereupon he turned and hid his face. + +"There was a mystery I might not fathom, +There was a history I might not hear: +Nor could I further press that saddened heart +To pour its secret sorrow in my ears. +Thereafter Paul was tenant of my tent-- +Sat at my mess and slept upon my couch, +Save when his duty called him from my side, +And not a word escaped his lips or mine +About his secret--yet how oft I found +My eyes upon him and my bridled tongue +Prone to a question; but that solemn face +Forbade me and he wore his mystery. + +"At that stern battle on Antietam's banks, +Where gallant Hooker led the fierce attack, +Paul bore a glorious part. Our starry flag, +Before a whirlwind of terrific fire, +Advancing proudly on the foe, went down. +Grim death and pale-faced panic seized the ranks. +Paul caught the flag and waving it aloft +Rallied our regiment. He came out unscathed. + +"At Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville he fought: +Grim in disaster--bravest in defeat, +He leaped not into danger without cause, +Nor shrunk he from it though a gulf of fire, +When duty bade him face it. All his aim-- +To win the victory; applause and praise +He almost hated; grimly he endured +The fulsome flattery of his comrades nerved +By his calm courage up to manlier deeds. + +"I saw him angered once--if one might call +His sullen silence anger--as by night +Across the Rappahannock, from the field +Where brave and gallant 'Stonewall' Jackson fell, +With hopeless hearts and heavy steps we marched. +Such sullen wrath on other human face +I never saw in all those bloody years. +One evening after, as he read to me +The fulsome General Order of our Chief-- +Congratulating officers and men +On their achievements in the late defeat-- +His handsome face grew rigid as he read, +And as he closed, down like a thunder-clap +Upon the mess-chest fell his clinchèd fist: +'Fit pap for fools!' he said--'an Iron Duke +Had ground the Southern legions into dust, +Or, by the gods!--the field of Chancellorsville +Had furnished graves for ninety thousand men!'[B] + +"That dark disaster sickened many a soul; +Stout hearts were sad and cowards cried for peace. +The vulture, perched hard by the eagle's crag, +Loud cawed his fellows from afar to feast. +Ill-omened bird--his carrion-cries were vain! +Again our veteran eagles plumed their wings, +And forth he fled from Montezuma's shores-- +A dastard flight--betraying unto death +Him whom he dazzled with a bauble crown. +Just retribution followed swift and sure-- +Germania's eagles plucked him at Sedan. +A gloomy month wore off, and then the news +That Lee, emboldened by his late success, +Had poured his legions upon Northern soil, +Rung through the camps, and thrilled the mighty heart +Of the Grand Army. Louder than the roar +Of brazen cannon on the battle-field. +Then rose and rolled our thunder-rounds of cheers. + +[B] Hooker had 90,000 men at Chancellorsville. + +We saw the dawn of victory--we should meet +Our wary foe upon familiar soil. +We cheered the news, we cheered the marching-orders, +We cheered our brave commander till the tears +Ran down his cheeks. Up from its sullen gloom +Leaped the Grand Army, as if God had writ +With fiery finger 'thwart the vault of heaven +A solemn promise of swift victory. + +"We marched. As rolls the deep, resistless flood +Of Mississippi, when the rains of June +Have swelled his thousand northern fountain-lakes +Above their barriers--rolls with restless roar, +Anon through rock-built gorges, and anon +Down through the prairied valley to the sea, +Gleaming and glittering in the summer sun, +By field and forest on his winding way, +So stretched and rolled the mighty column forth, +Winding among the hills and pouring out +Along the vernal valleys; so the sheen +Of moving bayonets glittered in the sun. +And as we marched there rolled upon the air, +Up from the vanguard-corps, a choral chant, +Feeble at first and far and far away, +But gathering volume as it rolled along +And regiment after regiment joined the choir, +Until an hundred thousand voices swelled +The surging chorus, and the solid hills +Shook to the thunder of the mighty song. +And ere it died away along the line, +The hill-tops caught the chorus--rolled away +From peak to peak the pealing thunder-chant, +Clear as the chime of bells on Sabbath morn: + +"'John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave; +John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave; +John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave; + But his soul is marching on. + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + His soul is marching on!' + +"And far away +The mountains echoed and re-echoed still-- + "'_Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + His soul is marching on!'_ + + "Until the winds +Bore the retreating echoes southward far, +And the dull distance murmured in our ears. + +"Fast by the field where gallant Baker fell, +We crossed the famous river and advanced +To Frederick. There a transitory cloud +Gloomed the Grand Army--Hooker was relieved: +Fell from command at victory's open gate +The dashing, daring, soul-inspiring chief, +The idol of his soldiers, and they mourned. +He had his faults--they were not faults of heart-- +His gravest--fiery valor. Since that day, +The self-same fault--or virtue--crowned a chief +With laurel plucked on rugged Kenesaw. +Envy it was that wrought the hero's fall, +Envy, with hydra-heads and serpent-tongues, +Hissed on the wolfish clamors of the Press. +O fickle Fortune, how thy favors fall-- +Like rain upon the just and the unjust! +Throughout the army, as the soldiers read +The farewell-order, gloomy murmurs ran; +But our new chieftain cheered our drooping hearts. + +"That Meade would choose his battle-ground we knew, +And if not his the gallant dash and dare +That on Antietam's bloody battle-field +Snatched victory from defeat, our faith was firm +That he would fight to win, and hold the reins +Firmly in hand, nor sacrifice our lives +In wild assaults and fruitless daring deeds. + +"From Taneytown, at mid-day, on the hills +Of Gettysburg we heard the cannon boom. +Our gallant Hancock rode full speed away; +We under Gibbon swiftly following him +At midnight camped on Cemetery Hill. +Sharp the initial combat of the grand +On-coming battle, and the sulphurous smoke +Hung in blue wreaths above the silent vale +Between two hostile armies, mightier far +Than met upon the field of Marathon. +Or where the proud Carthago bowed to Rome. +Hope of the North and Liberty--the one; +Pride of the South--the other. On the hills-- +A rolling range of rugged, broken hills, +Stretching from Round-Top northward, bending off +And butting down upon a silver stream-- +In open field our veteran regiments lay. +Facing our battle-line and parallel-- +Beyond the golden valley to the west-- +Lay Seminary Ridge--a crest of hills +Covered with emerald groves and fields of gold +Ripe for the harvest: on this rolling range, +As numerous as the swarming ocean-fowl +That perch in squadrons on some barren isle +Far in the Arctic sea when summer's sun +With slanting spears invades the icy realm, +The Southern legions lay upon their arms. +As countless as the winter-evening stars +That glint and glow above the frosted fields +Twinkled and blazed upon that crest of hills +The camp-fires of the foe. Two mighty hosts, +Ready and panoplied for deadliest war, +And eager for the combat where the prize +Of victory was empire--for the foe +An empire borne upon the bended backs +Of toiling slaves in millions--but for us, +An empire grounded on the rights of man-- +Lay on their arms awaiting innocent morn +To light the field for slaughter to begin. + +"Silent above us spread the dusky heavens, +Silent below us lay the smoky vale, +Silent beyond, the dreadful crest of hills. +Anon the neigh of horse, a sentry's call, +Or rapid hoof-beats of a flying steed +Bearing an aid and orders, broke the dread, +Portentous silence. I was worn and slept. + +"The call of bugles wakened me. The dawn +Was stealing softly o'er the shadowy land, +And morning grew apace. Broad in the east +Uprose above the crest of hazy hills +Like some broad shield by fabled giant borne, +The golden sun, and flashed upon the field. +Ripe for the harvest stood the golden grain, +Nodding on gentle slopes and dewy hills. +Ready for the harvest death's grim reapers stood +Waiting the signal with impatient steel; +And morning passed, and mid-day. Here and there +The crack of rifles on the picket-line, +Or boom of solitary cannon broke +The myriad-voiced and dreadful monotone. +So fled the anxious hours until the hills +Sent forth their silent shadows to the east-- +And then their batteries opened on our left +Advanced into the valley. All along +The rolling crest of Seminary Ridge +Rolled up the smoke of cannon. Answered then +The grim artillery on our chain of hills' +And heaven was hideous with the bellowing boom, +The whiz of shot, the infernal shrieks of shells. +Down from the hills their charging columns came +A glittering mass of steel. As when the snow +Piled by an hundred winters on the peak +Of cloud-robed Bernard thunders down the cliffs, +Nor rocks nor forests stay the mighty mass, +And men and flocks in terror fly the death, +So thundering fell the columns of the foe, +Crushing through Sickles' corps in front and flank; +And, roaring onward like a mighty wind, +They rushed for Little Round-Top--rugged hill, +Key to our left and center--all exposed-- +Manned by a broken battery half unmanned. +But Hancock saw the peril. On stalwart steed +Foam-flecked, wide-nostriled, panting like a hound, +That stalwart soldier--Spartan to the soles-- +Came dashing down where, prone along the ridge +Upon the right, our sheltered regiment lay. +'_By the left flank, forward--double-quick!_'--We sprang +And dashed for Little Round-Top; formed our line +Flanking the broken battery. Up the slope, +Like frightened sheep when howling wolves pursue, +Fled Sickles' men in panic: hard behind +On came the Rebel columns. Hat in hand +Waving and shouting to his eager corps-- +Rode gallant Longstreet leading on the foe. + +"Where yonder field-wall bounds the trampled wheat +By grove and meadow, see--among the trees-- +Their bayonets gleam advancing. Line on line, +Column on column, in the field beyond, +Their hurrying ranks crowd glittering on and on. +High at the head their flaunting colors fly; +High o'er the roar their wild, triumphant yell +Shrills like the scream of panthers. + + +"Hancock's voice +Rang down our lines above the cannons' roar: +_'Advance, and take those colors'_[C]--Adown the slope +Like Bengal tigers springing at the hounds, +We sprang and met them at the border wall: +Muzzle to muzzle--steel to steel--we met, +And fought like Romans and like Romans fell. +Even as a cyclone, growling thunder, roars +Down through a dusky forest, and its path +Is strown with broken and uprooted pines +Promiscuous piled in broad and broken swaths, +So crashed our volleys through their serried ranks, +Mowing great swaths of death; yet on and on, +Closing the gaps and yelling like the fiends +That Dante heard along the gulf of hell, +Still came our furious foes. A cloud of smoke-- +Dense, sulphurous, stifling--covered all our ranks. +Our steady, deadly rifles crackled still, +And still their crashing volleys rolled and roared. +Our rifles blazed upon the blaze below; +The blaze below upon the blaze above, +And in the blaze the buzz of myriad bees +Whose stings were deadlier than the Libyan asp. +Five times our colors fell--five times arose +Defiant, flapping on the broken wall. + +[C] These are the very words used by General Hancock on this occasion. + +"We hold the perilous breach; on either hand +Our foes out-flank us, leap the sheltering wall +And pour their deadly, enfilading fire. +God shield our shattered ranks!--God help us! + + "Ho! +'Stars and Stripes' on the right!--Hurra!--Hurra! +The Green Mountain Boys to our aid!--Hurra!--Hurra. +Cannon-roar down on the left!--Our batteries are there-- +Hurling hot hell-fire'--See!--like sickled corn +The close-ranked foemen fall in toppling swaths: +But still with hurried steps and steady steel +They close the gaps--like madmen they press on! +With one wild yell they rush upon the wall! +Lo from our lines a sheet of crackling fire +Scorches their grimy faces--back they reel +And tumble--down and down--a writhing mass +Of slaughter and defeat! + + "Leaped on the wall +A thousand Blues and swung their caps in air, +Thundering their wild _Hurra!_ above the roar +And crash of cannon;--victory was ours. +Back to his crest of hills the baffled foe +Reluctant turned and fled the storm of death. + +"The smoke of battle floated from the field, +And lo the woodside piled with slaughter-heaps! +And lo the meadow dotted with the slain! +And lo the ranks of dead and dying men +That fighting fell behind the broken wall! + +"Only a handful of my men remained; +The rest lay dead or wounded on the field; +Nor skulked their captain, but by grace was spared. +Behold the miracle!--This Bible holds, +Embedded in its leaves, the Rebel lead +Aimed at my heart. But here a scratch and there-- +Not worth the mention where so many fell. +Paul, foremost ever in the deadly hail, +As if protected by a shield unseen, +Escaped unscathed. + + "We camped upon the hill. +Night hovered o'er us on her dusky wings; +Then all along our lines upon the hills +Blazed up the evening camp-fires. Facing us +Beyond the smoke-robed valley sparkled up +A chain of fires on Seminary Ridge. +A hum of mingled voices filled the air. +As when upon the vast, hoarse-moaning sea +And all along the rock-built somber shore +Murmurs the menace of the coming storm-- +The muttering of the tempest from afar, +The plash and seethe of surf upon the sand, +The roll of distant thunder in the heavens, +Unite and blend in one prevailing voice-- +So rose the mingled murmurs of our camps, +So rose the groans and moans of wounded men +Along the slope and valley, and so rolled +From yonder frowning parallel of hills +The muttered menace of our baffled foes; +And so from camp to camp and hill to hill +Rolled the deep mutter and the dreadful moan +Of an hundred thousand voices blent in one. + +"That night a multitude of friends and foes +Slept soundly--but they slept to wake no more. +But few indeed among the living slept; +We lay upon our arms and courted sleep +With open eyes and ears: the fears and hopes +That centered in the half-fought battle held +The balm of slumber from our weary limbs. +Anon the rattle of the random fire +Broke on our drowsy ears and startled us, +As one is startled by some horrid dream; +Whereat old veterans muttered in their sleep. + +"Midnight had passed, and I lay wakeful still, +When Paul arose and sat upon the sward. +He said: 'I cannot sleep; unbidden thoughts +That will not down crowd on my restless brain. +Captain, I know not how, but still I know +That I shall see but one more sunrise. Morn +Will bring the clash of arms--to-morrow's sun +Will look upon unnumbered ghastly heaps +And gory ranks of dead and dying men, +And ere it sink beyond the western hills +Up from this field will roll a mighty shout +Victorious, echoed over all the land, +Proclaiming joy to freemen everywhere. +And I shall fall. I cannot tell you how +I know it--but I feel it in my soul. +I pray that death may spare me till I hear +Our shout of _"Victory!"_ rolling o'er these hills: +Then will I lay me down and die in peace.' + +"I lightly said--'Sheer superstition, Paul; +I'll wager a month's pay you'll live to fight +A dozen battles yet. They ill become +A gallant soldier on the battle field-- +Such grandam superstitions. You have fought +Ever like a hero--do you falter now?' + +"'Captain,' he said, 'I shall not falter now, +But gladlier will I hail the rising sun. +Death has no terror for a heart like mine: +Say what you may and call it what you will-- +I know that I shall fall to rise no more +Before the sunset of the coming day. +If this be superstition--still I know; +If this be fear it will not hold me back.' +I answered: + + "'Friend, I hope this prophecy +Will prove you a false prophet; but, my Paul, +Have you no farewells for your friends at home? +No message for a nearer, dearer one?' + +"'None; there is none I knew in other days +Knows where or what I am. So let it be. +If there be those--not many--who may care +For one who cares so little for himself, +Surely my soldier-name in the gazette +Among the killed will bring no pang to them. +And then he laid himself upon the sward; +Perhaps he slept--I know not, for fatigue +O'ercame me and I slept. + + "The picket guns +At random firing wakened me. The morn +Came stealing softly o'er the somber hills; +Dark clouds of smoke hung hovering o'er the field. +Blood-red as risen from a sea of blood, +The tardy sun as if in dread arose, +And hid his face in the uprising smoke. +As when the pale moon, envious of the glow +And gleam and glory of the god of day, +Creeps in by stealth between the earth and him, +Eclipsing all his glory, and the green +Of hills and dales is changed to yellowish dun, +So fell the strange and lurid light of morn. +And as I gazed I heard the hunger-cries +Of vultures circling on their dusky wings +Above the smoke-hid valley; then they plunged +To gorge themselves upon the slaughter-heaps, +As at the Buddhist temples in Siam +Whereto the hideous vultures flock to feast +With famished dogs upon the pauper dead. + +"The day wore on. Two mighty armies stood +Defiant--watching--dreading to assault; +Each hoping that the other would assault +And madly dash against its glittering steel. +As in the jungles of the Chambezè-- +Glaring defiance with their fiery eyes-- +Two tawny lions--rival monarchs--meet +And fright the forest with their horrid roar; +But ere they close in bloody combat crouch +And wait and watch for vantage in attack; +So on their bannered hills the opposing hosts, +Eager to grapple in the tug of death, +Waited and watched for vantage in the fight. +Noon came. The fire of pickets died away. +All eyes were turned to Seminary Ridge, +For lo our sullen foemen--park on park-- +Had massed their grim artillery on our corps. +Hoarse voices sunk to whispers or were hushed; +The rugged hills stood listening in awe; +So dread the ominous silence that I heard +The hearts of soldiers throbbing along the line. + +"Up from yon battery curled a cloud of smoke, +Shrieked o'er our heads a solitary shell,-- +Then instantly in horrid concert roared +Two hundred cannon on the Rebel hills-- +Hurling their hissing thunderbolts--and then +An hundred bellowing cannon from our lines +Thundered their iron answer. Horrible +Rolled in the heavens the infernal thunders--rolled +From hill to hill the reverberating roar, +As if the earth were bursting with the throes +Of some vast pent volcano; rocked and reeled, +As in an earthquake-shock, the solid hills; +Anon huge fragments of the hillside rocks, +And limbs and splinters of shot-shattered trees +Danced in the smoke like demons; hissed and howled +The crashing shell-storm bursting over us. +Prone on the earth awaiting the grand charge, +To which we knew the heavy cannonade +Was but a prelude, for two hours we lay-- +Two hours that tried the very souls of men-- +And many a brave man never rose again. +Then ceased our guns to swell the infernal roar; +The roll and crash of cannon in our front +Lulled, and we heard the foeman's bugle-calls. +Then from the slopes of Seminary Ridge +Poured down the storming columns of the foe. +As when the rain-clouds from the rim of heaven +Are gathered by the four contending winds, +And madly whirled until they meet and clash +Above the hills and burst--down pours a sea +And plunges roaring down through gorge and glen, +So poured the surging columns of our foes +Adown the slopes and spread along the vale +In glittering ranks of battle--line on line-- +Mile-long. Above the roar of cannon rose +In one wild yell the Rebel battle-cry. +Flash in the sun their serried ranks of steel; +Before them swarm a cloud of skirmishers. +That eager host the gallant Pickett leads; +He right and left his fiery charger wheels; +Steadies the lines with clarion voice; anon +His outstretched saber gleaming points the way. +As mid the myriad twinkling stars of heaven +Flashes the blazing comet, and a column +Of fiery fury follows it, so flashed +The dauntless chief, so followed his wild host. + +"We waited grim and silent till they crossed +The center and began the dread ascent. +Then brazen bugles rang the clarion call; +Arose as one twice twenty thousand men, +And all our hillsides blazed with crackling fire. +With sudden crash and simultaneous roar +An hundred cannon opened instantly, +And all the vast hills shuddered under us. +Yelling their mad defiance to our fire +Still on and upward came our daring foes. +As when upon the wooded mountain-side +The unchained Loki[D] riots and the winds +Of an autumnal tempest lash the flames, +Whirling the burning fragments through the air-- +Huge blazing limbs and tops of blasted pines-- +Mowing wide swaths with circling scythes of fire, +So fell our fire upon the advancing host, +And lashed their ranks and mowed them into heaps, +Cleaving broad avenues of death. Still on +And up they come undaunted, closing up +The ghastly gaps and firing as they come. +As if protected by the hand of heaven, +Rides at their head their gallant leader still; +The tempest drowns his voice--his naming sword +Gleams in the flash of rifles. One wild yell--Like +the mad hunger-howl of famished wolves +Midwinter on the flying cabris'[E] trail, +Swelled by ten thousand hideous voices, shrills, +And through the battle-smoke the bravest burst. +Flutters their tattered banner on our wall! +Thunders their shout of victory! Appalled +Our serried ranks are broken--but in vain! +On either hand our cannon enfilade, +Crushing great gaps along the stalwart lines; +In front our deadly rifles volley still, +Mowing the toppling swaths of daring men. +Behold--they falter!--Ho!--they break!--they fly! +With one wild cheer that shakes the solid hills +Spring to the charge our eager infantry. +Headlong we press them down the bloody slope, +Headlong they fall before our leveled steel +And break in wild disorder, cast away +Their arms and fly in panic. All the vale +Is spread with slaughter and wild fugitives. +Wide o'er the field the scattered foemen fly; +Dread havoc and mad terror swift pursue +Till battle is but slaughter. Thousands fall-- +Thousands surrender, and the Southern flag +Is trailed upon the field. + +[D] Norse fire-fiend + +[E] Cabri--the small, fleet antelope of the northern plains, so called +by the Crees and half-breeds. + + "The day was ours, +And well we knew the worth of victory. +Loud rolled the rounds of cheers from corps to corps; +Comrades embraced each other; iron men +Shed tears of joy like women; men profane +Fell on their knees and thanked Almighty God. +Then _'Hail Columbia'_ rang the brazen horns, +And all the hill-tops shouted unto heaven; +The welkin shouted to the shouting hills--And +heavens and hill-tops shouted _'Victory!'_ + +"Night with her pall had wrapped the bloody field. +The little remnants of our regiment +Were gathered and encamped upon the hill. +Paul was not with them, and they could not tell +Aught of him. I had seen him in the fight +Bravest of all the brave. I saw him last +When first the foremost foemen reached our wall, +Thrusting them off with bloody bayonet, +And shouting to his comrades, _'Steady, men!'_ +Sadly I wandered back where we had met +The onset of the foe. The rounds of cheers +Repeated oft still swept from corps to corps, +And as I passed along the line I saw +Our dying comrades raise their weary heads, +And cheer with feeble voices. Even in death +The cry of victory warmed their hearts again. +Paul lay upon the ground where he had fought, +Fast by the flag that floated on the line. +He slept--or seemed to sleep, but on his brow +Sat such a deadly pallor that I feared +My Paul would never march and fight again. +I raised his head--he woke as from a dream; +I said, 'Be quiet--you are badly hurt; +I'll call a surgeon; we will dress your wound.' +He gravely said: + + "'Tis vain; for I have done +With camp and march and battle. Ere the dawn +Shall I be mustered out of your command, +And mustered into the Grand Host of heaven.' + +"I sought a surgeon on the field and found; +With me he came and opened the bloody blouse, +Felt the dull pulse and sagely shook his head. +A musket ball had done its deadly work; +There was no hope, he said, the man might live +A day perchance--but had no need of him. +I called his comrades and we carried him, +Stretched on his blankets, gently to our camp, +And laid him by the camp-fire. As the light +Fell on Paul's face he took my hand and said: + + + + +PART II + +PAUL' S HISTORY + + +"Captain, I hear the cheers. My soul is glad. +My days are numbered, but this glorious day-- +Like some far beacon on a shadowy cape +That cheers at night the storm-belabored ships-- +Will light the misty ages from afar. +This field shall be the Mecca. Here shall rise +A holier than the Caaba where men kiss +The sacred stone that flaming fell from heaven. +But O how many sad and aching hearts +Will mourn the loved ones never to return! +Thank God--no heart will hope for my return! +Thank God--no heart will mourn because I die! +Captain, at life's mid-summer flush and glow, +For him to die who leaves his golden hopes, +His mourning friends and idol-love behind, +It must be hard and seem a cruel thing. +After the victory--upon this field--For +me to die hath more of peace than pain; +For I shall leave no golden hopes behind, +No idol-love to pine because I die, +No friends to wait my coming or to mourn. +They wait my coming in the world beyond; +And wait not long, for I am almost there. +'Tis but a gasp, and I shall pass the bound +'Twixt life and death--through death to life again-- +Where sorrow cometh never. Pangs and pains +Of flesh or spirit will not pierce me there; +And two will greet me from the jasper walls-- +God's angels--with a song of holy peace, +And haste to meet me at the pearly gate, +And kiss the death-damp from my silent lips, +And lead me through the golden avenues-- +Singing Hosanna--to the Great White Throne." + +So there he paused and calmly closed his eyes, +And silently I sat and held his hand. +After a time, when we were left alone, +He spoke again with calmer voice and said: +"Captain, you oft have asked my history, +And I as oft refused. There is no cause +Why I should longer hold it from my friend +Who reads the closing chapter. It may teach +One soul to lean upon the arm of Christ-- +That hope and happiness find anchorage +Only in heaven. While my lonesome life +Saw death but dimly in the dull distance +My lips were sealed to the unhappy tale; +Under my pride I hid a heavy heart. + +"I was ambitious in my boyhood days, +And dreamed of fame and honors--misty fogs +That climb at morn the ragged cliffs of life, +Veiling the ragged rocks and gloomy chasms, +And shaping airy castles on the top +With bristling battlements and looming towers; +But melt away into ethereal air +Beneath the blaze of the mid-summer sun, +Till cliffs and chasms and all the ragged rocks +Are bare, and all the castles crumbled away. + +"There winds a river 'twixt two chains of hills-- +Fir-capped and rugged monuments of time; +A level vale of rich alluvial land, +Washed from the slopes through circling centuries, +And sweet with clover and the hum of bees, +Lies broad between the rugged, somber hills. +Beneath a shade of willows and of elms +The river slumbers in this meadowy lap. +Down from the right there winds a babbling branch, +Cleaving a narrower valley through the hills. +A grand bald-headed hill-cone on the right +Looms like a patriarch, and above the branch +There towers another. I have seen the day +When those bald heads were plumed with lofty pines. +Below the branch and near the river bank, +Hidden among the elms and butternuts, +The dear old cottage stands where I was born. +An English ivy clambers to the eaves; +An English willow planted by my hand +Now spreads its golden branches o'er the roof +Not far below the cottage thrives a town, +A busy town of mills and merchandise-- +Belle Meadows, fairest village of the vale. +Behind it looms the hill-cone, and in front +The peaceful river winds its silent way. +Beyond the river spreads a level plain-- +Once hid with somber firs--a tangled marsh-- +Now beautiful with fields and cottages, +And sweet in spring-time with the blooming plum, +And white with apple-blossoms blown like snow. +Beyond the plain a lower chain of hills, +In summer gemmed with fields of golden grain +Set in the emerald of the beechen woods. +In other days the village school-house stood +Below our cottage on a grassy mound +That sloped away unto the river's marge; +And on the slope a cluster of tall pines +Crowning a copse of beech and evergreen. +There in my boyhood days I went to school; +A maiden mistress ruled the little realm; +She taught the rudiments to rompish rogues, +And walked a queen with magic wand of birch. +My years were hardly ten when father died. +Sole tenants of our humble cottage home +My sorrowing mother and myself remained; +But she was all economy, and kept +With my poor aid a comfortable house. +I was her idol and she wrought at night +To keep me at my books, and used to boast +That I should rise above our humble lot. +How oft I listened to her hopeful words-- +Poured from the fountain of a mother's heart +Until I longed to wing the sluggard years +That bore me on to what I hoped to be. + +"We had a garden-plat behind the house-- +Beyond, an orchard and a pasture-lot; +In front a narrow meadow--here and there +Shaded with elms and branching butternuts. +In spring and summer in the garden-plat +I wrought my morning and my evening hours +And kept myself at school--no idle boy. + +"One bright May morning when the robins sang +There came to school a stranger queenly fair, +With eyes that shamed the ethereal blue of heaven, +And golden hair in ringlets--cheeks as soft, +As fresh and rosy as the velvet blush +Of summer sunrise on the dew-damp hills. +Hers was the name I muttered in my dreams. +For days my bashful heart held me aloof +Although her senior by a single year; +But we were brought together oft in class, +And when she learned my name she spoke to me, +And then my tongue was loosed and we were friends. +Before the advent of the steeds of steel +Her sire--a shrewd and calculating man-- +Had lately come and purchased timbered-lands +And idle mills, and made the town his home. +And he was well-to-do and growing rich, +And she her father's pet and only child. +In mind and stature for two happy years +We grew together at the village school. +We grew together!--aye, our tender hearts +There grew together till they beat as one. +Her tasks were mine, and mine alike were hers; +We often stole away among the pines-- +That stately cluster on the sloping hill-- +And conned our lessons from the selfsame book, +And learned to love each other o'er our tasks, +While in the pine-tops piped the oriole, +And from his branch the chattering squirrel chid +Our guileless love and artless innocence. +'Twas childish love perhaps, but day by day +It grew into our souls as we grew up. +Then there was opened in the prospering town +A grammar school, and thither went Pauline. +I missed her and was sad for many a day, +Till mother gave me leave to follow her. +In autumn--in vacation--she would come +With girlish pretext to our cottage home. +She often brought my mother little gifts, +And cheered her with sweet songs and happy words; +And I would pluck the fairest meadow-flowers +To grace a garland for her golden hair, +And fill her basket from the butternuts +That flourished in our little meadow field. +I found in her all I had dreamed of heaven. +So garlanded with latest-blooming flowers, +Chanting the mellow music of our hopes, +The silver-sandaled Autumn-hours tripped by. +And mother learned to love her; but she feared, +Knowing her heart and mine, that one rude hand +Might break our hopes asunder. Like a thief +I often crept about her father's house, +Under the evening shadows, eager-eyed, +Peering for one dear face, and lingered late +To catch the silver music of one voice +That from her chamber nightly rose to heaven. +Her father's face I feared--a silent man, +Cold-faced, imperative, by nature prone +To set his will against the beating world; +Warm-hearted but heart-crusted. + +[Illustration: WE OFTEN STOLE AWAY AMONG THE PINES, AND CONNED OUR +LESSONS FROM THE SELF-SAME BOOK] + + "Two years more +Thus wore away. Pauline grew up a queen. +A shadow fell across my sunny path;-- +A hectic flush burned on my mother's cheeks; +She daily failed and nearer drew to death. +Pauline would often come with sun-lit face, +Cheating the day of half its languid hours +With cheering chapters from the holy book, +And border tales and wizard minstrelsy: +And mother loved her all the better for it. +With feeble hands upon our sad-bowed heads, +And in a voice all tremulous with tears, +She said to us: 'Dear children, love each other-- +Bear and forbear, and come to me in heaven;' +And praying for us daily--drooped and died. + +[Illustration: "'DEAR CHILDREN? LOVE EACH OTHER,--BEAR AND FORBEAR, AND +COME TO ME IN HEAVEN'"] + +"After the sad and solemn funeral, +Alone and weeping and disconsolate, +I sat at evening by the cottage door. +I felt as if a dark and bitter fate +Had fallen on me in my tender years. +I seemed an aimless wanderer doomed to grope +In vain among the darkling years and die. +One only star shone through the shadowy mists. +The moon that wandered in the gloomy heavens +Was robed in shrouds; the rugged, looming hills +Looked desolate;--the silent river seemed +A somber chasm, while my own pet lamb, +Mourning disconsolate among the trees, +As if he followed some dim phantom-form, +Bleated in vain and would not heed my call. +On weary hands I bent my weary head; +In gloomy sadness fell my silent tears. + +"An angel's hand was laid upon my head-- +There in the moonlight stood my own Pauline-- +Angel of love and hope and holy faith-- +She flashed upon me bowed in bitter grief, +As falls the meteor down the night-clad heavens-- +In silence. Then about my neck she clasped +Her loving arms and on my shoulder drooped +Her golden tresses, while her silent tears +Fell warm upon my cheek like summer rain. +Heart clasped to heart and cheek to cheek we sat; +The moon no longer gloomed--her face was cheer; +The rugged hills were old-time friends again; +The peaceful river slept beneath the moon, +And my pet lamb came bounding to our side +And kissed her hand and mine as he was wont. +Then I awoke as from a dream and said: +'Tell me, beloved, why you come to me +In this dark hour--so late--so desolate?' +And she replied: + + "'My darling, can I rest +While you are full of sorrow? In my ear +A spirit seemed to whisper--"Arise and go +To comfort him disconsolate." Tell me, Paul, +Why should you mourn your tender life away? +I will be mother to you; nay, dear boy, +I will be more. Come, brush away these tears.' + +"My heart was full; I kissed her pleading eyes: +'You are an angel sent by one in heaven,' +I said,'to heal my heart, but I have lost +More than you know. The cruel hand of death +Hath left me orphan, friendless--poor indeed, +Saving the precious jewel of your love. +And what to do? I know not what to do, +I feel so broken by a heavy hand. +My mother hoped that I would work my way +To competence and honor at the bar. +But shall I toil in poverty for years +To learn a science that so seldom yields +Or wealth or honor save to silvered heads? +I know that path to fame and fortune leads +Through thorns and brambles over ragged rocks; +But can I follow in the common path +Trod by the millions, never to lift my head +Above the busy hordes that delve and drudge +For bare existence in this bitter world-- +And be a mite, a midge, a worthless worm, +No more distinguished from the common mass +Than one poor polyp in the coral isle +Is marked amid the myriads teeming there? +Yet 'tis not for myself. For you, Pauline, +Far up the slippery heights of wealth and fame +Would I climb bravely; but if I would climb +By any art or science, I must train +Unto the task my feet for many years, +Else I should slip and fall from rugged ways, +Too badly bruised to ever mount again.' +Then she: + + "'O Paul, if wealth were mine to give! +O if my father could but know my heart! +But fear not, Paul, our _Father_ reigns in heaven. +Follow your bent--'twill lead you out aright; +The highest mountain lessens as we climb; +Persistent courage wins the smile of fate. +Apply yourself to law and master it, +And I will wait. This sad and solemn hour +Is dark with doubt and gloom, but by and by +The clouds will lift and you will see God's face. +For there is one in heaven whose pleading tongue +Will pray for blessings on her only son +Of Him who heeds the little sparrow's fall;-- +And O if He will listen to my prayers, +The gates of heaven shall echo to my voice +Morning and evening,--only keep your heart.' +I said: + + "'Pauline, your prayers had rolled away +The ponderous stone that closed the tomb of Christ; +And while they rise to heaven for my success +I cannot doubt, or I should doubt my God. +I think I see a pathway through this gloom; +I have a kinsman'--and I told her where-- +'A lawyer; I have heard my mother say-- +A self-made man with charitable heart; +And I might go and study under him; +I think he would assist me.' + + "Then she sighed: +'Paul, can you leave me? You may study here +And here you are among your boyhood friends, +And here I should be near to cheer you on.' + +"I promised her that I would think of it-- +Would see what prospect offered in the town; +And then we walked together half-embraced, +But when we neared her vine-arched garden gate, +She bade me stay and kissed me a good-night +And bounded through the moonlight like a fawn. +I watched her till she flitted from my sight, +Then slowly homeward turned my lingering steps. +I wrote my kinsman on the morrow morn, +And broached my project to a worthy man +Who kept an office and a case of books-- +An honest lawyer. People called him learn'd, +But wanting tact and ready speech he failed. +The rest were pettifoggers--scurrilous rogues +Who plied the village justice with their lies, +And garbled law to suit the case in hand-- +Mean, querulous, small-brained delvers in the mire +Of men's misfortunes--crafty, cunning knaves, +Versed in chicane and trickery that schemed +To keep the evil passions of weak men +In petty wars, and plied their tongues profane +With cunning words to argue honest fools +Into their spider-meshes to be fleeced. +I laid my case before him; took advice-- +Well-meant advice--to leave my native town, +And study with my kinsman whom he knew. +A week rolled round and brought me a reply-- +A frank and kindly letter--giving me +That which I needed most--encouragement. +But hard it was to fix my mind to go; +For in my heart an angel whispered 'Stay.' +It might be better for my after years, +And yet perhaps,'twere better to remain. +I balanced betwixt my reason and my heart, +And hesitated. Her I had not seen +Since that sad night, and so I made resolve +That we should meet, and at her father's house. +So whispering courage to my timid heart +I went. With happy greeting at the door +She met me, but her face was wan and pale-- +So pale and wan I feared that she was ill. +I read the letter to her, and she sighed, +And sat in silence for a little time, +Then said: + +"'God bless you, Paul, may be 'tis best-- +I sometimes feel it is not for the best, +But I am selfish--thinking of myself. +Go like a man, but keep your boyish heart-- +Your boyish heart is all the world to me. +Remember, Paul, how I shall watch and wait; +So write me often: like the dew of heaven +To withering grass will come your cheering words. +To know that you are well and happy, Paul, +And good and true, will wing the weary months. +And let me beg you as a sister would-- +Not that I doubt you but because I love-- +Beware of wine--touch not the treacherous cup, +And guard your honor as you guard your life. +The years will glide away like scudding clouds +That fleetly chase each other o'er the hills, +And you will be a man before you know, +And I will be a woman. God will crown +Our dearest hopes if we but trust in Him.' + +"We sat in silence for a little time, +And she was weeping, so I raised her face +And kissed away her tears. She softly said: +'Paul, there is something I must say to you-- +Something I have no time to tell you now; +But we must meet again before you go-- +Under the pines where we so oft have met. +Be this the sign,'--She waved her graceful hand, +'Come when the shadows gather on the pines, +And silent stars stand sentinel in heaven; +Now Paul, forgive me--I must say--good-bye.' + +"I read her fear upon her anxious brow. +Lingering and clasped within her loving arms +I, through her dewy, deep, blue eyes, beheld +Her inmost soul, and knew that love was there. +Ah, then and there her father blustered in, +And caught us blushing in each other's arms! +He stood a moment silent and amazed: +Then kindling wrath distorted all his face, +He showered his anger with a tongue of fire. +O cruel words that stung my boyish pride! +O dagger words that stabbed my very soul! +I strove, but fury mastered--up I sprang, +And felt a giant as I stood before him. +My breath was hot with anger;--impious boy-- +Frenzied--forgetful of his silvered hairs-- +Forgetful of her presence, too, I raved, +And poured a madman's curses on his head. +A moan of anguish brought me to myself; +I turned and saw her sad, imploring face, +And tears that quenched the wild fire in my heart. +I pressed her hand and passed into the hall, +While she stood sobbing in a flood of tears, +And he stood choked with anger and amazed. +But as I passed the ivied porch he came +With bated breath and muttered in my ear-- +'_Beggar!_'--It stung me like a serpent's fang. +Pride-pricked and muttering like a maniac, +I almost flew the street and hurried home +To vent my anger to the silent elms. +_'Beggar!_'--an hundred times that long, mad night +I muttered with hot lips and burning breath; +I paced the walk with hurried tread, and raved; +I threw myself beneath the willow-tree, +And muttered like the muttering of a storm. +My little lamb came bleating mournfully; +Angered I struck him;--out among the trees +I wandered mumbling 'beggar' as I went, +And beating in through all my burning soul +The bitter thoughts it conjured, till my brain +Reeled and I sunk upon the dew-damp grass, +And--utterly exhausted--slept till morn. + +"I dreamed a dream--all mist and mystery. +I saw a sunlit valley beautiful +With purple vineyards and with garden-plats; +And in the vineyards and the garden-plats +Were happy-hearted youths and merry girls +Toiling and singing. Grandsires too were there, +Sitting contented under their own vines +And fig-trees, while about them merrily played +Their children's children like the sportive lambs +That frolicked on the foot-hills. Low of kine, +Full-uddered, homeward-wending from the meads, +Fell on the ear as soft as Hulder's loor +Tuned on the Norse-land mountains. Like a nest +Hid in a hawthorn-hedge a cottage stood +Embowered with vines beneath broad-branching elms +Sweet-voiced with busy bees. + +[Illustration: PAUL'S DREAM] + + "On either hand +Rose steep and barren mountains--mighty cliffs +Cragged and chasm'd and over-grown with thorns; +And on the topmost peak a golden throne +Blazoned with burning characters that read-- +'Climb'--it is yours.' Not far above the vale +I saw a youth, fair-browed and raven-haired, +Clambering among the thorns and ragged rocks; +And from his brow with torn and bleeding hand +He wiped great drops of sweat. Down through the vale +I saw a rapid river, broad and deep, +Winding in solemn silence to the sea-- +The sea all mist and fog. Lo as I stood +Viewing the river and the moaning sea, +A sail--and then another--flitted down +And plunged into the mist. A moment more, +Like shapeless shadows of the by-gone years, +I saw them in the mist and they were gone-- +Gone!--and the sea moaned on and seemed to say-- +_'Gone--and forever!_'--So I gladly turned +To look upon the throne--the blazoned throne +That sat upon the everlasting cliff. +The throne had vanished!--Lo where it had stood, +A bed of ashes and a gray-haired man +Sitting upon it bowed and broken down. +And so the vision passed. + + "The rising sun +Beamed full upon my face and wakened me, +And there beside me lay my pet--the lamb-- +Gazing upon me with his wondering eyes, +And all the fields were bright and beautiful, +And brighter seemed the world. I rose resolved. +I let the cottage and disposed of all; +The lamb went bleating to a neighbor's field; +And oft my heart ached, but I mastered it. +This was the constant burden of my brain-- +_'Beggar!_'--I'll teach him that I am a man; +I'll speak and he shall listen; I will rise, +And he shall see my course as I go up +Round after round the ladder of success. +Even as the pine upon the mountain-top +Towers o'er the maple on the mountain-side, +I'll tower above him. Then will I look down +And call him _Father_:--He shall call me _Son_.' + +"Thus hushing my sad heart the day drew nigh +Of parting, and the promised sign was given. +The night was dismal darkness--not one star +Twinkled in heaven; the sad, low-moaning wind +Played like a mournful harp among the pines. +I groped and listened through the darkling grove, +Peering with eager eyes among the trees, +And calling as I peered with anxious voice +One darling name. No answer but the moan +Of the wind-shaken pines. I sat me down +Under the dusky shadows waiting for her, +And lost myself in gloomy reverie. +Dim in the darksome shadows of the night, +While thus I dreamed, my darling came and crept +Beneath the boughs as softly as a hare, +And whispered 'Paul'--and I was at her side. +We sat upon a mound moss-carpeted-- +No eyes but God's upon us, and no voice +Spake to us save the moaning of the pines. +Few were the words we spoke; her silent tears, +Our clasping, trembling, lingering embrace, +Were more than words. Into one solemn hour, +Were pressed the fears and hopes of coming years. +Two tender hearts that only dared to hope +There swelled and throbbed to the electric touch +Of love as holy as the love of Christ. +She gave her picture and I gave a ring-- +My mother's--almost with her latest breath +She gave it me and breathed my darling's name. +I girt her finger, and she kissed the ring +In solemn pledge, and said: + + "'I bring a gift-- +The priceless gift of God unto his own: +O may it prove a precious gift to you, +As it has proved a precious gift to me; +And promise me to read it day by day-- +Beginning on the morrow--every day +A chapter--and I too will read the same.' + +"I took the gift--a precious gift indeed-- +And you may see how I have treasured it. +Here, Captain, put your hand upon my breast-- +An inner pocket--you will find it there." + +I opened the bloody blouse and thence drew forth +The Book of Christ all stained with Christian blood. +He laid his hand upon the holy book, +And closed his eyes as if in silent prayer. +I held his weary head and bade him rest. +He lay a moment silent and resumed: +"Let me go on if you would hear the tale; +I soon shall sleep the sleep that wakes no more. +O there were promises and vows as solemn +As Christ's own promises; but as we sat +The pattering rain-drops fell among the pines, +And in the branches the foreboding owl +With dismal hooting hailed the coming storm. +So in that dreary hour and desolate +We parted in the silence of our tears. + +"And on the morrow morn I bade adieu +To the old cottage home I loved so well-- +The dear old cottage home where I was born. +Then from my mother's grave I plucked a rose +Bursting in bloom--Pauline had planted it-- +And left my little hill-girt boyhood world. +I journeyed eastward to my journey's end; +At first by rail for many a flying mile, +By mail-coach thence from where the hurrying train +Leaps a swift river that goes tumbling on +Between a village and a mountain-ledge, +Chafing its rocky banks. There seethes and foams +The restless river round the roaring rocks, +And then flows on a little way and pours +Its laughing waters into a bridal lap. +Its flood is fountain-fed among the hills; +Far up the mossy brooks the timid trout +Lie in the shadow of vine-tangled elms. +Out from the village-green the roadway leads +Along the river up between the hills, +Then climbs a wooded mountain to its top, +And gently winds adown the farther side +Unto a valley where the bridal stream +Flows rippling, meadow-flower-and-willow-fringed, +And dancing onward with a merry song, +Hastes to the nuptials. From the mountain-top-- +A thousand feet above the meadowy vale-- +She seems a chain of fretted silver wound +With artless art among the emerald hills. +Thence up a winding valley of grand views-- +Hill-guarded--firs and rocks upon the hills, +And here and there a solitary pine +Majestic--silent--mourns its slaughtered kin, +Like the last warrior of some tawny tribe +Returned from sunset mountains to behold +Once more the spot where his brave fathers sleep. +The farms along the valley stretch away +On either hand upon the rugged hills-- +Walled into fields. Tall elms and willow-trees +Huge-trunked and ivy-hung stand sentinel +Along the roadway walls--storm-wrinkled trees +Planted by men who slumber on the hills. +Amid such scenes all day we rolled along, +And as the shadows of the western hills +Across the valley crept and climbed the slopes, +The sunset blazed their hazy tops and fell +Upon the emerald like a mist of gold. +And at that hour I reached my journey's end. +The village is a gem among the hills-- +Tall, towering hills that reach into the blue. +One grand old mountain-cone looms on the left +Far up toward heaven, and all around are hills. +The river winds among the leafy hills +Adown the meadowy dale; a shade of elms +And willows fringe it. In this lap of hills +Cluster the happy homes of men content +To let the great world worry as it will. +The court-house park, the broad, bloom-bordered streets, +Are avenues of maples and of elms-- +Grander than Tadmor's pillared avenue-- +Fair as the fabled garden of the gods. +Beautiful villas, tidy cottages, +Flower gardens, fountains, offices and shops, +All nestle in a dreamy wealth of woods. + +"Kind hearts received me. All that wealth could bring-- +Refinement, luxury and ease--was theirs; +But I was proud and felt my poverty, +And gladly mured myself among the books +To master 'the lawless science of the law.' +I plodded through the ponderous commentaries-- +Some musty with the mildew of old age; +And these I found the better for their years, +Like olden wine in cobweb-covered flasks. +The blush of sunrise found me at my books; +The midnight cock-crow caught me reading still; +And oft my worthy master censured me: +'A time for work,' he said, 'a time for play; +Unbend the bow or else the bow will break.' +But when I wearied--needing sleep and rest-- +A single word seemed whispered in my ear-- +'_Beggar_,' it stung me to redoubled toil. +I trod the ofttimes mazy labyrinths +Of legal logic--mined the mountain-mass +Of precedents conflicting--found the rule, +Then branched into the exceptions; split the hair +Betwixt this case and that--ran parallels-- +Traced from a 'leading case' through many tomes +Back to the first decision on the 'point,' +And often found a pyramid of law +Built with bad logic on a broken base +Of careless '_dicta;_'--saw how narrow minds +Spun out the web of technicalities +Till common sense and common equity +Were strangled in its meshes. Here and there +I came upon a broad, unfettered mind +Like Murray's--cleaving through the spider-webs +Of shallower brains, and bravely pushing out +Upon the open sea of common sense. +But such were rare. The olden precedents-- +Oft stepping-stones of tyranny and wrong-- +Marked easy paths to follow, and they ruled +The course of reason as the iron rails +Rule the swift wheels of the down-thundering train. + +"I rose at dawn. First in this holy book +I read my chapter. How the happy thought +That my Pauline would read--the self-same morn +The self-same chapter--gave the sacred text, +Though I had heard my mother read it oft, +New light and import never seen before. +For I would ponder over every verse, +Because I felt that she was reading it, +And when I came upon dear promises +Of Christ to man, I read them o'er and o'er, +Till in a holy and mysterious way +They seemed the whisperings of Pauline to me. +Later I learned to lay up for myself +'Treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust +Corrupteth, and where thieves do not break through, +Nor steal'--and where my treasures all are laid +My heart is, and my spirit longs to go. +O friend, if Jesus was but man of man-- +And if indeed his wondrous miracles +Were mythic tales of priestly followers +To chain the brute till Reason came from heaven-- +Yet was his mission unto man divine. +Man's pity wounds, but Jesus' pity heals: +He gave us balm beyond all earthly balm; +He gave us strength beyond all human strength; +He taught us love above the low desires; +He taught us hope beyond all earthly hope; +He taught us charity wherewith to build +From out the broken walls of barbarism, +The holy temple of the perfect man. + +"On every Sabbath-eve I wrote Pauline. +Page after page was burdened with my love, +My glowing hopes of golden days to come, +And frequent boast of rapid progress made. +With hungry heart and eager I devoured +Her letters; I re-read them twenty times. +At morning when I laid the Gospel down +I read her latest answer, and again +At midnight by my lamp I read it over, +And murmuring 'God bless her,' fell asleep +To dream that I was with her under the pines. + +"Thus fled four years--four years of patient toil +Sweetened with love and hope, and I had made +Swift progress in my studies. Master said +Another year would bring me to the bar-- +No fledgeling but full-feathered for the field. +And then her letters ceased. I wrote and wrote +Again, but still no answer. Day after day +The tardy mail-coach lagged a mortal hour, +While I sat listening for its welcome horn; +And when it came I hastened from my books +With hope and fear contending in my soul. +Day after day--no answer--back again +I turned my footsteps with a weary sigh. +It wore upon me and I could not rest; +It gnawed me to the marrow of my bones. +The heavy tomes grew dull and wearisome, +And sometimes hateful;--then I broke away +As from a prison and rushed wildly out +Among the elms along the river-bank-- +Baring my burning temples to the breeze-- +And drank the air of heaven like sparkling wine-- +Conjuring excuses for her;--was she ill? +Perhaps forbidden. Had another heart +Come in between us?--No, that could not be; +She was all constancy and promise-bound. +A month, which seemed to me a laggard year, +Thus wore away. At last a letter came. +O with what springing step I hurried back-- +Back to my private chamber and my desk! +With what delight--what eager, trembling hand-- +The well-known seal that held my hopes I broke! +Thus ran the letter: + + "'Paul, the time has come +When we must both forgive while we forget. +Mine was a girlish fancy. We outgrow +Such childish follies in our later years. +Now I have pondered well and made an end. +I cannot wed myself to want, and curse +My life life-long, because a girlish freak +Of folly made a promise. So--farewell.' + +"My eyes were blind with passion as I read. +I tore the letter into bits and stamped +Upon them, ground my teeth and cursed the day +I met her, to be jilted. All that night +My thoughts ran riot. Round the room I strode +A raving madman--savage as a Sioux; +Then flung myself upon my couch in tears, +And wept in silence, and then stormed again. +'_Beggar!_'--it raised the serpent in my breast-- +Mad pride--bat-blind. I seized her pictured face +And ground it under my heel. With impious hand +I caught the book--the precious gift she gave, +And would have burned it, but that still small voice +Spake in my heart and bade me spare the book. + +"Then with this Gospel clutched in both my hands, +I swore a solemn oath that I would rise, +If God would spare me;--she should see me rise, +And learn what she had lost.--Yes, I would mount +Merely to be revenged. I would not cringe +Down like a spaniel underneath the lash, +But like a man would teach my proud Pauline +And her hard father to repent the day +They called me '_beggar_.' Thus I raved and stormed +That mad night out;--forgot at dawn of morn +This holy book, but fell to a huge tome +And read two hundred pages in a day. +I could not keep the thread of argument; +I could not hold my mind upon the book; +I could not break the silent under-tow +That swept all else from out my throbbing brain +But false Pauline. I read from morn till night, +But having closed the book I could not tell +Aught of its contents. Then I cursed myself, +And muttered--'Fool--can you not shake it off-- +This nightmare of your boyhood?--Brave, indeed-- +Crushed like a spaniel by this false Pauline! +Crushed am I?--By the gods, I'll make an end, +And she shall never know it nettled me!' +So passed the weary days. My cheeks grew thin; +I needed rest, I said, and quit my books +To range the fields and hills with fowling-piece +And '_mal prepense_' toward the feathery flocks. +The pigeons flew from tree-tops o'er my head; +I heard the flap of wings--and they were gone; +The pheasant whizzed from bushes at my feet +Unseen until its sudden whir of wings +Startled and broke my wandering reverie; +And then I whistled and relapsed to dreams, +Wandering I cared not whither--wheresoe'er +My silent gun still bore its primal charge. +So gameless, but with cheeks and forehead tinged +By breeze and sunshine, I returned to books. +But still a phantom haunted all my dreams-- +Awake or sleeping, for awake I dreamed-- +A spectre that I could not chase away-- +The phantom-form of my own false Pauline. + +"Six months wore off--six long and weary months; +Then came a letter from a school-boy friend-- +In answer to the queries I had made-- +Filled with the gossip of my native town. +Unto her father's friend--a bachelor, +Her senior by full twenty years at least-- +Dame Rumor said Pauline had pledged her hand. +I knew him well--a sly and cunning man-- +A honey-tongued, false-hearted flatterer. +And he my rival--carrying off my prize? +But what cared I? 'twas all the same to me-- +Yea, better for the sweet revenge to come. +So whispered pride, but in my secret heart +I cared, and hoped whatever came to pass +She might be happy all her days on earth, +And find a happy haven at the end. + +"My thoughtful master bade me quit my books +A month at least, for I was wearing out. +'Unbend the bow,' he said. His watchful eye +Saw toil and care at work upon my cheeks; +He could not see the canker at my heart, +But he had seen pale students wear away +With overwork the vigor of their lives; +And so he gave me means and bade me go +To romp a month among my native hills. +I went, but not as I had left my home-- +A bashful boy, uncouth and coarsely clad, +But clothed and mannered like a gentleman. + +"My school-boy friend gave me a cordial greeting; +That honest lawyer bade me welcome, too, +And doted on my progress and the advice +He gave me ere I left my native town. +Since first the iron-horse had coursed the vale +Five years had fled--five prosperous, magic years, +And well nigh five since I had left my home. +These prosperous years had wrought upon the place +Their wonders till I hardly knew the town. +The broad and stately blocks of brick that shamed +The weather-beaten wooden shops I knew +Seemed the creation of some magic hand. +Adown the river bank the town had stretched, +Sweeping away the quiet grove of pines +Where I had loved to ramble when a boy +And see the squirrels leap from tree to tree +With reckless venture, hazarding a fall +To dodge the ill-aimed arrows from my bow. +The dear old school-house on the hill was gone: +A costly church, tall-spired and built of stone +Stood in its stead--a monument to man. +Unholy greed had felled the stately pines, +And all the slope was bare and desolate. +Old faces had grown older; some were gone, +And many unfamiliar ones had come. +Boys in their teens had grown to bearded men, +And girls to womanhood, and all was changed, +Save the old cottage-home where I was born. +The elms and butternuts in the meadow-field +Still wore the features of familiar friends; +The English ivy clambered to the roof, +The English willow spread its branches still, +And as I stood before the cottage-door +My heart-pulse quickened, for methought I heard +My mother's footsteps on the ashen floor. + +"The rumor I had heard was verified; +The wedding-day was named and near at hand. +I met my rival: gracious were his smiles: +Glad as a boy that robs the robin's nest +He grasped the hands of half the men he met. +Pauline, I heard, but seldom ventured forth, +Save when her doting father took her out +On Sabbath morns to breathe the balmy air, +And grace with her sweet face his cushioned pew. +The smooth-faced suitor, old dame Gossip said, +Made daily visits to her father's house, +And played the boy at forty years or more, +While she had held him off to draw him on. + +[Illustration] + +"I would not fawn upon the hand that smote; +I would not cringe beneath its cruel blow, +Nor even let her know I cared for it. +I kept aloof--as proud as Lucifer. +But when the church-bells chimed on Sabbath morn +To that proud monument of stone I went-- +Her father's pride, since he had led the list +Of wealthy patrons who had builded it-- +To hear the sermon--for methought Pauline +Would hear it too. Might I not see her face, +And she not know I cared to look upon it? +She came not, and the psalms and sermon fell +Upon me like an autumn-mist of rain. +I met her once by chance upon the street-- +The day before the appointed wedding-day-- +Her and her father--she upon his arm. +'Paul--O Paul!' she said and gave her hand. +I took it with a cold and careless air-- +Begged pardon--had forgotten;--'Ah--Pauline?-- +Yes, I remembered;--five long years ago-- +And I had made so many later friends, +And she had lost so much of maiden bloom!' +Then turning met her father face to face, +Bowed with cold grace and haughtily passed on. +'This is revenge,' I muttered. Even then +My heart ached as I thought of her pale face, +Her pleading eyes, her trembling, clasping hand! +And then and there I would have turned about +To beg her pardon and an interview, +But pride--that serpent ever in my heart-- +Hissed '_beggar_,' and I cursed her with the lips +That oft had poured my love into her ears. +'She marries gold to-morrow--let her wed! +She will not wed a beggar, but I think +She'll wed a life-long sorrow--let her wed! +Aye--aye--I hope she'll live to curse the day +Whereon she broke her sacred promises. +And I forgive her?--yea, but not forget. +I'll take good care that she shall not forget; +I'll prick her memory with a bitter thorn +Through all her future. Let her marry gold!' +Thus ran my muttered words, but in my heart +There ran a counter-current; ere I slept +Its silent under-tow had mastered all-- +'Forgive and be forgiven.' I resolved +That on the morning of her wedding-day +Would I go kindly and forgive Pauline, +And send her to the altar with my blessing. +That night I read a chapter in this book-- +The first for many months, and fell asleep +Beseeching God to bless her. + Then I dreamed +That we were kneeling at my mother's bed-- +Her death-bed, and the feeble, trembling hands +Of her who loved us rested on our heads, +And in a voice all tremulous with tears +My mother said: 'Dear children, love each other; +Bear and forbear, and come to me in heaven.' + +"I wakened once--at midnight--a wild cry-- +'_Paul, O Paul!_' rang through my dreams and broke +My slumber. I arose, but all was still, +And then I, slept again and dreamed till morn. +In all my dreams her dear, sweet face appeared-- +Now radiant as a star, and now all pale-- +Now glad with smiles and now all wet with tears. +Then came a dream that agonized my soul, +While every limb was bound as if in chains. +Methought I saw her in the silent night +Leaning o'er misty waters dark and deep: +A moan--a plash of waters--and, O Christ!-- +Her agonized face upturned--imploring hands +Stretched out toward me, and a wailing cry-- +'_Paul, O Paul!_' Then face and hands went down, +And o'er her closed the deep and dismal flood +Forever--but it could not drown the cry: +'_Paul, O Paul!_' was ringing in my ears; +'_Paul, O Paul!_' was throbbing in my heart; +And moaning, sobbing in my shuddering soul +Trembled the wail of anguish--'_Paul, O Paul!_' + +"Then o'er the waters stole the silver dawn, +And lo a fairy boat with silken sail! +And in the boat an angel at the helm, +And at her feet the form of her I loved. +The white mists parted as the boat sped on +In silence, lessening far and far away. +And then the sunrise glimmered on the sail +A moment, and the angel turned her face: +My mother!--and I gave a joyful cry, +And stretched my hands, but lo the hovering mists +Closed in around them and the vision passed. + +"The morning sun stole through the window-blinds +And fell upon my face and wakened me, +And I lay musing--thinking of Pauline. +Yes, she should know the depths of all my heart-- +The love I bore her all those lonely years; +The hope that held me steadfast to my toil, +And feel the higher and the holier love +Her precious gift had wakened in my soul. +Yea, I would bless her for that precious gift-- +I had not known its treasures but for her, +And O for that would I forgive her all, +And bless the hand that smote me to the soul. +That would be comfort to me all my days, +And if there came a bitter time to her, +'Twould pain her less to know that I forgave. + +"A hasty rapping at my chamber-door; +In came my school-boy friend whose guest I was, +And said: + 'Come, Paul, the town is all ablaze! +A sad--a strange--a marvelous suicide! +Pauline, who was to be a bride to-day, +Was missed at dawn and after sunrise found-- +Traced by her robe and bonnet on the bridge, +Whence she had thrown herself and made an end--' + +"And he went on, but I could hear no more; +It fell upon me like a flash from heaven. +As one with sudden terror dumb, I turned +And in my pillow buried up my face. +Tears came at last, and then my friend passed out +In silence. O the agony of that hour! +O doubts and fears and half-read mysteries +That tore my heart and tortured all my soul! + +"I arose. About the town the wildest tales +And rumors ran; dame Gossip was agog. +Some said she had been ill and lost her mind, +Some whispered hints, and others shook their heads +But none could fathom the marvelous mystery. +Bearing a bitter anguish in my heart, +Half-crazed with dread and doubt and boding fears, +Hour after hour alone, disconsolate, +Among the scenes where we had wandered oft +I wandered, sat where once the stately pines +Domed the fair temple where we learned to love. +O spot of sacred memories--how changed! +Yet chiefly wanting one dear, blushing face +That, in those happy days, made every place +Wherever we might wander--hill or dale-- +Garden of love and peace and happiness. +So heavy-hearted I returned. My friend +Had brought for me a letter with his mail. +I knew the hand upon the envelope-- +With throbbing heart I hastened to my room; +With trembling hands I broke the seal and read. +One sheet inclosed another--one was writ +At midnight by my loved and lost Pauline. +Inclosed within, a letter false and forged, +Signed with my name--such perfect counterfeit, +At sight I would have sworn it was my own. +And thus her letter ran: + + "'Beloved Paul, +May God forgive you as my heart forgives. +Even as a vine that winds about an oak, +Rot-struck and hollow-hearted, for support, +Clasping the sapless branches as it climbs +With tender tendrils and undoubting faith, +I leaned upon your troth; nay, all my hopes-- +My love, my life, my very hope of heaven-- +I staked upon your solemn promises. +I learned to love you better than my God; +My God hath sent me bitter punishment. +O broken pledges! what have I to live +And suffer for? Half mad in my distress, +Yielding at last to father's oft request, +I pledged my hand to one whose very love +Would be a curse upon me all my days. +To-morrow is the promised wedding day; +To morrow!--but to-morrow shall not come! +Come gladlier, death, and make an end of all! +How many weary days and patiently +I waited for a letter, and at last +It came--a message crueler than death. +O take it back!--and if you have a heart +Yet warm to pity her you swore to love, +Read it--and think of those dear promises-- +O sacred as the Savior's promises-- +You whispered in my ear that solemn night +Beneath the pines, and kissed away my tears. +And know that I forgive, belovèd Paul: +Meet me in heaven. God will not frown upon +The sin that saves me from a greater sin, +And sends my soul to Him. Farewell--Farewell.'" + +Here he broke down. Unto his pallid lips +I held a flask of wine. He sipped the wine +And closed his eyes in silence for a time, +Resuming thus: + + "You see the wicked plot. +We both were victims of a crafty scheme +To break our hearts asunder. Forgery +Had done its work and pride had aided it. +The spurious letter was a cruel one-- +Casting her off with utter heartlessness, +And boasting of a later, dearer love, +And begging her to burn the _billets-doux_ +A moon-struck boy had sent her ere he found +That pretty girls were plenty in the world. + +"Think you my soul was roiled with anger?--No;-- +God's hand was on my head. A keen remorse +Gnawed at my heart. O false and fatal pride +That blinded me, else I had seen the plot +Ere all was lost--else I had saved a life +To me most precious of all lives on earth-- +Yea, dearer then than any soul in heaven! +False pride--the ruin of unnumbered souls-- +Thou art the serpent ever tempting me; +God, chastening me, has bruised thy serpent head. +O faithful heart in silence suffering-- +True unto death to one she could but count +A perjured villain, cheated as she was! +Captain, I prayed--'twas all that I could do. +God heard my prayer, and with a solemn heart, +Bearing the letters in my hand, I went +To ask a favor of the man who crushed +And cursed my life--to look upon her face-- +Only to look on her dear face once more. + +"I rung the bell--a servant bade me in. +I waited long. At last the father came-- +All pale and suffering. I could see remorse +Was gnawing at his heart; as I arose +He trembled like a culprit on the drop. +'O, sir,' he said, 'whatever be your quest, +I pray you leave me with my dead to-day; +I cannot look on any living face +Till her dead face is gone forevermore.' + +"'And who hath done this cruel thing?' I said. +'Explain,' he faltered. 'Pray _you_, sir, explain!' +I said, and thrust the letters in his hand. +And as he sat in silence reading hers, +I saw the pangs of conscience on his face; +I saw him tremble like a stricken soul; +And then a tear-drop fell upon his hand; +And there we sat in silence. Then he groaned +And fell upon his knees and hid his face, +And stretched his hand toward me wailing out-- +'I cannot bear this burden on my soul; +O Paul!--O God!--forgive me or I die.' + +"His anguish touched my heart. I took his hand, +And kneeling by him prayed a solemn prayer-- +'Father, forgive him, for he knew not what +He did who broke the bond that bound us twain. +O may her spirit whisper in his ear +Forever--God is love and all is well. + +"The iron man--all bowed and broken down-- +Sobbed like a child. He laid his trembling hand +With many a fervent blessing on my head, +And, with the crust all crumbled from his heart, +Arose and led me to her silent couch; +And I looked in upon my darling dead. +Mine--O mine in heaven forevermore! +God's angel sweetly smiling in her sleep; +How beautiful--how radiant of heaven! +The ring I gave begirt her finger still; +Her golden hair was wreathed with immortelles; +The lips half-parted seemed to move in psalm +Or holy blessing. As I kissed her brow, +It seemed as if her dead cheeks flushed again +As in those happy days beneath the pines; +And as my warm tears fell upon her face, +Methought I heard that dear familiar voice +So full of love and faith and calmest peace, +So near and yet so far and far away, +So mortal, yet so spiritual--like an air +Of softest music on the slumbering bay +Wafted on midnight wings to silent shores, +When myriad stars are twinkling in the sea: + +[Illustration: 'AND I LOOKED IN UPON MY DARLING DEAD.'] + +"'_Paul, O Paul, forgive and be forgiven; +Earth is all trial;--there is peace in heaven_.' + +"Aye, Captain, in that sad and solemn hour +I laid my hand upon the arm of Christ, +And he hath led me all the weary way +To this last battle. I shall win through Him; +And ere you hear the _reveille_ again +Paul and Pauline, amid the psalms of heaven, +Embraced will kneel and at the feet of God +Receive His benediction. Let me sleep. +You know the rest;--I'm weary and must sleep. +An angel's bugle-blast will waken me, +But not to pain, for there is peace in heaven." + +He slept, but not the silent sleep of death. +I felt his fitful pulse and caught anon +The softly-whispered words "_Pauline_," and "_Peace_." +Anon he clutched with eager, nervous hand, +And in hoarse whisper shouted--"_Steady, men_!" +Then sunk again. Thus passed an hour or more +And he woke, half-raised himself and said +With feeble voice and eyes strange luster-lit: + +"Captain, my boat is swiftly sailing out +Into the misty and eternal sea +From out whose waste no mortal craft returns. +The fog is closing round me and the mist +Is damp and cold upon my hands and face. +Why should I fear?--the loved have gone before: +I seem to hear the plash of coming oars; +The mists are lifting and the boat is near. +'Tis well. To die as I am dying now-- +A soldier's death amid the gladsome shouts +Of victory for which my puny hands +Did their full share, albeit it was small, +Was all my late ambition. Bring the Flag, +And hold it over my head. Let me die thus +Under the stars I've followed. Dear old Flag--" + +But here his words became inaudible, +As in the mazes of the Mammoth Cave, +Fainter and fainter on the listening ear, +The low, retreating voices die away. +His eyes were closed; a gentle smile of peace +Sat on his face. I held his nerveless hand, +And bent my ear to catch his latest breath; +And as the spirit fled the pulseless clay, +I heard--or thought I heard--his wonder-words-- +"_Pauline,--how beautiful!_" + + As I arose +The gray dawn paled the shadows in the east. + + + + +THE SEA-GULL.[1] + +THE LEGEND OF THE PICTURED ROCKS OF LAKE SUPERIOR. OJIBWAY + + +_In the measure of Hiawatha._ + +[The numerals refer to Notes to The Sea-Gull, in Appendix.] + + +On the shore of Gitchee Gumee[2]-- +Deep, mysterious, mighty waters-- +Where the mânitoes--the spirits-- +Ride the storms and speak in thunder, +In the days of Némè-Shómis,[3] +In the days that are forgotten, +Dwelt a tall and tawny hunter-- +Gitchee Péz-ze-u the Panther, +Son of Waub-Ojeeg,[4] the warrior, +Famous Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior. +Strong was he and fleet as roebuck, +Brave was he and very stealthy; +On the deer crept like a panther; +Grappled with Makwâ,[5] the monster, +Grappled with the bear and conquered; +Took his black claws for a necklet, +Took his black hide for a blanket. + +When the Panther wed the Sea-Gull, +Young was he and very gladsome; +Fair was she and full of laughter; +Like the robin in the spring-time, +Sang from sunrise till the sunset; +For she loved the handsome hunter. +Deep as Gitchee Gumee's waters +Was her love--as broad and boundless; +And the wedded twain were happy-- +Happy as the mated robins. +When their first-born saw the sunlight +Joyful was the heart of Panther, +Proud and joyful was the mother. +All the days were full of sunshine, +All the nights were full of starlight. +Nightly from the land of spirits +On them smiled the starry faces-- +Faces of their friends departed. +Little moccasins she made him, +Feathered cap and belt of wampum; +From the hide of fawn a blanket, +Fringed with feathers, soft as sable; +Singing at her pleasant labor, +By her side the tekenâgun, [6] +And the little hunter in it, +Oft the Panther smiled and fondled, +Smiled upon the babe and mother, +Frolicked with the boy and fondled, +Tall he grew and like his father, +And they called the boy the Raven-- +Called him Kâk-kâh-gè--the Raven. +Happy hunter was the Panther. +From the woods he brought the pheasant, +Brought the red deer and the rabbit, +Brought the trout from Gitchee Gumee-- +Brought the mallard from the marshes-- +Royal feast for boy and mother: +Brought the hides of fox and beaver, +Brought the skins of mink and otter, +Lured the loon and took his blanket, +Took his blanket for the Raven. +Winter swiftly followed winter, +And again the tekenâgun +Held a babe--a tawny daughter, +Held a dark-eyed, dimpled daughter; +And they called her Waub-omeé-meé +Thus they named her--the White-Pigeon. +But as winter followed winter +Cold and sullen grew the Panther; +Sat and smoked his pipe in silence; +When he spoke he spoke in anger; +In the forest often tarried +Many days, and homeward turning, +Brought no game unto his wigwam; +Only brought his empty quiver, +Brought his dark and sullen visage. + +Sad at heart and very lonely +Sat the Sea-Gull in the wigwam; +Sat and swung the tekenâgun +Sat and sang to Waub-omeé-meé: +Thus she sang to Waub-omeé-meé, +Thus the lullaby she chanted: + + Wâ-wa, wâ-wa, wâ-we-yeà; + Kah-wéen, nee-zhéka kè-diaus-âi, + Ke-gáh nau-wâi, ne-mé-go s'wéen, + Ne-bâun, ne-bâun, ne-dâun-is âis, + Wâ-wa, wâ-wa, wâ-we-yeà; + Ne-bâun, ne-bâun, ne-dâun-is-âis, + E-we wâ-wa, wâ-we-yeà, + E-we wâ-wa, wâ-we-yeà. + + TRANSLATION + + Swing, swing, little one, lullaby; + Thou'rt not left alone to weep; + Mother cares for you--she is nigh; + Sleep, my little one, sweetly sleep; + Swing, swing, little one, lullaby; + Mother watches you--she is nigh; + Gently, gently, wee one, swing; + Gently, gently, while I sing + E-we wâ-wa--lullaby, + E-we wâ-wa--lullaby. + +Homeward to his lodge returning +Kindly greeting found the hunter, +Fire to warm and food to nourish, +Golden trout from Gitchee Gumee, +Caught by Kâh-kâh-gè--the Raven. +With a snare he caught the rabbit-- +Caught Wabóse,[7] the furry-footed, +Caught Penây,[7] the forest-drummer; +Sometimes with his bow and arrows, +Shot the red deer in the forest, +Shot the squirrel in the pine-top, +Shot Ne-kâ, the wild-goose, flying. +Proud as Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior, +To the lodge he bore his trophies. +So when homeward turned the Panther, +Ever found he food provided, +Found the lodge-fire brightly burning, +Found the faithful Sea-Gull waiting. +"You are cold," she said, "and famished; +Here are fire and food, my husband." +Not by word or look he answered; +Only ate the food provided, +Filled his pipe and pensive puffed it, +Sat and smoked in sullen silence. +Once--her dark eyes full of hunger-- +Thus she spoke and thus besought him: +"Tell me, O my silent Panther, +Tell me, O beloved husband, +What has made you sad and sullen? +Have you met some evil spirit-- +Met some goblin in the forest? +Has he put a spell upon you-- +Filled your heart with bitter waters, +That you sit so sad and sullen, +Sit and smoke, but never answer, +Only when the storm is on you?" + +Gruffly then the Panther answered: +"Brave among the brave is Panther +Son of Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior, +And the brave are ever silent; +But a whining dog is woman, +Whining ever like a coward." +Forth into the tangled forest, +Threading through the thorny thickets, +Treading trails on marsh and meadow, +Sullen strode the moody hunter. +Saw he not the bear or beaver, +Saw he not the elk or roebuck; +From his path the red fawn scampered, +But no arrow followed after; +From his den the sly wolf listened, +But no twang of bow-string heard he. +Like one walking in his slumber, +Listless, dreaming, walked the Panther; +Surely had some witch bewitched him, +Some bad spirit of the forest. + +When the Sea-Gull wed the Panther, +Fair was she and full of laughter; +Like the robin in the spring-time, +Sang from sunrise till the sunset; +But the storms of many winters +Sifted frost upon her tresses, +Seamed her tawny face with wrinkles. +Not alone the storms of winters +Seamed her tawny face with wrinkles. +Twenty winters for the Panther +Had she ruled the humble wigwam; +For her haughty lord and master +Borne the burdens on the journey, +Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire, +Tanned the skins of bear and beaver, +Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer; +Made him moccasins and leggins, +Decked his hood with quills and feathers-- +Colored quills of Kaug,[8] the thorny, +Feathers from Kenéw,[8] the eagle. +For a warrior brave was Panther; +Often had he met the foemen, +Met the bold and fierce Dakotas, +Westward on the war-path met them; +And the scalps he won were numbered, +Numbered seven by Kenéw-feathers. +Sad at heart was Sea-Gull waiting, +Watching, waiting in the wigwam; +Not alone the storms of winters +Sifted frost upon her tresses. + +Ka-be-bón-ík-ka, the mighty,[9] +He that sends the cruel winter, +He that turned to stone the Giant, +From the distant Thunder-mountain, +Far across broad Gitchee Gumee, +Sent his warning of the winter, +Sent the white frost and Kewâydin,[10] +Sent the swift and hungry North-wind. +Homeward to the South the Summer +Turned and fled the naked forests. +With the Summer flew the robin, +Flew the bobolink and blue-bird. +Flock-wise following chosen leaders, +Like the shaftless heads of arrows +Southward cleaving through the ether, +Soon the wild-geese followed after. +One long moon the Sea-Gull waited, +Watched and waited for her husband, +Till at last she heard his footsteps, +Heard him coming through the thicket. +Forth she went to met her husband, +Joyful went to greet her husband. +Lo behind the haughty hunter, +Closely following in his footsteps, +Walked a young and handsome woman, +Walked the Red Fox from the island-- +Gitchee Ménis the Grand Island-- +Followed him into the wigwam, +Proudly took her seat beside him. +On the Red Fox smiled the hunter, +On the hunter smiled the woman. + +Old and wrinkled was the Sea-Gull, +Good and true, but old and wrinkled. +Twenty winters for the Panther +Had she ruled the humble wigwam, +Borne the burdens on the journey, +Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire, +Tanned the skins of bear and beaver, +Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer, +Made him moccasins and leggins, +Decked his hood with quills and feathers, +Colored quills of Kaug, the thorny, +Feathers from the great war-eagle; +Ever diligent and faithful, +Ever patient, ne'er complaining. +But like all brave men the Panther +Loved a young and handsome woman; +So he dallied with the danger, +Dallied with the fair Algónkin,[11] +Till a magic mead she gave him, +Brewed of buds of birch and cedar.[12] +Madly then he loved the woman; +Then she ruled him, then she held him +Tangled in her raven tresses, +Tied and tangled in her tresses. + +Ah, the tall and tawny Panther! +Ah, the brave and brawny Panther! +Son of Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior! +With a slender hair she led him, +With a slender hair she drew him, +Drew him often to her wigwam; +There she bound him, there she held him +Tangled in her raven tresses, +Tied and tangled in her tresses. +Ah, the best of men are tangled-- +Sometimes tangled in the tresses +Of a fair and crafty woman. + +So the Panther wed the Red Fox, +And she followed to his wigwam. +Young again he seemed and gladsome, +Glad as Raven when the father +Made his first bow from the elm-tree, +From the ash-tree made his arrows, +Taught him how to aim his arrows, +How to shoot Wabóse--the rabbit. +Then again the brawny hunter +Brought the black bear and the beaver, +Brought the haunch of elk and red-deer, +Brought the rabbit and the pheasant-- +Choicest bits of all for Red Fox. +For her robes he brought the sable, +Brought the otter and the ermine, +Brought the black-fox tipped with silver. + +But the Sea-Gull murmured never, +Not a word she spoke in anger, +Went about her work as ever, +Tanned the skins of bear and beaver, +Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer, +Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire, +Gathered rushes from the marshes; +Deftly into mats she wove them; +Kept the lodge as bright as ever. +Only to herself she murmured, +All alone with Waub-omeé-meé, +On the tall and toppling highland, +O'er the wilderness of waters; +Murmured to the murmuring waters, +Murmured to the Nébe-nâw-baigs-- +To the spirits of the waters; +On the wild waves poured her sorrow. +Save the infant on her bosom +With her dark eyes wide with wonder, +None to hear her but the spirits, +And the murmuring pines above her. +Thus she cast away her burdens, +Cast her burdens on the waters; +Thus unto the good Great Spirit, +Made her lowly lamentation: +"Wahonówin!--showiness![13] +Gitchee Mânito, benâ-nin! +Nah, Ba-bâ, showâin neméshin! +Wahonówin!--Wahonówin!" + +Ka-be-bón-ík-ka,[9] the mighty, +He that sends the cruel winter, +From the distant Thunder-mountain +On the shore of Gitchee Gumee, +On the rugged northern border, +Sent his solemn, final warning, +Sent the white wolves of the Nor'land.[14] +Like the dust of stars in ether-- +In the Pathway of the Spirits,[15] +Like the sparkling dust of diamonds, +Fell the frost upon the forest, +On the mountains and the meadows, +On the wilderness of woodland, +On the wilderness of waters. +All the lingering fowls departed-- +All that seek the South in winter, +All but Shingebís, the diver;[16] +He defies the Winter-maker, +Sits and laughs at Winter-maker. + +Ka-be-bón-ík-ka, the mighty, +From his wigwam called Kewâydin-- +From his home among the icebergs, +From the sea of frozen waters, +Called the swift and hungry North-wind. +Then he spread his mighty pinions +Over all the land and shook them. +Like the white down of Waubésè[17] +Fell the feathery snow and covered +All the marshes and the meadows, +All the hill-tops and the highlands. +Then old Péböán[18]--the winter-- +Laughed along the stormy waters, +Danced upon the windy headlands, +On the storm his white hair streaming, +And his steaming breath, ascending, +On the pine-tops and the cedars +Fell in frosty mists of silver, +Sprinkling spruce and fir with silver, +Sprinkling all the woods with silver. + +By the lodge-fire all the winter +Sat the Sea-Gull and the Red Fox, +Sat and kindly spoke and chatted, +Till the twain seemed friends together. +Friends they seemed in word and action, +But within the breast of either +Smoldered still the baneful embers-- +Fires of jealousy and hatred-- +Like a camp-fire in the forest +Left by hunters and deserted; +Only seems a bed of ashes, +But the East wind, Wâbun-noódin, +Scatters through the woods the ashes, +Fans to flame the sleeping embers, +And the wild-fire roars and rages, +Roars and rages through the forest. +So the baneful embers smoldered, +Smoldered in the breast of either. +From the far-off Sunny Islands, +From the pleasant land of Summer, +Where the spirits of the blessed +Feel no more the fangs of hunger, +Or the cold breath of Kewâydin, +Came a stately youth and handsome, +Came Según,[19] the foe of Winter. +Like the rising sun his face was, +Like the shining stars his eyes were, +Light his footsteps as the Morning's, +In his hand were buds and blossoms, +On his brow a blooming garland. +Straightway to the icy wigwam +Of old Péböán, the Winter, +Strode Según and quickly entered. +There old Péböán sat and shivered, +Shivered o'er his dying lodge-fire. + +"Ah, my son, I bid you welcome; +Sit and tell me your adventures; +I will tell you of my power; +We will pass the night together." +Thus spake Péböán--the Winter; +Then he filled his pipe and lighted; +Then by sacred custom raised it +To the spirits in the ether; +To the spirits in the caverns +Of the hollow earth he lowered it. +Thus he passed it to the spirits, +And the unseen spirits puffed it. +Next himself old Péböán honored; +Thrice he puffed his pipe and passed it, +Passed it to the handsome stranger. + +"Lo I blow my breath," said Winter, +"And the laughing brooks are silent. +Hard as flint become the waters, +And the rabbit runs upon them." + +Then Según, the fair youth, answered: +"Lo I breathe upon the hillsides, +On the valleys and the meadows, +And behold as if by magic-- +By the magic of the spirits, +Spring the flowers and tender grasses." + +Then old Péböán replying: +"_Nah!_[20] I breathe upon the forests, +And the leaves fall sere and yellow; +Then I shake my locks and snow falls, +Covering all the naked landscape." + +Then Según arose and answered: +"_Nashké!_[20]--see!--I shake my ringlets; +On the earth the warm rain falleth, +And the flowers look up like children +Glad-eyed from their mother's bosom. +Lo my voice recalls the robin, +Brings the bobolink and bluebird, +And the woods are full of music. +With my breath I melt their fetters, +And the brooks leap laughing onward." + +Then old Péböán looked upon him, +Looked and knew Según, the Summer. +From his eyes the big tears started +And his boastful tongue was silent. +Now Keezís--the great life-giver, +From his wigwam in Waubú-nong[21] +Rose and wrapped his shining blanket +Round his giant form and started, +Westward started on his journey, +Striding on from hill to hill-top. +Upward then he climbed the ether-- +On the Bridge of Stars[22] he traveled, +Westward traveled on his journey +To the far-off Sunset Mountains-- +To the gloomy land of shadows. + +On the lodge-poles sang the robin-- +And the brooks began to murmur. +On the South-wind floated fragrance +Of the early buds and blossoms. +From old Péböán's eyes the tear-drops +Down his pale face ran in streamlets; +Less and less he grew in stature +Till he melted down to nothing; +And behold, from out the ashes, +From the ashes of his lodge-fire, +Sprang the Miscodeed[23] and, blushing, +Welcomed Según to the North-land. + +So from Sunny Isles returning, +From the Summer-Land of spirits, +On the poles of Panther's wigwam +Sang Opeé-chee--sang the robin. +In the maples cooed the pigeons-- +Cooed and wooed like silly lovers. +"Hah!--hah!" laughed the crow derisive, +In the pine-top, at their folly-- +Laughed and jeered the silly lovers. +Blind with love were they, and saw not; +Deaf to all but love, and heard not; +So they cooed and wooed unheeding, +Till the gray hawk pounced upon them, +And the old crow shook with laughter. + +[Illustration: SEGUN AND PEBOAN] + +On the tall cliff by the sea-shore +Red Fox made a swing. She fastened +Thongs of moose-hide to the pine-tree, +To the strong arm of the pine-tree. +Like a hawk, above the waters, +There she swung herself and fluttered, +Laughing at the thought of danger, +Swung and fluttered o'er the waters. +Then she bantered Sea-Gull, saying, +"See!--I swing above the billows! +Dare you swing above the billows-- +Swing like me above the billows?" + +To herself said Sea-Gull--"Surely +I will dare whatever danger +Dares the Red Fox--dares my rival; +She shall never call me coward." +So she swung above the waters-- +Dizzy height above the waters, +Pushed and aided by her rival, +To and fro with reckless daring, +Till the strong tree rocked and trembled, +Rocked and trembled with its burden. +As above the yawning billows +Flew the Sea-Gull like a whirlwind, +Red Fox, swifter than red lightning, +Cut the thongs, and headlong downward, +Like an osprey from the ether, +Like a wild-goose pierced with arrows, +Fluttering fell the frantic woman, +Fluttering fell into the waters-- +Plunged and sunk beneath the waters! +Hark!--the wailing of the West-wind! +Hark!--the wailing of the waters, +And the beating of the billows! +But no more the voice of Sea-Gull. + +[Illustration: FLUTTERING FELL THE FRANTIC WOMAN] + +In the wigwam sat the Red Fox, +Hushed the wail of Waub-omeé-meé, +Weeping for her absent mother. +With the twinkling stars the hunter +From the forest came and Raven. +"Sea-Gull wanders late," said Red Fox, +"Late she wanders by the sea-shore, +And some evil may befall her." +In the misty morning twilight +Forth went Panther and the Raven, +Searched the forest and the marshes, +Searched for leagues along the lake-shore, +Searched the islands and the highlands; +But they found no trace or tidings, +Found no track in marsh or meadow, +Found no trail in fen or forest, +On the shore-sand found no footprints. +Many days they sought and found not. +Then to Panther spoke the Raven: +"She is in the Land of Spirits-- +Surely in the Land of Spirits. +High at midnight I beheld her-- +Like a flying star beheld her-- +To the waves of Gitchee Gumee +Downward flashing through the ether. +Thus she flashed that I might see her, +See and know my mother's spirit; +Thus she pointed to the waters, +And beneath them lies her body, +In the wigwam of the spirits-- +In the lodge of Nebe-nâw-baigs."[24] + +Then spoke Panther to the Raven: +"On the tall cliff by the waters +Wait and watch with Waub-omeé-meé. +If the Sea-Gull hear the wailing +Of her infant she will answer." + +On the tall cliff by the waters +So the Raven watched and waited; +All the day he watched and waited, +But the hungry infant slumbered, +Slumbered by the side of Raven, +Till the pines' gigantic shadows +Stretched and pointed to Waubú-nong[21]-- +To the far-off land of Sunrise; +Then the wee one woke and, famished, +Made a long and piteous wailing. + +From afar where sky and waters +Meet in misty haze and mingle, +Straight toward the rocky highland, +Straight as flies the feathered arrow, +Straight to Raven and the infant, +Swiftly flew a snow-white sea-gull-- +Flew and touched the earth a woman. +And behold, the long-lost mother +Caught her wailing child and nursed her, +Sang a lullaby and nursed her. + +Thrice was wound a chain of silver +Round her waist and strongly fastened. +Far away into the waters-- +To the wigwam of the spirits-- +To the lodge of Nebe-nâw-baigs-- +Stretched the magic chain of silver. +Spoke the mother to the Raven: +"O my son--my brave young hunter, +Feed my tender little orphan; +Be a father to my orphan; +Be a mother to my orphan-- +For the crafty Red Fox robbed us-- +Robbed the Sea-Gull of her husband, +Robbed the infant of her mother. +From this cliff the treacherous woman +Headlong into Gitchee Gumee +Plunged the mother of my orphan. +Then a Nebe-nâw-baig caught me-- +Chief of all the Nebe-nâw-baigs-- +Took me to his shining wigwam, +In the cavern of the waters, +Deep beneath the mighty waters. +All below is burnished copper, +All above is burnished silver +Gemmed with amethyst and agates. +As his wife the Spirit holds me; +By this silver chain he holds me. + +"When my little one is famished, +When with long and piteous wailing +Cries the orphan for her mother, +Hither bring her, O my Raven; +I will hear her--I will answer. +Now the Nebe-nâw-baig calls me-- +Pulls the chain--I must obey him." +Thus she spoke, and in the twinkling +Of a star the spirit-woman +Changed into a snow-white sea-gull, +Spread her wings and o'er the waters +Swiftly flew and swiftly vanished. +Then in secret to the Panther +Raven told his tale of wonder. +Sad and sullen was the hunter; +Sorrow gnawed his heart like hunger; +All the old love came upon him, +And the new love was a hatred. +Hateful to his heart was Red Fox, +But he kept from her the secret-- +Kept his knowledge of the murder. +Vain was she and very haughty-- +Oge-mâ-kwa[25] of the wigwam. +All in vain her fond caresses +On the Panther now she lavished; +When she smiled his face was sullen, +When she laughed he frowned upon her; +In her net of raven tresses +Now no more she held him tangled. +Now through all her fair disguises +Panther saw an evil spirit, +Saw the false heart of the woman. + +On the tall cliff o'er the waters +Raven sat with Waub-omeé-meé, +Sat and watched again and waited, +Till the wee one, faint and famished, +Made a long and piteous wailing. +Then again the snow-white Sea-Gull, +From afar where sky and waters +Meet in misty haze and mingle, +Straight toward the rocky highland, +Straight as flies the feathered arrow, +Straight to Raven and the infant, +With the silver chain around her, +Flew and touched the earth a woman. +In her arms she caught her infant-- +Caught the wailing Waub-omeé-meé, +Sang a lullaby and nursed her. +Sprang the Panther from the thicket-- +Sprang and broke the chain of silver! +With his tomahawk he broke it. +Thus he freed the willing Sea-Gull-- +From the Water-Spirit freed her, +From the Chief of Nebe-nâw-baigs. + +Very angry was the Spirit; +When he drew the chain of silver, +Drew and found that it was broken, +Found that he had lost the woman, +Very angry was the Spirit. +Then he raged beneath the waters, +Raged and smote the mighty waters, +Till the big sea boiled and bubbled, +Till the white-haired, bounding billows +Roared around the rocky headlands, +Rolled and roared upon the shingle. + +To the wigwam happy Panther, +As when first he wooed and won her +Led his wife--as young and handsome. +For the waves of Gitchee Gumee +Washed away the frost and wrinkles, +And the spirits by their magic +Made her young and fair forever. + +In the wigwam sat the Red Fox, +Sat and sang a song of triumph, +For she little dreamed of danger, +Till the haughty hunter entered, +Followed by the happy mother, +Holding in her arms her infant. +When the Red Fox saw the Sea-Gull-- +Saw the dead a living woman, +One wild cry she gave despairing, +One wild cry as of a demon. +Up she sprang and from the wigwam +To the tall cliff flew in terror; +Frantic sprang upon the margin, +Frantic plunged into the waters, +Headlong plunged into the waters. + +Dead she tossed upon the billows; +For the Nebe-nâw-baigs knew her, +Knew the crafty, wicked woman, +And they cast her from the waters, +Spurned her from their shining wigwams; +Far away upon the shingle +With the roaring waves they cast her. +There upon her bloated body +Fed the cawing crows and ravens, +Fed the hungry wolves and foxes. + +On the shore of Gitchee Gumee, +Ever young and ever handsome, +Long and happy lived the Sea-Gull, +Long and happy with the Panther. +Evermore the happy hunter +Loved the mother of his children. +Like a red star many winters +Blazed their lodge-fire on the sea-shore. +O'er the Bridge of Souls[26] together +Walked the Sea-Gull and the Panther. +To the far-off Sunny Islands-- +To the Summer-Land of Spirits, +Sea-Gull journeyed with her husband-- +Where no more the happy hunter +Feels the fangs of frost or famine, +Or the keen blasts of Kewâydin, +Where no pain or sorrow enters, +And no crafty, wicked woman. +There she rules his lodge forever, +And the twain are very happy, +On the far-off Sunny Islands, +In the Summer-Land of Spirits. +On the rocks of Gitchee Gumee-- +On the Pictured Rocks--the legend +Long ago was traced and written, +Pictured by the Water-Spirits; +But the storms of many winters +Have bedimmed the pictured story, +So that none can read the legend +But the Jossakeeds,[27] the prophets. + +POETRY. + + +I had rather write one word upon the rock +Of ages than ten thousand in the sand. +The rock of ages! lo I cannot reach +Its lofty shoulders with my puny hand: +I can but touch the sands about its feet. +Yea, I have painted pictures for the blind, +And sung my sweetest songs to ears of stone. +What matter if the dust of ages drift +Five fathoms deep above my grave unknown, +For I have sung and loved the songs I sung. +Who sings for fame the Muses may disown; +Who sings for gold will sing an idle song; +But he who sings because sweet music springs +Unbidden from his heart and warbles long, +May haply touch another heart unknown. +There is sweeter poetry in the hearts of men +Than ever poet wrote or minstrel sung; +For words are clumsy wings for burning thought. +The full heart falters on the stammering tongue, +And silence is more eloquent than song +When tender souls are wrung by grief or shameful wrong. + +The grandest poem is God's Universe: +In measured rhythm the planets whirl their course: +Rhythm swells and throbs in every sun and star, +In mighty ocean's organ-peals and roar, +In billows bounding on the harbor-bar, +In the blue surf that rolls upon the shore, +In the low zephyr's sigh, the tempest's sob, +In the rain's patter and the thunder's roar; +Aye, in the awful earthquake's shuddering throb, +When old Earth cracks her bones and trembles to her core. + +I hear a piper piping on a reed +To listening flocks of sheep and bearded goats; +I hear the larks shrill-warbling o'er the mead +Their silver sonnets from their golden throats; +And in my boyhood's clover-fields I hear +The twittering swallows and the hum of bees. +Ah, sweeter to my heart and to my ear +Than any idyl poet ever sung, +The low, sweet music of their melodies; +Because I listened when my soul was young, +In those dear meadows under maple trees. +My heart they molded when its clay was moist, +And all my life the hum of honey-bees +Hath waked in me a spirit that rejoiced, +And touched the trembling chords of tenderest memories. + +I hear loud voices and a clamorous throng +With braying bugles and with bragging drums-- +Bards and bardies laboring at a song. +One lifts his locks, above the rest preferred, +And to the buzzing flies of fashion thrums +A banjo. Lo him follow all the herd. +When Nero's wife put on her auburn wig, +And at the Coliseum showed her head, +The hair of every dame in Rome turned red; +When Nero fiddled all Rome danced a jig. +Novelty sets the gabbling geese agape, +And fickle fashion follows like an ape. +Aye, brass is plenty; gold is scarce and dear; +Crystals abound, but diamonds still are rare. +Is this the golden age, or the age of gold? +Lo by the page or column fame is sold. +Hear the big journal braying like an ass; +Behold the brazen statesmen as they pass; +See dapper poets hurrying for their dimes +With hasty verses hammered out in rhymes: +The Muses whisper--'"Tis the age of brass." +Workmen are plenty, but the masters few-- +Fewer to-day than in the days of old. +Rare blue-eyed pansies peeping pearled with dew, +And lilies lifting up their heads of gold, +Among the gaudy cockscombs I behold, +And here and there a lotus in the shade; +And under English oaks a rose that ne'er will fade. + +Fair barks that flutter in the sun your sails, +Piping anon to gay and tented shores +Sweet music and low laughter, it is well +Ye hug the haven when the tempest roars, +For only stalwart ships of oak or steel +May dare the deep and breast the billowy sea +When sweeps the thunder-voiced, dark hurricane, +And the mad ocean shakes his shaggy mane, +And roars through all his grim and vast immensity. + +The stars of heaven shine not till it is dark. +Seven cities strove for Homer's bones, 'tis said, +"Through which the living Homer begged for bread." +When in their coffins they lay dumb and stark +Shakespeare began to live, Dante to sing, +And Poe's sweet lute began its werbelling. +Rear monuments of fame or flattery-- +Think ye their sleeping souls are made aware? +Heap o'er their heads sweet praise or calumny-- +Think ye their moldering ashes hear or care? +Nay, praise and fame are by the living sought; +But he is wise who scorns their flattery, +And who escapes the tongue of calumny +May count himself an angel or a naught: +Lo over Byron's grave a maggot writhes distraught. + +Genius is patience, labor and good sense. +Steel and the mind grow bright by frequent use; +In rest they rust. A goodly recompense +Comes from hard toil, but not from its abuse. +The slave, the idler, are alike unblessed; +Aye, in loved labor only is there rest. +But he will read and range and rhyme in vain +Who hath no dust of diamonds in his brain; +And untaught genius is a gem undressed. +The life of man is short, but Art is long, +And labor is the lot of mortal man, +Ordained by God since human time began: +Day follows day and brings its toil and song. +Behind the western mountains sinks the moon, +The silver dawn steals in upon the dark, +Up from the dewy meadow wheels the lark +And trills his welcome to the rising sun, +And lo another day of labor is begun. + +Poets are born, not made, some scribbler said, +And every rhymester thinks the saying true: +Better unborn than wanting labor's aid: +Aye, all great poets--all great men--are made +Between the hammer and the anvil. Few +Have the true metal, many have the fire. +No slave or savage ever proved a bard; +Men have their bent, but labor its reward, +And untaught fingers cannot tune the lyre. +The poet's brain with spirit-vision teems; +The voice of nature warbles in his heart; +A sage, a seer, he moves from men apart, +And walks among the shadows of his dreams; +He sees God's light that in all nature beams; +And when he touches with the hand of art +The song of nature welling from his heart, +And guides it forth in pure and limpid streams, +Truth sparkles in the song and like a diamond gleams. + +Time and patience change the mulberry-leaf +To shining silk; the lapidary's skill +Makes the rough diamond sparkle at his will, +And cuts a gem from quartz or coral-reef. +Better a skillful cobbler at his last +Than unlearned poet twangling on the lyre; +Who sails on land and gallops on the blast, +And mounts the welkin on a braying ass, +Clattering a shattered cymbal bright with brass, +And slips his girth and tumbles in the mire. +All poetry must be, if it be true, +Like the keen arrows of the--Grecian god +Apollo, that caught fire as they flew. +Ah, such was Byron's, but alas he trod +Ofttimes among the brambles and the rue, +And sometimes dived full deep and brought up mud. +But when he touched with tears, as only he +Could touch, the tender chords of sympathy, +His coldest critics warmed and marveled much, +And all old England's heart throbbed to his thrilling touch. + +Truth is the touchstone of all genius Art, +In poet, painter, sculptor, is the same: +What cometh from the heart goes to the heart, +What comes from effort only is but tame. +Nature the only perfect artist is: +Who studies Nature may approach her skill; +Perfection hers, but never can be his, +Though her sweet voice his very marrow thrill; +The finest works of art are Nature's shadows still. + +Look not for faultless men or faultless art; +Small faults are ever virtue's parasites: +As in a picture shadows show the lights, +So human foibles show a human heart. + +O while I live and linger on the brink +Let the dear Muses be my company; +Their nectared goblets let my parched lips drink; +Ah, let me drink the _soma_ of their lips! +As humming-bird the lily's nectar sips, +Or _Houris_ sip the wine of Salsabil. +Aye, let me to their throbbing music thrill, +And let me never for one moment think, +Although no laurel crown my constancy, +Their gracious smiles are false, their dearest kiss a lie. + + + + +TWENTY YEARS AGO + + +I am growing old and weary + Ere yet my locks are gray; +Before me lies eternity, + Behind me--but a day. +How fast the years are vanishing! + They melt like April snow: +It seems to me but yesterday-- + Twenty years ago. + +There's the school-house on the hill-side, + And the romping scholars all; +Where we used to con our daily tasks, + And play our games of ball. +They rise to me in visions-- + In sunny dreams--and ho' +I sport among the boys and girls + Twenty years ago. + +We played at ball in summer time-- + We boys--with hearty will; +With merry shouts in winter time + We coasted on the hill. +We would choose our chiefs, divide in bands, + And build our forts of snow, +And storm those forts right gallantly-- + Twenty years ago. + +Last year in June I visited + That dear old sacred spot, +But the school-house on the hill-side + And the merry shouts were not. +A church was standing where it stood; + I looked around, but no-- +I could not see the boys and girls + Of twenty years ago. + +There was sister dear, and brother, + Around the old home-hearth; +And a tender, Christian mother, + Too angel-like for earth. +She used to warn me from the paths + Where thorns and brambles grow, +And lead me in the "narrow way"-- + Twenty years ago. + +I loved her and I honored her + Through all my boyhood years; +I knew her joys--I knew her cares-- + I knew her hopes and fears. +But alas, one autumn morning + She left her home below, +And she left us there a-weeping-- + Twenty years ago. + +They bore her to the church-yard, + With slow and solemn pace; +And there I took my last fond look + On her dear, peaceful face. +They lowered her in her silent grave, + While we bowed our heads in woe, +And they heaped the sods above her head-- + Twenty years ago. + +That low, sweet voice--my mother's voice-- + I never can forget; +And in those loving eyes I see + The big tears trembling yet. +I try to tread the "narrow way;" + I stumble oft I know: +I miss--how much!--the helping hand + Of twenty years ago. + +Mary--(Mary I will call you-- + 'Tis not the old-time name) +Sainted Mary--blue-eyed Mary-- + Are you in heaven the same? +Are your eyes as bright and beautiful, + Your cheeks as full of glow, +As when the school-boy kissed you, May, + Twenty years ago? + +How we swung upon the grape-vine + Down by the Genesee; + And I caught the speckled trout for you, + While you gathered flowers for me: + How we rambled o'er the meadows + With brows and cheeks aglow, + And hearts like God's own angels-- + Twenty years ago. + +[Illustration: HOW, WE SWUNG UPON THE GRAPE-VINE DOWN BY THE GENESEE, +AND I CAUGHT THE SPECKLED TROUT FOR YOU, WHILE YOU GATHERED FLOWERS FOR +ME] + +How our young hearts grew together + Until they beat as one; +Distrust it could not enter; + Cares and fears were none. +All my love was yours, dear Mary, + 'Twas boyish love, I know; +But I ne'er have loved as then I loved-- + Twenty years ago. + +How we pictured out the future-- + The golden coming years, +And saw no cloud in all our sky, + No gloomy mist of tears; +But ah--how vain are human hopes! + The angels came--and O-- +They bore my darling up to heaven-- + Twenty years ago. + +I will not tell--I cannot tell-- + What anguish wrung my soul; +But a silent grief is on my heart + Though the years so swiftly roll; +And I cannot shake it off, May, + This lingering sense of woe, +Though I try to drown the memory + Of twenty years ago. + +I am fighting life's stern battle, May, + With all my might and main; +But a seat by you and mother there + Is the dearest prize to gain; +And I know you both are near me, + Whatever winds may blow, +For I feel your spirits cheer me + Like twenty years ago. + + + + +BETZKO + +A HUNGARIAN LEGEND + +Stibor had led in many a fight, + And broken a score of swords +In furious frays and bloody raids + Against the Turkish hordes. + +And Sigismund, the Polish king, + Who joined the Magyar bands, +Bestowed upon the valiant knight + A broad estate of lands. + +Once when the wars were o'er, the knight + Was holding wassail high, +And the valiant men that followed him + Were at the revelry. + +Betzko, his Jester, pleased him so + He vowed it his the task +To do whatever in human power + His witty Fool might ask. + +"Build on yon cliff," the Jester cried, + In drunken jollity, +"A mighty castle high and wide, + And name it after me." + +"Ah, verily a Jester's prayer," + Exclaimed the knightly crew, +"To ask of such a noble lord + What you know he cannot do." + +"Who says I cannot," Stibor cried, + "Do whatsoe'er I will? +Within one year a castle shall stand + On yonder rocky hill-- + +"A castle built of ponderous stones, + To give me future fame; +In honor of my witty Fool, + Betzko shall be its name." + +Now the cliff was high three hundred feet, + And perpendicular; +And the skill that could build a castle there + Must come from lands afar. + +And craftsmen came from foreign lands, + Italian, German and Jew-- +Apprentices and fellow-craftsmen, + And master-masons, too. + +And every traveler journeying + Along the mountain-ways +Was held to pay his toll of toil + On the castle for seven days. + +Slowly they raised the massive towers + Upon the steep ascent, +And all around a thousand hands + Built up the battlement. + +Three hundred feet above the glen-- + (By the steps five hundred feet)-- +The castle stood upon the cliff + At the end of the year--complete. + +Now throughout all the Magyar land + There's none other half so high, +So massive built, so strong and grand;-- + It reaches the very sky. + +But from that same high battlement + (Say tales by gypsies told) +The valiant Stibor met his death + When he was cross and old. + +I'll tell you the tale as they told it to me, + And I doubt not it is true, +For 'twas handed down from the middle ages + From the lips of knights who knew. + +One day when the knight was old and cross, + And a little the worse for grog, +Betzko, the Jester, thoughtlessly + Struck Stibor's favorite dog. + +Now the dog was a hound and Stibor's pet, + And as white as Carpathian snow, +And Stibor hurled old Betzko down + From the walls to the rocks below. + +And as the Jester headlong fell + From the dizzy, dreadful height, +He muttered a curse with his latest breath + On the head of the cruel knight. + +One year from that day old Stibor held + His drunken wassail long, +And spent the hours till the cock crew morn + In jest and wine and song. + +Then he sought his garden on the cliff, + And lay down under a vine +To sleep away the lethargy + Of a wassail-bowl of wine. + +While sleeping soundly under the shade, + And dreaming of revelries, +An adder crawled upon his breast, + And bit him in both his eyes. + +Blinded and mad with pain he ran + Toward the precipice, +Unheeding till he headlong fell + Adown the dread abyss. + +Just where old Betzko's blood had dyed + With red the old rocks gray, +Quivering and bleeding and dumb and dead + Old Stibor's body lay. + + + + +WESSELENYI + +A HUNGARIAN TALE + + +When madly raged religious war + O'er all the Magyar land +And royal archer and hussar + Met foemen hand to hand, +A princess fair in castle strong + The royal troops defied +And bravely held her fortress long + Though help was all denied. + +Princess Maria was her name-- + Brave daughter nobly sired; +She caught her father's trusty sword + When bleeding he expired, +And bravely rallied warders all + To meet the storming foe, +And hurled them from the rampart-wall + Upon the crags below. + +Prince Casimir--her father--built + Murana high and wide; +It sat among the mountain cliffs-- + The Magyars' boast and pride. +Bold Wesselenyi--stalwart knight, + Young, famed and wondrous fair, +With a thousand men besieged the height, + And led the bravest there. + +And long he tried the arts of war + To take that castle-hold, +Till many a proud and plumed hussar + Was lying stiff and cold; +And still the frowning castle stood + A grim, unbroken wall, +Like some lone rock in stormy seas + That braves the billows all. + +Bold Wesselenyi's cheeks grew thin; + A solemn oath he sware +That if he failed the prize to win + His bones should molder there. +Two toilsome months had worn away, + Two hundred men were slain, +His bold assaults were baffled still, + And all his arts were vain. + +But love is mightier than the sword, + He clad him in disguise-- +In the dress of an inferior lord-- + To win the noble prize. +He bade his armed men to wait, + To cease the battle-blare +And sought alone the castle-gate + To hold a parley there. + +Aloft a flag of truce he bore: + Her warders bade him pass; +Within he met the princess fair + All clad in steel and brass. +Her bright, black eyes and queenly art, + Sweet lips and raven hair, +Smote bold young Wesselenyi's heart + While he held parley there. + +Cunning he talked of great reward + And royal favor, too, +If she would yield her father's sword; + She sternly answered "No." +But even while they parleyed there + Maria's lustrous eyes +Looked tenderly and lovingly + On the chieftain in disguise. + +"Go tell your gallant chief," she said, + "To keep his paltry pelf; +The knight who would my castle win, + Must dare to come himself." +And forth she sternly bade him go, + But followed with her eyes. +I ween she knew the brave knight well + Through all his fair disguise. + +But when had dawned another morn, + He bade his bugleman +To sound again the parley-horn + Ere yet the fray began. +And forth he sent a trusty knight + To seek the castle-gate +And to the princess privately + His message to relate;-- + +That he it was who in disguise + Her warders bade to pass, +And while he parleyed there her eyes + Had pierced his plates of brass. +His heart he offered and his hand, + And pledged a signet-ring +If she would yield her brave command + Unto his gracious king. + +"Go tell your chief," Maria cried-- + "Audacious as he is-- +If he be worthy such a bride + My castle and hand are his. +But he should know that lady fair + By faint heart ne'er was won; +So let your gallant chieftain, sir, + Come undisguised alone. + +"And he may see in the northern tower, + Over yonder precipice, +A lone, dim light at the midnight hour + Shine down the dark abyss. +And over the chasm's dungeon-gloom + Shall a slender ladder hang; +And if alone he dare to come,-- + Unarmed--without a clang, + +"More of his suit your chief shall hear + Perhaps may win the prize; +Tell him the way is hedged with fear,-- + One misstep and he dies. +Nor will I pledge him safe retreat + From out yon guarded tower; +My watchful warders all to cheat + May be beyond my power." + +At midnight's dark and silent hour + The tall and gallant knight +Sought on the cliff the northern tower, + And saw the promised light. +With toil he climbed the cragged cliff, + And there the ladder found; +And o'er the yawning gulf he clomb + The ladder round by round. + +And as he climbed the ladder bent + Above the yawning deep, +But bravely to the port he went + And entered at a leap +Full twenty warders thronged the hall + Each with his blade in hand; +They caught the brave knight like a thrall + And bound him foot and hand. + +They tied him fast to an iron ring, + At Maria's stern command, +And then they jeered--"God save the king + And all his knightly band!" +They bound a bandage o'er his eyes, + Then the haughty princess said: +"Audacious knight, I hold a prize,-- + My castle or your head! + +"Now, mark!--desert the king's command, + And join your sword with mine, +And thine shall be my heart and hand, + This castle shall be thine. +I grant one hour for thee to choose, + My bold and gallant lord; +And if my offer you refuse + You perish by the sword!" + +He spoke not a word, but his face was pale + And he prayed a silent prayer; +But his heart was oak and it could not quail, + And a secret oath he sware. +And grim stood the warders armed all, + In the torches' flicker and flare, +As they watch for an hour in the gloomy hall + The brave knight pinioned there. + +The short--the flying hour is past, + The warders have bared his breast; +The bugler bugles a doleful blast; + Will the pale knight stand the test? +He has made his choice--he will do his part, + He has sworn and he cannot lie, +And he cries with the sword at his beating heart,-- + "_Betray?--nay--better to die!_" + +Suddenly fell from his blue eyes + The silken, blinding bands, +And while he looked in sheer surprise + They freed his feet and hands. +"I give thee my castle," Maria cried, + "And I give thee my heart and hand, +And Maria will be the proudest bride + In all this Magyar land. + +"Grant heaven that thou be true to me + As thou art to the king, +And I'll bless the day I gave to thee + My castle for a ring." +The red blood flushed to the brave knight's face + As he looked on the lady fair; +He sprang to her arms in a fond embrace, + And he married her then and there. + +So the little blind elf with his feathered shaft + Did more than the sword could do, +For he conquered and took with his magical craft + Her heart and her castle, too. + +[Illustration: WESSELENYI] + + + + +ISABEL + + + Fare-thee-well: + On my soul the toll of bell +Trembles. Thou art calmly sleeping +While my weary heart is weeping: + I cannot listen to thy knell: + Fare-thee-well. + + Sleep and rest: + Sorrow shall not pain thy breast, +Pangs and pains that pierce the mortal +Cannot enter at the portal + Of the Mansion of the Blest: + Sleep and rest. + + Slumber sweet, + Heart that nevermore will beat +At the footsteps of thy lover; +All thy cares and fears are over. + In thy silent winding-sheet + Slumber sweet. + + Fare-thee-well: + In the garden and the dell +Where thou lov'dst to stroll and meet me, +Nevermore thy kiss shall greet me, + Nevermore, O Isabel! + Fare-thee-well. + + We shall meet-- + Where the wings of angels beat: +When my toils and cares are over, +Thou shalt greet again thy lover-- + Robed and crowned at Jesus' feet + We shall meet. + + Watch and wait + At the narrow, golden gate; +Watch my coming,--wait my greeting, +For my years are few and fleeting + And my love shall not abate: + Watch and wait. + + So farewell, + O my darling Isabel; +Till we meet in the supernal +Mansion and with love eternal + In the golden city dwell, + Fare-thee-well. + + + + +BYRON AND THE ANGEL + +_Poet:_ + +"Why this fever--why this sighing?-- +Why this restless longing--dying +For--a something--dreamy something, +Undefined, and yet defying +All the pride and power of manhood? + +"O these years of sin and sorrow! +Smiling while the iron harrow +Of a keen and biting longing +Tears and quivers in the marrow +Of my being every moment-- +Of my very inmost being. + +"What to me the mad ambition +For men's praise and proud position-- +Struggling, fighting to the summit +Of its vain and earthly mission, +To lie down on bed of ashes-- +Bed of barren, bitter ashes? + +"Cure this fever? I have tried it; +Smothered, drenched it and defied it +With a will of brass and iron; +Every smile and look denied it; +Yet it heeded not denying, +And it mocks at my defying +While my very soul is dying. + +"Is there balm in Gilead?--tell me! +Nay--no balm to soothe and quell me? +Must I tremble in this fever? +Death, O lift thy hand and fell me; +Let me sink to rest forever +Where this burning cometh never. + +"Sometimes when this restless madness +Softens down to mellow sadness, +I look back on sun-lit valleys +Where my boyish heart of gladness +Nestled without pain or longing-- +Nestled softly in a vision +Full of love and hope's fruition, +Lulled by morning songs of spring-time. + +"Then I ponder, and I wonder +Was some heart-chord snapped asunder +When the threads were soft and silken? +Did some fatal boyish blunder +Plant a canker in my bosom +That hath ever burned and rankled? + +"O this thirsting, thirsting hanker! +O this burning, burning canker' +Driving Peace and Hope to shipwreck-- +Without rudder, without anchor, +On the reef-rocks of Damnation!" + +_Invisible Angel:_ + +"Jesus--Son of Virgin Mary; +Lift the burden from the weary: +Pity, Jesus, and anoint him +With the holy balm of Gilead." + +_Poet:_ + +"Yea, Christ Jesus, pour thy blessings +On these terrible heart-pressings: +O I bless thee, unseen Angel; +Lead me--teach me, holy Spirit." + +_Angel:_ + + "There is balm in Gilead! + There is balm in Gilead! +Peace awaits thee with caressings-- +Sitting at the feet of Jesus-- +At the right-hand of Jehovah-- +At the blessed feet of Jesus;--Alleluia!" + + + + +CHRISTMAS EVE + +I + + +From church and chapel and dome and tower, + Near--far and everywhere, +The merry bells chime loud and clear + Upon the frosty air. + +All down the marble avenues + The lamp-lit casements glow, +And from an hundred palaces + Glad carols float and flow. + +A thousand lamps from street to street + Blaze on the dusky air, +And light the way for happy feet + To carol, praise and prayer. + +'Tis Christmas eve. In church and hall + The laden fir-trees bend; +Glad children throng the festival + And grandsires too attend. + +Fur-wrapped and gemmed with pearls and gold, + Proud ladies rich and fair +As Egypt's splendid queen of old + In all her pomp are there. + +And many a costly, golden gift + Hangs on each Christmas-tree, +While round and round the carols drift + In waves of melody. + + + +II + + +In a dim and dingy attic, + Away from the pomp and glare, +A widow sits by a flickering lamp, + Bowed down by toil and care. + +On her toil-worn hand her weary head, + At her feet a shoe half-bound, +On the bare, brown table a loaf of bread, + And hunger and want around. + +By her side at the broken window, + With her rosy feet all bare, +Her little one carols a Christmas tune + To the chimes on the frosty air. + +And the mother dreams of the by-gone years + And their merry Christmas-bells, +Till her cheeks are wet with womanly tears, + And a sob in her bosom swells. + +[Illustration: AND THE MOTHER DREAMS OF THE BY GONE YEARS, AND THEIR +MERRY CHRISTMAS BELLS] + +The child looked up; her innocent ears + Had caught the smothered cry; +She saw the pale face wet with tears + She fain would pacify. + +"Don't cry, mama," she softly said-- + "Here's a Christmas gift for you," +And on the mother's cheek a kiss + She printed warm and true. + +"God bless my child!" the mother cried + And caught her to her breast-- +"O Lord, whose Son was crucified, + Thy precious gift is best. + +"If toil and trouble be my lot + While on life's sea I drift, +O Lord, my soul shall murmur not, + If Thou wilt spare Thy gift." + + + + +OUT OF THE DEPTHS + +And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in +adultery, and when they had set her in the midst, they said unto him +"Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses in +the law commanded us that such be stoned; but what sayest thou?"--[_St. +John_, Chap, viii; 3, 4, 5. + +Reach thy hand to me, O Jesus; + Reach thy loving hand to me, +Or I sink, alas, and perish + In my sin and agony. + +From the depths I cry, O Jesus, + Lifting up mine eyes to thee; +Save me from my sin and sorrow + With thy loving charity. + +Pity, Jesus--blessed Savior; + I am weak, but thou art strong; +Fill my heart with prayer and praises, + Fill my soul with holy song. + +Lift me up, O sacred Jesus-- + Lift my bruised heart to thee; +Teach me to be pure and holy + As the holy angels be. + +Scribes and Pharisees surround me: + Thou art writing in the sand: +Must I perish, Son of Mary? + Wilt thou give the stern command? + +Am I saved?--for Jesus sayeth-- + "Let the sinless cast a stone." +Lo the Scribes have all departed, + And the Pharisees are gone! + +"Woman, where are thine accusers?" + (They have vanished one by one.) +"Hath no man condemned thee, woman?" + And she meekly answered--"None." + +Then he spake His blessed answer-- + Balm indeed for sinners sore-- +"Neither then will I condemn thee: + Go thy way and sin no more." + + +FAME + +Dust of the desert are thy walls + And temple-towers, O Babylon! +O'er crumbled halls the lizard crawls, + And serpents bask in blaze of sun. + +In vain kings piled the Pyramids; + Their tombs were robbed by ruthless hands. +Who now shall sing their fame and deeds, + Or sift their ashes from the sands? + +Deep in the drift of ages hoar + Lie nations lost and kings forgot; +Above their graves the oceans roar, + Or desert sands drift o'er the spot. + +A thousand years are but a day + When reckoned on the wrinkled earth; +And who among the wise shall say + What cycle saw the primal birth + +Of man, who lords on sea and land, + And builds his monuments to-day, +Like Syrian on the desert sand, + To crumble and be blown away. + +Proud chiefs of pageant armies led + To fame and death their followers forth, +Ere Helen sinned and Hector bled, + Or Odin ruled the rugged North. + +And poets sang immortal praise + To mortal heroes ere the fire +Of Homer blazed in Ilion lays, + Or Brage tuned the Northern lyre. + +For fame men piled the Pyramids; + Their names have perished with their bones: +For fame men wrote their boasted deeds + On Babel bricks and Runic stones-- + +On Tyrian temples, gates of brass, + On Roman arch and Damask blades, +And perished like the desert grass + That springs to-day--to-morrow--fades. + +And still for fame men delve and die + In Afric heat and Arctic cold; +For fame on flood and field they vie, + Or gather in the shining gold. + +Time, like the ocean, onward rolls + Relentless, burying men and deeds; +The brightest names, the bravest souls, + Float but an hour like ocean weeds, + +Then sink forever. In the slime-- + Forgotten, lost forevermore, +Lies Fame from every age and clime; + Yet thousands clamor on the shore. + +Immortal Fame!--O dust and death! + The centuries as they pass proclaim +That Fame is but a mortal breath, + That man must perish--name and fame. + +The earth is but a grain of sand-- + An atom in a shoreless sea; +A million worlds lie in God's hand-- + Yea, myriad millions--what are we? + +O mortal man of bone and blood! + Then is there nothing left but dust? +God made us; He is wise and good, + And we may humbly hope and trust. + + + + +WINONA. + +_When the meadow-lark trilled o'er the leas + and the oriole piped in the maples, +From my hammock, all under the trees, + by the sweet-scented field of red clover, +I harked to the hum of the bees, + as they gathered the mead of the blossoms, +And caught from their low melodies + the air of the song of Winona_. + + +(In pronouncing Dakota words give "a" the sound of "ah,"--"e" the sound +of "a,"--"i" the sound of "e" and "u" the sound of "oo." Sound "ee" as +in English. The numerals refer to Notes in appendix.) + + * * * * * + +Two hundred white Winters and more + have fled from the face of the Summer, +Since here on the oak-shaded shore + of the dark-winding, swift Mississippi, +Where his foaming floods tumble and roar + o'er the falls and the white-rolling rapids, +In the fair, fabled center of Earth, + sat the Indian town of _Ka-thá-ga_. [86] +Far rolling away to the north, and the south, + lay the emerald prairies, +All dotted with woodlands and lakes, + and above them the blue bent of ether. +And here where the dark river breaks into spray + and the roar of the _Ha-Ha_, [76] +Where gathered the bison-skin _tees_[F] + of the chief tawny tribe of Dakotas; +For here, in the blast and the breeze, + flew the flag of the chief of _Isantees_, [86] +Up-raised on the stem of a lance-- + the feathery flag of the eagle. +And here to the feast and the dance, + from the prairies remote and the forests, +Oft gathered the out-lying bands, + and honored the gods of the nation. +On the islands and murmuring strands + they danced to the god of the waters, +_Unktéhee_, [69] who dwelt in the caves, + deep under the flood of the _Ha-Ha_; [76] +And high o'er the eddies and waves + hung their offerings of furs and tobacco,[G] +And here to the Master of life-- + _Anpé-tu-wee_, [70] god of the heavens, +Chief, warrior, and maiden, and wife, + burned the sacred green sprigs of the cedar. [50] +And here to the Searcher-of-hearts-- + fierce _Tá-ku Skan-skán_, [51] the avenger, +Who dwells in the uppermost parts of the earth, + and the blue, starry ether, +Ever watching, with all-seeing eyes, + the deeds of the wives and the warriors, +As an osprey afar in the skies, + sees the fish as they swim in the waters, +Oft spread they the bison-tongue feast, + and singing preferred their petitions, +Till the Day-Spirit[70] rose in the East-- + in the red, rosy robes of the morning, +To sail o'er the sea of the skies, + to his lodge in the land of the shadows, +Where the black-winged tornadoes[H] arise, + rushing loud from the mouths of their caverns. +And here with a shudder they heard, + flying far from his _tee_ in the mountains, +_Wa-kín-yan_,[32] the huge Thunder-Bird, + with the arrows of fire in his talons. + +[F] _Tee--teepee_, the Dakota name for tent or wigwam + +[G] See _Hennepin's Description of Louisiana_, by Shea, pp. 243 and 256. +_Parkman's Discovery_, p. 246--and _Carver's Travels_, p. 67. + +[Illustration: FALLS OF ST. ANTHONY. +FACSIMILE OF THE CUT IN CARVER'S TRAVELS, PUBLISHED AT LONDON, IN 1778, +FROM A SURVEY AND SKETCH MADE BY CAPT. J. CARVER, NOV. 17, 1766. +PERPENDICULAR FALL, 30 FEET; BREADTH NEAR 600 FEET.] + +[H] The Dakotas, like the ancient Romans and Greeks, think the home of +the winds is in the caverns of the mountains, and their great +Thunder-bird resembles in many respects the Jupiter of the Romans and +the Zeus of the Greeks. The resemblance of the Dakota mythology to that +of the older Greeks and Romans is striking. + +Two hundred white Winters and more + have fled from the face of the Summer +Since here by the cataract's roar, + in the moon of the red-blooming lilies,[71] +In the _tee_ of Ta-té-psin[I] was born + Winona--wild-rose of the prairies. +Like the summer sun peeping, at morn, + o'er the hills was the face of Winona. +And here she grew up like a queen-- + a romping and lily-lipped laughter, +And danced on the undulant green, + and played in the frolicsome waters, +Where the foaming tide tumbles and whirls + o'er the murmuring rocks in the rapids; +And whiter than foam were the pearls + that gleamed in the midst of her laughter. +Long and dark was her flowing hair flung + like the robe of the night to the breezes; +And gay as the robin she sung, + or the gold-breasted lark of the meadows. +Like the wings of the wind were her feet, + and as sure as the feet of _Ta-tó-ka_[J] +And oft like an antelope fleet + o'er the hills and the prairies she bounded, +Lightly laughing in sport as she ran, + and looking back over her shoulder +At the fleet-footed maiden or man + that vainly her flying feet followed. +The belle of the village was she, + and the pride of the aged Ta-té-psin, +Like a sunbeam she lighted his _tee_, + and gladdened the heart of her father. + +[I] _Tate_--wind,--_psin_--wild-rice--wild-rice wind. + +[J] mountain antelope. + +In the golden-hued _Wázu-pe-weé_-- + the moon when the wild-rice is gathered; +When the leaves on the tall sugar-tree + are as red as the breast of the robin, +And the red-oaks that border the lea + are aflame with the fire of the sunset, +From the wide, waving fields of wild-rice-- + from the meadows of _Psin-ta-wak-pá-dan_,[K] +Where the geese and the mallards rejoice, + and grow fat on the bountiful harvest, +Came the hunters with saddles of moose + and the flesh of the bear and the bison, +And the women in birch-bark canoes + well laden with rice from the meadows. + +[K] Little Rice River. It bears the name of Rice Creek to-day and +empties into the Mississippi from the east, a few miles above +Minneapolis. + +With the tall, dusky hunters, behold, + came a marvelous man or a spirit, +White-faced and so wrinkled and old, + and clad in the robe of the raven. +Unsteady his steps were and slow, + and he walked with a staff in his right hand, +And white as the first-falling snow + were the thin locks that lay on his shoulders. +Like rime-covered moss hung his beard, + flowing down from his face to his girdle; +And wan was his aspect and weird, + and often he chanted and mumbled +In a strange and mysterious tongue, + as he bent o'er his book in devotion, +Or lifted his dim eyes and sung, + in a low voice, the solemn "_Te Deum_," +Or Latin, or Hebrew, or Greek-- + all the same were his words to the warriors,-- +All the same to the maids and the meek, + wide-wondering-eyed, hazel-brown children. + +Father René Menard [L]--it was he, + long lost to his Jesuit brothers, +Sent forth by an holy decree + to carry the Cross to the heathen. +In his old age abandoned to die, + in the swamps, by his timid companions, +He prayed to the Virgin on high, + and she led him forth from the forest; +For angels she sent him as men-- + in the forms of the tawny Dakotas, +And they led his feet from the fen, + from the slough of despond and the desert, +Half dead in a dismal morass, + as they followed the red-deer they found him, +In the midst of the mire and the grass, + and mumbling "_Te Deum laudamus._" +"_Unktómee[72]--Ho!_" muttered the braves, + for they deemed him the black Spider-Spirit +That dwells in the drearisome caves, + and walks on the marshes at midnight, +With a flickering torch in his hand, + to decoy to his den the unwary. +His tongue could they not understand, + but his torn hands all shriveled with famine +He stretched to the hunters and said: + "He feedeth his chosen with manna; +And ye are the angels of God + sent to save me from death in the desert." +His famished and woe-begone face, + and his tones touched the hearts of the hunters; +They fed the poor father apace, + and they led him away to _Ka-thá-ga._ + +[L] See the account of Father Menard, his mission and disappearance in +the wilderness. _Neill's Hist. Minnesota_, pp 104-107, inc. + +There little by little he learned + the tongue of the tawny Dakotas; +And the heart of the good father yearned + to lead them away from their idols-- +Their giants[16] and dread Thunder-birds-- + their worship of stones[73] and the devil. +"_Wakán-de!_"[M] they answered his words, + for he read from his book in the Latin, +Lest the Nazarene's holy commands + by his tongue should be marred in translation; +And oft with his beads in his hands, + or the cross and the crucified Jesus, +He knelt by himself on the sands, + and his dim eyes uplifted to heaven. +But the braves bade him look to the East-- + to the silvery lodge of _Han-nán-na_;[N] +And to dance with the chiefs at the feast-- + at the feast of the Giant _Heyó-ka._[16] +They frowned when the good father spurned + the flesh of the dog in the kettle, +And laughed when his fingers were burned + in the hot, boiling pot of the giant. +"The Black-robe" they called the poor priest, + from the hue of his robe and his girdle; +And never a game or a feast + but the father must grace with his presence. +His prayer-book the hunters revered,-- + they deemed it a marvelous spirit; +It spoke and the white father heard,-- + it interpreted visions and omens. +And often they bade him to pray + this marvelous spirit to answer, +And tell where the sly Chippewa + might be ambushed and slain in his forest. +For Menard was the first in the land, + proclaiming, like John in the desert, +"The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand; + repent ye, and turn from your idols." +The first of the brave brotherhood that, + threading the fens and the forest, +Stood afar by the turbulent flood + at the falls of the Father of Waters. + +[Illustration: FATHER RENE MENARD] + +[M] It is wonderful! + +[N] The morning. + +In the lodge of the Stranger[O] he sat, + awaiting the crown of a martyr; +His sad face compassion begat + in the heart of the dark-eyed Winona. +Oft she came to the _teepee_ and spoke; + she brought him the tongue of the bison, +Sweet nuts from the hazel and oak, + and flesh of the fawn and the mallard. +Soft _hánpa_[P] she made for his feet + and leggins of velvety fawn-skin, +A blanket of beaver complete, + and a hood of the hide of the otter. +And oft at his feet on the mat, + deftly braiding the flags and the rushes, +Till the sun sought his _teepee_ + she sat, enchanted with what he related +Of the white-wingèd ships on the sea + and the _teepees_ far over the ocean, +Of the love and the sweet charity of the Christ + and the beautiful Virgin. + +[O] A lodge set apart for guests of the village. + +[P] Moccasins. + +She listened like one in a trance + when he spoke of the brave, bearded Frenchmen, +From the green, sun-lit valleys of France + to the wild _Hochelága_[Q] transplanted, +Oft trailing the deserts of snow + in the heart of the dense Huron forests, +Or steering the dauntless canoe + through the waves of the fresh-water ocean. +"Yea, stronger and braver are they," + said the aged Menard to Winona, +"Than the head-chief, tall Wazi-kuté,[74] + but their words are as soft as a maiden's, +Their eyes are the eyes of the swan, + but their hearts are the hearts of the eagles; +And the terrible _Mása Wakán_[R] + ever walks by their side like a spirit; +Like a Thunder-bird, roaring in wrath, + flinging fire from his terrible talons, +He sends to their enemies death + in the flash of the fatal _Wakándee_."[S] + +[Q] The Ottawa name for the region of the St. Lawrence River. + +[R] "Mysterious metal"--or metal having a spirit in it. This is the +common name applied by the Dakotas to all firearms. + +[S] Lightning. + +The Autumn was past and the snow + lay drifted and deep on the prairies; +From his _teepee_ of ice came the foe-- + came the storm-breathing god of the winter. +Then roared in the groves, on the plains, + on the ice-covered lakes and the river, +The blasts of the fierce hurricanes + blown abroad from the breast of _Wazíya_. [3] +The bear cuddled down in his den, + and the elk fled away to the forest; +The pheasant and gray prairie-hen + made their beds in the heart of the snow-drift; +The bison herds huddled and stood + in the hollows and under the hill-sides, +Or rooted the snow for their food + in the lee of the bluffs and the timber; +And the mad winds that howled from the north, + from the ice-covered seas of _Wazíya_, +Chased the gray wolf and silver-fox forth + to their dens in the hills of the forest. + +Poor Father Menard--he was ill; + in his breast burned the fire of a fever; +All in vain was the magical skill + of _Wicásta Wakán_ [61] with his rattle; +Into soft, child-like slumber he fell, + and awoke in the land of the blessèd-- +To the holy applause of "Well-done!" + and the harps in the hands of the angels. +Long he carried the cross and he won + the coveted crown of a martyr. + +In the land of the heathen he died, + meekly following the voice of his Master, +One mourner alone by his side-- + Ta-té-psin's compassionate daughter. +She wailed the dead father with tears, + and his bones by her kindred she buried. +Then winter followed winter. The years + sprinkled frost on the head of her father; +And three weary winters she dreamed + of the fearless and fair, bearded Frenchmen; +At midnight their swift paddles gleamed + on the breast of the broad Mississippi, +And the eyes of the brave strangers beamed + on the maid in the midst of her slumber. + +She lacked not admirers; + the light of the lover oft burned in her _teepee_-- +At her couch in the midst of the night,-- + but she never extinguished the flambeau. +The son of Chief Wazi-kuté-- + a fearless and eagle-plumed warrior-- +Long sighed for Winona, + and he was the pride of the band of _Isántees_. +Three times, in the night at her bed, + had the brave held the torch of the lover, [75] +And thrice had she covered her head + and rejected the handsome Tamdóka. [T] + +[T] Tah-mdo-kah, literally, the buck-deer. + +'Twas Summer. The merry-voiced birds + trilled and warbled in woodland and meadow; +And abroad on the prairies the herds + cropped the grass in the land of the lilies,-- +And sweet was the odor of rose + wide-wafted from hillside and heather; +In the leaf-shaded lap of repose + lay the bright, blue-eyed babes of the summer; +And low was the murmur of brooks, + and low was the laugh of the _Ha-Ha_; [76] +And asleep in the eddies and nooks + lay the broods of _magá_ [60]and the mallard. +'Twas the moon of _Wasúnpa_. [71] + The band lay at rest in the tees at _Ka-thá-ga_, +And abroad o'er the beautiful land + walked the spirits of Peace and of Plenty-- +Twin sisters, with bountiful hand + wide scattering wild-rice and the lilies. +_An-pé-tu-wee_[70] walked in the west-- + to his lodge in the far-away mountains, +And the war-eagle flew to her nest + in the oak on the Isle of the Spirit.[U] +And now at the end of the day, + by the shore of the Beautiful Island,[V] +A score of fair maidens and gay + made joy in the midst of the waters. +Half-robed in their dark, flowing hair, + and limbed like the fair Aphroditè, +They played in the waters, and there + they dived and they swam like the beavers, +Loud-laughing like loons on the lake + when the moon is a round shield of silver, +And the songs of the whippowils wake + on the shore in the midst of the maples. + +But hark!--on the river a song,-- + strange voices commingled in chorus; +On the current a boat swept along + with DuLuth and his hardy companions; +To the stroke of their paddles they sung, + and this the refrain that they chanted: + + "Dans mon chemin j'ai rencontré + Deux cavaliers bien montés. + Lon, lon, laridon daine, + Lon, lon, laridon da." + + "Deux cavaliers bien montés; + L'un à cheval, et l'autre à pied. + Lon, lon, laridon daine, + Lon, lon, laridon da."[W] + +[U] The Dakotas say that for many years in olden times war-eagles made +their nests in oak trees on Spirit-island--_Wanagi-wita_, just below the +Falls till frightened away by the advent of white men. + +[V] The Dakotas called Nicollet Island _Wi-ta Waste_--the Beautiful +Island. + +[W] A part of one of the favorite songs of the French _voyageurs_. + +[Illustration: ARRIVAL OF DULUTH AT KATHAGA] + +Like the red, dappled deer in the glade + alarmed by the footsteps of hunters, +Discovered, disordered, dismayed, + the nude nymphs fled forth from the waters, +And scampered away to the shade, + and peered from the screen of the lindens. + +A bold and adventuresome man was DuLuth, + and a dauntless in danger, +And straight to _Kathága_ he ran, + and boldly advanced to the warriors, +Now gathering, a cloud on the strand, + and gazing amazed on the strangers; +And straightway he offered his hand + unto Wázi-kuté, the _Itáncan_.[X] +To the Lodge of the Stranger were led + DuLuth and his hardy companions; +Robes of beaver and bison were spread, + and the Peace-pipe[23] was smoked with the Frenchman. + +[X] Head-chief + +There was dancing and feasting at night, + and joy at the presents he lavished. +All the maidens were wild with delight + with the flaming red robes and the ribbons, +With the beads and the trinkets untold, + and the fair, bearded face of the giver; +And glad were they all to behold + the friends from the Land of the Sunrise. +But one stood apart from the rest-- + the queenly and silent Winona, +Intently regarding the guest-- + hardly heeding the robes and the ribbons, +Whom the White Chief beholding admired, + and straightway he spread on her shoulders +A lily-red robe and attired + with necklet and ribbons the maiden. +The red lilies bloomed in her face, + and her glad eyes gave thanks to the giver, +And forth from her _teepee_ apace + she brought him the robe and the missal +Of the father--poor René Menard; + and related the tale of the "Black Robe." +She spoke of the sacred regard + he inspired in the hearts of Dakotas; +That she buried his bones with her kin, + in the mound by the Cave of the Council; +That she treasured and wrapt in the skin + of the red-deer his robe and his prayer book-- +"Till his brothers should come from the East-- + from the land of the far _Hochelága_, +To smoke with the braves at the feast, + on the shores of the Loud-laughing Waters. [16] +For the 'Black Robe' spake much of his youth + and his friends in the Land of the Sunrise; +It was then as a dream; now in truth + I behold them, and not in a vision." +But more spake her blushes, I ween, + and her eyes full of language unspoken, +As she turned with the grace of a queen + and carried her gifts to the _teepee_. + +Far away from his beautiful France-- + from his home in the city of Lyons, +A noble youth full of romance, + with a Norman heart big with adventure, +In the new world a wanderer, by chance + DuLuth sought the wild Huron forests. +But afar by the vale of the Rhone, + the winding and musical river, +And the vine-covered hills of the Saône, + the heart of the wanderer lingered,-- +'Mid the vineyards and mulberry trees, + and the fair fields of corn and of clover +That rippled and waved in the breeze, + while the honey-bees hummed in the blossoms. +For there, where th' impetuous Rhone, + leaping down from the Switzerland mountains, +And the silver-lipped, soft-flowing Saône, + meeting, kiss and commingle together, +Down winding by vineyards and leas, + by the orchards of fig-trees and olives, +To the island-gemmed, sapphire-blue seas + of the glorious Greeks and the Romans; +Aye, there, on the vine-covered shore, + 'mid the mulberry-trees and the olives, +Dwelt his blue-eyed and beautiful Flore, + with her hair like a wheat-field at harvest, +All rippled and tossed by the breeze, + and her cheeks like the glow of the morning, +Far away o'er the emerald seas, + as the sun lifts his brow from the billows, +Or the red-clover fields when the bees, + singing sip the sweet cups of the blossoms. +Wherever he wandered-- + alone in the heart of the wild Huron forests, +Or cruising the rivers unknown + to the land of the Crees or Dakotas-- +His heart lingered still on the Rhone, + 'mid the mulberry trees and the vineyards, +Fast-fettered and bound by the zone + that girdled the robes of his darling. +Till the red Harvest Moon[71] he remained + in the vale of the swift Mississippi. +The esteem of the warriors he gained, + and the love of the dark-eyed Winona. +He joined in the sports and the chase; + with the hunters he followed the bison, +And swift were his feet in the race + when the red elk they ran on the prairies. +At the Game of the Plum-stones[77] he played, + and he won from the skillfulest players; +A feast to _Wa'tánka_[78] he made, + and he danced at the feast of _Heyôka_.[16] +With the flash and the roar of his gun + he astonished the fearless Dakotas; +They called it the "_Máza Wakán_"-- + the mighty, mysterious metal. +"'Tis a brother," they said, "of the fire + in the talons of dreadful Wakinyan,'[32] +When he flaps his huge wings in his ire, + and shoots his red shafts at _Unktéhee_."[69] + +The _Itáncan_,[74] tall Wází-kuté, + appointed a day for the races. +From the red stake that stood by his _tee_, + on the southerly side of the _Ha-ha_, +O'er the crest of the hills and the dunes + and the billowy breadth of the prairie, +To a stake at the Lake of the Loons[79]-- + a league and return--was the distance. +They gathered from near and afar, + to the races and dancing and feasting; +Five hundred tall warriors were there + from _Kapóza_[6] and far-off _Keóza_;[8] +_Remnica_[Y] too, furnished a share + of the legions that thronged to the races, +And a bountiful feast was prepared + by the diligent hands of the women, +And gaily the multitudes fared + in the generous _tees_ of _Kathága_. +The chief of the mystical clan + appointed a feast to _Unktéhee_-- +The mystic "_Wacípee Wakán_"[Z]-- + at the end of the day and the races. +A band of sworn brothers are they, + and the secrets of each one are sacred, +And death to the lips that betray + is the doom of the swarthy avengers, +And the son of tall _Wází-kuté_ + was the chief of the mystical order. + +[Y] Pronounced Ray-mne-chah--The village of the Mountains, situate where +Red Wing now stands. + +[Z] Sacred Dance--The Medicine-dance--See description _infra._ + + + + +THE FOOT RACES. + +On an arm of an oak hangs the prize + for the swiftest and strongest of runners-- +A blanket as red as the skies, + when the flames sweep the plains in October. +And beside it a strong, polished bow, + and a quiver of iron-tipped arrows, +Which _Kapóza's_ tall chief will bestow + on the fleet-footed second that follows. +A score of swift runners are there + from the several bands of the nation, +And now for the race they prepare, + and among them fleet-footed Tamdóka. +With the oil of the buck and the bear + their sinewy limbs are annointed, +For fleet are the feet of the deer + and strong are the limbs of the bruin. + +Hark!--the shouts and the braying of drums, + and the Babel of tongues and confusion! +From his _teepee_ the tall chieftain comes, + and DuLuth brings a prize for the runners-- +A keen hunting-knife from the Seine, + horn-handled and mounted with silver. +The runners are ranged on the plain, + and the Chief waves a flag as a signal, +And away like the gray wolves they fly-- + like the wolves on the trail of the red-deer; +O'er the hills and the prairie they vie, + and strain their strong limbs to the utmost, +While high on the hills hangs a cloud + of warriors and maidens and mothers, +To see the swift-runners, and loud + are the cheers and the shouts of the warriors. + +Now swift from the lake they return + o'er the emerald hills of the prairies; +Like grey-hounds they pant and they yearn, + and the leader of all is Tamdóka. +At his heels flies _Hu-pá-hu,_[AA] + the fleet--the pride of the band of _Kaóza_,-- +A warrior with eagle-winged feet, + but his prize is the bow and the quiver. +Tamdóka first reaches the post, + and his are the knife and the blanket, +By the mighty acclaim of the host + and award of the chief and the judges. +Then proud was the tall warrior's stride, + and haughty his look and demeanor; +He boasted aloud in his pride, + and he scoffed at the rest of the runners. +"Behold me, for I am a man![AB] + my feet are as swift as the West-wind. +With the coons and the beavers I ran; + but where is the elk or the _cabri?_[80] +Come!--where is the hunter will dare + match his feet with the feet of Tamdóka? +Let him think of _Taté_[AC] and beware, + ere he stake his last robe on the trial." +"_Ohó! Ho! Hó-héca!_"[AD] they jeered, + for they liked not the boast of the boaster; +But to match him no warrior appeared, + for his feet wore the wings of the west-wind. + +[AA] The wings. + +[AB] A favorite boast of the Dakota braves. + +[AC] The wind. + +[AD] About equivalent to Oho!--Aha!--fudge! + +Then forth from the side of the chief + stepped DuLuth and he looked on the boaster; +"The words of a warrior are brief,-- + I will run with the brave," said the Frenchman; +"But the feet of Tamdóka are tired; + abide till the cool of the sunset." +All the hunters and maidens admired, + for strong were the limbs of the stranger. +"_Hiwó Ho!_"[AE] they shouted + and loud rose the cheers of the multitude mingled; +And there in the midst of the crowd + stood the glad-eyed and blushing Winona. + +[AE] Hurra there! + +Now afar o'er the plains of the west + walked the sun at the end of his journey, +And forth came the brave and the guest, + at the tap of the drum, for the trial. +Like a forest of larches the hordes + were gathered to witness the contest; +As loud as the drums were their words + and they roared like the roar of the _Ha-ha._ +For some for Tamdóka contend, + and some for the fair, bearded stranger, +And the betting runs high to the end, + with the skins of the bison and beaver. +A wife of tall _Wází-kuté_-- + the mother of boastful Tamdóka-- +Brought her handsomest robe from the _tee_ + with a vaunting and loud proclamation: +She would stake her last robe on her son + who, she boasted, was fleet as the _cabri_, +And the tall, tawny chieftain looked on, + approving the boast of the mother. +Then fleet as the feet of a fawn + to her lodge ran the dark-eyed Winona, +She brought and she spread on the lawn, + by the side of the robe of the boaster, +The lily-red mantel DuLuth, + with his own hands, had laid on her shoulders. +"Tamdóka is swift, but forsooth, + the tongue of his mother is swifter," +She said, and her face was aflame + with the red of the rose and the lily, +And loud was the roar of acclaim; + but dark was the face of Tamdóka. +They strip for the race and prepare,-- + DuLuth in his breeches and leggins; +And the brown, curling locks of his hair + down droop to his bare, brawny shoulders, +And his face wears a smile debonair, + as he tightens his red sash around him; +But stripped to the moccasins bare, + save the belt and the breech-clout of buckskin, +Stands the haughty Tamdóka aware + that the eyes of the warriors admire him; +For his arms are the arms of a bear + and his legs are the legs of a panther. + +The drum beats,--the chief waves the flag, + and away on the course speed the runners, +And away leads the brave like a stag,-- + like a bound on his track flies the Frenchman; +And away haste the hunters once more + to the hills, for a view to the lakeside, +And the dark-swarming hill-tops, they roar + with the storm of loud voices commingled. +Far away o'er the prairie they fly, + and still in the lead is Tamdóka, +But the feet of his rival are nigh, + and slowly he gains on the hunter. +Now they turn on the post at the lake,-- + now they run full abreast on the home-stretch: +Side by side they contend for the stake + for a long mile or more on the prairie +They strain like a stag and a hound, + when the swift river gleams through the thicket, +And the horns of the riders resound, + winding shrill through the depths of the forest. +But behold!--at full length on the ground + falls the fleet-footed Frenchman abruptly, +And away with a whoop and a bound + springs the eager, exulting Tamdóka +Long and loud on the hills is the + shout of his swarthy admirers and backers, +"But the race is not won till it's out," + said DuLuth, to himself as he gathered, +With a frown on his face, for the foot + of the wily Tamdóka had tripped him. +Far ahead ran the brave on the route, + and turning he boasted exultant. +Like spurs to the steed to DuLuth + were the jeers and the taunts of the boaster; +Indignant was he and red wroth + at the trick of the runner dishonest; +And away like a whirlwind he speeds-- + like a hurricane mad from the mountains; +He gains on Tamdóka,--he leads!-- + and behold, with the spring of a panther, +He leaps to the goal and succeeds, + 'mid the roar of the mad acclamation. +Then glad as the robin in May + was the voice of Winona exulting; +Tamdóka turned sullen away, + and sulking he walked by the river; +He glowered as he went and the fire + of revenge in his bosom was kindled: +Dark was his visage with ire + and his eyes were the eyes of a panther. + + +THE WAKAN-WACEPEE, OR SACRED DANCE. [81] + +Lo the lights in the _"Teepee-Wákan!"_ + 'tis the night of the _Wákan Wacépee_. +Round and round walks the chief of the clan, + as he rattles the sacred _Ta-shá-kay_; [81] +Long and loud on the _Chán-che-ga_ [81] + beat the drummers with magical drumsticks, +And the notes of the _Chô-tánka_ [81] + greet like the murmur of winds on the waters. +By the friction of white-cedar wood + for the feast was a Virgin-fire [20] kindled. +They that enter the firm brotherhood + first must fast and be cleansed by _E-neé-pee_;[81] +And from foot-sole to crown of the head + must they paint with the favorite colors; +For _Unktéhee_ likes bands of blood-red, + with the stripings of blue intermingled. +In the hollow earth, dark and profound, + _Unktéhee_ and fiery _Wakínyan_ +Long fought, and the terrible sound + of the battle was louder than thunder; +The mountains were heaved and around + were scattered the hills and the boulders, +And the vast solid plains of the ground + rose and fell like the waves of the ocean. +But the god of the waters prevailed. + _Wakín-yan_ escaped from the cavern, +And long on the mountains he wailed, + and his hatred endureth forever. + +When _Unktéhee_ had finished the earth, + and the beasts and the birds and the fishes, +And men at his bidding came forth + from the heart of the huge hollow mountains,[69] +A band chose the god from the hordes, + and he said: "Ye are the sons of _Unktéhee_: +Ye are lords of the beasts and the birds, + and the fishes that swim in the waters. +But hearken ye now to my words,-- + let them sound in your bosoms forever: +Ye shall honor _Unktéhee_ and hate _Wakinyan_, + the Spirit of Thunder, +For the power of _Unktéhee_ is great, + and he laughs at the darts of _Wakinyan_. +Ye shall honor the Earth and the Sun,-- + for they are your father and mother; [70] +Let your prayer to the Sun be:-- + _Wakán Até; on-si-md-da oheé-neé_."[AF] +And remember the _Táku Wakán_[73] + all-pervading in earth and in ether-- +Invisible ever to man, + but He dwells in the midst of all matter; +Yea, he dwells in the heart of the stone-- + in the hard granite heart of the boulder; +Ye shall call him forever _Tunkán_-- + grandfather of all the Dakotas. +Ye are men that I choose for my own; + ye shall be as a strong band of brothers, +Now I give you the magical bone + and the magical pouch of the spirits,[AG] +And these are the laws ye shall heed: + Ye shall honor the pouch and the giver. +Ye shall walk as twin-brothers; in need, + one shall forfeit his life for another. +Listen not to the voice of the crow.[AH] + Hold as sacred the wife of a brother. +Strike, and fear not the shaft of the foe, + for the soul of the brave is immortal. +Slay the warrior in battle, + but spare the innocent babe and the mother. +Remember a promise,--beware,-- + let the word of a warrior be sacred +When a stranger arrives at the _tee_-- + be he friend of the band or a foeman, +Give him food; let your bounty be free; + lay a robe for the guest by the lodge-fire; +Let him go to his kindred in peace, + if the peace-pipe he smoke in the _teepee_; +And so shall your children increase, + and your lodges shall laugh with abundance. +And long shall ye live in the land, + and the spirits of earth and the waters +Shall come to your aid, at command, + with the power of invisible magic. +And at last, when you journey afar-- + o'er the shining "_Wanágee Ta-chán-ku_,"[68] +You shall walk as a red, shining star[8] + in the land of perpetual summer." + +[AF] "Sacred Spirit! Father! have pity on me always." + +[AG] Riggs' Takoo Wakan, p. 90. + +[AH] Slander. + +All the night in the _teepee_ they sang, + and they danced to the mighty _Unktéhee_, +While the loud-braying _Chán-che-ga_ rang + and the shrill-piping flute and the rattle, +Till _Anpétuwee_ [70] rose in the east-- + from the couch of the blushing _Han-nân-na_, +And thus at the dance and the feast + sang the sons of _Unktéhee_ in chorus: + + "Wa-dú-ta o-hná mi-ká-ge! + Wa-dú-ta o-hná mi-ká-ge! + Mini-yâta ité wakândè makú, + Atè wakán--Tunkánsidân. + + Tunkânsidân pejihúta wakán + Micâgè--he Wicâgè! + Miniyáta ité wakándè makú. + Taukánsidan ité, nápè dú-win-ta woo, + Wahutôpa wan yúha, nápè dú-win-ta woo." + +TRANSLATION. + + In red swan-down he made it for me; + In red swan-down he made it for me; + He of the water--he of the mysterious face-- + Gave it to me; + Sacred Father--Grandfather! + + Grandfather made me magical medicine. + That is true! + Being of mystery,--grown in the water-- + He gave it to me! + To the face of our Grandfather stretch out your hand; + Holding a quadruped, stretch out your hand! + +Till high o'er the hills of the east + _Anpétuwee_ walked on his journey, +In secret they danced at the feast, + and communed with the mighty _Unktéhee_. +Then opened the door of the _tee_ + to the eyes of the wondering Dakotas, +And the sons of _Unktéhee_ to be, + were endowed with the sacred _Ozúha_[82] +By the son of tall Wazí-kuté, Tamdóka, + the chief of the Magi. +And thus since the birth-day of man-- + since he sprang from the heart of the mountains,[69] +Has the sacred "_Wacépee Wakán_" + by the warlike Dakotas been honored, +And the god-favored sons of the clan + work their will with the help of the spirits. + + +WINONA'S WARNING. + +'Twas sunrise; the spirits of mist + trailed their white robes on dewy savannas, +And the flowers raised their heads to be kissed + by the first golden beams of the morning. +The breeze was abroad with the breath + of the rose of the Isles of the Summer, +And the humming-bird hummed on the heath + from his home in the land of the rainbow.[AI] +'Twas the morn of departure. DuLuth + stood alone by the roar of the _Ha-ha_; +Tall and fair in the strength of his youth + stood the blue-eyed and fair-bearded Frenchman. +A rustle of robes on the grass broke his dream + as he mused by the waters, +And, turning, he looked on the face of Winona, + wild-rose of the prairies, +Half hid in her dark, flowing hair, + like the round, golden moon in the pine-tops. +Admiring he gazed--she was fair + as his own blooming Flore in her orchards, +With her golden locks loose on the air, + like the gleam of the sun through the olives, +Far away on the vine-covered shore, + in the sun-favored land of his fathers. +"Lists the chief to the cataract's roar + for the mournful lament of the Spirit?"[AJ] +Said Winona,--"The wail of the sprite + for her babe and its father unfaithful, +Is heard in the midst of the night, + when the moon wanders dim in the heavens." + +"Wild-Rose of the Prairies," he said, + "DuLuth listens not to the _Ha-ha_, +For the wail of the ghost of the dead + for her babe and its father unfaithful; +But he lists to a voice in his heart + that is heard by the ear of no other, +And to-day will the White Chief depart; + he returns to the land of the sunrise." +"Let Winona depart with the chief,-- + she will kindle the fire in his _teepee_; +For long are the days of her grief, + if she stay in the _tee_ of Ta-té-psin," +She replied, and her cheeks were aflame + with the bloom of the wild prairie lilies. +"_Tanke_[AK], is the White Chief to blame?" + said DuLuth to the blushing Winona. +"The White Chief is blameless," she said, + "but the heart of Winona will follow +Wherever thy footsteps may lead, + O blue-eyed, brave Chief of the white men. +For her mother sleeps long in the mound, + and a step-mother rules in the _teepee_, +And her father, once strong and renowned, + is bent with the weight of his winters. +No longer he handles the spear,-- + no longer his swift, humming arrows +Overtake the fleet feet of the deer, + or the bear of the woods, or the bison; +But he bends as he walks, and the wind + shakes his white hair and hinders his footsteps; +And soon will he leave me behind, + without brother or sister or kindred. +The doe scents the wolf in the wind, + and a wolf walks the path of Winona. +Three times have the gifts for the bride[55] + to the lodge of Ta-té-psin been carried, +But the voice of Winona replied + that she liked not the haughty Tamdóka. +And thrice were the gifts sent away, + but the tongue of the mother protested, +And the were-wolf[52] still follows his prey, + and abides but the death of my father." + +[AI] The Dakotas say the humming-bird comes from the "Land of the +rain-bow." + +[AJ] See Legend of the Falls, or Note 28--Appendix. + +[AK] My Sister. + +"I pity Winona," he said, + "but my path is a pathway of danger, +And long is the trail for the maid + to the far-away land of the sunrise; +And few are the braves of my band, + and the braves of Tamdóka are many; +But soon I return to the land, + and a cloud of my hunters will follow. +When the cold winds of winter return + and toss the white robes of the prairies, +The fire of the White Chief will burn + in his lodge at the Meeting-of-Waters;[AL] +And when from the Sunrise again + comes the chief of the sons of the Morning, +Many moons will his hunters remain + in the land of the friendly Dakotas. +The son of Chief Wází-Kuté guides + the White Chief afar on his journey; +Nor long on the _Tânka Medé_[AM]-- + on the breast of the blue, bounding billows-- +Shall the bark of the Frenchman delay, + but his pathway shall kindle behind him." + +[AL] Mendota--properly Mdo-te--meaning the out-let of a lake or river +into another, commonly applied to the region about Fort Snelling. + +[AM] _Tanka-Mede_--Great Lake, i.e. Lake Superior. The Dakotas seem to +have had no other name for it. They generally referred to it as +_Mini-ya-ta--There at the water_. + +She was pale, and her hurried voice + swelled with alarm as she questioned replying-- +"Tamdóka thy guide?--I beheld + thy death in his face at the races. +He covers his heart with a smile, + but revenge never sleeps in his bosom; +His tongue--it is soft to beguile; + but beware of the pur of the panther! +For death, like a shadow, will walk + by thy side in the midst of the forest, +Or follow thy path like a hawk + on the trail of a wounded _Mastínca_.[AN] +A son of _Unktéhee_ is he,-- + the Chief of the crafty magicians; +They have plotted thy death; + I can see thy trail--it is red in the forest; +Beware of Tamdóka,--beware. + Slumber not like the grouse of the woodlands, +With head under wing, for the glare + of the eyes that sleep not are upon thee." + +[AN] The rabbit. The Dakotas called the Crees "Mastincapi"--Rabbits. + +"Winona, fear not," said DuLuth, + "for I carry the fire of _Wakínyan_[AO] +And strong is the arm of my youth, + and stout are the hearts of my warriors; +But Winona has spoken the truth, + and the heart of the White Chief is thankful. +Hide this in thy bosom, dear maid,-- + 'tis the crucified Christ of the white men.[AP] +Lift thy voice to his spirit in need, + and his spirit will hear thee and answer; +For often he comes to my aid; + he is stronger than all the Dakotas; +And the Spirits of evil, afraid, + hide away when he looks from the heavens." +In her swelling, brown bosom she hid + the crucified Jesus in silver; +"_Niwástè_,"[AQ] she sadly replied; + in her low voice the rising tears trembled; +Her dewy eyes turned she aside, + and she slowly returned to the _teepees_. +But still on the swift river's strand, + admiring the graceful Winona, +As she gathered, with brown, dimpled hand, + her hair from the wind, stood the Frenchman. + + +DULUTH'S DEPARTURE + +To bid the brave White Chief adieu, + on the shady shore gathered the warriors; +His glad boatmen manned the canoe, + and the oars in their hands were impatient. +Spake the Chief of _Isántees_: + "A feast will await the return of my brother. +In peace rose the sun in the East, + in peace in the West he descended. +May the feet of my brother be swift + till they bring him again to our _teepees_, +The red pipe he takes as a gift, + may he smoke that red pipe many winters. +At my lodge-fire his pipe shall be lit, + when the White Chief returns to _Kathága_; +On the robes of my _tee_ shall he sit; + he shall smoke with the chiefs of my people. +The brave love the brave, and his son + sends the Chief as a guide for his brother, +By the way of the _Wákpa Wakán_[AR] + to the Chief at the Lake of the Spirits. +As light as the foot-steps of dawn + are the feet of the stealthy Tamdóka; +He fears not the _Máza Wakán_;[AS] + he is sly as the fox of the forest. +When he dances the dance of red war + howl the wolves by the broad _Mini-ya-ta_,[AT] +For they scent on the south-wind afar + their feast on the bones of Ojibways." +Thrice the Chief puffed the red pipe of peace, + ere it passed to the lips of the Frenchman. +Spake DuLuth: "May the Great Spirit bless + with abundance the Chief and his people; +May their sons and their daughters increase, + and the fire ever burn in their _teepees_." +Then he waved with a flag his adieu + to the Chief and the warriors assembled; +And away shot Tamdóka's canoe + to the strokes of ten sinewy hunters; +And a white path he clove up the blue, + bubbling stream of the swift Mississippi; +And away on his foaming trail flew, + like a sea-gull, the bark of the Frenchman. + +[AO] i.e. fire-arms which the Dakotas compare to the roar of the wings +of the Thunder-bird and the fierey arrows he shoots. + +[AP] DuLuth was a devout Catholic. + +[AQ] _Nee-wah-shtay_--Thou art good. + +[AR] Spirit-River, now called Rum River. + +[AS] Fire-arm--spirit-metal. + +[AT] Lake Superior--at that time the home of the Ojibways (Chippewas). + +[Illustration: TWO HUNDRED WHITE WINTERS AND MORE HAVE FLED FROM THE +FACE OF THE SUMMER ... + + * * * * * + +AH, LITTLE HE DREAMED THEN, FORSOOTH, THAT A CITY WOULD STAND ON THAT +HILL SIDE] + +Then merrily rose the blithe song + of the _voyageurs_ homeward returning, +And thus, as they glided along, + sang the bugle-voiced boatmen in chorus: + + SONG. + + Home again! home again! bend to the oar! + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur._ + He rides on the river with his paddle in his hand, + And his boat is his shelter on the water and the land. + The clam has his shell and the water-turtle too, + But the brave boatman's shell is his birch-bark canoe. + So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar; + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur._ + + Home again! home again! bend to the oar! + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_, + His couch is as downy as a couch can be, + For he sleeps on the feathers of the green fir-tree. + He dines on the fat of the pemmican-sack, + And his _eau de vie_ is the _eau de lac_. + So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar; + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_. + + Home again! home again! bend to the oar! + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_. + The brave, jolly boatman,--he never is afraid + When he meets at the portage a red, forest maid, + A Huron, or a Cree, or a blooming Chippeway; + And he marks his trail with the _bois brulés_[AU] + So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar; + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_. + Home again! home again! bend to the oar! + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_. + +In the reeds of the meadow the stag + lifts his branchy head stately and listens, +And the bobolink, perched on the flag, + her ear sidelong bends to the chorus. +From the brow of the Beautiful Isle,[AV] + half hid in the midst of the maples, +The sad-faced Winona, the while, + watched the boat growing less in the distance, +Till away in the bend of the stream, + where it turned and was lost in the lindens, +She saw the last dip and the gleam + of the oars ere they vanished forever. + + +[AU] "Burnt woods"--half-breeds. + +[AV] _Wita Waste_--"Beautiful Island"; the Dakota name for Nicollet +Island. + +Still afar on the waters the song, + like bridal bells distantly chiming, +The stout, jolly boatmen prolong, + beating time with the stroke of their paddles; +And Winona's ear, turned to the breeze, + lists the air falling fainter and fainter, +Till it dies like the murmur of bees + when the sun is aslant on the meadows. +Blow, breezes,--blow softly and sing + in the dark, flowing hair of the maiden; +But never again shall you bring + the voice that she loves to Winona. + + +THE CANOE RACE. + +Now a light rustling wind from the South + shakes his wings o'er the wide, wimpling waters: +Up the dark-winding river DuLuth + follows fast in the wake of Tamdóka. +On the slopes of the emerald shores + leafy woodlands and prairies alternate; +On the vine-tangled islands the flowers + peep timidly out at the white men; +In the dark-winding eddy the loon + sits warily watching and voiceless, +And the wild-goose, in reedy lagoon, + stills the prattle and play of her children. +The does and their sleek, dappled fawns + prick their ears and peer out from the thickets, +And the bison-calves play on the lawns, + and gambol like colts in the clover. +Up the still-flowing _Wákpa Wakán's_ + winding path through the groves and the meadows, +Now DuLuth's brawny boatmen pursue + the swift-gliding bark of Tamdóka; +And hardly the red braves out-do + the stout, steady oars of the white men. + +Now they bend to their oars in the race-- + the ten tawny braves of Tamdóka; +And hard on their heels in the chase + ply the six stalwart oars of the Frenchmen. +In the stern of his boat sits DuLuth; + in the stern of his boat sits Tamdóka, +And warily, cheerily, both urge + the oars of their men to the utmost. +Far-stretching away to the eyes, + winding blue in the midst of the meadows, +As a necklet of sapphires that lies + unclaspt in the lap of a virgin, +Here asleep in the lap of the plain + lies the reed-bordered, beautiful river. +Like two flying coursers that strain, + on the track, neck and neck on the home-stretch, +With nostrils distended and mane froth-flecked, + and the neck and the shoulders, +Each urged to his best by the cry + and the whip and the rein of his rider, +Now they skim o'er the waters and fly, + side by side, neck and neck, through the meadows, +The blue heron flaps from the reeds, + and away wings her course up the river: +Straight and swift is her flight o'er the meads, + but she hardly outstrips the canoemen. +See! the _voyageurs_ bend to their oars + till the blue veins swell out on their foreheads; +And the sweat from their brawny breasts pours; + but in vain their Herculean labor; +For the oars of Tamdóka are ten, + and but six are the oars of the Frenchman, +And the red warriors' burden of men + is matched by the _voyageurs'_ luggage. +Side by side, neck and neck, for a mile, + still they strain their strong arms to the utmost, +Till rounding a willowy isle, + now ahead creeps the boat of Tamdóka, +And the neighboring forests profound, + and the far-stretching plain of the meadows +To the whoop of the victors resound, + while the panting French rest on their paddles. + + +IN CAMP. + +With sable wings wide o'er the land + night sprinkles the dew of the heavens; +And hard by the dark river's strand, + in the midst of a tall, somber forest, +Two camp fires are lighted and beam + on the trunks and the arms of the pine trees. +In the fitful light darkle and gleam + the swarthy-hued faces around them. +And one is the camp of DuLuth, + and the other the camp of Tamdóka. +But few are the jests and uncouth + of the voyageurs over their supper, +While moody and silent the braves + round their fire in a circle sit crouching; +And low is the whisper of leaves + and the sough of the wind in the branches; +And low is the long-winding howl + of the lone wolf afar in the forest; +But shrill is the hoot of the owl, + like a bugle-blast blown in the pine-tops, +And the half-startled _voyageurs_ scowl + at the sudden and saucy intruder. +Like the eyes of the wolves are the eyes + of the watchful and silent Dakotas; +Like the face of the moon in the skies, + when the clouds chase each other across it, +Is Tamdóka's dark face in the light + of the flickering flames of the camp-fire. +They have plotted red murder by night, + and securely contemplate their victims. +But wary and armed to the teeth + are the resolute Frenchmen, and ready, +If need be, to grapple with death, + and to die hand to hand in the forest. +Yet skilled in the arts and the wiles + of the cunning and crafty _Algonkins_[AW] +They cover their hearts with their smiles, + and hide their suspicions of evil. +Round their low, smouldering fire, + feigning sleep, lie the watchful and wily Dakotas; +But DuLuth and his _voyageurs_ heap + their fire that shall blaze till the morning, +Ere they lay themselves snugly to rest, + with their guns by their sides on the blankets, +As if there were none to molest + but the gray, skulking wolves of the forest. + +[AW] Ojibways. + +'Tis midnight. The rising moon gleams, + weird and still, o'er the dusky horizon; +Through the hushed, somber forest she beams, + and fitfully gloams on the meadows; +And a dim, glimmering pathway she paves, + at times, on the dark stretch of river. +The winds are asleep in the caves-- + in the heart of the far-away mountains; +And here on the meadows and there, + the lazy mists gather and hover; +And the lights of the Fen-Spirits[72] flare + and dance on the low-lying marshes, +As still as the footsteps of death + by the bed of the babe and its mother; +And hushed are the pines, and beneath + lie the weary-limbed boatmen in slumber. +Walk softly,--walk softly, O Moon, + through the gray, broken clouds in thy pathway, +For the earth lies asleep and the boon + of repose is bestowed on the weary. +Toiling hands have forgotten their care; + e'en the brooks have forgotten to murmur; +But hark!--there's a sound on the air!-- + 'tis the light-rustling robes of the Spirits, +Like the breath of the night in the leaves + or the murmur of reeds on the river, +In the cool of the mid-summer eyes, + when the blaze of the day has descended. +Low-crouching and shadowy forms, + as still as the gray morning's footsteps, +Creep sly as the serpent that charms, + on her nest in the meadow, the plover; +In the shadows of pine-trunks they creep, + but their panther-eyes gleam in the fire-light, +As they peer on the white-men asleep, + in the glow of the fire, on their blankets. +Lo in each swarthy right-hand a knife; + in the left-hand, the bow and the arrows! +Brave Frenchmen, awake to the strife!-- + or you sleep in the forest forever. +Nay, nearer and nearer they glide, + like ghosts on the field of their battles, +Till close on the sleepers, they bide + but the signal of death from Tamdóka. +Still the sleepers sleep on. Not a breath + stirs the leaves of the awe-stricken forest; +The hushed air is heavy with death; + like the footsteps of death are the moments. +"_Arise!_"--At the word, with a bound, + to their feet spring the vigilant Frenchmen; +And the depths of the forest resound + to the crack and the roar of their rifles; +And seven writhing forms on the ground + clutch the earth. From the pine-tops the screech-owl +Screams and flaps his wide wings in affright, + and plunges away through the shadows; +And swift on the wings of the night + flee the dim, phantom-forms through the darkness. +Like _cabris_[80] when white wolves pursue, + fled the four yet remaining Dakotas; +Through forest and fen-land they flew, + and wild terror howled on their footsteps. +And one was Tamdóka. DuLuth + through the night sent his voice like a trumpet: +"Ye are _Sons of Unktéhee_, forsooth! + Return to your mothers, ye cowards!" +His shrill voice they heard as they fled, + but only the echoes made answer. +At the feet of the brave Frenchmen, dead, + lay seven swarthy _Sons of whitehead_; +And there, in the midst of the slain, + they found, as it gleamed in the fire-light, +The horn-handled knife from the Seine, + where it fell from the hand of Tamdóka. + +[Illustration: NEARER AND NEARER THEY GLIDE LIKE GHOSTS ON THE FIELDS OF +THEIR BATTLES. TILL CLOSE ON THE SLEEPERS, THEY BIDE FOR THE SIGNAL OF +DEATH FROM TAMDOKA] + +In the gray of the morn, ere the sun + peeped over the dewy horizon, +Their journey again was begun, + and they toiled up the swift, winding river; +And many a shallow they passed + on their way to the Lake of the Spirits;[AX] +But dauntless they reached it at last, + and found Akee-pá-kee-tin's[AY] village, +On an isle in the midst of the lake; + and a day in his teepees they tarried. +Of the deed in the wilderness spake, + to the brave Chief, the frank-hearted Frenchman. +A generous man was the Chief, + and a friend of the fearless explorer; +And dark was his visage with grief + at the treacherous act of the warriors. +"Brave Wází-kuté is a man, + and his heart is as clear as the sunlight; +But the head of a treacherous clan + and a snake-in-the-grass, is Tamdóka," +Said the chief; and he promised DuLuth, + on the word of a friend and a warrior, +To carry the pipe and the truth + to his cousin, the chief at Kathága; +For thrice at the _Tânka Medé_ + he smoked in the lodge of the Frenchman; +And thrice had he carried away + the bountiful gifts of the trader. + +[AX] Mille Lacs + +[AY] See Hennepin's account of "Aqui-pa-que-tin," and his village. +Shea's Hennepin, 225. + +When the chief could no longer prevail + on the white men to rest in his _teepees_, +He guided their feet on the trail + to the lakes of the winding Rice-River.[AZ] +Now on speeds the light bark canoe, + through the lakes to the broad _Gitchee Seebee_;[BA] +And up the great river they row,-- + up the Big Sandy Lake and Savanna; +And down through the meadows they go + to the river of blue _Gitchee-Gumee_.[BB] +Still onward they speed to the Dalles-- + to the roar of the white-rolling rapids, +Where the dark river tumbles and falls + down the ragged ravine of the mountains. +And singing his wild jubilee + to the low-moaning pines and the cedars, +Rushes on to the unsalted sea + o'er the ledges upheaved by volcanoes. +Their luggage the _voyageurs_ bore + down the long, winding path of the portage,[BC] +While they mingled their song with the roar + of the turbid and turbulent waters. +Down-wimpling and murmuring there + 'twixt two dewy hills winds a streamlet, +Like a long, flaxen ringlet of hair + on the breast of a maid in her slumber. + +All safe at the foot of the trail, + where they left it, they found their felucca, +And soon to the wind spread the sail, + and glided at ease through the waters,-- +Through the meadows and lakelets and forth, + round the point stretching south like a finger, +From the pine-plumed hills on the north, + sloping down to the bay and the lake-side +And behold, at the foot of the hill, + a cluster of Chippewa wigwams, +And the busy wives plying with skill + their nets in the emerald waters. +Two hundred white winters and more + have fled from the face of the Summer +Since DuLuth on that wild, somber shore, + in the unbroken forest primeval, +From the midst of the spruce and the pines, + saw the smoke of the wigwams up-curling, +Like the fumes from the temples and shrines + of the Druids of old in their forests. +Ah, little he dreamed then, forsooth, + that a city would stand on that hill-side, +And bear the proud name of DuLuth, + the untiring and dauntless explorer,-- +A refuge for ships from the storms, + and for men from the bee-hives of Europe, +Out-stretching her long, iron arms + o'er an empire of Saxons and Normans. + +[AZ] Now called "Mud River"--it empties into the Mississippi at Aitkin. + +[BA] _Gitchee See-bee_--Big River--is the Ojibway name for the +Mississippi, which is a corruption of Gitchee Seebee--as Michigan is a +corruption of _Gitchee Gumee_--Great Lake, the Ojibway name of Lake +Superior. + +[BB] The Ojibways called the St. Louis River _Gitchee-Gumee +See-bee_--_Great-lake River_, i.e. the river of the Great Lake (Lake +Superior). + +[BC] The route of DuLuth above described--from the mouth of the +Wild-Rice (Mud) River, to Lake Superior--was for centuries, and still +is, the Indians' canoe-route. I have walked over the old portage from +the foot of the Dalles to the St. Louis above--trod by the feet of +half-breeds and _voyageurs_ for more than two centuries, and by the +Indians for perhaps a thousand years. + +The swift west-wind sang in the sails, + and on flew the boat like a sea-gull, +By the green, templed hills and the dales, + and the dark, rugged rocks of the North Shore; +For the course of the brave Frenchman lay + to his fort at the _Gáh-mah-na-ték-wáhk,_[83] +By the shore of the grand Thunder Bay, + where the gray rocks loom up into mountains; +Where the Stone Giant sleeps on the Cape, + and the god of the storms makes the thunder,[83] +And the _Makinak_[83] lifts his huge shape + from the breast of the blue-rolling waters. +And thence to the south-westward led his course + to the Holy Ghost Mission,[84] +Where the Black Robes, the brave shepherds, + fed their wild sheep on the isle _Wauga-bá-mè_,[94] +In the enchanting _Cha-quám-e-gon_ Bay + defended by all the Apostles,[BD] +And thence, by the Ké-we-naw, + lay his course to the Mission Sainte Marie,[BE] +Now the waves clap their myriad hands, + and streams the white hair of the surges; +DuLuth at the steady helm stands, + and he hums as he bounds o'er the billows: + + O sweet is the carol of bird, + And sweet is the murmur of streams, + But sweeter the voice that I heard-- + In the night--in the midst of my dreams. + +[BD] The Apostle Islands. + +[BE] At the Sault Ste. Marie. + + + +WINONA AND TA-TE-PSIN. + +'Tis the moon of the sere, falling leaves. + From the heads of the maples the west-wind +Plucks the red-and-gold plumage and grieves + on the meads for the rose and the lily; +Their brown leaves the moaning oaks strew, + and the breezes that roam on the prairies, +Low-whistling and wanton pursue + the down of the silk-weed and thistle. +All sere are the prairies and brown + in the glimmer and haze of the Autumn; +From the far northern marshes flock down, + by thousands, the geese and the mallards. +From the meadows and wide-prairied plains, + for their long southward journey preparing. +In croaking flocks gather the cranes, + and choose with loud clamor their leaders. +The breath of the evening is cold, + and lurid along the horizon +The flames of the prairies are rolled, + on the somber skies flashing their torches. +At noontide a shimmer of gold + through the haze pours the sun from his pathway. +The wild-rice is gathered and ripe, +von the moors, lie the scarlet _po-pan-ka_,[BF] +_Michábo_[85] is smoking his pipe,-- + 'tis the soft, dreamy Indian Summer, +When the god of the South[3] as he flies + from _Wazíya_, the god of the Winter, +For a time turns his beautiful eyes, + and backward looks over his shoulder. + +[BF] Cranberries. + +It is noon. From his path in the skies + the red sun looks down on _Kathága_. +Asleep in the valley it lies, + for the swift hunters follow the bison. +Ta-té-psin, the aged brave, bends + as he walks by the side of Winona; +Her arm to his left hand she lends, + and he feels with his staff for the pathway; +On his slow, feeble footsteps attends + his gray dog, the watchful Wicháka; [a] +For blind in his years is the chief + of a fever that followed the Summer, +And the days of Ta-té-psin are brief. + Once more by the dark-rolling river +Sits the Chief in the warm, dreamy haze + of the beautiful Summer in Autumn; +And the faithful dog lovingly lays his head + at the feet of his master. +On a dead, withered branch sits a crow, + down-peering askance at the old man; +On the marge of the river below + romp the nut-brown and merry-voiced children, +And the dark waters silently flow, + broad and deep, to the plunge of the Ha-ha. + +[a] Wee-chah kah--literally "Faithful". + +By his side sat Winona. + He laid his thin, shriveled hand on her tresses, +"Winona my daughter," he said, + "no longer thy father beholds thee; +But he feels the long locks of thy hair, + and the days that are gone are remembered, +When Sisóka [BG] sat faithful and fair + in the lodge of swift footed Ta-té-psin. +The white years have broken my spear; + from my bow they have taken the bow-string; +But once on the trail of the deer, + like a gray wolf from sunrise till sunset, +By woodland and meadow and mere, + ran the feet of Ta-té-psin untiring. +But dim are the days that are gone, + and darkly around me they wander, +Like the pale, misty face of the moon + when she walks through the storm of the winter; +And sadly they speak in my ear. + I have looked on the graves of my kindred. +The Land of the Spirits is near. + Death walks by my side like a shadow. +Now open thine ear to my voice, + and thy heart to the wish of thy father, +And long will Winona rejoice + that she heeded the words of Ta-té-psin. +The cold, cruel winter is near, + and famine will sit in the teepee. +What hunter will bring me the deer, + or the flesh of the bear or the bison? +For my kinsmen before me have gone; + they hunt in the land of the shadows. +In my old age forsaken, alone, + must I die in my teepee of hunger? +Winona, Tamdóka can make my empty lodge + laugh with abundance; +For thine aged and blind father's sake, + to the son of the Chief speak the promise. +For gladly again to my tee + will the bridal gifts come for my daughter. +A fleet-footed hunter is he, + and the good spirits feather his arrows; +And the cold, cruel winter + will be a feast-time instead of a famine." + +[BG] The Robin--the name of Winona's Mother. + + +"My father," she said, and her voice + was filial and full of compassion, +"Would the heart of Ta-té-psin rejoice + at the death of Winona, his daughter? +The crafty Tamdóka I hate. + Must I die in his _teepee_ of sorrow? +For I love the White Chief and I wait + his return to the land of Dakotas. +When the cold winds of winter return, + and toss the white robes of the prairies, +The fire of the White Chief will burn + in his lodge at the Meeting-of-Waters. +Winona's heart followed his feet + far away to the land of the Morning, +And she hears in her slumber his sweet, + kindly voice call the name of thy daughter. +My father, abide, I entreat, + the return of the brave to _Katáhga_. +The wild-rice is gathered, the meat + of the bison is stored in the _teepee_; +Till the Coon-Moon[71] enough and to spare; + and if then the white warrior return not, +Winona will follow the bear and the coon + to their dens in the forest. +She is strong; she can handle the spear; + she can bend the stout bow of the hunter; +And swift on the trail of the deer + will she run o'er the snow on her snow-shoes. +Let the step-mother sit in the tee, + and kindle the fire for my father; +And the cold, cruel winter shall be + a feast-time instead of a famine." +"The White Chief will never return," + half angrily muttered Ta-té-psin; +"His camp-fire will nevermore burn + in the land of the warriors he slaughtered. +I grieve, for my daughter has said + that she loves the false friend of her kindred; +For the hands of the White Chief are red + with the blood of the trustful Dakotas." + +Then warmly Winona replied, + "Tamdóka himself is the traitor, +And the brave-hearted stranger had died + by his treacherous hand in the forest, +But thy daughter's voice bade him beware + of the sly death that followed his footsteps. +The words of Tamdóka are fair, + but his heart is the den of the serpents. +When the braves told their tale like a bird + sang the heart of Winona rejoicing, +But gladlier still had she heard + of the death of the crafty Tamdóka. +The Chief will return; he is bold, + and he carries the fire of Wakínyan: +To our people the truth will be told, + and Tamdóka will hide like a coward." +His thin locks the aged brave shook; + to himself half inaudibly muttered; +To Winona no answer he spoke,--only moaned he "_Micúnksee! Micúnksee_![BH] +In my old age forsaken and blind! + _Yun-hé-hé! Micúnksee! Micúnksee_!"[BI] +And Wicháka, the pitying dog, + whined as he looked on the face of his master. + +[BH] My Daughter; My Daughter. + +[BI] Alas, O My Daughter,--My Daughter! + + + +FAMINE. + +_Wazíya_ came down from the North-- + from the land of perpetual winter. +From his frost-covered beard issued forth the sharp-biting, + shrill-whistling North-wind; +At the touch of his breath + the wide earth turned to stone, and the lakes and the rivers: +From his nostrils the white vapors rose, + and they covered the sky like a blanket. +Like the down of _Magá_[BJ] fell the snows, + tossed and whirled into heaps by the North-wind. +Then the blinding storms roared on the plains, + like the simoons on sandy Sahara; +From the fangs of the fierce hurricanes + fled the elk and the deer and the bison. +Ever colder and colder it grew, + till the frozen ground cracked and split open; +And harder and harder it blew, + till the hillocks were bare as the boulders. +To the southward the buffalos fled, + and the white rabbits hid in their burrows; +On the bare sacred mounds of the dead + howled the gaunt, hungry wolves in the night-time, +The strong hunters crouched in their _tees_; + by the lodge-fires the little ones shivered; +And the Magic-Men[BK] danced to appease, + in their _teepee_, the wrath of _Wazíya_; +But famine and fatal disease, + like phantoms, crept into the village. +The Hard Moon[BL] was past, but the moon + when the coons make their trails in the forest[BM] +Grew colder and colder. The coon, + or the bear, ventured not from his cover; +For the cold, cruel Arctic simoon + swept the earth like the breath of a furnace. +In the _tee_ of Ta-té-psin the store + of wild-rice and dried meat was exhausted; +And Famine crept in at the door, + and sat crouching and gaunt by the lodge-fire. +But now with the saddle of deer + and the gifts came the crafty Tamdóka; +And he said, "Lo I bring you good cheer, + for I love the blind Chief and his daughter. +Take the gifts of Tamdóka, for dear + to his heart is the dark-eyed Winona." +The aged Chief opened his ears; + in his heart he already consented: +But the moans of his child and her tears + touched the age-softened heart of the father, +And he said, "I am burdened with years,-- + I am bent by the snows of my winters; +Ta-té-psin will die in his _tee_; + let him pass to the Land of the Spirits; +But Winona is young; she is free + and her own heart shall choose her a husband." +The dark warrior strode from the _tee_; + low-muttering and grim he departed; +"Let him die in his lodge," muttered he, + "but Winona shall kindle my lodge-fire." + +Then forth went Winona. The bow + of Ta-té-psin she took and his arrows, +And afar o'er the deep, drifted snow + through the forest she sped on her snow shoes. +Over meadow and ice-covered mere, + through the thickets of red-oak and hazel, +She followed the tracks of the deer, + but like phantoms they fled from her vision. +From sunrise to sunset she sped; + half famished she camped in the thicket; +In the cold snow she made her lone bed; + on the buds of the birch[BN] made her supper. +To the dim moon the gray owl preferred, + from the tree-top, his shrill lamentation, +And around her at midnight she heard + the dread famine-cries of the gray wolves. +In the gloam of the morning again + on the trail of the red-deer she followed-- +All day long through the thickets in vain, + for the gray wolves were chasing the roebucks; +And the cold, hungry winds from the plain + chased the wolves and the deer and Winona. + +[BJ] Wild-goose + +[BK] Medicine-men. + +[BL] January. + +[BM] February. + +[BN] The pheasant feeds on birch-buds in winter. Indians eat them when +very hungry. + +In the twilight of sundown she sat + in the forest, all weak and despairing; +Ta-té-psin's bow lay at her feet, + and his otter-skin quiver of arrows +"He promised,--he promised," she said,-- + half-dreamily uttered and mournful,-- +"And why comes he not? Is he dead? + Was he slain by the crafty Tamdóka? +Must Winona, alas, make her choice-- + make her choice between death and Tamdóka? +She will die, but her soul will rejoice + in the far Summer-land of the spirits. +Hark! I hear his low, musical voice! + he is coming! My White Chief is coming! +Ah, no, I am half in a dream!-- + 'twas the memory of days long departed; +But the birds of the green Summer seem + to be singing above in the branches." +Then forth from her bosom she drew + the crucified Jesus in silver. +In her dark hair the cold north-wind blew, + as meekly she bent o'er the image. +"O Christ of the Whiteman," she prayed, + "lead the feet of my brave to Kathága; +Send a good spirit down to my aid, + or the friend of the White Chief will perish." +Then a smile on her wan features played, + and she lifted her pale face and chanted + + "E-ye-he-ktá! E-ye-he-ktá! + Hé-kta-cè; é-ye-ce-quón. + Mí-Wamdee-ská, he-he-ktá, + He-kta-cè, é-ye-ce-quón, + Mí-Wamdee-ská." + + [TRANSLATON] + + He will come; he will come; + He will come, for he promised. + My White Eagle, he will come; + He will come, for he promised---- + My White Eagle. + +Thus sadly she chanted, and lo-- + allured by her sorrowful accents-- +From the dark covert crept a red roe + and wonderingly gazed on Winona. +Then swift caught the huntress her bow; + from her trembling hand hummed the keen arrow. +Up-leaped the red roebuck and fled, + but the white snow was sprinkled with scarlet, +And he fell in the oak thicket dead. + On the trail ran the eager Winona. +Half-famished the raw flesh she ate. + To the hungry maid sweet was her supper +Then swift through the night ran her feet, + and she trailed the sleek roebuck behind her; +And the guide of her steps was a star-- + the cold-glinting star of _Wazíya_[BO]-- +Over meadow and hilltop afar, on the way + to the lodge of her father. +But hark! on the keen frosty air + wind the shrill hunger-howls of the gray-wolves! +And nearer,--still nearer!--the blood + of the deer have they scented and follow; +Through the thicket, the meadow, the wood, + dash the pack on the trail of Winona. +Swift she speeds with her burden, + but swift on her track fly the minions of famine; +Now they yell on the view from the drift, + in the reeds at the marge of the meadow; +Red gleam their wild, ravenous eyes, + for they see on the hill-side their supper; +The dark forest echoes their cries, + but her heart is the heart of a warrior. +From its sheath snatched Winona her knife, + and a leg from the roebuck she severed; +With the carcass she ran for her life,-- + to a low-branching oak ran the maiden; +Round the deer's neck her head-strap[BP] was tied; + swiftly she sprang to the arms of the oak-tree; +Quick her burden she drew to her side, + and higher she clomb on the branches, +While the maddened wolves battled and bled, + dealing death o'er the leg to each other; +Their keen fangs devouring the dead,-- + yea, devouring the flesh of the living, +They raved and they gnashed and they growled, + like the fiends in the regions infernal; +The wide night re-echoing howled, + and the hoarse North-wind laughed o'er the slaughter. +But their ravenous maws unappeased + by the blood and the flesh of their fellows, +To the cold wind their muzzles they raised, + and the trail to the oak-tree they followed. +Round and round it they howled for the prey, + madly leaping and snarling and snapping; +But the brave maiden's keen arrows slay, + till the dead number more than the living. +All the long, dreary night-time, at bay, + in the oak sat the shivering Winona; +But the sun gleamed at last, and away + skulked the gray cowards[BQ] down through the forest. +Then down dropped the deer and the maid. + Ere the sun reached the midst of his journey, +Her red, welcome burden she laid + at the feet of her famishing father. +_Wazíya's_ wild wrath was appeased, + and homeward he turned to his _teepee_,[3] +O'er the plains and the forest-land breezed + from the Islands of Summer the South-wind. +From their dens came the coon and the bear; + o'er the snow through the woodlands they wandered; +On her snow-shoes with stout bow and spear + on their trails ran the huntress Winona. +The coon to his den in the tree, + and the bear to his burrow she followed; +A brave, skillful hunter was she, + and Ta-té-psin's lodge laughed with abundance. + +[BO] _Wazíya's_ Star is the North-star. + +[Illustration] + +[BP] A strap used in carrying burdens. + +[BQ] Wolves sometimes attack people at night, but rarely, if ever, in +the day time. If they have followed a hunter all night, and "treed" him, +they will skulk away as soon as the sun rises. + + +DEATH OF TA-TE-PSIN. + +The long winter wanes. On the wings + of the spring come the geese and the mallards; +On the bare oak the red-robin sings, + and the crocus peeps up on the prairies, +And the bobolink pipes, but he brings + of the blue-eyed, brave White Chief no tidings. +With the waning of winter, alas, + waned the life of the aged Ta-té-psin; +Ere the wild pansies peeped from the grass, + to the Land of the Spirits he journeyed; +Like a babe in its slumber he passed, + or the snow from the hill-tops of April; +And the dark-eyed Winona, at last, + stood alone by the graves of her kindred. +When their myriad mouths opened the trees + to the sweet dew of heaven and the raindrops, +And the April showers fell on the leas, + on his mound fell the tears of Winona. +Round her drooping form gathered the years + and the spirits unseen of her kindred, +As low, in the midst of her tears, + at the grave of her father she chanted + + E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày! + E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày! + E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày! + Ma-kàh kin háy-chay-dan táy-han wan-kày. + Tú-way ne ktáy snee e-yáy-chen e-wáh chày. + E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày! + E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày! +Ma-kàh kin háy-chay-dan táy-han wan-kày. + +[TRANSLATION]. + + Sore is my sorrow! + Sore is my sorrow! + Sore is my sorrow! + The earth alone lasts. + I speak as one dying; + Sore is my sorrow! + Sore is my sorrow! + The earth alone lasts. + +Still hope, like a star in the night + gleaming oft through the broken clouds somber, +Cheered the heart of Winona, and bright + on her dreams beamed the face of the Frenchman. +As the thought of a loved one and lost, + sad and sweet were her thoughts of the White Chief; +In the moon's mellow light, like a ghost, + walked Winona alone by the _Ha-Ha_, +Ever wrapped in a dream. Far away-- + to the land of the sunrise--she wandered; +On the blue-rolling _Tánka-Medé_[BR] + in the midst of her dreams, she beheld him-- +In his white-winged canoe, like a bird, + to the land of Dakotas returning, + +[BR] Lake Superior,--The Gitchee Gumee of the Chippewas. + +And often in fancy she heard + the dip of his oars on the river. +On the dark waters glimmered the moon, + but she saw not the boat of the Frenchman. +On the somber night bugled the loon, + but she heard not the song of the boatmen. +The moon waxed and waned, but the star + of her hope never waned to the setting; +Through her tears she beheld it afar, + like a torch on the eastern horizon. +"He will come,--he is coming," she said; + "he will come, for my White Eagle promised," +And low to the bare earth the maid + bent her ear for the sound of his footsteps, +"He is gone, but his voice in my ear + still remains like the voice of the robin; +He is far, but his footsteps I hear; + he is coming; my White Chief is coming!" +But the moon waxed and waned. Nevermore + will the eyes of Winona behold him. +Far away on the dark, rugged shore + of the blue _Gitchee Gúmee_ he lingers. +No tidings the rising sun brings; + no tidings the star of the evening; +But morning and evening she sings, + like a turtle-dove widowed and waiting: + + Aké u, aké u, aké u; + Ma cántè maséeca. + Aké u, aké u, aké u; + Ma cántè maséca. + + Come again, come again, come again; + For my heart is sad. + Come again, come again, come again; + For my heart is sad. + + + +DEATH OF WINONA. + +Down the broad _Ha-Ha Wák-pa_[BS] + the band took their way to the Games at _Keóza_[8] +While the swift-footed hunters by land + ran the shores for the elk and the bison. +Like _magás_[BT] ride the birchen canoes + on the breast of the dark, winding river, +By the willow-fringed island they cruise, + by the grassy hills green to their summits; +By the lofty bluffs hooded with oaks + that darken the deep with their shadows; +And bright in the sun gleam the strokes + of the oars in the hands of the women. +With the band went Winona. + The oar plied the maid with the skill of a hunter. +They tarried a time on the shore of _Remníca_-- + the Lake of the Mountains.[BU] +There the fleet hunters followed the deer, + and the thorny pahin[BV] for the women +From the tees rose the smoke of good cheer, + curling blue through the tops of the maples, +Near the foot of a cliff that arose, + like the battle-scarred walls of a castle, +Up-towering, in rugged repose, + to a dizzy height over the waters. + +[BS] The Dakota name for the Mississippi, see note 76 in Appendix. + +[BT] Wild Geese. + +[BU] Lake Pepin, by Hennepin called Lake of Tears--Called by the Dakotas +_Remnee-chah-Mday_--Lake of the Mountains. + +[BV] Pah-hin--the porcupine--the quills of which are greatly prized for +ornamental work. + +But the man-wolf still followed his prey, + and the step-mother ruled in the teepee; +Her will must Winona obey, + by the custom and law of Dakotas. +The gifts to the teepee were brought-- + the blankets and beads of the White men, +And Winona, the orphaned, was bought + by the crafty, relentless Tamdóka. +In the Spring-time of life, in the flush + of the gladsome mid-May days of Summer, +When the bobolink sang and the thrush, + and the red robin chirped in the branches, +To the tent of the brave must she go; + she must kindle the fire in his _teepee_; +She must sit in the lodge of her foe, + as a slave at the feet of her master. +Alas for her waiting! the wings + of the East-wind have brought her no tidings; +On the meadow the meadow-lark sings, + but sad is her song to Winona, +For the glad warbler's melody brings + but the memory of voices departed. +The Day-Spirit walked in the west + to his lodge in the land of the shadows; +His shining face gleamed on the crest + of the oak-hooded hills and the mountains, +And the meadow-lark hied to her nest, + and the mottled owl peeped from her cover. +But hark! from the _teepees_ a cry! + Hear the shouts of the hurrying warriors! +Are the feet of the enemy nigh,-- + of the crafty and cruel Ojibways? +Nay; look!--on the dizzy cliff high-- + on the brink of the cliff stands Winona! +Her sad face up-turned to the sky. + Hark! I hear the wild wail of her death-song: + + "My Father's Spirit, look down, look down-- + From your hunting grounds in the shining skies; + Behold, for the light of my heart is gone; + The light is gone and Winona dies. + + I looked to the East, but I saw no star; + The face of my White Chief was turned away. + I harked for his footsteps in vain; afar + His bark sailed over the Sunrise-sea. + + Long have I watched till my heart is cold; + In my breast it is heavy and cold as a stone. + No more shall Winona his face behold, + And the robin that sang in her heart is gone. + + Shall I sit at the feet of the treacherous brave? + On his hateful couch shall Winona lie? + Shall she kindle his fire like a coward slave? + No!--a warrior's daughter can bravely die. + + My Father's Spirit, look down, look down-- + From your hunting-grounds in the shining skies; + Behold, for the light in my heart is gone; + The light is gone and Winona dies." + +[Illustration: DOWN WHIRLING AND FLUTTERING SHE FELL, +AND HEADLONG PLUNGED INTO THE WATERS.] + +Swift the strong hunters climbed as she sang, + and the foremost of all was Tamdóka; +From crag to crag upward he sprang; + like a panther he leaped to the summit. +Too late!--on the brave as he crept + turned the maid in her scorn and defiance; +Then swift from the dizzy height leaped. + Like a brant arrow-pierced in mid-heaven. +Down whirling and fluttering she fell, + and headlong plunged into the waters. +Forever she sank mid the wail, + and the wild lamentation of women. +Her lone spirit evermore dwells + in the depths of the Lake of the Mountains, +And the lofty cliff evermore tells + to the years as they pass her sad story.[BW] + +In the silence of sorrow the night + o'er the earth spread her wide, sable pinions; +And the stars[18] hid their faces; and light + on the lake fell the tears of the spirits. +As her sad sisters watched on the shore + for her spirit to rise from the waters, +They heard the swift dip of an oar, + and a boat they beheld like a shadow, +Gliding down through the night in the gray, + gloaming mists on the face of the waters. +'Twas the bark of DuLuth on his way + from the Falls to the Games at _Keóza_. + +[BW] The Dakotas say that the spirit of Winona forever haunts the lake. +They say that it was many, many winters ago when Winona leaped from the +rock,--that the rock was then perpendicular to the water's edge and she +leaped into the lake, but now the rock has partly crumbled down and the +waters have also receded, so that they do not now reach, the foot of the +perpendicular rock as of old. + + + + +SPRING + +_Et nunc omnis ager, mine omms parturit arbos; +Nunc frondent sylvæ, nunc formostssimus annus. +--Virgil._ + +Delightful harbinger of joys to come, + Of summer's verdure and a fruitful year, +Who bids thee o'er our northern snow-fields roam, + And make all gladness in thy bright career? +Lo from the Indian Isle thou dost appear, + And dost a thousand pleasures with thee bring: +But why to us art thou so ever dear? + Bearest thou the hope--upon thy radiant wing-- +Of Immortality, O soft, celestial Spring? + +Yea, buds and flowers that fade not, they are thine, + And youth-renewing balms; the sear and old +Are young and gladsome at thy touch divine. + Thou breath'st upon the frozen earth--behold, +Meadows and vales of grass and floral gold, + Green-covered hills and leafy mountains grand: +Young life leaps up where all was dumb and cold, + As smoldering embers into flame are fanned, +Or the dead came back to life at the touch of the Savior's hand. + +The snow-clouds fly the canopy of heaven; + The rivulets ripple with the merry tone +Of wanton waters, and the breezes given + To fan the budding hills are all thine own. +Returning songsters from the tropic zone + Their vernal love-songs in the tree tops sing, +And talk and twitter in a tongue unknown + Of joys that journey on thy golden wing, +And God who sends thee forth to wake the world, O Spring! + +[ILLUSTRATION: SPRING ADA MARY HUNTLY WILLIE] + + Emblem of youth--enchanting goddess, Spring; +Lo now the happy rustic wends his way + O'er meadows decked with violets from thy wing, +And laboring to the rhythm of song all day, + Performs the task the harvest shall repay + An hundredfold into the reaper's hand. +What recks the tiller of his toil in May? + What cares he if his cheeks are tinged and tanned +By thy warm sunshine-kiss and by thy breezes bland? + +Hark to the tinkling bells of grazing kine! + The lambkins bleating on the mountain-side! +The red squirrel chippering in the proud old pine! + The pigeon-cock cooing to his vernal bride! +O'er all the land and o'er the peaceful tide, + Singing and praising every living thing, +Till one sweet anthem, echoed far and wide, + Makes all the broad blue bent of ether ring +With welcomings to thee, God-given, supernal Spring. + + + + +TO MOLLIE + +O Mollie, I would I possessed such a heart; + It enchants me--so gentle and true; +I would I possessed all its magical art, + Then, Mollie, I would enchant you. + +Those dear, rosy lips--tho' I never caressed them(?)-- + Are as sweet as the wild honey-dew; +Your cheeks--all the angels in Heaven have blessed them, + But not one is as lovely as you. + +Then give me that heart,--O that innocent heart! + For mine own is cold and _perdu_; +It enchants me, but give me its magical art, + Then, Mollie, I will enchant you. + +1855. + + + + +TO SYLVA + +I know thou art true, and I know thou art fair + As the rose-bud that blooms in thy beautiful hair; +Thou art far, but I feel the warm throb of thy heart; + Thou art far, but I love thee wherever thou art. + +Wherever at noontide my spirit may be, + At evening it silently wanders to thee; +It seeks thee, my dear one, for comfort and rest, + As the weary-winged dove seeks at night-fall her nest. + +Through the battle of life--through its sorrow and care-- + Till the mortal sink down with its load of despair,-- +Till we meet at the feet of the Father and Son, + I'll love thee and cherish thee, beautiful one. + +1859. + + + + +THANKSGIVING. + +[Nov. 26, 1857, during the great financial depression.] + + +Father, our thanks are due to thee + For many a blessing given, +By thy paternal love and care, + From the bounty-horn of heaven. + +We know that still that horn is filled + With blessings for our race, +And we calmly look thro' winter's storm + To thy benignant face. + +Father, we raise our thanks to Thee,-- + Who seldom thanked before; +And seldom bent the stubborn knee + Thy goodness to adore: + +But Father, thou hast blessings poured + On all our wayward days +And now thy mercies manifold + Have filled our hearts with praise + +The winter-storm may rack and roar; + We do not fear its blast; +And we'll bear with faith and fortitude + The lot that thou hast cast. + +But Father,--Father,--O look down + On the poor and homeless head +And feed the hungry thousands + That cry to thee for bread. + +Thou givest us our daily bread; + We would not ask for more; +But, Father, give their daily bread + To the multitudes of poor. + +In all the cities of the land + The naked and hungry are; +O feed them with thy manna, Lord, + And clothe them with thy care. + +Thou dost not give a serpent, Lord, + We will not give a stone; +For the bread and meat thou givest us + Are not for us alone. + +And while a loaf is given to us + From thy all-bounteous horn +We'll cheerfully divide that loaf + With the hungry and forlorn. + + + + +CHARITY + +Frail are the best of us, brothers-- + God's charity cover us all-- +Yet we ask for perfection in others, + And scoff when they stumble and fall. +Shall we give him a fish--or a serpent-- + Who stretches his hand in his need? +Let the proud give a stone, but the manly + Will give him a hand full of bread. + +Let us search our own hearts and behavior + Ere we cast at a brother a stone, +And remember the words of the Savior + To the frail and unfortunate one; +Remember when others displease us + The Nazarene's holy command, +For the only word written by Jesus + Was charity--writ in the sand. + + + + +CHARITY + +[Written in a friend's book of autographs, 1876.] + +Bear and forbear, I counsel thee, + Forgive and be forgiven, +For Charity is the golden key + That opens the gate of heaven. + + + + +SAILOR-BOY'S SONG + +Away, away, o'er the bounding sea + My spirit flies like a gull; +For I know my Mary is watching for me, + And the moon is bright and full. + +She sits on the rock by the sounding shore, + And gazes over the sea; +And she sighs, "Will my sailor-boy come no more? + Will he never come back to me?" + +The moonbeams play in her raven hair; + And the soft breeze kisses her brow; +But if your sailor-boy, love, were there, + He would kiss your sweet lips I trow. + +And mother--she sits in the cottage-door; + But her heart is out on the sea; +And she sighs, "Will my sailor-boy come no more? + Will he never come back to me?" + +Ye winds that over the billows roam + With a low and sullen moan, +O swiftly come to waft me home; + O bear me back to my own. + +For long have I been on the billowy deep, + On the boundless waste of sea; +And while I sleep there are two who weep, + And watch and pray for me. + +When the mad storm roars till the stoutest fear + And the thunders roll over the sea, +I think of you, Mary and mother dear, + For I know you are thinking of me. + +Then blow, ye winds, for my swift return; + Let the tempest roar o'er the main; +Let the billows yearn and the lightning burn; + They will hasten me home again. + + + +MY DEAD + +Last night in my feverish dreams I heard +A voice like the moan of an autumn sea, +Or the low, sad wail of a widowed bird, +And it said--"My darling, come home to me." + +Then a hand was laid on my throbbing head-- +As cold as clay, but it soothed my pain: +I wakened and knew from among the dead +My darling stood by my coach again. + + + +DUST TO DUST + + Dust to dust: +Fall and perish love and lust: + Life is one brief autumn day; + Sin and sorrow haunt the way + To the narrow house of clay, +Clutching at the good and just: + Dust to dust. + +Dust to dust: +Still we strive and toil and trust, + From the cradle to the grave: + Vainly crying, "Jesus, save!" + Fall the coward and the brave, +Fall the felon and the just: + Dust to dust. + + Dust to dust: +Hark, I hear the wintry gust; + Yet the roses bloom to-day, + Blushing to the kiss of May, + While the north winds sigh and say: +"Lo we bring the cruel frost-- + Dust to dust." + + Dust to dust: +Yet we live and love and trust, + Lifting burning brow and eye + To the mountain peaks on high: + From the peaks the ages cry, +Strewing ashes, rime and rust: + "Dust to dust!" + + Dust to dust: +What is gained when all is lost? + Gaily for a day we tread-- + Proudly with averted head + O'er the ashes of the dead-- +Blind with pride and mad with lust: + Dust to dust. + + Hope and trust: +All life springs from out the dust: + Ah, we measure God by man, +Looking forward but a span + On His wondrous, boundless plan; +All His ways are wise and just; + Hope and trust. + + Hope and trust: +Hope will blossom from the dust; + Love is queen: God's throne is hers; + His great heart with loving force + Throbs throughout the universe; +We are His and He is just; + Hope and trust. + + + + +O LET ME DREAM THE DREAMS OF LONG AGO + +Call me not back, O cold and crafty world: +I scorn your thankless thanks and hollow praise. +Wiser than seer or scientist--content +To tread no paths beyond these bleating hills, +Here let me lie beneath this dear old elm, +Among the blossoms of the clover-fields, +And listen to the humming of the bees. +Here in those far-off, happy, boyhood years, +When all my world was bounded by these hills, +I dreamed my first dreams underneath this elm. +Dreamed? Aye, and builded castles in the clouds; +Dreamed, and made glad a fond, proud mother's heart, +Now moldering into clay on yonder hill; +Dreamed till my day-dreams paved the world with gold; +Dreamed till my mad dreams made one desolate; +Dreamed--O my soul, and was it all a dream? + +As I lay dreaming under this old elm, +Building my castles in the sunny clouds, +Her soft eyes peeping from the copse of pine, +Looked tenderly on me and my glad heart leaped +Following her footsteps. O the dream--the dream! +O fawn-eyed, lotus-lipped, white-bosomed Flore! +I hide my bronzed face in your golden hair: +Thou wilt not heed the dew-drops on my beard; +Thou wilt not heed the wrinkles on my brow; +Thou wilt not chide me for my long delay. + +Here we stood heart to heart and eye to eye, +And I looked down into her inmost soul, +The while she drank my promise like sweet wine +O let me dream the dreams of long ago! +Soft are the tender eyes of maiden love; +Sweet are the dew-drops of a dear girl's lips +When love's red roses blush in sudden bloom: +O let me dream the dreams of long ago! +Hum soft and low, O bee-bent clover-fields; +Blink, blue-eyed violets, from the dewy grass; +Break into bloom, my golden dandelions; +Break into bloom, my dear old apple-trees. +I hear the robins cherup on the hedge, +I hear the warbling of the meadow-larks; +I hear the silver-fluted whippowil; +I hear the harps that moan among the pines +Touched by the ghostly fingers of the dead. +Hush!--let me dream the dreams of long ago. + +And wherefore left I these fair, flowery fields, +Where her fond eyes and ever gladsome voice +Made all the year one joyous, warbling June, +To chase my castles in the passing clouds-- +False as the mirage of some Indian isle +To shipwrecked sailors famished on the brine? +Wherefore?--Look out upon the babbling world-- +Fools clamoring at the heels of clamorous fools! +I hungered for the sapless husks of fame. +Dreaming I saw, beyond my native hills, +The sunshine shimmer on the laurel trees. +Ah tenderly plead her fond eyes brimmed with tears; +But lightly laughing at her fears I turned, +Eager to clutch my crown of laurel leaves, +Strong-souled and bold to front all winds of heaven-- +A lamb and lion molded into one-- +And burst away to tread the hollow world. +Ah nut-brown boys that tend the lowing kine, +Ah blithesome plowmen whistling on the glebe, +Ah merry mowers singing in the swaths, +Sweet, simple souls, contented not to know, +Wiser are ye and ye may teach the wise. + +Years trode upon the heels of flying years, +And still my _Ignis Fatuus_ flew before; +On thorny paths my eager feet pursued, +Till she whose fond heart doted on my dreams +Passed painless to the pure eternal peace. +Years trode upon the heels of flying years +And touched my brown beard with their silver wands, +And still my _Ignis Fatuus_ flew before; +Through thorns and mire my torn feet followed still, +Till she, my darling, unforgotten Flore, +Nursing her one hope all those weary years +Waiting my tardy coming, drooped and died. +I hear her low, sweet voice among the pines: +O let me dream the dreams of long ago: +I see her fond eyes peeping from the pines: +O let me dream the dreams of long ago +And hide my bronzed face in her golden hair. + +Is this the Indian summer of my days-- +Wealth without care and love without desire? +O misty, cheerless moon of falling leaves! +Is this the fruitage promised by the spring? +O blighted clusters withering on the vine! +O promised lips of love to one who dreams +And wakens holding but the hollow air! + +Let me dream on lest, dead unto my dead, +False to the true and true unto the false, +Maddened by thoughts of that which might have been, +And weary of the chains of that which is, +I slake my heart-thirst at forbidden springs. +I hear the voices of the moaning pines; +I hear the low, hushed whispers of the dead, +And one wan face looks in upon my dreams +And wounds me with her sad, imploring eyes. + +The dead sun sinks beyond the misty hills; +The chill winds whistle in the leafless elms; +The cold rain patters on the fallen leaves. +Where pipes the silver-fluted whippowil? +I hear no hum of bees among the bloom; +I hear no robin cherup on the hedge: +One dumb, lone lark sits shivering in the rain. +I hear the voices of the Autumn wind; +I hear the cold rain dripping on the leaves; +I hear the moaning of the mournful pines; +I hear the hollow voices of the dead. +O let me dream the dreams of long ago +And dreaming pass into the dreamless sleep-- +Beyond the voices of the autumn winds, +Beyond the patter of the dreary rain, +Beyond compassion and all vain regret +Beyond all waking and all weariness: +O let me dream the dreams of long ago. + + + + +THE PIONEER + +[MINNESOTA--1860-1875] + +When Mollie and I were married from the dear old cottage-home, + In the vale between the hills of fir and pine, +I parted with a sigh in a stranger-land to roam, + And to seek a western home for me and mine. + +By a grove-encircled lake in the wild and prairied West, + As the sun was sinking down one summer day, +I laid my knapsack down and my weary limbs to rest, + And resolved to build a cottage-home and stay. + +I staked and marked my "corners," and I "filed" upon my claim, + And I built a cottage-home of "logs and shakes;" +And then I wrote a letter, and Mollie and baby came + Out to bless me and to bake my johnny-cakes. + +When Mollie saw my "cottage" and the way that I had "bached", + She smiled, but I could see that she was "blue;" +Then she found my "Sunday-clothes" all soiled and torn and patched, + And she hid her face and shed a tear or two. + +But she went to work in earnest and the cabin fairly shone, + And her dinners were so savory and so nice +That I felt it was "not good that the man should be alone"-- + Even in this lovely land of Paradise. + +Well, the neighbors they were few and were many miles apart, + And you couldn't hear the locomotive scream; +But I was young and hardy, and my Mollie gave me heart, + And my "steers" they made a fast and fancy team. + +And the way I broke the sod was a marvel, you can bet, + For I fed my "steers" before the dawn of day; +And when the sun went under I was plowing prairie yet, + Till my Mollie blew the old tin horn for tea. + +And the lazy, lousy "Injuns" came a-loafing round the lake, + And a-begging for a bone or bit of bread; +And the sneaking thieves would steal whatever they could take-- + From the very house where they were kindly fed. + +O the eastern preachers preach, and the long-haired poets sing + Of the "noble braves" and "dusky maidens fair;" +But if they had pioneered 'twould have been another thing + When the "Injuns" got a-hankering for their "hair." + +Often when we lay in bed in the middle of the night, + How the prairie-wolves would howl their jubilee! +Then Mollie she would waken in a shiver and a fright, + Clasp our baby-pet and snuggle up to me. + +There were hardships you may guess, and enough of weary toil + For the first few years, but then it was so grand +To see the corn and wheat waving o'er the virgin soil, + And two stout and loving hearts went hand in hand. + +But Mollie took the fever when our second babe was born, + And she lay upon the bed as white as snow; +And my idle cultivator lay a rusting in the corn; + And the doctor said poor Mollie she must go. + +Now I never prayed before, but I fell upon my knees, + And I prayed as never any preacher prayed; +And Mollie always said that it broke the fell disease; + And I truly think the Lord He sent us aid: + +For the fever it was broken, and she took a bit of food, + And O then I went upon my knees again; +And I never cried before,--and I never thought I could,-- + But my tears they fell upon her hand like rain. + +And I think the Lord has blessed us ever since I prayed the prayer, + For my crops have never wanted rain or dew: +And Mollie often said in the days of debt and care, + "Don't you worry, John, the Lord will help us through." + +For the "pesky," painted Sioux, in the fall of 'sixty-two, + Came a-whooping on their ponies o'er the plain, +And they killed my pigs and cattle, and I tell you it looked "blue," + When they danced around my blazing stacks of grain. + +And the settlers mostly fled, but I didn't have a chance, + So I caught my hunting-rifle long and true, +And Mollie poured the powder while I made the devils dance, + To a tune that made 'em jump and tumble, too. + +And they fired upon the cabin; 'twas as good as any fort, + But the "beauties" wouldn't give us any rest; +For they skulked and blazed away, and I didn't call it sport, + For I had to do my very "level best." + +Now they don't call _me_ a coward, but my Mollie she's a "brick;" + For she chucked the children down the cellar-way, +And she never flinched a hair tho' the bullets pattered thick, + And we held the "painted beauties" well at bay. + +But once when I was aiming, a bullet grazed my head, + And it cut the scalp and made the air look blue; +Then Mollie straightened up like a soldier and she said: + "Never mind it, John, the Lord will help us through." + +And you bet it raised my "grit," and I never flinched a bit, + And my nerves they got as strong as steel or brass; +And when I fired again I was sure that I had hit, + For I saw the skulking devil "claw the grass." + +Well, the fight was long and hot, and I got a charge of shot + In the shoulder, but it never broke a bone; +And I never stopped to think whether I was hit or not + Till we found our ammunition almost gone. + +But the "Rangers" came at last--just as we were out of lead,-- + And I thanked the Lord, and Mollie thanked Him, too; +Then she put her arms around my neck and sobbed and cried and said: + "Bless the Lord!--I knew that He would help us through." + +And yonder on the hooks hangs that same old trusty gun, + And above it--I am sorry they're so few-- +Hang the black and braided trophies[BX] yet that I and Mollie won + In that same old bloody battle with the Sioux. + +[BX] Scalp-locks. + +Fifteen years have rolled away since I laid my knapsack down, + And my prairie claim is now one field of grain; +And yonder down the lake loom the steeples of a town, + And my flocks are feeding out upon the plain. + +The old log-house is standing filled with bins of corn and wheat, + And the cars they whistle past our cottage-home; +But my span of spanking trotters they are "just about" as fleet, + And I wouldn't give my farm to rule in Rome. + +For Mollie and I are young yet, and monarchs, too, are we-- + Of a "section" just as good as lies out-doors; +And the children are so happy (and Mollie and I have three) + And we think that we can "lie upon our oars." + +[Illustration: THE PIONEER] + +So this summer we went back to the old home by the hill: + O the hills they were so rugged and so tall! +And the lofty pines were gone but the rocks were all there still, + And the valleys looked so crowded and so small; + +And the dear familiar faces that I longed so much to see, + Looked so strangely unfamiliar and so old, +That the land of hills and valleys was no more a home to me, + And the river seemed a rivulet as it rolled. + +So I gladly hastened back to the prairies of the West-- + To the boundless fields of waving grass and corn; +And I love the lake-gemmed land where the wild-goose builds her nest, + Far better than the land where I was born. + +And I mean to lay my bones over yonder by the lake-- + By and by when I have nothing else to do-- +And I'll give the "chicks" the farm, and I know for Mollie's sake, + That the good and gracious Lord will help 'em through. + + + + +NIGHT THOUGHTS + +"_Le notte e madre dipensien_." + +I tumble and toss on my pillow, + As a ship without rudder or spars +Is tumbled and tossed on the billow, + 'Neath the glint and the glory of stars. +'Tis midnight and moonlight, and slumber + Has hushed every heart but my own; +O why are these thoughts without number + Sent to me by the man in the moon? + +Thoughts of the Here and Hereafter,-- + Thoughts all unbidden to come,-- +Thoughts that are echoes of laughter-- + Thoughts that are ghosts from the tomb,-- +Thoughts that are sweet as wild honey,-- + Thoughts that are bitter as gall,-- +Thoughts to be coined into money,-- + Thoughts of no value at all. + +Dreams that are tangled like wild-wood, + A hint creeping in like a hare; +Visions of innocent childhood,-- + Glimpses of pleasure and care; +Brave thoughts that flash like a saber,-- + Cowards that crouch as they come,-- +Thoughts of sweet love and sweet labor + In the fields at the old cottage-home. + +Visions of maize and of meadow, + Songs of the birds and the brooks, +Glimpses of sunshine and shadow, + Of hills and the vine-covered nooks; +Dreams that were dreams of a lover,-- + A face like the blushing of morn,-- +Hum of bees and the sweet scent of clover + And a bare-headed girl in the corn. + +Hopes that went down in the battle, + Apples that crumbled to dust,-- +Manna for rogues, and the rattle + Of hail-storms that fall on the just. +The "shoddy" that lolls in her chariot,-- + Maud Muller at work in the grass: +Here a silver-bribed Judas Iscariot,-- + There--Leonidas dead in the pass. + +Commingled the good and the evil; + Sown together the wheat and the tares; +In the heart of the wheat is the weevil; + There is joy in the midst of our cares. +The past,--shall we stop to regret it? + What is,--shall we falter and fall? +If the envious wrong thee, forget it; + Let thy charity cover them all. + +The cock hails the morn, and the rumble + Of wheels is abroad in the streets, +Still I tumble and mumble and grumble + At the fleas in my ears and--the sheets; +Mumble and grumble and tumble + Till the buzz of the bees is no more; +In a jumble I mumble and drumble + And tumble off--into a snore. + + + + +DANIEL + +[Written at the grave of an old friend.] + +Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,--down into the darkness at last; +Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,--sleeping the dreamless sleep,-- +Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn--the pure and the perfect rest: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew? + +Joy was there in the spring-time and hope like a blossoming rose, +When the wine-blood of youth ran tingling and throbbing in every vein; +Chirrup of robin and blue-bird in the white-blossomed apple and pear; +Carpets of green on the meadows spangled with dandelions; +Lowing of kine in the valleys, bleating of lambs on the hills; +Babble of brooks and the prattle of fountains that flashed in the sun; +Glad, merry voices, ripples of laughter, snatches of music and song, +And blue-eyed girls in the gardens that blushed like the roses they wore. + +And life was a pleasure unvexed, unmingled with sorrow and pain? +A round of delight from the blink of morn + till the moon rose laughing at night? +Nay, there were cares and cankers--envy and hunger and hate; +Death and disease in the pith of the limbs, + in the root and the bud and the branch; +Dry-rot, alas, at the heart, and a canker-worm gnawing therein. + +The summer of life came on with its heat and its struggle and toil, +Sweat of the brow and the soul, throbbing of muscle and brain, +Toil and moil and grapple with Fortune clutched as she flew-- +Only a shred of her robe, and a brave heart baffled and bowed! +Stern-visaged Fate with a hand of iron uplifted to fell; +The secret stab of a friend that stung like the sting of an asp, +Wringing red drops from the soul and a stifled moan of despair; +The loose lips of gossip and then--a storm of slander and lies, +Till Justice was blind as a bat and deaf to the cries of the just, +And Mercy, wrapped up in her robe, stood by like a statue in stone. + +Sear autumn followed the summer with frost and the falling of leaves +And red-ripe apples that blushed on the hills in the orchard of peace: +Red-ripe apples, alas, with worms writhing down to the core, +Apples of ashes and fungus that fell into rot at a touch; +Clusters of grapes in the garden blighted and sour on the vines; +Wheat-fields that waved in the valley and promised a harvest of gold, +Thrashing but chaff and weevil or cockle and shriveled cheat. +Fair was the promise of spring-time; the harvest a harvest of lies: +Fair was the promise of summer with Fortune clutched by the robe; +Fair was the promise of autumn--a hollow harlot in red, +A withered rose at her girdle and the thorns of the rose in her hand. + +Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,--down into the darkness at last; +Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel, sleeping the dreamless sleep-- +Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn--the pure and the perfect rest: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew? +Dead Ashes, what do you care if it storm, if it shine, if it shower? +Hail-storm, tornado or tempest, or the blinding blizzard of snow, +Or the mid-May showers on the blossoms with the glad sun blinking between, +Dead Ashes, what do you care?--they break not the sleep of the dead. + +Proud stands the ship to the sea, fair breezes belly her sails; +Strong masted, stanch in her shrouds, stanch in her beams and her bones; +Bound for Hesperian isles--for the isles of the plantain and palm, +Hope walks her deck with a smile and Confidence stands at the helm; +Proudly she turns to the sea and walks like a queen on the waves. +Caught in the grasp of the tempest, lashed by the fiends of the storm, +Torn into shreds are her sails, tumbled her masts to the main; +Rudderless, rolling she drives and groans in the grasp of the sea; +Harbor or hope there is none; she goes to her grave in the brine: +Dead in the fathomless slime lie the bones of the ship and her crew. +Such was the promise of life; so is the promise fulfilled. + +Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,--down into the darkness at last; +Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,--sleeping the dreamless sleep,-- +Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn--the pure and the perfect rest: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew? +Over your grave the tempest may roar or the zephyr sigh; +Over your grave the blue-bells may blink or the snow-drifts whirl,-- +Dead Ashes, what do you care?--they break not the sleep of the dead. +They that were friends may mourn, they that were friends may praise; +They that knew you and yet--knew you never--may cavil and blame; +They that were foes in disguise may strike at you down in the grave; +Slander, the scavenger-buzzard--may vomit her lies on you there; +Dead Ashes, what do you care?--they break not the sleep of the dead. + +The hoarse, low voice of the years croaks on forever-and-aye: +_Change! Change! Change_! and the winters wax and wane. +The old oak dies in the forest; the acorn sprouts at its feet; +The sea gnaws on at the land; the continent crowds on the sea. +Bound to the Ixion wheel with brazen fetters of fate +Man rises up from the dust and falls to the dust again. +God washes our eyes with tears, and still they are blinded with dust: +We grope in the dark and marvel, and pray to the Power unknown-- +Crying for help to the desert: not even an echo replies. +Doomed unto death like the moon, like the midget that men call man, +Wrinkled with age and agony the old Earth rolls her rounds; +Shrinking and shuddering she rolls--an atom in God's great sea-- +Only an atom of dust in the infinite ocean of space. +What to him are the years who sleeps in her bosom there? +What to him is the cry wrung out of the souls of men? +_Change, Change, Change_, and the sea gnaws on at the land: +Dead Ashes, what do you care?--it breaks not the sleep of the dead. + +Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,--down into the darkness at last; +Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,--sleeping the dreamless sleep,-- +Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn--the pure and the perfect rest: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better if only the dead soul knew? + +Up--out of the darkness at last, Daniel,--out of the darkness at last; +Into the light of the life eternal--into the sunlight of God, +Singing the song of the soul immortal freed from the fetters of flesh: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better than sleeping the dreamless sleep? +Hark! from the reel of the spheres eternal + the freed soul answereth "_Aye_." +Aye--Aye--Aye--it is better, brothers, + if it be but the dream of the famished soul. + + +MINNETONKA[BY] + +[BY] The Dakota name for this beautiful lake is _We-ne-a-tan-ka_--Broad +Water. By dropping the "a" before "tanka" we have changed the name to +_Big Water_. + + +I sit once more on breezy shore, at sunset in this glorious June, +I hear the dip of gleaming oar, I list the singers' merry tune. +Beneath my feet the waters beat, and ripple on the polished stones, +The squirrel chatters from his seat; the bag-pipe beetle hums and drones. +The pink and gold in blooming wold,--the green hills mirrored in the lake! +The deep, blue waters, zephyr-rolled, along the murmuring pebbles break. +The maples screen the ferns, and lean the leafy lindens o'er the deep; +The sapphire, set in emerald green, lies like an Orient gem asleep. +The crimson west glows + like the breast of _Rhuddin_[CA] when he pipes in May, +As downward droops the sun to rest, and shadows gather on the bay. +In amber sky the swallows fly and sail and circle o'er the deep; +The light-winged night-hawks whir and cry; the silver pike and salmon leap. +The rising moon, o'er isle and dune, looks laughing down on lake and lea; +Weird o'er the waters shrills the loon; the high stars twinkle in the sea. +From bank and hill the whippowil sends piping forth his flute-like notes, +And clear and shrill the answers trill from leafy isles and silver throats. +The twinkling light on cape and height; the hum of voices on the shores; +The merry laughter on the night; the dip and plash of frolic oars,-- +These tell the tale. On hill and dale the cities pour their gay and fair; +Along the sapphire lake they sail, and quaff like wine the balmy air. +'Tis well. Of yore from isle and shore + the smoke of Indian _teepees_[CB] rose; +The hunter plied the silent oar; the forest lay in still repose. +The moon-faced maid, in leafy glade, her warrior waited from the chase; +The nut-brown, naked children played, and chased the gopher on the grass. +The dappled fawn on wooded lawn, peeped out upon the birch canoe, +Swift-gliding in the gray of dawn along the silent waters blue. +In yonder tree the great Wanm-dee[CC] securely built her spacious nest; +The blast that swept the landlocked sea[CD] + but rocked her clamorous babes to rest. +By grassy mere the elk and deer gazed on the hunter as he came; +Nor fled with fear from bow or spear;-- + "so wild were they that they were tame." +Ah, birch canoe, and hunter, too, have long forsaken lake and shore; +He bade his fathers' bones adieu and turned away forevermore. +But still, methinks, on dusky brinks the spirit of the warrior moves; +At crystal springs the hunter drinks, and nightly haunts the spot he loves. +For oft at night I see the light of lodge-fires on the shadowy shores, +And hear the wail some maiden's sprite above her slaughtered warrior pours. +I hear the sob, on Spirit Knob,[BZ] of Indian mother o'er her child; +And on the midnight waters throb her low _yun-he-he's_[CE] weird and wild: +And sometimes, too, the light canoe glides like a shadow o'er the deep +At midnight when the moon is low, and all the shores are hushed in sleep. +Alas,--Alas!--for all things pass; and we shall vanish too, as they; +We build our monuments of brass, and granite, but they waste away. + +[BZ] Spirit-Knob was a small hill upon a point in the lake in full view +from Wayzata. It is now washed away by the waves. The spirit of a Dakota +mother, whose only child was drowned in the lake during a storm many +years ago, often wailed at midnight (so the Dakotas said), on this hill. +So they called it _Wa-na-gee Pa-zo-dan_--Spirit-Knob. (Literally--little +hill of the spirit.) + +[CA] The Welsh name for the robin. + +[Illustration: CRYSTAL BAY LAKE MINNETONKA] + +[CB] Lodges. + +[CC] Wanm-dee--the war-eagle of the Dakotas. + +[CD] Lake Superior. + +[CE] Pronounced _Yoon-hay-hay_--the exclamation used by Dakota women in +their lament for the dead, and equivalent to "woe-is-me." + + + +BEYOND + + +White-haired and hoary-bearded, who art thou +That speedest on, albeit bent with age, +Even as a youth that followeth after dreams? +Whence are thy feet, and whither trends thy way? + +Stayed not his hurried steps, but as he passed +His low, hoarse answer fell upon the wind: +"Go thou and question yonder mountain-peaks; +Go thou and ask the hoary-heaving main;-- +Nay, if thou wilt, the great, globed, silent stars +That sail innumerable the shoreless sea, +And let the eldest answer if he may. +Lo the unnumbered myriad, myriad worlds +Rolling around innumerable suns, +Through all the boundless, bottomless abyss, +Are but as grains of sand upwhirled and flung +By roaring winds and scattered on the sea. +I have beheld them and my hand hath sown. + +"Far-twinkling faint through dim, immeasured depths, +Behold Alcyone--a grander sun. +Round him thy solar orb with all his brood +Glimmering revolves. Lo from yon mightier sphere +Light, flying faster than the thoughts of men, +Swift as the lightnings cleave the glowering storm, +Shot on and on through dim, ethereal space, +Ere yet it touched thy little orb of Earth, +Five hundred cycles of thy world and more. +Round him thy Sun, obedient to his power, +Thrice tenfold swifter than the swiftest wing, +His æon-orbit, million-yeared and vast, +Wheels through the void. Him flaming I beheld +When first he flashed from out his central fire-- +A mightier orb beyond thine utmost ken. +Round upon round innumerable hath swung +Thy sun upon his circuit; grander still +His vaster orbit far Alcyone +Wheels and obeys the mightier orb unseen. + +"Seest thou yon star-paved pathway like an arch +Athwart thy welkin?--wondrous zone of stars, +Dim in the distance circling one huge sun, +To whom thy sun is but a spark of fire-- +To whom thine Earth is but a grain of dust: +Glimmering around him myriad suns revolve +And worlds innumerable as sea-beach sands. +Ere on yon _Via Lactea_ rolled one star +Lo I was there and trode the mighty round; +Yea, ere the central orb was fired and hung +A lamp to light the chaos. Star on star, +System on system, myriad worlds on worlds, +Beyond the utmost reach of mortal ken, +Beyond the utmost flight of mortal dream, +Yet have mine eyes beheld the birth of all. +But whence I am I know not. We are three-- +Known, yet unknown--unfathomable to man, +Time, Space, and Matter pregnant with all life, +Immortals older than the oldest orb. +We were and are forever: out of us +Are all things--suns and satellites, midge and man. +Worlds wax and wane, suns flame and glow and die; +Through shoreless space their scattered ashes float, +Unite, cohere, and wax to worlds again, +Changing, yet changless--new, but ever old-- +No atom lost and not one atom gained, +Though fire to vapor melt the adamant, +Or feldspar fall in drops of summer rain. +And in the atoms sleep the germs of life, +Myriad and multiform and marvelous, +Throughout all vast, immeasurable space, +In every grain of dust, in every drop +Of water, waiting but the thermal touch. +Yea, in the womb of nature slumber still +Wonders undreamed and forms beyond compare, +Minds that will cleave the chaos and unwind +The web of fate, and from the atom trace +The worlds, the suns, the universal law: +And from the law, the Master; yea, and read +On yon grand starry scroll the Master's will." + +Yea, but what Master? Lift the veil, O Time! +Where lie the bounds of Space and whither dwells +The Power unseen--the infinite Unknown? +Faint from afar the solemn answer fell: + +"Æon on æon, cycles myriad-yeared, +Swifter than light out-flashing from the suns, +My flying feet have sought the bounds of space +And found not, nor the infinite Unknown. +I see the Master only in his work: +I see the Ruler only in his law: +Time hath not touched the great All-father's throne, +Whose voice unheard the Universe obeys, +Who breathes upon the deep and worlds are born. +Worlds wax and wane, suns crumble into dust, +But matter pregnant with immortal life, +Since erst the white-haired centuries wheeled the vast, +Hath lost nor gained. Who made it, and who made +The Maker? Out of nothing, nothing. Lo +The worm that crawls from out the sun-touched sand, +What knows he of the huge, round, rolling Earth? +Yet more than thou of all the vast Beyond, +Or ever wilt. Content thee; let it be: +Know only this--there is a Power unknown-- +Master of life and Maker of the worlds." + + + +LINES + +On the death of Captain Hiram A. Coats, my old schoolmate and friend. + +Dead? or is it a dream-- +Only the voice of a dream? +Dead in the prime of his years, +And laid in the lap of the dust; +Only a handful of ashes +Moldering down into dust. + +Strong and manly was he, +Strong and tender and true; +Proud in the prime of his years; +Strong in the strength of the just: +A heart that was half a lion's, +And half the heart of a girl; +Tender to all that was tender, +And true to all that was true; +Bold in the battle of life, +And bold on the bloody field; +First at the call of his country, +First in the front of the foe. +Hope of the years was his-- +The golden and garnered sheaves; +Fair on the hills of autumn +Reddened the apples of peace. + +Dead? or is it a dream? +Dead in the prime of his years, +And laid in the lap of the dust. + +Aye, it _is_ but a dream; +For the life of man is a dream: +Dead in the prime of his years +And laid in the lap of the dust; +Only a handful of ashes +Moldering down into dust. + +Only a handful of ashes +Moldering down into dust? +Aye, but what of the breath +Blown out of the bosom of God? +What of the spirit that breathed +And burned in the temple of clay? +Dust unto dust returns; +The dew-drop returns to the sea; +The flash from the flint and the steel +Returns to its source in the sun. +Change cometh forever-and-aye, +But forever nothing is lost-- +The dew-drop that sinks in the sand, +Nor the sunbeam that falls in the sea. +Ah, life is only a link +In the endless chain of change. +Death giveth the dust to the dust +And the soul to the infinite soul: +For aye since the morning of man-- + +Since the human rose up from the brute-- +Hath Hope, like a beacon of light, +Like a star in the rift of the storm, +Been writ by the finger of God +On the longing hearts of men. +O follow no goblin fear; +O cringe to no cruel creed; +Nor chase the shadow of doubt +Till the brain runs mad with despair. +Stretch forth thy hand, O man, +To the winds and the quaking earth-- +To the heaving and falling sea-- +To the ultimate stars and feel +The throb of the spirit of God-- +The pulse of the Universe. + + +MAULEY + +THE BRAVE FERRY-MAN + +[NOTE.--The great Sioux massacre in Minnesota commenced at the Agency +village, on the Minnesota River, early in the morning of the 16th day of +August, 1862, precipitated, doubtless, by the murders at Acton on the +day previous. The massacre and the Indian war that followed developed +many brave men, but no truer hero than Mauley, an obscure Frenchman, the +ferry-man at the Agency. Continually under fire, he resolutely ran his +ferry-boat back and forth across the river, affording the +terror-stricken people the only chance for escape. He was shot down on +his boat just as he had landed on the opposite shore the last of those +who fled from the burning village to the ferry-landing. The Indians +disemboweled his dead body, cut off the head, hands and feet and thrust +them into the cavity. See _Heard's Hist. Sioux War_, p 67.] + + +Crouching in the early morning, +Came the swarth and naked "Sioux;"[CF] +On the village, without warning, +Fell the sudden, savage blow. +Horrid yell and crack of rifle +Mingle as the flames arise;-- +With the tomahawk they stifle +Mothers' wails and children's cries. +Men and women to the ferry +Fly from many a blazing cot;-- +Brave and ready--grim and steady, +Mauley mans the ferry-boat. + +Can they cross the ambushed river? +'Tis for life the only chance; +Only this may some deliver +From the scalping-knife and lance. +Through the throng of wailing women +Frantic men in terror burst;-- +"Back, ye cowards!" thundered Mauley,-- +"I will take the women first!" +Then with brawny arms and lever +Back the craven men he smote. +Brave and ready--grim and steady, +Mauley mans the ferry-boat. + +To and fro across the river +Plies the little mercy-craft, +While from ambushed gun and quiver +On it falls the fatal shaft. +Trembling from the burning village, +Still the terror-stricken fly, +For the Indians' love of pillage +Stays the bloody tragedy. +At the windlass-bar bare-headed-- +Bare his brawny arms and throat-- +Brave and ready--grim and steady, +Mauley mans the ferry-boat. + +Hark!--a sudden burst of war-whoops! +They are bent on murder now; +Down the ferry-road they rally, +Led by furious Little Crow. +Frantic mothers clasp their children, +And the help of God implore; +Frantic men leap in the river +Ere the boat can reach the shore. +Mauley helps the weak and wounded +Till the last soul is afloat;-- +Brave and ready--grim and steady, +Mauley mans the ferry-boat. + +Speed the craft!--The fierce Dakotas +Whoop and hasten to the shore, +And a shower of shot and arrows +On the crowded boat they pour. +Fast it floats across the river, +Managed by the master hand, +Laden with a freight so precious,-- +God be thanked!--it reaches land. +Where is Mauley--grim and steady, +Shall his brave deed be forgot? +Grasping still the windlass-lever, +Dead he lies upon the boat. + +[CF] Pronounced Soo; a name given to the Dakotas in early days by the +French traders. + +[Illustration: MAULEY THE BRAVE FERRY-MAN] + + + + +MEN + +Man is a creature of a thousand whims; +The slave of hope and fear and circumstance. +Through toil and martyrdom a million years +Struggling and groping upward from the brute, +And ever dragging still the brutish chains, +And ever slipping backward to the brute. +Shall he not break the galling, brazen bonds +That bind him writhing on the wheel of fate? +Long ages groveling with his brother brutes, +He plucked the tree of knowledge and uprose +And walked erect--a god; but died the death: +For knowledge brings but sadness and unrest +Forever, insatiate longing and regret. +Behold the brute's unerring instinct guides +True as the pole-star, while man's reason leads +How oft to quicksands and the hidden reefs! +Contented brute, his daily wants how few! +And these by Nature's mother-hand supplied. +Man's wants unnumbered and unsatisfied, +And multiplied at every onward step-- +Insatiate as the cavernous maw of time. +His real wants how simple and how few! +Behold the kine in yonder pasture-field +Cropping the clover, or in rest reclined, +Chewing meek-eyed the cud of sweet content. +Ambition plagues them not, nor hope, nor fear; +No demons fright them and no cruel creeds; +No pangs of disappointment or remorse. +See man the picture of perpetual want, +The prototype of all disquietude; +Full of trouble, yet ever seeking more; +Between the upper and the nether stone +Ground and forever in the mill of fate. +Nature and art combine to clothe his form, +To feed his fancy and to fill his maw; +And yet the more they give the more he craves. +Give him the gold of Ophir, still he delves; +Give him the land, and he demands the sea; +Give him the earth--he reaches for the stars. +Doomed by his fate to scorn the good he has +And grasp at fancied good beyond his reach, +He seeks for silver in the distant hills +While in the sand gold glitters at his feet. + +O man, thy wisdom is but folly still; +Wiser the brute and full of sweet content. +The wit and wisdom of five thousand years--What +are they but the husks we feed upon, +While beast and bird devour the golden grain? +Lo for the brutes dame Nature sows and tills; +For them the Tuba-tree of Paradise +Bends with its bounties free and manifold; +For them the fabled fountain Salsabil, +Gushes pure wine that sparkles as it runs, +And fair Al Cawthar flows with creamy milk. +But man, forever doomed to toil and sweat, +Digs the hard earth and casts his seeds therein, +And hopes the harvest;--how oft he hopes in vain! +Weeds choke, winds blast, and myriad pests devour, +The hot sun withers and the floods destroy. +Unceasing labor, vigilance and care +Reward him here and there with bounteous store. +Had man the blessed wisdom of content, +Happy were he--as wise Horatius sung-- +To whom God gives enough with sparing hand. +Of all the crops by sighing mortals sown, +And watered with man's sweat and woman's tears, +There is but only one that never fails +In drouth or flood, on fat or flinty soil, +On Nilus' banks or Scandia's stony hills-- +The plenteous, never-stinted crop of fools. +So hath it been since erst aspiring man +Broke from the brute and plucked the fatal tree, +And will be till eternity grows gray. + +Princes and parasites comprise mankind: +To one wise prince a million parasites; +The most uncommon thing is common-sense; +A truly wise man is a freak of nature. +The herd are parasites of parasites +That blindly follow priest or demagogue, +Himself blind leader of the blind. The wise +Weigh words, but by the yard fools measure them. +The wise beginneth at the end; the fool +Ends at the beginning, or begins anew: +Aye, every ditch is full of after-wit. +Folly sows broad cast; Wisdom gathers in, +And so the wise man fattens on the fool, +And from the follies of the foolish learns +Wisdom to guide himself and bridle them. +"To-morrow I made my fortune," cries the fool, +"To-day I'll spend it." Thus will Folly eat +His chicken ere the hen hath laid the egg. +So Folly blossoms with promises all the year-- +Promises that bud and blossom but to blast. +"All men are fools," said Socrates, the wise, +And in the broader sense I grant it true, +For even Socrates had his Xanthipp'. +Whose head is wise oft hath a foolish heart; +The wisest has more follies than he needs; +Wisdom and madness, too, are near akin. +The marrow-maddening canker-worm of love +Feeds on the brains of wise men as on fools'. + +The wise man gathers wisdom from all men +As bees their honey hive from plant and weed. +Yea, from the varied history of the world, +From the experience of all times, all men, +The wise man learneth wisdom. Folly learns +From his own bruises if he learns at all. +The fool--born wise--what need hath he to learn? +He needs but gabble wisdom to the world: +Grill him on a gridiron and he gabbles still. + +Wise men there are--wise in the eyes of men-- +Who cram their hollow heads with ancient wit +Cackled in Carthage, babbled in Babylon, +Gabbled in Greece and riddled in old Rome, +And never coin a farthing of their own. +Wise men there are--for owls are counted wise-- +Who love to leave the lamp-lit paths behind, +And chase the shapeless shadow of a doubt. +Too wise to learn, too wise to see the truth, +E'en though it glow and sparkle like a gem +On God's outstretched forefinger for all time. +These have one argument, and only one, +For good or evil, earth or jeweled heaven-- +The olden, owlish argument of doubt. +Ah, he alone is wise who ever stands +Armed _cap-a-pié_ with God's eternal truth. +Where _Grex_ is _Rex_ God help the hapless land. +The yelping curs that bay the rising moon +Are not more clamorous, and the fitful winds +Not more inconstant. List the croaking frogs +That raise their heads in fen or stagnant pool, +Shouting at eve their wisdom from the mud. +Beside the braying, bleating, bellowing mob, +Their jarring discords are sweet harmony. +The headless herd are but a noise of wind; +Sometimes, alas, the wild tornado's roar. +As full of freaks as curs are full of fleas, +Like gnats they swarm, like flies they buzz and breed. +Thought works in silence: Wisdom stops to think. +No ass so obstinate as ignorance. +Oft as they seize the ship of state, behold-- +Overboard goes all ballast and they crowd +To blast or breeze or hurricane full sail, +Each dunce a pilot and a captain too. +How often cross-eyed Justice hits amiss! +Doomed by Athenian mobs to banishment, +See Aristides leave the land he saved: +Wisdom his fault and justice his offense. +See Caesar crowned a god and Tully slain; +See Paris red with riot and noble blood, +A king beheaded and a monster throned,-- +King Drone, flat fool that weather-cocked all winds, +Gulped gall and vinegar and smacked it wine, +Wig-wagged his way from gilded _Oeil de Boeuf_ +Through mob and maelstrom to the guillotine. +Chateaus up-blazing torch the doom of France, +While human wolves howl ruin round their walls. +Contention hisses from a million mouths, +And from ten thousand muttering craters smokes +The smell of sulphur. Gaul becomes a ghoul; +While _Parlez-Tous_ in hot palaver holds +Hubbub _ad_ Bedlam--Pandemonium thriced. +There, voices drowning voice with frantic cries, +Discord demented flaps her ruffled wings +And shrieks delirium to her screeching brood. +Sneer-lipped, hawk-eyed, wolf-tongued oraculars-- +Wise-wigs, Girondins, frothing Jacobins-- +Reason to madness run, tongues venom-tanged-- +Howl chaos all with one united throat. +Maelstrom of madness, lazar-howled, hag-shrilled! +Quack quackles quack; all doctors disagree, +While Doctor Guillotine's huge scalpel heads +Hell-dogs beheading helpless innocents. +The very babes bark rabies. Journalism, +Moon-mad, green-eyed, hound-scented, _lupus_-tongued +On howls the pack and smells her bread in blood. + +_O Tempus ferax insanorum, Heu!_ +Physicked with metaphysics, pamphleteered +Into paroxysms, bruited into brutes. +And metamorphosed into murder, lo +Men lapse to savagery and turn to beasts. +Hell-broth hag-boiled: a mad Theroigne is queen-- +Mounts to the brazen throne of Harlotdom, +Queen of the cursed, and flares her cannon-torch. +Watch-wolves, lean-jawed, fore-smelling feast of blood, +In packs on Paris howl from farthest France. +Discord demented bursts the bounds of _Dis_; +Mad Murder raves and Horror holds her hell. +Hades up-heaves her whelps. In human forms +Up-flare the Furies, serpent-haired and grin +Horrid with bloody jaws. Scaled reptiles crawl +From slum and sewer, slimy, coil on coil-- +Danton, dark beast, that builded for himself +A monument of quicksand limed with blood; +Horse-leech Marat, blear-eyed, vile vulture born; +Fair Charlotte's dagger robbed the guillotine! +Black-biled, green-visaged, traitorous Robespierre, +That buzzard-beaked, hawk-taloned octopus +Who played with pale poltroonery of men, +And drank the cup of flattery till he reeled; +Hell's pope uncrowned, immortal for a day. +Tinville, relentless dog of murder-plot-- +Doom-judge whose trembling victims were foredoomed; +Maillard who sucked his milk from Murder's dugs, +Twin-whelp to Theroigne, captain of the hags; +Jourdan, red-grizzled mule-son blotched with blood, +Headsman forever "famous-infamous;" +Keen, hag-whelped journalist Camille Desmoulins, +Who with a hundred other of his ilk +Hissed on the hounds and smeared his bread with blood; +Lebon, man-fiend, that vampire-ghoul who drank +Hot blood of headless victims, and compelled +Mothers to view the murder of their babes; +At whose red guillotine, in Arras raised, +The pipe and fiddle played at every fall +Of ghastly head the ribald "_Ca Ira_;" +And fiends unnamed and nameless brutes untaled. + +Petticoat-patriots _sans bas_, and _Sans-culottes_, +Rampant in rags and hunger-toothed uproar +Paris the proud. With Jacobin clubs they club +The head of France till all her brains are out. +Hired murder hunts in packs. Men murder-mad +Slay for the love of murder. Gloomy night, +Hiding her stars lest they in pity fall, +Beholds a thousand guiltless, trembling souls-- +Men, women, children--forth from prisons flung +In flare of torch and glare of demon eyes, +Among the howling wolves and lazar-hags, +Crying for mercy where no mercy is, +Hewed down in heaps by bloody ax and pike. +From their grim battlements the imps of hell +Indignant hissed and damped their fires with tears; +And Manhood from the watch-towers of the world +Cried in the name of Human Nature--"Hold!" +As well the drifting snail might strive to still +The volcan-heaved, storm-struck, moon-maddened sea. +Blood-frenzied beasts demand their feast of blood. +_"Liberty--Equality--Fraternity!"_--the cry +Of blood-hounds baying on the track of babes. +Queen innocent beheaded--mother-queen! +And queenly Roland--Nature's queenly queen! +Aye, at the foot of bloody guillotine +She stood a heroine: before her loomed +The Goddess of Liberty--in statue-stone. +Queen Roland saw, and spake the words that ring +Along the centuries--_"O Liberty! +What crimes are committed in thy name!"_--and died. +And when the headsman raised her severed head +To hell-dogs shouting _"Vive la Liberté,"_ +Godlike disdain still sparkled in her eyes. +Grim Hell herself in pity stood aghast, +Clanged shut her doors and stopped her ears with pitch. + +See the wise ruler--father of Brazil, +Who struck the shackles from a million slaves, +Whose reign was peace and love and gentleness, +Despoiled and driven from the land he loves. +See jealous Labor strike the hand that feeds, +And burn the mills that grind his daily bread; +Yea, in blind rage denounce the very laws +That shield his home from Europe's pauperdom. +See the grieved farmer raise his horny hand +And splutter garlic. Hear the demagogues +Fist-maul the wind and weather-cock the crowd, +With brazen foreheads full of empty noise +Out-bellowing the bulls of Bashan; and behold +Shrill, wrinkled Amazons in high harangue +Stamp their flat feet and gnash their toothless gums, +And flaunt their petticoat-flag of "Liberty." +Hear the old bandogs of the Daily Press, +Chained to their party posts, or fetter-free +And running amuck against old party creeds, +On-howl their packs and glory in the fight. +See mangy curs, whose editorial ears +Prick to all winds to catch the popular breeze, +Slang-whanging yelp, and froth and snap and snarl, +And sniff the gutters for their daily food. +And these--are they our prophets and our priests? +Hurra!--Hurra!--Hurra!--for "Liberty!" +Flaunt the red flag and flutter the petticoat; +Ran-tan the drums and let the bugles bray, +The eagle scream and sixty million throats +Sing Yankee-doodle--Yankee-doodle-doo. + +The state is sick and every fool a quack +Running with pills and plasters and sure-cures, +And every pill and package labelled _Ism_. +See Liberty run mad, and Anarchy, +Bearing the torch, the dagger and the bomb +Red-mouthed run riot in her sacred name +Hear mobs of idlers cry--_"Equality! +Let all men share alike: divide, divide!"_ +Butting their heads against the granite rocks +Of Nature and the eternal laws of God. +Pull down the toiler, lift the idler up! +Despoil the frugal, crown the negligent! +Offer rewards to idleness and crime! +And pay a premium for improvidence! +Fools, can your wolfish cries repeal the laws +Of God engraven on the granite hills, +Written in every Wrinkle of the earth, +On every plain, on every mountain-top,-- +Nay, blazened o'er all the boundless Universe +On every jewel that sparkles on God's throne? +And can ye rectify God's mighty plan? +O pygmies, can ye measure God himself? +Aye, would ye measure God's almighty power, +Go--crack Earth's bones and heave the granite hills; +Measure the ocean in a drinking-cup; +Measure Eternity by the town-clock; +Nay, with a yard-stick measure the Universe: +Measure for measure. Measure God by man! +"Fools to the midmost marrow of your bones!" +O buzzing flies and gnats! Ye cannot strike +One little atom from God's Universe, +Or warp the laws of Nature by a hair! + +His loving eye sees through all evil good. +Man's life is but a breath; but lo with Him +To-day, to-morrow, yesterday, are one +One in the cycle of eternal time +That hath beginning none, nor any end. +The Earth revolving round her sire, the Sun, +Measures the flying year of mortal man, +But who shall measure God's eternal year? +The unbegotten, everlasting God; +Unmade, eternal, all-pervading power; +Center and source of all things, high and low, +Maker and master of the Universe-- +Ah, nay, the mighty Universe itself! +All things in nature bear God's signature +So plainly writ that he who runs may read. +We know not what life is; how may we know +Death--what it is, or what may lie beyond? +Whoso forgets his God forgets himself. + +Let me not blindly judge my brother man: +There is but one just judge; there is but one +Who knows the hearts of men. Him let us praise-- +Not with blind prayer, or idle, sounding psalms-- +But let us daily in our daily works, +Praise God by righteous deeds and brother-love. +Go forth into the forest and observe-- +For men believe their eyes and doubt their ears-- +The creeping vine, the shrub, the lowly bush, +The dwarfed and stunted trees, the bent and bowed, +And here and there a lordly oak or elm, +And o'er them all a tall and princely pine. +All struggle upward, but the many fail; +The low dwarfed by the shadows of the great, +The stronger basking in the genial sun. +Observe the myriad fishes of the seas-- +The mammoths and the minnows of the deep. +Behold the eagle and the little wren, +The condor on his cliff, the pigeon-hawk, +The teal, the coot, the broad-winged albatross. +Turn to the beasts in forest and in field-- +The lion, the lynx, the mammoth and the mouse, +The sheep, the goat, the bullock and the horse, +The fierce gorillas and the chattering apes-- +Progenitors and prototypes of man. +Not only differences in genera find, +But grades in every kind and every class. + +I would not doom to serfdom or to toil +One race, one caste, one class, or any man: +Give every honest man an honest chance; +Protect alike the rich man and the poor; +Let not the toiler live upon a crust +While Croesus' bread is buttered on both sides. + +O people's king and shepherd, thronèd Law, +Strike down the monsters of Monopoly. +Lift up thy club, O mighty Hercules! +Behold thy "Labors" yet unfinished are: +Tear off thy Nessus shirt and bare thine arms. +The Numean lion fattens on our flocks; +The Lernean Hydra coils around our farms, +Our towns, our mills, our mines, our factories; +The triple monster Geryon lives again, +Grown quadruple, and over all our plains +And thousand hills his fattening oxen feed. +Stymphalean buzzards ravage round our fields; +The Augean stables reeking stench the land; +The hundred-headed monster Cerberus, +That throttled Greece and ravaged hapless France, +Hath broke from hell and howls for human blood. +Lift up thy knotted club, O Hercules! +Strike swift and sure: crush down the Hydra's heads; +Throttle the Numean lion: strike! nor spare +The monster Geryon or the buzzard-beaks. +Clean the Augean stables if thou can'st; +But hurl the hundred-headed monster down +Headlong to Hades: chain him; make thee sure +He shall not burst the bonds of hell again. + +To you, O chosen makers of the laws, +The nation looks--and shall it look in vain? +Will ye sit idle, or in idle wind +Blow out your zeal, and crack your party whips, +Or drivel dotage, while the crisis cries-- +While all around the dark horizon loom +Clouds thunder-capped that bode a hurricane? +Sleep ye as slept the "Notables" of France, +While under them an hundred Ætnas hissed +And spluttered sulphur, gathering for the shock? +Be ye our Hercules--and Lynceus-eyed: +Still ye the storm or ere the storm begin-- +Ere "Liberty" take Justice by the throat, +And run moon-mad a Malay murder-muck, +Throttle the "Trusts", and crush the coils combined +That crack our bones and fatten on our fields. +Strike down the hissing heads of Anarchy: +Strike swift and hard, nor parley with the fiend +Mothered of hell and father of all fiends-- +Fell monster with an hundred bloody mouths, +And every mouth an hundred hissing tongues, +And every tongue drips venom from his fangs. + +Protect the toiling millions by just laws; +Let honest labor find its sure reward; +Let willing hands find work and honest bread. +So frame the laws that every honest man +May find his home protected and his craft. +Let Liberty and Order walk hand in hand +With Justice: happy Trio! let them rule. +Put up the bars: bar out the pauper swarms +Alike from Asia's huts and Europe's hives. +Let charity begin at home. In vain +Will we bar out the swarms from Europe's hives +And Asia's countless lepers, if our ports +Are free to all the products of their hands. +Put up the bars: bar out the pauper hordes; +Bar out their products that compete with ours: +Give honest toil at home an honest chance: +Build up our own and keep our coin at home. +In vain our mines pour forth their wealth of gold +And silver, if by every ship it sail +For London, Paris, Birmingham or Berlin. + +We have been prodigal. The days are past +When virgin acres wanted willing hands, +When fertile empires lay in wilderness +Waiting the teeming millions of the world. +Lo where the Indian and the bison roamed--Lords +of the prairies boundless as the sea--But +twenty years ago, behold the change! +Homesteads and hamlets, flocks and lowing herds, +Railways and cities, miles of rustling corn, +And leagues on leagues of waving fields of gold. + +Let wise men teach and honest men proclaim +The mutual dependence of the rich and poor; +For if the wealthy profit by the poor, +The poor man profits ever by the rich. +Wealth builds our churches and our colleges; +Wealth builds the mills that grind the million's bread; +Wealth builds the factories that clothe the poor; +Wealth builds the railways and the million ride. +God hath so willed the toiling millions reap +The golden harvest that the rich have sown. +Six feet of earth make all men even; lo +The toilers are the rich man's heirs at last. +But there be men would grumble at their lot, +Even if it were a corner-lot on Broadway. +We stand upon the shoulders of the past. +Who knoweth not the past how may he know +The folly or the wisdom of to-day? +For by comparison we weigh the good, +And by comparison all evil weigh. +"What can we reason, but from what we know?" +Let honest men look back an hundred years-- +Nay, fifty, and behold the wondrous change. +Where wooden tubs like sluggards sailed the sea, +Steam-ships of steel like greyhounds course the main; +Where lumbering coach and wain and wagon toiled +Through mud and mire and rut and rugged way, +The cushioned train a mile a minute flies. +Then by slow coach the message went and came, +But now by lightning bridled to man's use +We flash our silent thoughts from sea to sea; +Nay, under ocean's depths from shore to shore; +And talk by telephone to distant ears. +The dreams of yesterday are deeds to-day. +Our frugal mothers spun with tedious toil, +And wove the homespun cloth for all their fold; +Their needles plied by weary fingers sewed. +Behold, the humming factory spins and weaves, +The singing "Singer" sews with lightning speed. +Our fathers sowed their little fields by hand, +And reaped with bended sickles and bent backs; +By hand they bound the sheaves of wheat and rye; +With flails they threshed and winnowed in the wind. +Now by machines we sow and reap and bind; +By steam we thresh and sack the bounteous grain. +These are but few of all the million ways +Whereby man's toil is lightened and he hath gained +Tenfold in comfort, luxury and ease. +For these and more the millions that enjoy +May thank the wise and wealthy few who gave. +If the rich are richer the poor are richer too. +A narrow demagogue I count the man +Who cries to-day--_"Progress and Poverty"_; +As if a thousand added comforts made +The poor man poorer and his lot the worse. +'Tis but a new toot on the same old horn +That brayed in ancient Greece and Babylon, +And now amid the ruined walls of Rome +Lies buried fathoms deep in dead men's dust. + +_"Progress and Poverty!"_ Man, hast thou traced +The blood that throbs commingled in thy veins? +Over thy shoulder hast thou cast a glance +On thine old Celtic-Saxon-Norman sires-- +Huddled in squalid huts on beds of straw? +Barefooted churls swine-herding in the fens, +Bare-legged cowherds in their cow-skin coats, +Wearing the collars of their Thane or Eorl, +His serfs, his slaves, even as thy dog is thine; +Harried by hunger, pillaged, ravaged, slain, +By Viking robbers and the warring Jarls; +Oft glad like hunted swine to fill their maws +With herbs and acorns. _"Progress and Poverty!"_ +The humblest laborer in our mills or mines +Is royal Thane beside those slavish churls; +The frugal farmer in our land to-day +Lives better than their kings--himself a king. + +Lo every age refutes old errors still, +And still begets new errors for the next; +But all the creeds of politics or priests +Can't make one error truth, one truth a lie. +There is no religion higher than the truth; +Men make the creeds, but God ordains the law. + + +Above all cant, all arguments of men, +Above all superstitions, old or new, +Above all creeds of every age and clime, +Stands the eternal truth--the creed of creeds. + +Sweet is the lute to him who hath not heard +The prattle of his children at his knees: +Ah, he is rich indeed whose humble home +Contains a frugal wife and sweet content. + + + + +HELOISE + +I saw a light on yester-night-- + A low light on the misty lea; +The stars were dim and silence grim + Sat brooding on the sullen sea. + +From out the silence came a voice-- + A voice that thrilled me through and through, +And said, "Alas, is this your choice? + For he is false and I was true." + +And in my ears the passing years + Will sadly whisper words of rue: +Forget--and yet--can I forget + That one was false and one was true? + + + + +CHANGE + +Change is the order of the universe. +Worlds wax and wane; suns die and stars are born. +Two atoms of cosmic dust unite, cohere-- +And lo the building of a world begun. +On all things--high or low, or great or small-- +Earth, ocean, mountain, mammoth, midge and man, +On mind and matter--lo perpetual change-- +God's fiat--stamped! The very bones of man +Change as he grows from infancy to age. +His loves, his hates, his tastes, his fancies, change. +His blood and brawn demand a change of food; +His mind as well: the sweetest harp of heaven +Were hateful if it played the selfsame tune +Forever, and the fairest flower that gems +The garden, if it bloomed throughout the year, +Would blush unsought. The most delicious fruits +Pall on our palate if we taste too oft, +And Hyblan honey turns to bitter gall. +Perpetual winter is a reign of gloom; +Perpetual summer hardly pleases more. +Behold the Esquimau--the Hottentot: +This doomed to regions of perpetual ice, +And that to constant summer's heat and glow: +Inferior both, both gloomy and unblessed. +The home of happiness and plenty lies +Where autumn follows summer and the breath +Of spring melts into rills the winter's snows. +How gladly, after summer's blazing suns, +We hail the autumn frosts and autumn fruits: +How blithesome seems the fall of feathery snow +When winter comes with merry clang of bells: +And after winter's reign of ice and storm +How glad we hail the robins of the spring. +For God hath planted in the hearts of men +The love of change, and sown the seeds of change +In earth and air and sea and shoreless space. +Day follows night and night the dying day, +And every day--and every hour--is change; +From when on dewy hills the rising dawn +Sprinkles her mists of silver in the east, +Till in the west the golden dust up-wheels +Behind the chariot of the setting sun; +From when above the hills the evening star +Sparkles a diamond 'mong the grains of gold, +Until her last faint flicker on the sea. +The voices of the hoar and hurrying years +Cry from the silence--"Change!--perpetual Change!" +Man's heart responding throbs--"Perpetual Change," +And grinds like a mill-stone: wanting grists of change +It grinds and grinds upon its troubled self. + +Behold the flowers that spring and bloom and fade. +Behold the blooming maid: the song of larks +Is in her warbling throat; the blue of heaven +Is in her eyes; her loosened tresses fall +A shower of gold on shoulders tinged with rose; +Her form a seraph's and her gladsome face +A benediction. Lo beneath her feet +The loving crocus bursts in sudden bloom. +Fawn-eyed and full of gentleness she moves-- +A sunbeam on the lawn. The hearts of men +Follow her footsteps. He whose sinewy arms +Might burst through bars of steel like bands of straw, +Caught in the net of her unloosened hair, +A helpless prisoner lies and loves his chains. +Blow, ye soft winds, from sandal-shaded isle, +And bring the _mogra's_ breath and orange-bloom. + +Fly, fleet-winged doves, to Ponce de Leon's spring, +And in your bills bring her the pearls of youth; +For lo the fingers of relentless Time +Weave threads of silver in among the gold, +And seam her face with pain and carking care, +Till, bent and bowed, the shriveled hands of Death +Reach from the welcome grave and draw her in. + + + + +FIDO + +Hark, the storm is raging high; + Beat the breakers on the coast, +And the wintry waters cry + Like the wailing of a ghost. + +On the rugged coast of Maine + Stands the frugal farmer's cot: +What if drive the sleet and rain? + John and Hannah heed it not. + +On the hills the mad winds roar, + And the tall pines toss and groan; +Round the headland--down the shore-- + Stormy spirits shriek and moan. + +Inky darkness wraps the sky; + Not a glimpse of moon or star; +And the stormy-petrels cry + Out along the harbor-bar. + +Seated by their blazing hearth-- + John and Hannah--snug and warm-- +What if darkness wrap the earth? + Drive the sleet and howl the storm! + +Let the stormy-petrels fly! + Let the moaning breakers beat! +Hark! I hear an infant cry + And the patter of baby-feet: + +And Hannah listened as she spoke, + But only heard the driving rain, +As on the cottage-roof it broke + And pattered on the window-pane. + +And she sat knitting by the fire + While pussy frolicked at her feet; +And ever roared the tempest higher, + And ever harder the hailstones beat. + +"Hark! the cry--it comes again!" + "Nay, it is the winds that wail, +And the patter on the pane + Of the driving sleet and hail" + +Replied the farmer as he piled + The crackling hemlock on the coals, +And lit his corn-cob pipe and smiled + The smile of sweet contented souls. + +Aye, let the storm rave o'er the earth; + Their kine are snug in barn and byre; +The apples sputter on the hearth, + The cider simmers on the fire. + +But once again at midnight high, + She heard in dreams, through wind and sleet, +An infant moan, an infant cry, + And the patter of baby-feet. + +Half-waking from her dreams she turned + And heard the driving wind and rain; +Still on the hearth the fagots burned, + And hail beat on the window-pane. + +John rose as wont, at dawn of day; + The earth was white with frozen sleet; +And lo his faithful Fido lay + Dead on the door-stone at his feet. + + + + +THE REIGN OF REASON + +The day of truth is dawning. I behold +O'er darksome hills the trailing robes of gold +And silent footsteps of the gladsome dawn. +The morning breaks by sages long foretold; +Truth comes to set upon the world her throne. +Men lift their foreheads to the rising sun, +And lo the reign of Reason is begun. +Fantastic phantasms fly before the light-- +Pale, gibbering ghosts and ghouls and goblin fears: +Man who hath walked in sleep--what thousands years? +Groping among the shadows of the night, +Moon-struck and in a weird somnambulism, +Mumbling some cunning cant or catechism, +Thrilled by the electric magic of the skies-- +Sun-touched by Truth--awakes and rubs his eyes. + +Old Superstition, mother of cruel creeds, +O'er all the earth hath sown her dragon-teeth. +Lo centuries on centuries the seeds +Grew rank, and from them all the haggard breeds +Of Hate and Fear and Hell and cruel Death. +And still her sunken eyes glare on mankind; +Her livid lips grin horrible; her hands, +Shriveled to bone and sinew, clutch all lands +And with blind fear lead on or drive the blind. +Ah ignorance and fear go hand in hand, +Twin-born, and broadcast scatter hate and thorns, +They people earth with ghosts and hell with horns, +And sear the eyes of truth with burning brand. + +Behold, the serried ranks of Truth advance, +And stubborn Science shakes her shining lance +Full in the face of stolid Ignorance. +But Superstition is a monster still-- +An Hydra we may scotch but hardly kill; +For if with sword of Truth we lop a head, +How soon another groweth in its stead! +All men are slaves. Yea, some are slave to wine +And some to women, some to shining gold, +But all to habit and to customs old. +Around our stunted souls old tenets twine +And it is hard to straighten in the oak +The crook that in the sapling had its start: +The callous neck is glad to wear the yoke; +Nor reason rules the head, but aye the heart: +The head is weak, the throbbing heart is strong; +But where the heart is right the head is not far wrong. + +Men have been learning error age on age, +And superstition is their heritage +Bequeathed from age to age and sire to son +Since the dim history of the world begun. +Trust paves the way for treachery to tread; +Under the cloak of virtue vices creep; +Fools chew the chaff while cunning eats the bread, +And wolves become the shepherds of the sheep. +The mindless herd are but the cunning's tools; +For ages have the learned of the schools +Furnished pack-saddles for the backs of fools. +Pale Superstition loves the gloom of night; +Truth, like a diamond, ever loves the light. +But still 'twere wrong to speak but in abuse, +For priests and popes have had, and have, their use. +Yea, Superstition since the world began +Hath been an instrument to govern man: +For men were brutes, and brutal fear was given +To chain the brute till Reason came from heaven. +Aye, men were beasts for lo how many ages! +And only fear held them in chains and cages. + +Wise men were priests, and gladly I accord +They were the priests and prophets of the Lord; +For love was lust and o'er all earth's arena +Hell-fire alone could tame the wild hyena. +All history is the register, we find, +Of the crimes and lusts and sufferings of mankind; +And there are still dark lands where it is well +That Superstition wear the horns of hell, +And hold her torches o'er the brutal head, +And fright the beast with fire and goblin dread +Till Reason come the darkness to dispel. + +How hard it is for mortals to unlearn +Beliefs bred in the marrow of their bones! +How hard it is for mortals to discern +The truth that preaches from the silent stones, +The silent hills, the silent universe, +While Error cries in sanctimonious tones +That all the light of life and God is hers! +Lo in the midst we stand: we cannot see +Either the dark beginning or the end, +Or where our tottering footsteps turn or trend +In the vast orbit of Eternity. +Let Reason be our light--the only light +That God hath given unto benighted man, +Wherewith to see a glimpse of his vast plan +And stars of hope that glimmer on our night. +Lo all-pervading Unity is His; +Lo all-pervading Unity is He: +One mighty heart throbs in the earth and sea, +In every star through heaven's immensity, +And God in all things breathes, in all things is. +God's perfect order rules the vast expanse, +And Love is queen and all the realms are hers; +But strike one planet from the Universe +And all is chaos and unbridled chance. + +And is there life beyond this life below? +Aye, is death death?--or but a happy change +From night to light--on angel wings to range, +And sing the songs of seraphs as we go? +Alas, the more we know the less we know we know. + +God hath laid down the limits we cannot pass; +And it is well he giveth us no glass +Wherewith to see beyond the present glance, +Else we might die a thousand deaths perchance +Before we lay our bones beneath the grass. +What is the soul, and whither will it fly? +We only know that matter cannot die, +But lives and lived through all eternity, +And ever turns from hoary age to youth. +And is the soul not worthier than the dust? +So in His providence we put our trust; +And so we humbly hope, for God is just-- +Father all-wise, unmoved by wrath or ruth: +What then is certain--what eternal? Truth, +Almighty God, Time, Space and Cosmic Dust. + + + + +LOVE WILL FIND + + +Seek ye the fairest lily of the field, + The fairest lotus that in lakelet lies, +The fairest rose that ever morn revealed, +And Love will find--from other eyes concealed-- + A fairer flower in some fair woman's eyes. + +List ye the lark that warbles to the morn, + The sweetest note that linnet ever sung, +Or trembling lute in tune with silver horn, +And Love will list--and laugh your lute to scorn-- + A sweeter lute in some fair woman's tongue. + +Seek ye the dewy perfume seaward blown + From flowering orange-groves to passing ships; +Nay, sip the nectared dew of Helicon, +And Love will find--and claim it all his own-- + A sweeter dew on some fair woman's lips. + +Seek ye a couch of softest eider-down, + The silken floss that baby birdling warms, +Or shaded moss with blushing roses strown, +And Love will find--when they are all alone-- + A softer couch in some fair woman's arms. + + + + +AN OLD ENGLISH OAK + + +Silence is the voice of mighty things. +In silence dropped the acorn in the rain; +In silence slept till sun-touched. Wondrous life +Peeped from the mold and oped its eyes on morn. +Up-grew in silence through a thousand years +The Titan-armed, gnarl-jointed, rugged oak, +Rock-rooted. Through his beard and shaggy locks +Soft breezes sung and tempests roared: the rain +A thousand summers trickled down his beard; +A thousand winters whitened on his head; +Yet spake he not. He, from his coigne of hills, +Beheld the rise and fall of empire, saw +The pageantry and perjury of kings, +The feudal barons and the slavish churls, +The peace of peasants; heard the merry song +Of mowers singing to the swing of scythes, +The solemn-voiced, low-wailing funeral dirge +Winding slow-paced with death to humble graves; +And heard the requiem sung for coffined kings. +Saw castles rise and castles crumble down, +Abbeys up-loom and clang their solemn bells, +And heard the owl hoot ruin on their walls: +Beheld a score of battle fields corpse-strewn-- +Blood-fertiled with ten thousand flattered fools +Who, but to please the vanity of one, +Marched on hurrahing to the doom of death-- +And spake not, neither sighed nor made a moan. +Saw from the blood of heroes roses spring, +And where the clangor of steel-sinewed War +Roared o'er embattled rage, heard gentle Peace +To bleating hills and vales of rustling gold +Flute her glad notes from morn till even-tide. +Grim with the grime of a thousand years he stood-- +Grand in his silence, mighty in his years. +Under his shade the maid and lover wooed; +Under his arms their children's children played +And lambkins gamboled; at his feet by night +The heart-sick wanderer laid him down and died, +And he looked on in silence. + +Silent hours +In ghostly pantomime on tip-toe tripped +The stately minuet of the passing years, +Until the horologe of Time struck _One_. +Black Thunder growled and from his throne of gloom +Fire-flashed the night with hissing bolt, and lo, +Heart-split, the giant of a thousand years +Uttered one voice and like a Titan fell, +Crashing one hammer-clang, and passed away. + + + + +THE LEGEND OF THE FALLS[CG] + +[CG] _An-pe-tu Sa-pa_--Clouded Day--was the name of the Dakota mother +who committed suicide, as related in this legend, by plunging over the +Falls of St. Anthony. Schoolcraft calls her "_Ampata Sapa_." _Ampata_ is +not Dakota. There are several versions of this legend, all agreeing in +the main points. + +[Read at the Celebration of the Old Settlers of Hennepin County, at the +Academy of Music, Minneapolis, July 4, 1879.] + +[_The Numerals refer to Notes in Appendix._] + + +On the Spirit-Island [CH] sitting under midnight's misty moon, +Lo I see the spirits flitting o'er the waters one by one! +Slumber wraps the silent city, and the droning mills are dumb; +One lone whippowil's shrill ditty calls her mate that ne'er will come. +Sadly moans the mighty river, foaming down the fettered falls, +Where of old he thundered ever o'er abrupt and lofty walls. +Great _Unktéhee_--god of waters--lifts no more his mighty head; +Fled he with the timid otters?--lies he in the cavern dead? +Hark!--the waters hush their sighing and the whippowil her call, +Through the moon-lit mists are flying dusky shadows silent all. +Lo from out the waters foaming--from the cavern deep and dread-- +Through the glamour and the gloaming comes a spirit of the dead. +Sad she seems; her tresses raven on her tawny shoulders rest; +Sorrow on her brow is graven, in her arms a babe is pressed. +Hark!--she chants the solemn story--sings the legend sad and old, +And the river wrapt in glory listens while the tale is told. +Would you hear the legend olden hearken while I tell the tale-- +Shorn, alas, of many a golden, weird Dakota chant and wail. + +[CH] The small island of rock a few rods below the Falls, was called by +the Dakotas _Wanagee We-ta_--Spirit-Island. They say the spirit of +_Anpetu Sapa_ sits upon that island at night and pours forth her sorrow +in song. They also say that from time out of mind, war-eagles nested on +that island, until the advent of white men frightened them away. This +seems to be true. See _Carver's Travels_ (London, 1778), p. 71. + + + + +THE LEGEND + + +Tall was young Wanâta, stronger than _Heyóka's_ [16] giant form,-- +Laughed at flood and fire and hunger, faced the fiercest winter storm. +When _Wakinyan_ [32] flashed and thundered, when Unktéhee raved and roared, +All but brave _Wanâta_ wondered, and the gods with fear implored. +When the war-whoop shrill resounded, calling friends to meet the foe, +From the _teepee_ swift he bounded, armed with polished lance and bow. +In the battle's din and clangor fast his fatal arrows flew, +Flashed his fiery eyes with anger,--many a stealthy foe he slew. +Hunter swift was he and cunning, caught the beaver, slew the bear, +Overtook the roebuck running, dragged the panther from his lair. +Loved was he by many a maiden; many a dark eye glanced in vain; +Many a heart with sighs was laden for the love it could not gain. +So they called the brave "_Ska Câpa_;"[CI] but the fairest of the band-- +Moon-faced, meek Anpétu-Sâpa--won the hunter's heart and hand. + +[CI] Or _Capa Ska_--White beaver. White beavers are very rare, very +cunning and hard to catch. + +From the wars with triumph burning, from the chase of bison fleet, +To his lodge the brave returning, spread his trophies at her feet. +Love and joy sat in the _teepee_; him a black-eyed boy she bore; +But alas, she lived to weep a love she lost forevermore. +For the warriors chose Wanâta first _Itáncan_[CJ] of the band. +At the council-fire he sat a leader brave, a chieftain grand. +Proud was fair Anpétu-Sâpa, and her eyes were glad with joy; +Proud was she and very happy with her warrior and her boy. +But alas, the fatal honor that her brave Wanâta won, +Brought a bitter woe upon her,--hid with clouds the summer sun. +For among the brave Dakotas wives bring honor to the chief. +On the vine-clad Minnesota's banks he met the Scarlet Leaf. + +[CJ] _E-tan-can_--Chief. + +Young and fair was Apè-dúta[CK]--full of craft and very fair; +Proud she walked a queen of beauty with her dark, abundant hair. +In her net of hair she caught him--caught Wanâta with her wiles; +All in vain his wife besought him--begged in vain his wonted smiles. +Apè-dúta ruled the _teepee_--all Wanâta's smiles were hers; +When the lodge was wrapped in sleep a star[CL] beheld the mother's tears. +Long she strove to do her duty for the black-eyed babe she bore; +But the proud, imperious beauty made her sad forevermore. +Still she dressed the skins of beaver, bore the burdens, spread the fare; +Patient ever, murmuring never, though her cheeks were creased with care. +In the moon _Magâ-o kâda_, [71] twice an hundred years ago-- +Ere the "Black Robe's"[CM] sacred shadow + stalked the prairies' pathless snow-- +Down the swollen, rushing river, in the sunset's golden hues, +From the hunt of bear and beaver came the band in swift canoes. +On the queen of fairy islands, on the _Wita Wâstè's_ [CN] shore +Camped Wanâta, on the highlands just above the cataract's roar. +Many braves were with Wanâta; Apè-dúta, too, was there, +And the sad Anpétu-sâpa spread the lodge with wonted care. +Then above the leafless prairie leaped the fat-faced, laughing moon, +And the stars--the spirits fairy--walked the welkin one by one. +Swift and silent in the gloaming on the waste of waters blue, +Speeding downward to the foaming, shot Wanâta's birch canoe. +In it stood Anpétu-sâpa--in her arms her sleeping child; +Like a wailing Norse-land _drapa_ [CO] rose her death-song weird and wild: + +[CK] _A-pe_--leaf,--_duta_--Scarlet,--Scarlet leaf + +[CL] Stars, the Dakotas say, are the faces of the departed watching over +their friends and relatives on earth. + +[CM] The Dakotas called the Jesuit priests "Black Robes," from the color +of their vestments. + +[CN] _Wee-tah Wah-stay_--Beautiful Island,--the Dakota name for Nicollet +Island, just above the Falls. + +[CO] _Drapa_, a Norse funeral wail in which the virtues of the deceased +are recounted. + +[Illustration: ANPETU-SAPA] + + _Mihihna_,[CP] _Mihihna_, my heart is stone; + The light is gone from my longing eyes; + The wounded loon in the lake alone + Her death-song sings to the moon and dies. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, the path is long, + The burden is heavy and hard to bear; + I sink--I die, and my dying song + Is a song of joy to the false one's ear. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, my young heart flew + Far away with my brave to the bison-chase; + To the battle it went with my warrior true, + And never returned till I saw his face. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, my brave was glad + When he came from the chase of the roebuck fleet; + Sweet were the words that my hunter said + As his trophies he laid at Anpétu's feet. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, the boy I bore-- + When the robin sang and my brave was true, + I can bear to look on his face no more, + For he looks, _Mihihna_, so much like you. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, the Scarlet Leaf + Has robbed my boy of his father's love; + He sleeps in my arms--he will find no grief + In the star-lit lodge in the land above. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, my heart is stone; + The light is gone from my longing eyes; + The wounded loon in the lake alone + Her death-song sings to the moon and dies. + +[CP] _Mee-heen-yah_--My husband. + +Swiftly down the turbid torrent, as she sung her song she flew; +Like a swan upon the current, dancing rode the light canoe. +Hunters hurry in the gloaming; all in vain Wanâta calls; +Singing through the surges foaming, lo she plunges o'er the Falls. + +Long they searched the sullen river--searched for leagues along the shore, +Bark or babe or mother never saw the sad Dakotas more; +But at night or misty morning oft the hunters heard her song, +Oft the maidens heard her warning in their mellow mother-tongue. +On the bluffs they sat enchanted till the blush of beamy dawn; +Spirit Isle, they say, is haunted, and they call the spot Wakân[CQ] +Many summers on the highland in the full moon's golden glow-- +In the woods on Fairy Island,[CR] walked a snow-white fawn and doe-- +Spirits of the babe and mother sadly seeking evermore +For a father's love another turned away with evil power. + +Sometimes still when moonbeams shimmer through the maples on the lawn, +In the gloaming and the glimmer walk the silent doe and fawn; +And on Spirit Isle or near it, under midnight's misty moon, +Oft is seen the mother's spirit, oft is heard her mournful tune. + +[CQ] Pronounced Walk-on,--Sacred, inhabited by a spirit. + +[CR] Fairy Island,--_Wita-Waste_--Nicollet Island. + + + + +CHICKADEE + + +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee! +That was the song that he sang to me--Sang +from his perch in the willow tree-- +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + My little brown bird, + The song that I heard +Was a happier song than the minstrels sing-- +A paean of joy and a carol of spring; +And my heart leaped throbbing and sang with thee +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + + My birdie looked wise + With his little black eyes, +As he peeked and peered from his perch at me +With a throbbing throat and a flutter of glee, + As if he would say-- + Sing trouble away, +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + + Only one note + From his silver throat; + Only one word + From my wise little bird; +But a sweeter note or a wiser word +From the tongue of mortal I never have heard, +Than my little philosopher sang to me +From his bending perch in the willow tree-- +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + + Come foul or fair, + Come trouble and care-- + No--never a sigh + Or a thought of despair! +For my little bird sings in my heart to me, +As he sang from his perch in the willow tree-- +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee dee: +Chickadee-dee, chickadee-dee; +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + + + + +ANTHEM + +[APRIL, 1861.] + + +Spirit of Liberty, + Wake in the Land! +Sons of our Forefathers, + Raise the strong hand! +Burn in each heart anew + Liberty's fires; +Wave the old Flag again, + Flag of our sires; +Glow all thy stars again, + Banner of Light! +Wave o'er us forever, + Emblem of might; +God for our Banner! + God for the Right! + +Minions of Tyranny, + Tremble and kneel! +The sons of the Pilgrims +Are sharpening their steel. +Pledge for our Land again + Honor and life; +Wave the old Flag again; + On to the strife! +Shades of our Forefathers, + Witness our fright! +Wave o'er us forever, + Emblem of might; +God for our Banner! + God for our Right! + + + + +HURRAH FOR THE VOLUNTEERS + +[May, 1861.] + + +Come then, brave men, from the Land of Lakes + With steady steps and cheers; +Our country calls, as the battle breaks, + On the Northwest Pioneers. +Let the eagle scream, and the bayonet gleam! + Hurrah for the Volunteers! + + + + +CHARGE OF "THE BLACK-HORSE" + +[First battle of Bull Run.] + + +Our columns are broken, defeated, and fled; +We are gathered, a few from the flying and dead, +Where the green flag is up and our wounded remain +Imploring for water and groaning in pain. +Lo the blood-spattered bosom, the shot-shattered limb, +The hand-clutch of fear as the vision grows dim, +The half-uttered prayer and the blood-fettered breath, +The cold marble brow and the calm face of death. +O proud were these forms at the dawning of morn, +When they sprang to the call of the shrill bugle-horn: +There are mothers and wives that await them afar; +God help them!--Is this then the glory of war? +But hark!--hear the cries from the field of despair; +"The Black-Horse" are charging the fugitives there; +They gallop the field o'er the dying and dead, +And their blades with the blood of their victims are red. +The cries of the fallen and flying are vain; +They saber the wounded and trample the slain; +And the plumes of the riders wave red in the sun, +As they stoop for the stroke and the murder goes on. +They halt for a moment--they form and they stand; +Then with sabers aloft they ride down on our band +Like the samiel that sweeps o'er Arabia's sand. +"Halt!--down with your sabers!--the dying are here! +Let the foeman respect while the friend sheds a tear." +Nay; the merciless butchers were thirsting for blood, +And mad for the murder still onward they rode. +"_Stand firm and be ready_!"--Our brave, gallant few +Have faced to the foe, and our rifles are true; +Fire!--a score of grim riders go down in a breath +At the flash of our guns--in the tempest of death! +They wheel, and they clutch in despair at the mane! +They reel in their saddles and fall to the plain! + +The riderless steeds, wild with wounds and with fear, +Dash away o'er the field in unbridled career; +Their stirrups swing loose and their manes are all gore +From the mad cavaliers that shall ride them no more. +Of the hundred so bold that rode down on us there +But few rode away with the tale of despair; +Their proud, plumèd comrades so reckless, alas, +Slept their long, dreamless sleep on the blood-spattered grass. + + + + +ONLY A PRIVATE KILLED + +[The soldier was Louis Mitchell, of Co. 1, 1st Minn. Vols., killed in a +skirmish, near Ball's Bluff, October 22, 1861.] + + +"We've had a brush," the Captain said, + "And Rebel blood we've spilled; +We came off victors with the loss + Of only a _private_ killed." +"Ah," said the orderly--"it was hot,"-- + Then he breathed a heavy breath-- +"Poor fellow!--he was badly shot, + Then bayoneted to death." + +And now was hushed the martial din; + The saucy foe had fled; +They brought the private's body in; + I went to see the dead; +For I could not think our Rebel foes-- + So valiant in the van-- +So boastful of their chivalry-- + Could kill a wounded man. + +A musket ball had pierced his thigh-- + A frightful, crushing wound-- +And then with savage bayonets + They pinned him to the ground. +One deadly thrust drove through the heart, + Another through the head; +Three times they stabbed his pulseless breast + When he lay cold and dead. + +His hair was matted with his gore, + His hands were clinched with might, +As if he still his musket bore + So firmly in the fight. +He had grasped the foemen's bayonets + Their murderous thrusts to fend: +They raised the coat-cape from his face, + And lo--it was my friend! + +Think what a shudder chilled my heart! + 'Twas but the day before +We laughed together merrily, + As we talked of days of yore. +"How happy we shall be," he said, + "When the war is o'er, and when +With victory's song and victory's tread + We all march home again." + +Ah little he dreamed--that soldier brave + So near his journey's goal-- +How soon a heavenly messenger + Would claim his Christian soul. +But he fell like a hero--fighting, + And hearts with grief are filled; +And honor is his,--tho' the Captain says + "Only a _private_ killed." + +I knew him well,--he was my friend; + He loved our land and laws, +And he fell a blessed martyr + To our Country's holy cause; +And I know a cottage in the West + Where eyes with tears are filled +As they read the careless telegram-- + "Only a _private_ killed." + +Comrades, bury him under the oak, + Wrapped in his army-blue; +He is done with the battle's din and smoke, + With drill and the proud review. +And the time will come ere long, perchance, + When our blood will thus be spilled, +And what care we if the Captain say-- + "Only a _private_ killed." + +For the glorious Old Flag beckons. + We have pledged her heart and hand, +And we'll brave even death to rescue + Our dear old Fatherland. +We ask not praise--nor honors, + Then--as each grave is filled-- +What care we if the Captain say-- + "Only a _private_ killed." + + + + +DO THEY THINK OF US? + +[October, 1861, after the Battle of Ball's Bluff.] + + +Do they think of us, say--in the far distant West-- +On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest? +On the long dusty march when the suntide is hot, +O say, are their sons and their brothers forgot? +Are our names on their lips, is our comfort their care +When they kneel to the God of our fathers in prayer? +When at night on their warm, downy pillows they lie, +Wrapped in comfort and ease, do they think of us, say? +When the rain patters down on the roof overhead, +Do they think of the camps without shelter or bed? +Ah many a night on the cold ground we've lain-- +Chilled, chilled to the heart by the merciless rain, +And yet there stole o'er us the peace of the blest, +For our spirits went back to our homes in the West. +O we think of them, and it sharpens our steel, +When the battle-smoke rolls and the grim cannon peal, +When forward we rush at the shrill bugle's call +To the hail-storm of conflict where many must fall. + +When night settles down on the slaughter-piled plain, +And the dead are at rest and the wounded in pain, +Do they think of us, say, in the far distant West-- +On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest? +Aye, comrades, we know that our darlings are there +With their hearts full of hope and their souls full of prayer, +And it steadies our rifles--it steels every breast-- +The thought of our loved ones at home in the West-- +On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest. + + + + +CHARGE OF FREMONT'S BODY-GUARD + + +On they ride--on they ride-- +Only three hundred,-- +Ride the brave Body-Guard, +From the "Prairie Scouts" sundered: +Two thousand riflemen, +Ambushed on either side, +The signal of slaughter bide: +Ho! has the farmer-guide +Led them astray and lied? +How can they pass the wood? +On they ride--on they ride-- + Fearlessly, readily, + Silently, steadily +Ride the brave Body-Guard + Led by Zagonyi. + +Up leap the Southrons there; +Loud breaks the battle-blare; +Now swings his hat in air; +Flashes his saber bare: +"_Draw sabers;--follow me_!" +Shouts the brave Captain: +"_Union and Liberty_!" +Thunders the Captain. +Three hundred sabers flash; +Three hundred Guardsmen dash +On to the fierce attack; +Into the _cul-de-sac_ + Plunge the Three Hundred. +Yell the mad ambushed pack-- +Two thousand rifles crack + At the Three Hundred. + +Dire is the death they deal, +Gleams the steel--volleys peal-- +Horses plunge--riders reel; +Sabers and bayonets clash; +Guns in their faces flash; +Blue coats are spattered red-- +Fifty brave Guards are dead-- +Zagonyi is still ahead, +Swinging his hat in air, + Flashing his saber: +"Steady men;--steady there; + Forward--Battalion!" + +On they plunge--on they dash +Thro' the dread gantlet; +Death gurgles in the gash +Of furious-dealt saber-slash; +Over them the volleys crash +Thro' the trees like a whirlwind. +They pass through the fire of death; +Pant riders and steeds for breath; + "_Halt!_" cried the Captain +Then he looked up the hill; +There on the summit still + The "Third Company" paltered. +Right through the fire of hell, +Where fifty brave Guardsmen fell, +Zagonyi had ridden well; +Foley had faltered. + +Flashed like a flame of fire-- +Flashed with a menace dire-- +Flashed with a yell of ire + The sword of the Captain. +Kennedy saw the flash, +And ordered the "Third" to dash + Gallantly forward: +"Come on, Boys, for Liberty! +Forward, and follow me! + Remember Kentucky!" +Into the hell they broke-- +Into the fire and smoke-- +Dealing swift saber-stroke-- + The gallant Kentuckians. + Horses plunge, + Riders lunge + Heavily forward; +Over the fallen they ride +Down to Zagonyi's side, +Mowing a swath of death +Either side,--right and left + Piling the slaughtered! + +Under the storm of lead, +Still hissing overhead, +They re-formed the battle-line; +Then the brave Captain said: +"Guardsmen: avenge our dead! +_Charge_!"--Up the hill they go,-- +Right into the swarming foe! +Woe to the foemen--woe! +See mad Zagonyi there; +Streams on the wind his hair, +Flashes his saber bare; + On they go--on they go; + Volleys flash, + Sabers clash, +On they plunge, on they dash, +Following Zagonyi + Into the hell again. + +Hand to hand fight and die + Infantry, cavalry; +Grappled and mixed they lie-- + Infantry, cavalry: +Hurra!--the Rebels fly! +Bravo!--Three Hundred! +"Forward and follow me!" + Shouted the Captain; +"Union and Liberty!" + All the Guards thundered. +With mad hearts and sabers stout +Into the Rebel-rout + Gallop the Guardsmen, +Thundering their cry again, +Cleaving their foes in twain, +Piling the heaps of slain + Sabered and sundered. +Three hundred foes they slayed, +Glorious the charge they made, +Victorious the charge they made-- + The gallant Three Hundred! +Let the Crown-Poet paid +Sing of the "Light Brigade" +And "The wild charge they made" + When "Some one had blundered;" +Following the British Bard, +I sing of the Body-Guard-- +The Heroes that fought so hard-- + Where nobody blundered. +Hail, brave Zagonyi--hail! +All hail, the Body-Guard!-- + The glorious-- + The victorious-- +The invincible Three Hundred. + + + + +A MILLION MORE + +[AUGUST, 1862.] + + +The nation calls aloud again, +For Freedom wounded writhes in pain. +Gird on your armor, Northern men; +Drop scythe and sickle, square and pen; +A million bayonets gleam and flash; +A thousand cannon peal and crash; +Brothers and sons have gone before; +A million more!--a million more! + +Fire and sword!--aye, sword and fire! +Let war be fierce and grim and dire; +Your path be marked by flame and smoke, +And tyrant's bones and fetters broke: +Stay not for foe's uplifted hand; +Sheathe not the sword; quench not the brand +Till Freedom reign from shore to shore, +Or might 'mid ashes smoke and gore. + +If leader stay the vengeance-rod, +Let him beware the wrath of God; +The maddened millions long his trust +Will crush his puny bones to dust, +And all the law to guide their ire +Will be the law of blood and fire. +Come, then--the shattered ranks implore-- +A million more--a million more! + +Form and file and file and form; +This war is but God's thunder-storm +To purify our cankered land +And strike the fetter from the hand. +Forced by grim fate our Chief at last +Shall blow dear Freedom's bugle-blast; +And then shall rise from shore to shore +Four millions more--four millions more.[CS] + +[CS] There were four millions of slaves in the South when the war began. + + + + + +ON READING PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S LETTER + +To Horace Greeley, of date Aug. 22, 1862--"If I could save the Union +without freeing any slave, I would do it," etc. + +Perish the power that, bowed to dust, +Still wields a tyrant's rod-- +That dares not even then be just, +And leave the rest with God. + + + + + +THE DYING VETERAN + +All-day-long the crash of cannon + Shook the battle-covered plain; +All-day-long the frenzied foemen + Dashed against our lines in vain; +All the field was piled with slaughter; + Now the lurid setting sun +Saw our foes in wild disorder, + And the bloody day was won. + +Foremost on our line of battle + All-day-long a veteran stood-- +Stalwart, brawny, grim and steady, + Black with powder, smeared with blood; +Never flinched and never faltered + In the deadliest storm of lead, +And before his steady rifle + Lay a score of foemen dead. + +Never flinched and never faltered + Till our shout of victory rose, +Till he saw defeat, disaster, + Overwhelmed our flying foes; +Then he trembled, then he tottered, + Gasped for breath and dropped his gun, +Staggered from the ranks and prostrate + Fell to the earth. His work was done. + +Silent comrades gathered round him, + And his Captain sadly came, +Bathed his quivering lips with water, + Took his hand and spoke his name; +And his fellow soldiers softly + On his knapsack laid his head; +Then his eyes were lit with luster, + And he raised his hand and said: + +"Good-bye, comrades; farewell, Captain! + I am glad the day is won; +I am mustered out, I reckon-- + Never mind-my part is done. +We have marched and fought together + Till you seem like brothers all, +But I hope again to meet you + At the final bugle-call. + +"Captain, write and tell my mother + That she must not mourn and cry, +For I never flinched in battle, + And I do not fear to die. +You may add a word for Mary; + Tell her I was ever true. +Mary took a miff one Sunday, + And so I put on the "blue." + +"And I know she has repented, + But I never let her see +How it cut--her crusty answer-- + When she turned away from me. +I was never good at coaxing, + So I didn't even try; +But you tell her I forgive her, + And she must not mourn and cry," + +Then he closed his eyes in slumber, + And his spirit passed away, +And his comrades spread a blanket + O'er his cold and silent clay. +At dawn of morn they buried him, + Wrapped in his army-blue. +On the bloody field of Fair Oaks + Sleeps the soldier tried and true. + + + + +GRIERSON'S RAID + +Mount to horse--mount to horse; + Forward, Battalion! +Gallop the gallant force; + Down with Rebellion! +Over hill, creek and plain + Clatter the fearless-- +Dash away--splash away-- + Led by the Peerless. + +Carbines crack--foemen fly + Hither and thither; +Under the death-fire + They falter and wither. +Burn the bridge--tear the track-- + Down with Rebellion! +Cut the wires--cut the wires! + Forward, Battalion! +Day and night--night and day, + Gallop the fearless-- +Swimming the rivers' floods-- + Led by the Peerless; +Depots and powder-trains + Blazing and thundering +Masters and dusky slaves + Gazing and wondering. +Eight hundred miles they ride-- + Dauntless Battalion-- +Down through the Southern Land + Mad with Rebellion. +Into our lines they dash-- + Brave Cavaliers-- +Greeting our flag with + A thunder of cheers. + + + + + +THE OLD FLAG + +[Written July 4, 1863.] + +Have ye heard of Fort Donelson's desperate fight, +Where the giant Northwest bared his arm for the right, +Where thousands so bravely went down in the slaughter, +And the blood of the West ran as freely as water; +Where the Rebel Flag fell and our banner arose +O'er an army of captured and suppliant foes? +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + +Heard ye of Shiloh, where fierce Beauregard +O'erwhelmed us with numbers and pressed us so hard, +Till our veteran supporters came up to our aid +And the tide of defeat and disaster was staid-- +Where like grain-sheaves the slaughtered were piled on the plain +And the brave rebel Johnston went down with the slain? +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + +Heard ye the cannon-roar down by Stone River? +Saw ye the bleeding braves stagger and quiver? +Heard ye the shout and the roar and the rattle? +And saw ye the desperate surging of battle? +Volley on volley and steel upon steel-- +Breast unto breast--how they lunge and they reel! +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + +Heard ye of Vicksburg--the Southern Gibraltar, +Where the hands of our foemen built tyranny's altar, +Where their hosts are walled in by a cordon of braves, +And the pits they have dug for defense are their graves, +Where the red bombs are bursting and hissing the shot, +Where the nine thunders death and the charge follows hot? +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + +Heard ye from Gettysburg?--Glory to God! +Bare your heads, O ye Freemen, and kneel on the sod! +Praise the Lord!--praise the Lord!--it is done!--it is done! +The battle is fought and the victory won! +They first took the sword, and they fall by the sword; +They are scattered and crushed by the hand of the Lord! +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + + + + +GETTYSBURG: CHARGE OF THE FIRST MINNESOTA + +[Written for and read at the Camp Fire of the G.A.R. Department of +Minnesota, National Encampment of the Grand Army of the Republic, at +Minneapolis, June 22, 1884.] + + +Ready and ripe for the harvest lay the acres of golden grain +Waving on hillock and hillside and bending along the plain. +Ready and ripe for the harvest two veteran armies lay +Waiting the signal of battle on the Gettysburg hills that day. +Sharp rang the blast of the bugles calling the foe to the fray, +And shrill from the enemy's cannon the demon shells shrieked as they flew; +Crashed and rumbled and roared our batteries ranged on the hill, +Rumbled and roared at the front the bellowing guns of the foe +Swelling the chorus of hell ever louder and deadlier still, +And shrill o'er the roar of the cannon rose the yell of the rebels below, +As they charged on our Third Corps advanced + and crushed in the lines at a blow. +Leading his clamorous legions, flashing his saber in air, +Forward rode furious Longstreet charging on Round Top there-- +Key to our left and center--key to the fate of the field-- +Leading his wild-mad Southrons on to the lions' lair. + +Red with the blood of our legions--red with the blood of our best, +Waiting the fate of the battle the lurid sun stood in the west. +Hid by the crest of the hills we lay at the right concealed, +Prone on the earth that shuddered under us there as we lay. +Thunder of cheers on the left!--dashing down on his stalwart bay, +Spurring his gallant charger till his foaming flanks ran blood, +Hancock, the star of our legions, rode down where our officers stood: +"_By the left flank, double-quick, march!_"-- + We sprang to our feet and away, +Like a fierce pack of hunger-mad wolves that pant + for the blood of the prey. +"_Halt!_"--on our battery's flank we stood like a hedge-row of steel-- +Bearing the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day. + +Down at the marge of the valley our broken ranks stagger and reel, +Grimy with dust and with powder, wearied and panting for breath, +Flinging their arms in panic, flying the hail-storm of death. +Rumble of volley on volley of the enemy hard on the rear, +Yelling their wild, mad triumph, thundering cheer upon cheer, +Dotting the slope with slaughter and sweeping the field with fear. +Drowned is the blare of the bugle, lost is the bray of the drum, +Yelling, defiant, victorious, column on column they come. +Only a handful are we, thrown into the gap of our lines, +Holding the perilous breach where the fate of the battle inclines, +Only a handful are we--column on column they come. + +Roared like the voice of a lion brave Hancock fierce for the fray: +"Hurry the reserve battalions; bring every banner and gun: +Charge on the enemy, Colvill, stay the advance of his lines: +Here--by the God of our Fathers!--here shall the battle be won, +Or we'll die for the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills today." +Shrill rang the voice of our Colonel, the bravest and best of the brave: +"_Forward, the First Minnesota! Forward, and follow me, men!_" +Gallantly forward he strode, the bravest and best of the brave. + +Two hundred and fifty and two--all that were left of us then-- +Two hundred and fifty and two fearless, unfaltering men +Dashed at a run for the enemy, sprang to the charge with a yell. +On us their batteries thundered solid shot, grape shot and shell; +Never a man of us faltered, but many a comrade fell. +"_Forward, the First Minnesota!_"--like tigers we sprang at our foes; +Grim gaps of death in our ranks, but ever the brave ranks close: +Down went our sergeant and colors--defiant our colors arose! +"_Fire_!" At the flash of our rifles--grim gaps in the ranks of our foes! + +"_Forward, the First Minnesota!_" our brave Colonel cried as he fell +Gashed and shattered and mangled--"_Forward_!" he cried as he fell. +Over him mangled and bleeding frenzied we sprang to the fight, +Over him mangled and bleeding we sprang to the jaws of hell. +Flashed in our faces their rifles, roared on the left and the right, +Swarming around us by thousands we fought them with desperate might. +Five times our banner went down--five times our banner arose, +Tattered and torn but defiant, and flapped in the face of our foes. +Hold them? We held them at bay, as a bear holds the hounds on his track, +Knee to knee, shoulder to shoulder, we met them and staggered them back. + +Desperate, frenzied, bewildered, blindly they fired on their own; +Like reeds in the whirl of the cyclone columns and colors went down. +Banner of stars on the right! Hurrah! gallant Gibbon is come! +Thunder of guns on the left! Hurrah! 'tis our cannon that boom! +Solid-shot, grape-shot and canister crash like the cracking of doom. +Baffled, bewildered and broken the ranks of the enemy yield; +Panic-struck, routed and shattered they fly from the fate of the field. +Hold them? We held them at bay, as a bear holds the hounds on his track; +Knee to knee, shoulder to shoulder, we met them and staggered them back; +Two hundred and fifty and two, we held their mad thousands at bay, +Met them and baffled and broke them, turning the tide of the day; +Two hundred and fifty and two when the sun hung low in heaven, +But ah! when the stars rode over we numbered but forty-seven: +Dead on the field or wounded the rest of our regiment lay; +Never a man of us faltered or flinched in the fire of the fray, +For we bore the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day. + +Tears for our fallen comrades--cover their graves with flowers, +For they fought and fell like Spartans for this glorious land of ours. +They fell, but they fell victorious, for the Rebel ranks were riven, +And over our land united--one nation from sea to sea, +Over the grave of Treason, over millions of men made free, +Triumphant the flag of our fathers waves in the winds of heaven-- +Striped with the blood of her heroes she waves in the winds of heaven. +Tears for our fallen comrades--cover their graves with flowers, +For they fought and fell like Spartans for this glorious land of ours; +And oft shall our children's children garland their graves and say: +"They bore the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day." + + + + +ADDRESS TO THE FLAG + +[After the Battle of Gettysburg.] + +Float in the winds of heaven, O tattered Flag! +Emblem of hope to all the misruled world: +Thy field of golden stars is rent and red-- +Dyed in the blood of brothers madly spilled +By brother-hands upon the mother-soil. +O fatal Upas of the savage Nile,[CT] +Transplanted hither--rooted--multiplied-- +Watered with bitter tears and sending forth +Thy venom-vapors till the land is mad, +Thy day is done. A million blades are swung +To lay thy jungles open to the sun; +A million torches fire thy blasted boles; +A million hands shall drag thy fibers out +And feed the fires till every root and branch +Lie in dead ashes. From the blackened soil, +Enriched and moistened with fraternal blood, +Beside the palm shall spring the olive-tree, +And every breeze shall waft the happy song +Of Freedom crowned with olive-twigs and flowers. + +Yea, Patriot-Flag of our old patriot-sires, +Honored--victorious on an hundred fields +Where side by side for Freedom's mother-land +Her Southern sons and Northern fighting fell, +And side by side in glorious graves repose, + +[CT] African slavery. + +I see the dawn of glory grander still, +When hand in hand upon this battle-field +The blue-eyed maidens of the Merrimac +With dewy roses from the Granite Hills, +And dark-eyed daughters from the land of palms +With orange-blossoms from the broad St. Johns, +In solemn concert singing as they go, +Shall strew the graves of these fraternal dead. +The day of triumph comes, O blood-stained Flag! +Washed clean and lustrous in the morning light +Of a new era, thou shalt float again +In more than pristine glory o'er the land +Peace-blest and re-united. On the seas +Thou shalt be honored to the farthest isle. +The oppressed of foreign lands shall flock the shores +To look upon and bless thee. Mothers shall lift +Their infants to behold thee as a star +New-born in heaven to light the darksome world. +The children weeping round the desolate, +Sore-stricken mother in the saddened home +Whereto the father shall no more return, +In future years will proudly boast the blood +Of him who bravely fell defending thee. +And these misguided brothers who would tear +Thy starry field asunder and would trail +Their own proud flag and history in the dust, +Ere many years will bless thee, dear old Flag, +That thou didst triumph even over them. +Aye, even they with proudly swelling hearts +Will see the glory thou shalt shortly wear, +And new-born stars swing in upon thy field +In lustrous clusters. Come, O glorious day +Of Freedom crowned with Peace. God's will be done! +God's will is peace on earth--good-will to men. +The chains all broken and the bond all free, +O may this nation learn to war no more; +Yea, into plow-shares may these brothers beat +Their swords and into pruning-hooks their spears, +Clasp hands again, and plant these battle-fields +With golden corn and purple-clustered vines, +And side by side re-build the broken walls-- +Joined and cemented as one solid stone +With patriot-love and Christ's sweet charity. + + + + + +NEW-YEARS ADDRESS--JANUARY 1, 1866 + +[Written for the St. Paul Pioneer.] + +Good morning--good morning--a happy new year! +We greet you, kind friends of the old _Pioneer_; +Hope your coffee is good and your steak is well done, +And you're happy as clams in the sand and the sun. +The old year's a shadow--a shade of the past; +It is gone with its toils and its triumphs so vast-- +With its joys and its tears--with its pleasure and pain-- +With its shouts of the brave and its heaps of the slain-- +Gone--and it cometh--no, never again. +And as we look forth on the future so fair +Let us brush from the picture the visage of care; +The error, the folly, the frown and the tear-- +Drop them all at the grave of the silent old year. +Has the heart been oppressed with a burden of woe? +Has the spirit been cowed by a merciless blow? +Has the tongue of the brave or the voice of the fair +Prayed to God and received no response to its prayer? +Look up!--'twas a shadow--the morning is here: +A Happy New Year!--O, a Happy New Year! +Yet stay for a moment. We cannot forget +The fields where the true and the traitor have met; +When the old year came in we were trembling with fear +Lest Freedom should fall in her glorious career; +And the roar of the conflict was loud o'er the land +Where the traitor-flag waved in a rebel's red hand; +But the God of the Just led the hosts of the Free, +And Victory marched from the north to the sea. +Behold--where the conflict was doubtful and dire-- +There--on house-top and hill-top, on fortress and spire-- +The Old Banner waves again higher and prouder, +Though torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder. + +God bless the brave soldiers that followed that flag +Through river and swamp, over mountain and crag-- +On the wild charge triumphant--the sullen retreat-- +On fields spread with victory or piled with defeat; +God bless their true hearts for they stood like a wall, +And saved us our Country and saved us our all. +But many a mother and many a daughter +Weep, alas, o'er the brave that went down in the slaughter. +Pile the monuments high--not on hill-top and plain-- +To the glorious sons 'neath the old banner slain-- +But over the land from the sea to the sea-- +Pile their monuments high in the hearts of the Free. +Heaven bless the brave souls that are spared to return +Where the "lamp in the window" ceased never to burn-- +Where the vacant chair stood at the desolate hearth +Since the son shouldered arms or the father went forth. +"Peace!--Peace!"--was the shout;--at the jubilant word +Wives and mothers went down on their knees to the Lord! + +Methinks I can see, through the vista of years-- +From the memories of old such a vision appears-- +A gray-haired old veteran in arm-chair at ease, +With his grandchildren clustered intent at his knees, +Recounting his deeds with an eloquent tongue, +And a fire that enkindles the hearts of the young; +How he followed the Flag from the first to the last-- +On the long, weary march, in the battle's hot blast; +How he marched under Sherman from center to sea, +Or fought under Grant in his battles with Lee; +And the old fire comes back to his eye as of yore, +And his iron hand clutches his musket once more, +As of old on the battle-field ghastly and red, +When he sprang to the charge o'er the dying and dead; +And the eyes of his listeners are gleaming with fire, +As he points to that Flag floating high on the spire. + +[Illustration: AND THE EYES OF HIS LISTENERS ARE GLEAMING WITH FIRE +AS HE POINTS TO THAT FLAG FLOATING HIGH ON THE SPIRE.] + +Heaven bless the new year that is just ushered in; +May the Rebels repent of their folly and sin, +Depart from their idols, extend the right hand, +And pledge that the Union forever shall stand. +May they see that the rending of fetter and chain +Is _their_ triumph as well--their unspeakable gain; +That the Union dissevered and weltering in blood +Could yield them no profit and bode them no good. +'Tis human to err and divine to forgive; +Let us walk after Christ--bid the poor sinners live, +And come back to the fold of the Union once more, +And we'll do as the prodigal's father of yore-- +Kill the well-fatted calf--(but we'll not do it twice) +And invite them to dinner--and give them a slice. + +There's old Johnny Bull--what a terrible groan +Escapes when he thinks of his big "Rebel Loan"-- +How the money went out with a nod and a grin, +But the cotton--the cotton--it didn't come in. +Then he thinks of diplomacy--Mason-Slidell, +And he wishes that both had been warming in hell, +For he got such a rap from our little Bill Seward +That the red nose he blows is right hard to be cured; +And then the steam pirates he built and equipped, +And boasted, you know, that they couldn't be whipped; +But alas for his boast--Johnny Bull "caught a Tartar," +And now like a calf he is bawling for quarter. +Yes, bluff Johnny Bull will be tame as a yearling, +Beg pardon and humbly "come down" with his sterling. + +There's Monsieur _l'Escamoteur_[CU] over in France; +He has had a clear field and a gay country dance +Down there in Mexico--playing his tricks +While we had a family "discussion wid sticks"; +But the game is played out; don't you see it's so handy +For Grant and his boys to march over the Grande. +He twists his waxed moustache and looks very blue, +And he says to himself, (what he wouldn't to you) +"Py tam--dair's mon poor leetle chappie--Dutch Max! +_Cornes du Diable_[CV]--'e'll 'ave to make tracks +Or ve'll 'ave all dem tam Yankee poys on our packs." + +Monsieur l'Empereur, if your Max can get out +With the hair of his head on--he'd better, no doubt. +If you'll not take it hard, here's a bit of advice-- +It is dangerous for big pigs to dance on the ice; +They sometimes slip up and they sometimes fall in, +And the ice you are on is exceedingly thin. +You're _au fait_, I'll admit, at a sharp game of chance, +But the Devil himself couldn't always beat France. +Remember the fate of your uncle of yore, +Tread lightly, and keep very close to the shore. + +The Giant Republic--its future how vast! +Now, freed from the follies and sins of the past, + +[CU] The Juggler. + +[CV] Horns of the Devil!--equivalent to the exclamation--The Devil! + +It will tower to the zenith; the ice-covered sea +And Darien shall bound-mark the Land of the Free. +Behold how the landless, the poor and oppressed, +Flock in on our shores from the East and the West! +Let them come--bid them come--we have plenty of room; +Our forests shall echo, our prairies shall bloom; +The iron horse, puffing his cloud-breath of steam, +Shall course every valley and leap every stream; +New cities shall rise with a magic untold, +While our mines yield their treasures of silver and gold, +And prosperous, united and happy, we'll climb +Up the mountain of Fame till the end of Old Time-- +Which, as I figure up, is a century hence: +Then we'll all go abroad without any expense; +We'll capture a comet--the smart Yankee race +Will ride on his tail through the kingdom of Space, +Tack their telegraph wires to Uranus and Mars; +Yea, carry their arts to the ultimate stars, +And flaunt the Old Flag at the suns as they pass, +And astonish the Devil himself with--their brass. + +And now, "Gentle Readers," I'll bid you farewell; +I hope this fine poem will please you--and _sell_. +You'll ne'er lack a friend if you ne'er lack a dime; +May you never grow old till the end of Old Time; +May you never be cursed with an itching for rhyme; +For in spite of your physic, in spite of your plaster, +The rash will break out till you go to disaster-- +Which you plainly can see is the case with my Muse, +For she scratches away though she's said her adieus. + +Dear Ladies, though last to receive my oblation, +And last in the list of Mosaic creation, +The last is the best, and the last shall be first. +Through Eve, sayeth Moses, old Adam was cursed; +But I cannot agree with you, Moses, that Adam +Sinned and fell through the gentle persuasion of madam. +The victim, no doubt, of Egyptian flirtation, +You mistook your chagrin for divine inspiration, +And condemned all the sex without proof or probation, +As we rhymsters mistake the moonbeams that elate us +For flashes of wit or the holy afflatus, +And imagine we hear the applause of a nation,-- +But all honest men who are married and blest +Will agree that the last work of God is the best. + +And now to you all--whether married or single-- +Whether sheltered by slate, or by "shake," or by shingle-- +God bless you with peace and with bountiful cheer, +Happy houses, happy hearts--and a happy New Year! + +P.S.--If you wish all these blessings, 'tis clear +You should send in your "stamps" for the old _Pioneer_. + + * * * * * + +MY FATHER-LAND + +[From the German of Theodor Korner.] + +Where is the minstrel's Father-land? + Where the sparks of noble spirits flew, + Where flowery wreaths for beauty grew, + Where strong hearts glowed so glad and true + For all things sacred, good and grand: +There was my Father-land. + +How named the minstrel's Father-land? + O'er slaughtered son--'neath tyrants' yokes, + She weepeth now--and foreign strokes; + They called her once the Land of Oaks-- + Land of the Free--the German Land: +Thus was called my Father-land. +Why weeps the minstrel's Father-land? + Because while tyrant's tempest hailed + The people's chosen princes quailed, + And all their sacred pledges failed; + Because she could no ear command, +Alas must weep my Father-land. + +Whom calls the minstrel's Father-land? + She calls on heaven with wild alarm-- + With desperation's thunder-storm-- + On Liberty to bare her arm, + On Retribution's vengeful hand: +On these she calls--my Father-land. + +What would the minstrel's Father-land? + She would strike the base slaves to the ground + Chase from her soil the tyrant hound, + And free her sons in shackles bound, + Or lay them free beneath her sand: +That would my Father-land. + +And hopes the minstrel's Father-land? + She hopes for holy Freedom's sake, + Hopes that her true sons will awake, + Hopes that just God will vengeance take, + And ne'er mistakes the Avenger's hand: +Thereon relies my Father-land. + + + + +MY HEART'S ON THE RHINE + +[From the German of Wolfgang Muller.] + +My heart's on the Rhine--in the old Father-land; +Where my cradle was rocked by a dear mother's hand, +My youth and my friends--they are there yet, I know, +And my love dreams of me with her cheeks all aglow; +O there where I reveled in song and in wine! +Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine. + +I hail thee, thou broad-breasted, golden-green stream; +Ye cities and churches and castles that gleam; +Ye grain-fields of gold in the valley so blue; +Ye vineyards that glow in the sun-shimmered dew; +Ye forests and caverns and cliffs that were mine! +Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine. + +I hail thee, O life of the soul-stirring song, +Of waltz and of wine, with a yearning so strong, +Hail, ye stout race of heroes, so brave and so true. +Ye blue-eyed, gay maidens, a greeting to you! +Your life and your aims and your efforts be mine; +Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine. + +My heart's on the Rhine--in the old Father-land, +Where my cradle was rocked by a dear mother's hand; +My youth and my friends--they are there yet, I know, +And my love dreams of me with her cheeks all aglow: +Be thou ever the same to me, Land of the Vine! +Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine. + + + + +THE MINSTREL + +[From the German of Goethe] + +[_Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, Book 2, Chap. 2._] + +"What hear I at the gateway ringing? +What bard upon the drawbridge singing? +Go bid him to repeat his song +Here, in the hall amid the throng," +The monarch cried; +The little page hied; +As back he sped, +The monarch said-- +"Bring in the gray-haired minstrel." + +"I greet you, noble lords and peers; +I greet you, lovely dames. +O heaven begemmed with golden spheres! +Who knows your noble names? +In hall of splendor so sublime, +Close ye, mine eyes--'tis not the time +To gaze in idle wonder." + +The gray-haired minstrel closed his eyes; +He struck his wildest air; +Brave faces glowed like sunset skies; +Cast down their eyes the fair. +The king well pleased with the minstrel's song, +Sent the little page through the wondering throng +A chain of gold to bear him. + +"O give not me the chain of gold; +Award it to thy braves, +Before whose faces fierce and bold +Quail foes when battle raves; +Or give it thy chancellor of state, +And let him wear its golden weight +With his official burdens. + +"I sing, I sing as the wild birds sing +That in the forest dwell; +The songs that from my bosom spring +Alone reward me well: +But may I ask that page of thine +To bring me one good cup of wine +In golden goblet sparkling?" + +He took the cup; he drank it all: +"O soothing nectar thine! +Thrice bless'd the highly favored hall +Where flows such glorious wine: +If thou farest well, then think of me, +And thank thy God, as I thank thee +For this inspiring goblet." + + + + +HOPE + +[From the German of Schiller.] + +Men talk and dream of better days-- + Of a golden time to come; +Toward a happy and shining goal + They run with a ceaseless hum. +The world grows old and grows young again, +Still hope of the better is bright to men. + +Hope leads us in at the gate of life; + She crowns the boyish head; +Her bright lamp lures the stalwart youth, + Nor burns out with the gray-haired dead; +For the grave closes over his trouble and care, +But see--on the grave--Hope is planted there! + +'Tis not an empty and flattering deceit, + Begot in a foolish brain; +For the heart speaks loud with its ceaseless throbs, + "We are not born in vain"; +And the words that out of the heart-throbs roll, +They cannot deceive the hoping soul. + + + + +MRS. MCNAIR + +_Misce stultitiam consiliis brevem.--Horace._ + + Mrs. McNair + Was tall and fair; + Mrs. McNair was slim; +She had flashing black eyes and raven hair; +But a very remarkably modest air; +And her only care was for Mr. McNair; + She was exceedingly fond of him. + + He sold "notions" and lace + With wonderful grace, +And kept everything neatly displayed in its place: +The red, curly hair on his head and his face + He always persisted + Should be oiled and twisted; +He was the sleekest young husband that ever existed. + + Precisely at four + He would leave his store; +And Mr. McNair with his modest bride +Seated snugly and lovingly by his side, + On the rural Broadway, + Every pleasant day, +In his spick-span carriage would rattle away. + + Though it must be allowed + The lady was proud, +She'd have no maid about her the dear lady vowed: + So for Mr. McNair + The wear and the fare +She made it a care of her own to prepare. +I think I may guess, being married myself, +That the cause was not solely the saving of pelf. + + As for her, I'll declare, + Though raven her hair, +Though her eyes were so dark and her body so slim, +She hadn't a thought for a man but him. + + From three to nine, + Invited to dine, +Oft met at the house of the pair divine: +Her husband--and who, by the way, was well able-- +Did all the "agreeable" done at the table; +While she--most remarkably loving bride-- +Sat snugly and modestly down by his side. + And when they went out + It was whispered about, +"She's the lovingest wife in the town beyond doubt;" +And every one swore, from pastor to clown, +They were the most affectionate couple in town. + + Yes; Mrs McNair + Was modest and fair; +She never fell into a pout or a fret; + And Mr. McNair + Was her only care + And indeed her only pet. +The few short hours he spent at his store +She spent sewing or reading the romancers' lore; + And whoever came + It was always the same +With the modest lady that opened the door. + +But there came to town + One Captain Brown + To spend a month or more. + Now this same Captain Brown + Was a man of renown, +And a dashing blue coat he wore; + And a bright, brass star. + And a visible scar +On his brow--that he said he had got in the war + As he led the van: + (He never ran!) +In short, he was the "General's" right-hand man, +And had written his name on the pages of fame. + He was smooth as an eel, + And rode so genteel +That in less than a week every old maid and dame +Was constantly lisping the bold Captain's name. + + Now Mr. McNair, + As well as the fair, +Had a "bump of reverence" as big as a pear, + And whoever like Brown + Had a little renown, +And happened to visit that rural town, +Was invited of course by McNair--to "go down." + + So merely by chance, + The son of the lance +Became the bold hero of quite a romance: +For Mrs. McNair thought him wonderful fair, +And that none but her husband could with him compare. +Half her timidity vanished in air +The first time he dined with herself and McNair. + Now the Captain was arch + In whiskers and starch +And preferred, now and then, a gay waltz to a march. +A man, too, he was of uncommon good taste; +Always "at home" and never in haste, +And his manners and speech were remarkably chaste. + To tell you in short + His daily resort +He made at the house of "his good friend McNair," +Who ('twas really too bad) was so frequently out +When the Captain called in "just to see _him_" (no doubt) +But Mrs. McNair was so lonely--too bad; +So he chatted and chattered and made her look glad. + And many a view + Of his coat of blue, +All studded with buttons gilt, spangled and new, + The dear lady took + Half askance from her book, +As she modestly sat in the opposite nook. + Familiarly he + And modestly she +Talked nonsense and sense so strangely commingled, +That the dear lady's heart was delighted and tingled. + A man of sobriety + Renown and variety +It could not be wrong to enjoy his society: + O was it a sin + For him to "drop in," +And sometimes to pat her in sport on the chin? + + Dear Ladies, beware; + Dear Ladies, take care-- +How you play with a lion asleep in his lair: +"Mere trifling flirtations"--these arts you employ? +Flirtations once led to the siege of old Troy; + And a woman was in +For the sorrow and sin +And slaughter that fell when the Greeks tumbled in; +Nor is there a doubt, my dears, under the sun, +But they've led to the sack of more cities than one. + I would we were all + As pure as Saint Paul +That we touched not the goblet whose lees are but gall; +But if so we must know where a flirtation leads; +Beware of the fair and look out for our heads. + Remember the odious, + Frail woman, Herodias +Sent old Baptist John to a place incommodious, +And prevailed on her husband to cut off his head +For an indiscreet thing the old Nazarite said. + + Day in and day out + The blue coat was about; +And the dear little lady was glad when he came +And began to be talkative, tender and tame. +Then he gave her a ring, begged a curl of her hair, +And smilingly whispered her--"don't tell McNair." + She dropped her dark eyes + And with two little sighs +Sent the bold Captain's heart fluttering up to the skies. + + Then alas-- + What a pass! +He fell at the feet of the lady so sweet, +And swore that he loved her beyond his control-- +With all his humanity--body and soul! + The lady so frail + Turned suddenly pale, +Then--sighed that his love was of little avail; +For alas, the dear Captain--he must have forgot-- +She was tied to McNair with a conjugal knot. + But indeed + She agreed-- +Were she only a maid he alone could succeed; +But she prayed him by all that is sacred and fair, +Not to rouse the suspicion of Mr. McNair. + + 'Twas really too bad, + For the lady was sad: +And a terrible night o't the poor lady had, +While Mr. McNair wondered what was the matter, +And endeavored to coax, to console and to flatter. + Many tears she shed + That night while in bed +For she had such a terrible pain in her head! +"My dear little pet, where's the camphor?" he said; +"I'll go for the doctor--you'll have to be bled; +I declare, my dear wife, you are just about dead." + + "O no, my dear; + I pray you don't fear, +Though the pain, I'll admit, is exceeding severe. +I know what it is--I have had it before-- +It's only neuralgia: please go to the store +And bring me a bottle of 'Davis's Pain- +Killer,' and I shall be better again." + He sprang out of bed + And away he sped +In his gown for the cordial to cure her head, +Not dreaming that Cupid had played her a trick-- +The blind little rogue with a sharpened stick. + I confess on my knees + I have had the disease; +It is worse than the bites of a thousand fleas; +And the only cure I have found for these ills +Is a double dose of "Purgative Pills." + He rubbed her head-- + And eased it, she said; +And he shrugged and shivered and got into bed. +He slept and he snored, but the poor lady's pain, +When her lord slept soundly, came on again. + It wore away + However by day +And when Brown called again she was smiling and gay; +But alas, he must say--to the lady's dismay-- +In the town of his heart he had staid out his stay, +And must leave for his regiment with little delay. + + Now Mrs. McNair + Was tall and fair, +Mrs. McNair was slim, +But the like of Brown was so wonderful rare + That she could not part with him. +Indeed you can see it was truly a pity, +For her husband was just going down to the city, + And Captain Brown-- + The man of renown-- +Could console her indeed were he only in town. +So McNair to the city the next Monday hied, +And left bold Captain Brown with his modest young bride. + + As the serpent did Eve + Most sorely deceive-- +Causing old father Adam to sorrow and grieve, +And us, his frail children, tho' punished and chidden, +To hanker for things that are sweet but forbidden-- + The Captain so fair, + With his genius so rare, +Wound the web of enchantment round Mrs. McNair; +And alas, fickle Helen, ere three days were over, +She had sworn to elope with her brass-buttoned lover. + Like Helen, the Greek, + She was modest and meek, +And as fair as a rose, but a trifle too weak. +When a maid she had suitors as proud as Ulysses, +But she ne'er bent her neck to their arms or their kisses, + Till McNair he came in + With a brush on his chin-- +It was love at first sight--but a trifle too thin; +For, married, the dreams of her girlhood fell short all, +And she found that her husband was only a mortal. + + Dear ladies, betray us-- + Fast and loose play us-- +We'll follow you still like bereaved Menelaus, +Till the little blind god with his cruel shafts slay us. + Cold-blooded as I am, + If a son of old Priam +Should break the Mosaic commands and defy 'em, +And elope with my "pet," and moreover my riches, +I would follow the rogue if I went upon crutches +To the plains of old Troy without jacket or breeches. + But then I'm so funny + If he'd give up the money, +He might go to the dogs with himself and his "Honey." + + The lovers agreed + That the hazardous deed +Should be done in the dark and with very great speed, +For Mr. McNair--when the fellow came back-- +Might go crazy and foolishly follow their track. + So at midnight should wait + At her garden-gate +A carriage to carry the dear, precious freight +Of Mrs. McNair who should meet Captain Brown +At the Globe Hotel in a neighboring town. + A man should be hired + To convey the admired. +And keep mum as a mouse, and do what was desired. + +Wearily, wearily half the night + The lady watched away; +At times in a spirit of sadness quite, +But fully resolved on her amorous flight, + She longed to be under way; +Yet with sad heaving heart and a tear, I declare, +As she sorrowfully thought of poor Mr. McNair. + + "Poor fellow," she sighed, + "I wish he had died +Last spring when he had his complaint in the side +For I know--I am sure--it will terribly grieve him +To have me elope with the Captain and leave him. + But the Captain--dear me! + I hardly can see +Why I love the brave Captain to such a degree: +But see--there's the carriage, I vow, at the gate! +I must go--'tis the law of inveterate fate." + So a parting look + At her home she took, +While a terrible conflict her timid soul shook; +Then turned to the carriage heart-stricken and sore, +Stepped hastily in and closed up the door. + "Crack!" went the whip; + She bit her white lip, +And away she flew on her desperate trip. +She thought of dear Brown; and poor Mr. McNair-- +She knew he would hang himself straight in despair. + +She sighed + And she cried + All during the ride, +And endeavored--alas, but she could not decide. + Three times she prayed; + Three times she essayed +To call to the driver for pity and aid-- + To drive her straight + To her garden-gate, +And break the spell of her terrible fate. + But her tongue was tied-- + She couldn't decide, +And she only moaned at a wonderful rate. + + No mortal can tell + "What might have befell," +Had it been a mile more to the Globe Hotel; +But as they approached it she broke from her spell. + A single hair + For Mr. McNair +She vowed to herself that she did not care; + But the Captain so true + In his coat of blue-- +To his loving arms in her fancy she flew. + In a moment or more + They drove up to the door, +And she felt that her trials and troubles were o'er. +The landlord came hastily out in his slippers, +For late he had sat with some smokers and sippers. + As the lady stepped down + With a fret and a frown, +She sighed half aloud, "Where is dear Captain Brown?" +"This way, my dear madam," politely he said, +And straightway to the parlor the lady he led. + +Now the light was dim + Where she followed him, +And the dingy old parlor looked gloomy and grim. +As she entered, behold, in contemplative mood, +In the farther corner the bold Captain stood + In his coat of blue: + To his arms she flew; +She buried her face in his bosom so true: +"Dear Captain!--my Darling!" sighed Mrs. McNair; +Then she raised her dark eyes and--Good Heavens' + I declare!--- +Instead of the Captain 'twas--_Mr. McNair!_ +She threw up her arms--she screamed--and she fainted; +Such a scene!--Ah the like of it never was painted. + +Of repentance and pardon I need not tell; +Her vows I will not relate, +For every man must guess them well +Who knows much of the "married state." +Of the sad mischance suffice it to say +That McNair had suspected the Captain's "foul play;" + So he laid a snare + For the bold and the fair, +But he captured, alas, only Mrs. McNair; +And the brass-buttoned lover--bold Captain Brown-- +Was nevermore seen in that rural town. + + Mrs. McNair + Is tall and fair; + Mrs. McNair is slim; +And her husband again is her only care-- +She is wonderfully fond of him; +For now he is all the dear lady can wish--he +Is a captain himself--in the State militia. + + 1859. + + + + +THE DRAFT + +[January, 1865.] + +Old Father Abe has issued his "Call" + For Three Hundred Thousand more! +By Jupiter, boys, he is after you all-- +Lamed and maimed--tall and small-- +With his drag-net spread for a general haul + Of the "suckers" uncaught before. + +I am sorry to see such a woeful change + In the health of the hardiest; +It is wonderful odd--it is "passing strange"-- +As over the country you travel and range, +To behold such a sudden, lamentable change + All over the East and the West. + +"Blades" tough and hearty a week ago, + Who tippled and danced and laughed, +Are "suddenly taken," and some quite low +With an epidemical illness, you know: +"What!--Zounds!--the cholera?" you quiz;--no--no-- + The doctors call it the "Draft." + +What a blessed thing it were to be old-- + A little past "forty-five;" +'Twere better indeed than a purse of gold +At a premium yet unwritten, untold, +For what poor devil that's now "enrolled" + Expects to get off alive? + +There's a miracle wrought in the Democrats; + They swore it was murder and sin +To put in the "Niggers," like Kilkenny cats, +To clear the ship of the rebel rats, +But now I notice they swing their hats + And shout to the "Niggers"--"_Go in!_" + + + + +THE DEVIL AND THE MONK + +Once Satan and a monk went on a "drunk," +And Satan struck a bargain with the monk, +Whereby the Devil's crew was much increased +By penceless poor and now and then a priest +Who, lacking cunning or good common sense, +Got caught _in flagrante_ and out of pence. +Then in high glee the Devil filled a cup +And drank a brimming bumper to the pope: +Then--"Here's to you," he said, "sober or drunk, +In cowl or corsets, every monk's a punk. +Whate'er they preach unto the common breed, +At heart the priests and I are well agreed. +Justice is blind we see, and deaf and old, +But in her scales can hear the clink of gold. +The convent is a harem in disguise, +And virtue is a fig-leaf for the wise +To hide the naked truth of lust and lecheries. + +"And still the toilers feed the pious breed, +And pin their faith upon the bishop's sleeve; +Hungry for hope they gulp a moldy creed +And dine on faith. 'Tis easier to believe +An old-time fiction than to wear a tooth +In gnawing bones to reach the marrow truth. +Priests murder Truth and with her gory ghost +They frighten fools and give the rogues a roast +Until without or pounds or pence or price-- +Free as the fabled wine of paradise-- +They furnish priestly plates with buttered toast. +Your priests of superstition stalk the land +With Jacob's winning voice and Esau's hand; +Sinners to hell and saints to heaven they call, +And eat the fattest fodder in the stall. +They, versed in dead rituals in dead language deep, +Talk Greek to th' _grex_ and Latin to their sheep, +And feed their flocks a flood of cant and college +For every drop of sense or useful knowledge." + +"I beg your pardon," softly said the monk, +"I fear your Majesty is raving drunk. +I would be courteous." + But the Devil laughed +And slyly winked and sagely shook his head. +"My fawning dog," the sage satanic said, +"Wags not his tail for me but for my bread. +Brains rule to day as they have ruled for aye, +And craft grown craftier in this modern day +Still rides the fools, but in a craftier way; +And priestcraft lingers and survives its use; +What was a blessing once is now abuse: +Grown fat and arrogant on power and pelf, +The old-time shepherd has become a wolf +And only feeds his flocks to feast himself. +To clink of coin the pious juggler jumps, +For still he thinks, as in the days of old, +The key to holy heaven is made of gold, +That in the game of mortals money is trumps, +That golden darts will pierce e'en Virtue's shield, +And by the salve of gold all sins are healed. +So old Saint Peter stands outside the fence +With hand outstretched for toll of Peter-pence, +And sinners' souls must groan in Purgatory +Until they pay the admission-fee to glory. + +"There was an honest poet once on earth +Who beat all other bardies at a canter; +Rob' Burns his mother called him at his birth. +Though handicapped by rum and much a ranter, +He won the madcap race in _Tam O'Shanter_. +He drove a spanking span from Scottish heather, +Strong-limbed, but light of foot as flea or feather-- +Rhyme and Reason, matched and yoked together, +And reined them with light hand and limber leather. +He wrote to me once on a time--I mind it-- +A bold epistle and the poet signed it. +He thought to cheat "Auld Nickie" of his dues, +But who outruns the Devil casts his shoes; +And so at last from frolicking and drinkin', +'Some luckless hour' sent him to Hell 'alinkin'![CW] +Times had been rather dull in my dominion, +And all my imps like lubbers lay a snoring, +But Burns began to rhyme us his opinion, +And in ten minutes had all Hell aroaring. +Then Robbie pulled his book of poems out +And read us sundry satires from the book; +'_Death and Doctor Hornbook_' raised a shout +Till all the roof-tin on the rafters shook; +And when his '_Unco Guid_' the bardie read +The crew all clapped their hands and yelled like mad; +But '_Holy Willie's Prayer_' 'brought down the house'. +So I was glad to give the bard a pass +And a few pence for toll at Peter's gate; +For if the roof of Hell were made of brass +Bob Burns would shake it off as sure as fate. +I mind it well--that poem on a louse! +'O wad some pow'r the giftie gie us,' Monk, +'To see oursels as others see us'--drunk; +'It wad frae monie a blunder free us'--list!-- +'And foolish notion.' Abbot, bishop, priest, +'What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e' you all, +'And ev'n devotion.' Cowls and robes would fall, +And sometimes leave a bishop but a beast, +And show a leper sore where erst they made a priest." + +[CW] Tripping. See Burns' "_Address to the Deil_" + +Not to be beat the jolly monk filled up +His silver mug with rare old Burgundy; +"Here's to your health," he said, "your Majesty"-- +And drained the brimming goblet at a gulp-- +"'For when the Devil was sick the Devil a monk would be; +But when the Devil got well a devil a monk was he.' +_In vino veritas_ is true, no doubt-- +When wine goes in teetotal truth comes out. +To shake a little Shakespeare in the wine: +'Some rise by sin and some by virtue fall'; +But in the realm of Fate, as I opine, +A devil a virtue is or sin at all. +'The Devil be damned' is what we preach, you know it-- +At mass and vespers, holy-bread and dinner: +From priest to pope, from pedagogue to poet, +We sanctify the sin and damn the sinner. +This poet Shakespeare, whom I read with pleasure, +Wrote once--I think, in taking his own 'Measure':-- +'They say best men are molded out of faults, +And, for the most, become much more the better +For being a little bad.' The reason halts: +If read between the lines--not by the letter-- +'Tis plain enough that Shakespeare was atrimmin' +His own unruly ship and furling sail +To meet a British tempest or a gale, +And keep cold water from his wine and women. +Now I'll admit, when he's a little mellow, +The Devil himself's a devilish clever fellow, +And, though his cheeks and paunch are somewhat shrunk, +He only lacks a cowl to make a monk. +Time is the mother of twins _et hic et nunc;_ +Come, hood your horns and fill the mug abrimmin', +For we are cheek by jowl on wit and wine and women." + +And so the monk and Devil filled the mug, +And quaffed and chaffed and laughed the night away; +And when the "wee sma" hours of night had come, +The monk slipped out and stole the abbot's rum; +And when the abbot came at break of day, +There cheek by jowl--horns, hoofs, and hood--they lay, +With open missal and an empty jug, +And broken beads and badly battered mug-- +In fond embrace--dead drunk upon the rug. + +Think not, wise reader, that the bard hath drunk +The wine that fumed these vagaries from the monk; +Nor, in the devil ethics thou hast read, +There spake the poet in the Devil's stead. +Let Virtue be our helmet and our shield, +And Truth our weapon--weapon sharp and strong +And deadly to all error and all wrong. +Yea, armed with Truth, though rogues and rascals throng +The citadel of Virtue shall not yield, +For God's right arm of Truth prevails in every field. + +[Illustration: THE DEVIL AND THE MONK] + + + + +THE TARIFF ON TIN + +Monarch of Hannah's rocking-chair, +With unclipped beard and unkempt hair, +Sitting at ease by the kitchen fire, + Nor heeding the wind and the driving sleet, +Jo Lumpkin perused the _Daily Liar_-- + A leading and stanch Democratic sheet, +While Hannah, his wife, in her calico, +Sat knitting a pair of mittens for Jo. + +"Hanner," he said, and he raised his eyes +And looked exceedingly grave and wise, +"The kentry's agoin, I guess, tu the dogs: +Them durned Republikins, they air hogs: +A dev'lish purty fix we air in; +They've gone un riz the teriff on tin." + +"How's thet?" said Hannah, and turned her eyes +With a look of wonder and vague surprise. + +"Why them confoundered Congriss chaps +Hez knocked the prices out uv our craps: +We can't sell butter ner beans no more +Tu enny furren ship er shore, +Becuz them durned Republikins +Hez gone un riz the teriff on tins." + +Hannah dropped her knitting-work on her knees, +And looked very solemn and ill-at-ease: + She gazed profoundly into the fire, +Then hitched her chair a little bit nigher, + And said as she glanced at the _Daily Liar_ +With a sad, wan look in her buttermilk eyes: +"I vum thet's a tax on punkin-pies, +Fer they know we allers bakes 'em in +Pans un platters un plates uv tin." + +"I wouldn't agrumbled a bit," said Jo, +"Et a tax on sugar un salt un sich; + But I swow it's a morul political sin +Tu drive the farmer intu the ditch + With thet pesky teriff on tin. +Ef they'd a put a teriff on irn un coal + Un hides un taller un hemlock bark, +Why thet might a helped us out uv a hole + By buildin uv mills un givin uv work, +Un gladd'nin many a farmer's soul + By raisin the price of pertaters un pork: +But durn their eyes, it's a morul sin-- +They've gone un riz the teriff on tin. +I wouldn't wonder a bit ef Blaine +Hed diskivered a tin mine over in Maine; +Er else he hez foundered a combinashin +Tu gobble the tin uv the hull creashin. +I'll bet Jay Gould is intu the'trust,' +Un they've gone in tergether tu make er bust; +Un tu keep the British frum crowdin in +They've gone un riz the teriff on tin. +What'll we du fer pans un pails +When the cow comes in un the old uns fails? +Tu borrer a word frum Scripter, Hanner, +Un du it, tu, in pious manner, +You'll hev tu go down in yer sock fer a ducat, +Er milk old Roan in a wooden bucket: +Fer them Republikins--durn their skin-- +Hez riz sich a turrible teriff on tin. +Tu cents a pound on British tin-plate! +Why, Hanner, you see, at thet air rate, +Accordin tu this ere newspaper-print-- +Un it mus be so er it wouldn't' be in't-- +It's a dollar un a half on one tin pan, +Un about six shillin on a coffee-can, +Un ten shillin, Hanner, on a dinner-pail! +Gol! won't it make the workin men squeal-- +Thet durned Republikin tax un steal! +They call it Protecshin, but blast my skin +Ef it aint a morul political sin-- +Thet durned Republikin teriff on tin. + +"Un then they hev put a teriff on silk +Un satin un velvit un thet air ilk, +Un broadcloth un brandy un Havanny cigars, +Un them slick silk hats thet our preacher wears; +Un he'll hev tu wear humspun un drink skim milk. +Un, Hanner, you see we'll hev tu be savin, +Un whittle our store-bill down tu a shavin; +You can't go tu meetin in silks; I vum +You'll hev tu wear ging-um er stay tu hum." +But Hannah said sharply--"I won't though, I swum!" +And Hannah gazed wistfully on her Jo +As he rocked himself mournfully to and fro, +And then she looked thoughtfully into the fire, +While the sleet fell faster and the wind blew higher, +And Jo took a turn at the _Daily Liar_. + +1890. + +[Illustration: "THE KENTRY'S AGOIN', I GUESS, TO THE DOGS"] + + + + +PAT AND THE PIG + +Old Deutchland's the country for sauerkraut and beer, +Old England's the land of roast beef and good cheer, +Auld Scotland's the mother of gristle and grit, +But Ireland, my boy, is the mother of wit. +Once Pat was indicted for stealing a pig, +And brought into court to the man in the wig. +The indictment was long and so lumbered with Latin +That Pat hardly knew what a pickle was Pat in; +But at last it was read to the end, and the wig +Said: "Pat, are you guilty of stealing the pig?" +Pat looked very wise, though a trifle forlorn, +And he asked of milord that the witness be sworn. +"Bless yer sowl," stammered Pat, "an' the day ye was born! +Faith how in the divil d'ye think Oi can tell +Till Oi hear the ividince?" + Pat reckoned well; +For the witness was sworn and the facts he revealed-- +How Pat stole the piggy and how the pig squealed, +Whose piggy the pig was and what he was worth, +And the slits in his ears and his tail and--so forth; +But he never once said, 'in the county of Meath,'[CX] +So Pat he escaped by the skin of his teeth. + +[CX] In criminal cases it is necessary to prove that the crime was +committed in the county where the venue is laid. + + + + +NOTES + +[1] Called in the Dakota tongue "_Hok-sée-win-nâ-pee +Wo-hán-pee_"--Virgins' Dance (or Feast). + +[2] One of the favorite and most exciting games of the Dakotas is +ball-playing. A smooth place on the prairie, or in winter, on a frozen +lake or river, is chosen. Each player has a sort of bat, called +"_Tâ-kée-cha-psé-cha_," about thirty-two inches long, with a hoop at the +lower end four or five inches in diameter, interlaced with thongs of +deer-skin, forming a sort of pocket. With these bats they catch and +throw the ball. Stakes are set as bounds at a considerable distance from +the center on either side. Two parties are then formed and each chooses +a leader or chief. The ball (_Tâpa_) is then thrown up half way between +the bounds, and the game begins, the contestants contending with their +bats for the ball as it falls. When one succeeds in getting it fairly +into the pocket of his bat he swings it aloft and throws it as far as he +can toward the bound to which his party is working, taking care to send +it if possible where some of his own side will take it up. Thus the ball +is thrown and contended for till one party succeeds in casting it beyond +the bounds of the opposite party. A hundred players on a side are +sometimes engaged in this exciting game. Betting on the result often +runs high. Moccasins, pipes, knives, hatchets, blankets, robes and guns +are hung on the prize-pole. Not unfrequently horses are staked on the +issue and sometimes even women. Old men and mothers are among the +spectators, praising their swift-footed sons, and young wives and +maidens are there to stimulate their husbands and lovers. This game is +not confined to the warriors but is also a favorite amusement of the +Dakota maidens, who generally play for prizes offered by the chief or +warriors. (See _Neill's Hist. Minn._, pp 74-5; _Riggs' Tâkoo Wakân_, pp +44-5, and _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, p 55.) + +[3] Pronounced _Wah-zeé-yah_--the god of the North, or Winter. A fabled +spirit who dwells in the frozen North, in a great _teepee_ of ice and +snow. From his mouth and nostrils he blows the cold blasts of winter. He +and _I-tó-ka-ga Wi câs-ta_--the spirit or god of the South (literally +the "South Man") are inveterate enemies, and always on the war-path +against each other. In winter _Wa-zi-ya_ advances southward and drives +_I-tó-ka-ga Wi-câs-ta_ before him to the Summer-Islands. But in spring +the god of the South having renewed his youth and strength in the "Happy +Hunting Grounds," is able to drive _Wa-zi-ya_ back again to his icy +wigwam in the North. Some Dakotas say that the numerous granite +boulders scattered over the prairies of Minnesota and Dakota, were +hurled in battle by _Wa-zi-ya_ from his home in the North at _I-tó-ka-ga +Wi-câs-ta_. The _Wa-zi-ya_ of the Dakotas is substantially the same as +"_Ka be-bon-ik-ka_"--the "Winter-maker" of the Ojibways. + +[4] Mendota--(meeting of the waters) at the confluence of the Mississippi +and Minnesota rivers. The true Dakota word is _Mdó-tè_--applied to the +mouth of a river flowing into another, also to the outlet of a lake. + +[5] Pronounced _Wee-wâh-stay_; literally--a beautiful virgin or woman. + +[6] _Cetân-wa-ká-wa-mâni_--"He who shoots pigeon-hawks walking"--was the +full Dakota name of the grandfather of the celebrated "Little Crow" +(_Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta_--His Red People) who led his warriors in the +terrible outbreak in Minnesota in 1862-3. The Chippeways called the +grandfather _Ká-ká-gè_--crow or raven--from his war-badge, a crow-skin; +and hence the French traders and _courriers du bois_ called him "_Petit +Corbeau_"--Little Crow. This sobriquet, of which he was proud, descended +to his son, _Wakinyan Tânka_--Big Thunder, who succeeded him as chief; +and from Big Thunder to his son _Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta_, who became chief on +the death of _Wakinyan Tânka_. These several "Little Crows" were +successively Chiefs of the Light-foot, or _Kapóza_ band of Dakotas. +_Kapóza_, the principal village of this band, was originally located on +the east bank of the Mississippi near the site of the city of St. Paul. +_Col. Minn. Hist. Soc._, 1864, p. 29. It was in later years moved to the +west bank. The grandfather whom I, for short, call _Wakâwa_, died the +death of a brave in battle against the Ojibways (commonly called +Chippeways)--the hereditary enemies of the Dakotas. _Wakinyan +Tânka_--Big Thunder, was killed by the accidental discharge of his own +gun. They were both buried with their kindred near the "_Wakan Teepee_," +the sacred Cave--(Carver's Cave). _Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta_, the last of the +Little Crows, was killed July 3, 1863, during the outbreak, near +Hutchinson, Minnesota, by the Lampsons--father and son, and his bones +were duly "done up" for the Historical Society of Minnesota. See +_Heard's Hist. Sioux War_, and _Neill's Hist. Minnesota_, Third Edition. + +[Illustration: LITTLE CROW. _From an original photograph in the author's +possession_] + +Little Crow's sixteen-year-old son, _Wa-wi-na-pe_--(One who appears +--like the spirit of his forefather) was with him at the time he was +killed; but escaped, and after much hardship and suffering, was at last +captured at _Mini Wakan_ (Devil's Lake, in North Dakota). From him +personally I obtained much information in regard to Little Crow's +participation in the "Sioux War," and minutely the speech that Little +Crow made to his braves when he finally consented to lead them on the +war-path against the whites. A literal translation of that speech will +be found further on in this note. + +I knew _Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta_, and from his own lips, in 1859-60 and 61, +obtained much interesting information in regard to the history, +tradition, customs, superstitions and habits of the Dakotas, of whom he +was the recognized Head-Chief. He was a remarkable Indian--a philosopher +and a brave and generous man. "Untutored savage" that he was, he was a +prince among his own people, and the peer in natural ability of the +ablest white men in the Northwest in his time. He had largely adopted +the dress and habits of civilized man, and he urged his people to +abandon their savage ways, build houses, cultivate fields, and learn to +live like the white people. He clearly forsaw the ultimate extinction of +his people as a distinct race. He well knew and realized the numbers and +power of the whites then rapidly taking possession of the +hunting-grounds of the Dakotas, and the folly of armed opposition on the +part of his people. He said to me once: "No more Dakotas by and by; +Indians all white men. No more buffaloes by and by; all cows, all oxen." +But his braves were restless. They smarted under years of wrong and +robbery, to which, indeed, the most stinging insults were often added by +the traders and officials among them. If the true, unvarnished history +of the cause and inception of the "Sioux Outbreak" in Minnesota is ever +written and published, it will bring the blush of shame to the cheeks of +every honest man who reads it. + +Against his judgment and repeated protests, Little Crow was at last, +after the depredations had begun, forced into the war on the whites by +his hot-headed and uncontrollable "young men." + +Goaded to desperation, a party of Little Crow's young "bucks," in +August, 1862, began their depredations and spilled white blood at Acton. +Returning to their chief's camp near the agency, they told their fellow +braves what they had done. The hot-headed young warriors immediately +demanded of Little Crow that he put on the "war-paint" and lead them +against the white men. The chief severely rebuked the "young men" who +had committed the murders, blackened his face (a sign of mourning), +retired to his _teepee_ and covered his head in sorrow. + +His braves surrounded his tent and cut it into strips with their knives. +They threatened to depose him from the chiefship unless he immediately +put on the "war-paint" and led them against the whites. They knew that +the Civil War was then in progress, that the white men were fighting +among themselves, and they declared that now was the time to regain +their lost hunting-grounds; that now was the time to avenge the thievery +and insults of the Agents who had for years systematically cheated them +out of the greater part of their promised annuities, for which they had +been induced to part with their lands; that now was the time to avenge +the debauchery of their wives and daughters by the dissolute hangers-on +who, as employees of the Indian Agents and licensed traders, had for +years hovered around them like buzzards around the carcasses of +slaughtered buffaloes. + +But Little Crow was unmoved by the appeals and threats of his warriors. +It is said that once for a moment he uncovered his head; that his face +was haggard and great beads of sweat stood out on his forehead. But at +last one of his enraged braves, bolder than the rest, cried out: + +"_Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta_ is a coward!" + +Instantly Little Crow sprang from his _teepee_, snatched the +eagle-feathers from the head of his insulter and flung them on the +ground. Then, stretching himself to his full height, his eyes flashing +fire, and in a voice tremulous with rage, he exclaimed: + +"_Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta_ is not a coward, and he is not a fool! When did he +run away from his enemies? When did he leave his braves behind him on +the war-path and turn back to his _teepees_? When he ran away from your +enemies, he walked behind on your trail with his face to the Ojibways +and covered your backs as a she-bear covers her cubs! Is +_Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta_ without scalps? Look at his war-feathers! Behold the +scalp-locks of your enemies hanging there on his lodge-poles! Do they +call him a coward? _Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta_ is not a coward, and he is not a +fool. Braves, you are like little children; you know not what you are +doing. + +"You are full of the white man's _devil-water_" (rum). "You are like +dogs in the Hot Moon when they run mad and snap at their own shadows. We +are only little herds of buffaloes left scattered; the great herds that +once covered the prairies are no more. See!--the white men are like the +locusts when they fly so thick that the whole sky is a snow-storm. You +may kill one--two--ten; yes, as many as the leaves in the forest +yonder, and their brothers will not miss them. Kill one--two--ten, and +ten times ten will come to kill you. Count your fingers all day long and +white men with guns in their hands will come faster than you can count. + +"Yes; they fight among themselves--away off. Do you hear the thunder of +their big guns? No; it would take you two moons to run down to where +they are fighting, and all the way your path would be among white +soldiers as thick as tamaracks in the swamps of the Ojibways. Yes; they +fight among themselves, but if you strike at them they will all turn on +you and devour you and your women and little children just as the +locusts in their time fall on the trees and devour all the leaves in one +day. You are fools. You cannot see the face of your chief; your eyes are +full of smoke. You cannot hear his voice; your ears are full of roaring +waters. Braves, you are little children--you are fools. You will die +like the rabbits when the hungry wolves hunt them in the Hard Moon +(January). _Ta-ó-ya-té dú-ta_ is not a coward: he will die with you." + +[7] _Hârps-te-nâh_. The first-born daughter of a Dakota is called +_Winona_; the second, _Hârpen_; the third, _Hârpstinâ_; the fourth, +_Wâska_; the fifth, _Wehârka_. The first-born son is called _Chaskè_; +the second, _Hârpam_; the third, _Hapéda_; the fourth, _Châtun_; the +fifth, _Hârka_. They retain these names till others are given them on +account of some action, peculiarity, etc. The females often retain their +child-names through life. + +[8] _Wah-pah-sâh_ was the hereditary name of a long and illustrious line +of Dakota chiefs. Wabashaw is a corrupt pronunciation. The name is a +contraction of _Wâ-pa-hâ-sa_, which is from _Wâ-ha-pa_, the standard or +pole used in the Dakota dances and upon which feathers of various colors +are tied, and not from _Wâ-pa_--leaf, as has been generally supposed. +Therefore _Wâpasa_ means the Standard--and not the "Leaf-Shaker," as +many writers have it. The principal village of these hereditary chiefs +was _Ke-úk-sa_, or _Ke-ó-sa_,--where now stands the fair city of Winona. +_Ke-úk-sa_ signifies--The village of law-breakers; so called because +this band broke the law or custom of the Dakotas against marrying blood +relatives of any degree. I get this information from Rev. Stephen R. +Riggs, author of the Dakota Grammar and Dictionary, "_Takoo Wakan_," +etc. _Wapasa_, grandfather of the last chief of that name, and a +contemporary of _Cetan-Wa-kâ-wa-mâni_, was a noted chief, and a friend +of the British in the war of the Revolution. _Neill's Hist. Minn._, pp. +225-9. + +[9] _E-hó, E-tó_--Exclamations of surprise and delight. + +[10] _Mah-gâh_--The wild-goose. + +[11] _Teé-peé_--A lodge or wigwam, often contracted to "_tee_." + +[12] Pronounced _Mahr-peé-yah-doó-tah_--literally, Cloud Red. + +[13] Pronounced _Wahnmdeé_--The War Eagle. Each feather worn by a warrior +represents an enemy slain or captured--man, woman or child; but the +Dakotas, before they became desperate under the cruel warfare of their +enemies, usually spared the lives of their captives, and never killed +women or infants, except in rare instances under the _lex talionis_. +_Neill's Hist. Minn._, p. 112. + +[14] _Mah-tó_--The polar bear--_ursus maritimus_. The Dakotas say that in +olden times white bears were often found about Rainy Lake and the Lake +of the Woods in winter, and sometimes as far south as the mouth of the +Minnesota. They say one was once killed at White Bear Lake (but a few +miles from St. Paul and Minneapolis), and they therefore named the lake +Medé Mató--White Bear Lake, literally--Lake White Bear. + +[15] The _Hó-hé_ (Ho-hay) are the Assiniboins or "Stone-roasters." Their +home is the region of the Assiniboin River in Manitoba. They speak the +Dakota tongue, and originally were a band of that nation. Tradition says +a Dakota "Helen" was the cause of the separation and a bloody feud that +lasted for many years. The _Hóhés_ are called "Stone-roasters," because, +until recently at least, they used _wa-ta-pe_ kettles and vessels made +of birch bark in which they cooked their food. They boiled water in +these vessels by heating stones and putting them in the water. The +_wa-ta-pe_ kettle is made of the fibrous roots of the white cedar +interlaced and tightly woven. When the vessel is soaked it becomes +water-tight. [_Snelling's_] _Tales of the North-west_, p 21, +_Mackenzie's Travels._ + +[16] _Hey-ó-ka_ is one of the principal Dakota deities. He is a giant, but +can change himself into a buffalo, a bear, a fish or a bird. He is +called the Anti-natural God or Spirit. In summer he shivers with cold, +in winter he suffers from heat; he cries when he laughs and he laughs +when he cries, etc. He is the reverse of nature in all things. _Heyóka_ +is universally feared and reverenced by the Dakotas, but so severe is +the ordeal that the _Heyóka Wacipee_ (the dance to _Heyóka_) is now +rarely celebrated. It is said that the "Medicine-men" use a secret +preparation which enables them to handle fire and dip their hands in +boiling water without injury and thereby gain great _eclat_ from the +uninitiated. The chiefs and the leading warriors usually belong to the +secret order of "Medicine-men" or "Sons of _Unktéhee_"--the Spirit of +the Waters. + +[17] The Dakota name for the moon is _Han-yé-tu-wee_--literally, +Night-Sun. He is the twin brother of _An-pé-tu-wee_--the Day Sun. See +note 70. + +[18] The Dakotas believe that the stars are the spirits of their departed +friends. + +[19] _Tee_--Contracted from _teepee_, lodge or wigwam, and means the same. + +[20] For all their sacred feasts the Dakotas kindle a new fire called "The +Virgin Fire." This is done with flint and steel, or by rubbing together +pieces of wood till friction produces fire. It must be done by a virgin, +nor must any woman, except a virgin, ever touch the "sacred armor" of a +Dakota warrior. White cedar is "_Wakân_"--sacred. See note 50. _Riggs' +Tahkoo Wakân_, p. 84. + +[21] All Northern Indians consider the East a mysterious and sacred land +whence comes the sun. The Dakota name for the East is +_Wee-yo-heé-yan-pa_--the sunrise. The Ojibways call it _Waub-ó-nong_ +--the white land or land of light, and they have many myths, legends and +traditions relating thereto. Barbarous peoples of all times have +regarded the East with superstitious reverence simply because the sun +rises in that quarter. + +[22] See _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, pp. 225-8, describing the feast to +_Heyóka_. + +[23] This stone from which the Dakotas have made their pipes for ages, is +esteemed _wakân_--sacred. They call it _I-yân-ska_, probably from _iya_, +to speak, and _ska_, white, truthful, peaceful,--hence, peace-pipe, +herald of peace, pledge of truth, etc. In the cabinet at Albany, N.Y., +there is a very ancient pipe of this material which the Iroquois +obtained from the Dakotas. Charlevoix speaks of this pipe-stone in his +_History of New France_. LeSueur refers to the Yanktons as the village +of the Dakotas at the Red-Stone Quarry. See _Neill's Hist. Minn._, p. +514. + +[24] "_Ho_" is an exclamation of approval--yea, yes, bravo. + +[25] Buying is the honorable way of taking a wife among the Dakotas. The +proposed husband usually gives a horse or its value in other articles to +the father or natural guardian of the woman selected--sometimes against +her will. See note 75. + +[26] The Dakotas believe that the _Aurora Borealis_ is an evil omen and +the threatening of an evil spirit (perhaps _Waziya_, the +Winter-god--some say a witch, or a very ugly old woman). When the lights +appear danger threatens, and the warriors shoot at, and often slay, the +evil spirit, but it rises from the dead again. + +[27] _Se-só-kah_--The Robin. + +[28] The spirit of _Anpétu-sâpa_ that haunts the Falls of St. Anthony with +her dead babe in her arms. See the Legend in _Neill's Hist. Minn._, or +my _Legend of the Falls._ + +[29] _Mee-coónk-shee_--My daughter. + +[30] The Dakotas call the meteor, "_Wakân-dénda_" (sacred fire) and +_Wakân-wóhlpa_ (sacred gift). Meteors are messages from the Land of +Spirits warning of impending danger. It is a curious fact that the +"sacred stone" of the Mohammedans, in the Kaaba at Mecca, is a meteoric +stone, and obtains its sacred character from the fact that it fell from +heaven. + +[31] _Kah-nó-te-dahn_,--the little, mysterious dweller in the woods. This +spirit lives in the forest, in hollow trees. _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, +Pre. Rem. xxxi. "The Dakota god of the woods--an unknown animal said to +resemble a man, which the Dakotas worship: perhaps, the +monkey."--_Riggs' Dakota Dic. Tit--Canotidan_. + +[32] The Dakotas believe that thunder is produced by the flapping of the +wings of an immense bird which they call _Wakinyan_--the Thunder-bird. +Near the source of the Minnesota River is a place called +"Thunder-Tracks" where the foot-prints of a "Thunder-bird" are seen on +the rocks twenty-five miles apart. _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, p. 71. +There are many Thunder-birds. The father of all the +Thunder-birds--"_Wakinyan Tanka_"--or "Big Thunder," has his _teepee_ on +a lofty mountain in the far West. His _teepee_ has four openings, at +each of which is a sentinel; at the east, a butterfly; at the west, a +bear; at the south, a red deer; at the north, a caribou. He has a bitter +enmity against _Unktéhee_ (god of waters) and often shoots his fiery +arrows at him, and hits the earth, trees, rocks, and sometimes men. +_Wakinyan_ created wild-rice, the bow and arrow, the tomahawk and the +spear. He is a great war-spirit, and _Wanmdée_ (the war-eagle) is his +messenger. A Thunder-bird (say the Dakotas) was once killed near Kapóza +by the son of Cetan-Wakawa-mâni and he thereupon took the name of +"_Wakinyan Tanka_"--"Big Thunder." + +[33] Pronounced _Tah-tâhn-kah_--Bison or Buffalo. + +[34] _Enâh_--An exclamation of wonder. _Ehó_--Behold! see there! + +[35] The Crees are the Knisteneaux of Alexander Mackenzie. See his account +of them, _Mackenzie's Travels_, (London, 1801) p. xci to cvii. + +[36] Lake Superior. The only names the Dakotas have for Lake Superior are +_Medé Tânka_ or _Tânka Medé_--Great Lake, and _Me-ne-yâ-ta_--literally, +_At-the-Water_. + +[37] April--Literally, the moon when the geese lay eggs. See note 71. + +[38] Carver's Cave at St. Paul was called by the Dakotas _Wakân_ +_Teepee_--sacred lodge. In the days that are no more they lighted their +council-fires in this cave and buried their dead near it. See _Neill's +Hist. Minn_., p. 207. Capt. Carver in his _Travels_, London, 1778, p. +63, et. seq., describes this cave as follows: "It is a remarkable cave +of an amazing depth. The Indians term it Wakonteebe, that is, the +Dwelling of the Great Spirit. The entrance into it is about ten feet +wide, the height of it five feet, the arch within is near fifteen feet +high and about thirty feet broad. The bottom of it consists of fine +clear sand. About twenty feet from the entrance begins a lake, the water +of which is transparent, and extends to an unsearchable distance; for +the darkness of the cave prevents all attempts to acquire a knowledge of +it. I threw a small pebble toward the interior parts of it with my +utmost strength. I could hear that it fell into the water, and +notwithstanding it was of so small a size it caused an astonishing and +horrible noise that reverberated through all those gloomy regions. I +found in this cave many Indian hieroglyphics which appeared very +ancient, for time had nearly covered them with moss so that it was with +difficulty I could trace them. They were cut in a rude manner upon the +inside of the walls, which were composed of a stone so extremely soft +that it might be easily penetrated with a knife: a stone everywhere to +be found near the Mississippi. This cave is only accessible by ascending +a narrow, steep passage that lies near the brink of the river. At a +little distance from this dreary cavern is the burying-place of several +bands of the Naudowessie (Dakota) Indians," Many years ago the roof fell +in but the cave has been partly restored and is now used as a beer +cellar. + +[39] _Wah-kâhn-dee_--The lightning. + +[40] The Bloody River--the Red River was so called on account of the +numerous Indian battles that have been fought on its banks. The Ojibways +say that its waters were colored red by the blood of many warriors slain +on its banks in the fierce wars between themselves and the Dakotas. + +[41] _Tah_--The Moose. This is the root-word for all ruminating animals: +_Ta-tânka_, buffalo--Ta-tóka, mountain antelope--Ta-hinca, the red +deer--Ta-mdóka, the buck-deer--Ta-hinca-ská, white deer (sheep). + +[42] _Hogâhn_--Fish. Red Hogan, the trout. + +[43] _Tipsânna_ (often called _tipsinna_) is a wild prairie-turnip used +for food by the Dakotas. It grows on high, dry land, and increases from +year to year. It is eaten both cooked and raw. + +[44] _Rio Tajo_ (or Tagus), a river of Spain and Portugal. + +[45] + * * * * "Bees of Trebizond-- + Which from the sunniest flowers that glad + With their pure smile the gardens round, + Draw venom forth that drives men mad." + +_--Thomas Moore_. + +[46] _Skeé-skah_--The Wood-duck. + +[47] The Crocus. I have seen the prairies in Minnesota spangled with these +beautiful flowers in various colors before the ground was free from +frost. The Dakotas call them "frost-flowers." + +[48] The "Sacred Ring" around the Feast of the Virgins is formed by armed +warriors sitting, and none but a virgin must enter this ring. The +warrior who knows is bound on honor, and by old and sacred custom, to +expose and publicly denounce any tarnished maiden who dares to enter +this ring, and his word cannot be questioned--even by the chief. See +_Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, p. 64. + +[49] Prairie's Pride.--This annual shrub, which abounds on many of the +sandy prairies in Minnesota, is sometimes called "tea-plant," +"sage-plant," and "red-root willow." I doubt if it has any botanic name. +Its long plumes of purple and gold are truly the "pride of the +prairies." + +[50] The Dakotas consider white cedar "_Wakân_," (sacred). They use +sprigs of it at their feasts, and often burn it to destroy the power of +evil spirits. _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, p. 210. + +[51] _Tâhkoo-skahng-skahng_. This deity is supposed to be invisible, yet +everywhere present; he is an avenger and a searcher of hearts. (_Neill's +Hist. Minn_., p. 57). I suspect he was the chief spirit of the Dakotas +before the missionaries imported "_Wakân-Tánka_" (Great Spirit). + +[52] The Dakotas believe in "were-wolves" as firmly as did our Saxon +ancestors, and for similar reasons--the howl of the wolf being often +imitated as a decoy or signal by their enemies the Ojibways. + +[53] _Shee-shó-kah_--The Robin. + +[54] The Dakotas call the Evening Star the "_Virgin Star_," and believe it +to be the spirit of the virgin wronged at the feast. + +[55] Mille Lacs. This lake was discovered by Du Luth, and by him named Lac +Buade in honor of Governor Frontenac of Canada, whose family name was +Buade. The Dakota name for it is _Mdé Wakân_--Spirit Lake. + +[56] The Ojibways imitate the hoot of the owl and the howl of the wolf to +perfection, and often use these cries as signals to each other in war +and the chase. + +[57] The Dakotas called the Ojibways the "Snakes of the Forest" on account +of their lying in ambush for their enemies. + +[58] Strawberries. + +[59] _Seé-yo_--The prairie-hen. + +[60] _Mahgâh_--The wild-goose. _Fox-pups_. I could never see the propriety +of calling the young of foxes _kits_ or _kittens_, which mean _little +cats_. The fox belongs to the _canis_ or dog family, and not the _felis_ +or cat family. If it is proper to call the young of dogs and wolves +_pups_, it is equally proper to so call the young of foxes. + +[61] When a Dakota is sick he thinks the spirit of an enemy or some animal +has entered into his body, and the principal business of the +"medicine-man"--_Wicásta Wakân_--is to cast out the "unclean spirit," +with incantations and charms. See _Neill's Hist. Minn_., pp. 66-8. The +Jews entertained a similar belief in the days of Jesus of Nazareth. + +[62] _Wah-zeé-yah's_ star--The North-star. See note 3. + +[63] The Dakotas, like our forefathers and all other barbarians, believe +in witches and witchcraft. + +[64] The _Medó_ is a wild potato; it resembles the sweet-potato in top and +taste. It grows in bottom-lands, and is much prized by the Dakotas for +food. The "_Dakota Friend_," for December, 1850. (Minn. Hist. Col.) + +[65] The meteor--_Wakân-denda_--Sacred fire. + +[66] _Me-tá-win_--My bride. + +[68] The _Via Lactea_ or Milky Way. The Dakotas call it _Wanágee +Tach-ánku_--The pathway of the spirits; and believe that over this path +the spirits of the dead pass to the Spirit-land. See _Riggs' Tah-koo +Wah-kan_, p. 101. + +[69] _Oonk-táy-he_. There are many _Unktéhees_, children of the _Great +Unktéhee_, who created the earth and man, and who formerly dwelt in a +vast cavern under the Falls of St. Anthony. The _Unktéhee_ sometimes +reveals himself in the form of a huge buffalo-bull. From him proceed +invisible influences. The _Great Unktéhee_ created the earth. +"Assembling in grand conclave all the aquatic tribes he ordered them to +bring up dirt from beneath the waters, and proclaimed death to the +disobedient. The beaver and otter forfeited their lives. At last the +muskrat went beneath the waters, and, after a long time, appeared at the +surface, nearly exhausted, with some dirt. From this _Unktéhee_ +fashioned the earth into a large circular plain. The earth being +finished he took a deity, one of his own offspring, and, grinding him to +powder, sprinkled it upon the earth, and this produced many worms. The +worms were then collected and scattered again. They matured into infants +and these were then collected and scattered and became full-grown +Dakotas. The bones of the mastodon, the Dakotas think, are the bones of +_Unktéhees_, and they preserve them with the greatest care in the +medicine-bag." _Neill's Hist. Minn_., p. 55. The _Unktéhees_ and the +Thunder-birds are perpetually at war. There are various accounts of the +creation of man. Some say that at the bidding of the _Great Unktéhee_, +men sprang full grown from the caverns of the earth. See _Riggs' "Tahkoo +Wahkan"_, and _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_. The _Great Unktéhee_ and the +Great Thunder-bird had a terrible battle in the bowels of the earth to +determine which should be the ruler of the world. See description in +_Winona_. + +[70] Pronounced _Ahng-páy-too-wee_--The Sun; literally the Day-Sun, thus +distinguishing him from _Han-yé-tuwee_ (Hahng-yay-too-wee) the Night Sun +(the moon). They are twin brothers, but _Anpétuwee_ is the more +powerful. _Han-yé-tuwee_ receives his power from his brother and obeys +him. He watches over the earth while the sun sleeps. The Dakotas believe +the sun is the father of life. Unlike the most of their other gods, he +is beneficent and kind; yet they worshiped him (in the sun-dance) in the +most dreadful manner. See _Riggs' Tahkoo Wakan_, pp. 81-2, and Catlin's +_Okeepa_. The moon is worshiped as the representative of the sun; and in +the great Sun-dance, which is usually held in the full of the moon, when +the moon rises the dancers turn their eyes on her (or him). _Anpétuwee_ +issues every morning from the lodge of _Han-nán-na_ (the Morning) and +begins his journey over the sky to his lodge in the land of shadows. +Sometimes he walks over on the Bridge (or path) of the Spirits--_Wanâge +Ta-chán-ku_,--and sometimes he sails over the sea of the skies in his +shining canoe; but _somehow_, and the Dakotas do not explain how, he +gets back again to the lodge of _Hannánna_ in time to take a nap and eat +his breakfast before starting anew on his journey. The Dakotas swear by +the sun, "_As Anpétuwee hears me, this is true!_" They call him Father +and pray to him--"_Wakán! Até, on-she-má-da_"--"Sacred Spirit,--Father, +have mercy on me." As the Sun is the father, so they believe the Earth +is the mother, of life. Truly there is much philosophy in the Dakota +mythology. The Algonkins call the earth "_Me-suk-kum-mik-o-kwa_"--the +great-grandmother of all. _Narrative of John Tanner_, p. 193. + +[71] The Dakotas reckon their months by _moons_. They name their moons +from natural circumstances. They correspond very nearly with our months, +as follows: + +January--_Wee-té-rhee_--The Hard Moon; i.e.--the cold moon. + +February--_Wee-câ-ta-wee_--The Coon Moon--(the moon when the coons come +out of their hollow trees). + +March--_Istâ-wee-ca-ya-zang-wee_--the sore-eyes moon (from snow +blindness). + +April--Magâ-oka-da-wee--the moon when the geese lay eggs; also called +Wokâ da-wee--egg-moon; and sometimes Wató-papee-wee, the canoe-moon, or +moon when the streams become free from ice. + +May--Wó-zu-pee-wee--the planting moon. + +June--Wazú-ste-ca-sa-wee--the strawberry moon. + +July--Wa-sún-pa-wee--the moon when the geese shed their feathers, also +called Chang-pâ-sapa-wee--Choke-Cherry moon, and +sometimes--Mna-rchâ-rcha-wee--"The moon of the red-blooming lilies," +literally, the red-lily moon. + +August--Wasú-ton-wee--the ripe moon, i.e., Harvest Moon. + +September--Psin-na-ké-tu-wee--the ripe rice moon. (When the wild rice is +ripe.) + +October--Wâ-zu-pee-wee or Wee-wa-zu-pee--the moon when wild rice is +gathered and laid up for winter. + +November--Ta-kee-yu-hrâ-wee--the deer-rutting moon. + +December--Ta-hé-cha-psung-wee--the moon when deer shed their horns. + +[72] Oonk-to-mee--is a bad spirit in the form of a monstrous black spider. +He inhabits fens and marshes and lies in wait for his prey. At night he +often lights a torch (evidently the ignis fatuus or Jack-o' lantern) and +swings it on the marshes to decoy the unwary into his toils. + +[73] The Dakotas have their stone-idol, or god, called Toon-kan--or Inyan. +This god dwells in stone or rocks and is, they say, the oldest god of +all--he is grandfather of all living things. I think, however, that the +stone is merely the symbol of the everlasting, all-pervading, invisible +Ta-ku Wa-kan--the essence of all life,--pervading all nature, animate +and inanimate. The Rev. S.R. Riggs, who for forty years has been a +student of Dakota customs, superstitions, etc., says, Tâhkoo Wahkan, p. +55, et seq.: "The religious faith of the Dakota is not in his gods as +such. It is in an intangible, mysterious something of which they are +only the embodiment, and that in such measure and degree as may accord +with the individual fancy of the worshiper. Each one will worship some +of these divinities, and neglect or despise others, but the great object +of all their worship, whatever its chosen medium, is the _Ta-koo +Wa-kan_, which is the supernatural and mysterious. No one term can +express the full meaning of the Dakota's _Wakan_. It comprehends all +mystery, secret power and divinity. Awe and reverence are its due, and +it is as unlimited in manifestation as it is in idea. All life is +_Wakan_; so also is everything which exhibits power, whether in action, +as the winds and drifting clouds; or in passive endurance, as the +boulder by the wayside. For even the commonest sticks and stones have a +spiritual essence which must be reverenced as a manifestation of the +all-pervading, mysterious power that fills the universe." + +[74] _Wazi-kuté_--Wah-ze-koo-tay; literally--Pine-shooter,--he that shoots +among the pines. When Father Hennepin was at Mille Lacs in 1679-80, +_Wazi-kuté_ was the head chief (_Itâncan_) of the band of Isantees. +Hennepin writes the name Ouasicoude, and translates it--the "Pierced +Pine." See Shea's _Hennepin_, p. 234, _Minn. Hist. Coll_. vol. i, p. +316. + +[75] When a Dakota brave wishes to "propose" to a "dusky maid," he visits +her _teepee_ at night after she has retired, or rather, laid down in her +robe to sleep. He lights a splinter of wood and holds it to her face. If +she blows out the light, he is accepted; if she covers her head and +leaves it burning he is rejected. The rejection however is not +considered final till it has been thrice repeated. Even then the maiden +is often bought of her parents or guardian, and forced to become the +wife of the rejected suitor. If she accepts the proposal, still the +suitor must buy her of her parents with suitable gifts. + +[76] The Dakotas called the falls of St. Anthony the _Ha-Ha_--the _loud +laughing_, or _roaring_. The Mississippi River they called _Ha-Ha +Wâ-kpa_ River of the Falls. The Ojibway name for the Falls of St. +Anthony is _Ka-kâ-bik-kúng_. Minnehaha is a combination of two Dakota +words--_Mini_--water and _Ha-Ha_, Falls; but it is not the name by which +the Dakotas designated that cataract. Some authorities say they called +it _I-hâ-ha_--pronounced E-rhah-rhah--lightly laughing. Rev. S.W. Pond, +whose long residence as a missionary among the Dakotas in this immediate +vicinity makes him an authority that can hardly be questioned, says they +called the Falls of Minnehaha "_Mini-i-hrpa-ya-dan_," and it had no +other name in Dakota. "It means Little Falls and nothing else." Letter +to the author. + +[77] The game of the Plum-stones is one of the favorite games of the +Dakotas. Hennepin was the first to describe this game, in his +_Description de la Louisiane_, Paris, 1683, and he describes it very +accurately. See Shea's translation p. 301. The Dakotas call this game +_Kan-soo Koo-tay-pe_--shooting plum-stones. Each stone is painted black +on one side and red on the other; on one side they grave certain figures +which make the stones _Wakan_. They are placed in a dish and thrown up +like dice. Indeed, the game is virtually a game of dice. Hennepin says: +"There are some so given to this game that they will gamble away even +their great coat. Those who conduct the game cry at the top of their +voices when they rattle the platter, and they strike their shoulders so +hard as to leave them all black with the blows." + +[78] _Wa-tanka_--contraction of _Wa-kan Tanka_--Great Spirit. The Dakotas +had no _Wakan Tanka_ or _Wakan-peta_--fire spirit--till white men +imported them. There being no name for the Supreme Being in the Dakota +tongue (except _Tâku Skán-skán_.--See note 51)--and all their gods and +spirits being _Wakan_--the missionaries named God in Dakota--"_Wakan +Tanka_"--which means _Big Spirit_, or _The Big Mysterious_. + +[79] The Dakotas called Lake Calhoun, at Minneapolis, +Minn.--_Mdé-mdó-za_--Loon Lake. They also called it _Re-ya-ta-mde_--the +lake back from the river. They called Lake Harriet--_Mdé-únma_--the +other lake--or (perhaps) _Mdé-uma_--Hazel-nut Lake. The lake nearest +Calhoun on the north--Lake of the Isles--they called _Wi-ta +Mdé_--Island-Lake. Lake Minnetonka they called _Me-ne-a-tân-ka_--_Broad +Water_. + +[80] The animal called by the French _voyageurs_ the _cabri_ (the kid) is +found only on the prairies. It is of the goat kind, smaller than a deer +and so swift that neither horse nor dog can overtake it. (Snelling's +"_Tales of the Northwest_," p. 286, note 15.) It is the gazelle, or +prairie antelope, called by the Dakotas _Ta-tóka-dan_--little antelope. +It is the _Pish-tah-te-koosh_ of the Algonkin tribes, "reckoned the +fleetest animal in the prairie country about the Assiniboin." _Captivity +and Adventures of John Tanner_, p. 301. + +[81] The _Wicâstâpi Wakânpi_ (literally, _men supernatural_) are the +"Medicine-men" or Magicians of the Dakotas. They call themselves the +sons or disciples of _Unktéhee_. In their rites, ceremonies, tricks and +pretensions they closely resemble the _Dactyli, Idæ_, and _Curetes_ of +the ancient Greeks and Romans, the _Magi_ of the Persians and the Druids +of Britain. Their pretended intercourse with spirits, their powers of +magic and divination, and their rites are substantially the same, and +point unmistakably to a common origin. The Dakota "Medicine-Man" can do +the "rope trick" of the Hindoo magician to perfection. The _teepee_ used +for the _Wakan Wacipee_--or Sacred Dance--is called the _Wakan +Teepee_--the Sacred Teepee. Carvers Cave at St. Paul was also called +_Wakan Teepee_ because the Medicine-men or magicians often held their +dances and feasts in it. For a full account of the rites, etc., see +Riggs' _Tahkoo Wahkan_, Chapter VI. The _Ta-sha-ke_--literally, +"Deer-hoofs"--is a rattle made by hanging the hard segments of +deer-hoofs to a wooden rod a foot long--about an inch in diameter at the +handle end, and tapering to a point at the other. The clashing of these +horny bits makes a sharp, shrill sound something like distant +sleigh-bells. In their incantations over the sick they sometimes use the +gourd shell rattle. + +The _Chân-che-ga_--is a drum or "Wooden Kettle." The hoop of the drum is +from a foot to eighteen inches in diameter, and from three to ten inches +deep. The skin covering is stretched over one end, making a drum with +one end only. The magical drum-sticks are ornamented with down, and +heads of birds or animals are carved on them. This makes them _Wakan_. + +The flute called _Cho-tanka_ (big pith) is of two varieties--one made of +sumac, the pith of which is punched out. The second variety is made of +the long bone of the wing or thigh of the swan or crane. They call the +first the _bubbling chotanka_ from the tremulous note it gives when +blown with all the holes stopped. Riggs' _Tâhkoo Wahkan_, p. 476, et +seq. + +_E-né-pee_--vapor-bath, is used as a purification preparatory to the +sacred feasts. The vapor-bath is taken in this way: "A number of poles, +the size of hoop-poles or less, are taken, and their larger ends being +set in the ground in a circle, the flexible tops are bent over and tied +in the center. This frame-work is then covered with robes and blankets, +a small hole being left on one side for an entrance. Before the door a +fire is built, and round stones about the size of a man's head, are +heated in it. When hot they are rolled within, and the door being closed +steam is made by pouring water on them. The devotee, stripped to the +skin, sits within this steam-tight dome, sweating profusely at every +pore, until he is nearly suffocated. Sometimes a number engage in it +together and unite their prayers and songs." _Tâhkoo Wakan_, p. 83. +Father Hennepin was subjected to the vapor-bath at Mille Lacs by Chief +_Aqui-pa-que-tin_, two hundred years ago. After describing the method, +Hennepin says: "When he had made me sweat thus three times in a week, I +felt as strong as ever." Shea's Hennepin, p. 228. For a very full and +accurate account of the Medicine-men of the Dakotas, and their rites, +etc., see Chap. II, Neill's Hist. Minnesota. + +[82] The sacred _O-zu-ha_--or Medicine sack must be made of the skin of +the otter, the coon, the weasel, the squirrel, the loon, a certain kind +of fish or the skins of serpents. It must contain four kinds of medicine +(or magic) representing birds, beasts, herbs and trees, viz.: The down +of the female swan colored red, the roots of certain grasses, bark from +the roots of cedar trees, and hair of the buffalo. "From this +combination proceeds a Wakân influence so powerful that no human being, +unassisted, can resist it." Wonderful indeed must be the magic power of +these Dakota Druids to lead such a man as the Rev. S.R. Riggs to say of +them: "By great shrewdness, untiring industry, and more or less of +_actual demoniacal possession_, they convince great numbers of their +fellows, and in the process are convinced themselves of their sacred +character and office." _Tâhkoo Wakân_, pp. 88-9. + +[83] _Gâh-ma-na-tek-wahk--the river of many falls_--is the Ojibway name of +the river commonly called Kaministiguia, near the mouth of which is +situated Fort William. The view on Thunder-Bay is one of the grandest in +America. Thunder-Cap, with its sleeping stone-giant, looms up into the +heavens. Here _Ka-be-bon-ikka_--the Ojibway's god of storms--flaps his +huge wings and makes the Thunder. From this mountain he sends forth the +rain, the snow, the hail, the lightning and the tempest. A vast giant, +turned to stone by his magic, lies asleep at his feet. The island called +by the Ojibways the _Mak-i-nak_ (the turtle) from its tortoise-like +shape, lifts its huge form in the distance. Some "down-east Yankee" +called it "Pie-island," from its fancied resemblance to a pumpkin pie, +and the name, like all bad names, _sticks_. McKay's Mountain on the +mainland, a perpendicular rock more than a thousand feet high, upheaved +by the throes of some vast volcano, and numerous other bold and +precipitous headlands, and rock-built islands, around which roll the +sapphire-blue waters of the fathomless bay, present some of the most +magnificent views to be found on either continent. + +[84] The Mission of the Holy Ghost--at La Pointe, on the isle +_Wauga-bâ-me_--(winding view) in the beautiful bay of Cha-quam-egon +--was founded by the Jesuits about the year 1660. Father René Menard was +probably the first priest at this point. After he was lost in the +wilderness, Father Glaude Allouëz permanently established the mission in +1665. The famous Father Marquette, who took Allouëz's place, Sept. 13, +1669, writing to his superior, thus describes the Dakotas: "The +Nadouessi are the Iroquois of this country, beyond La Pointe, _but less +faithless, and never attack till attacked._ Their language is entirely +different from the Huron and Algonquin. They have many villages but are +widely scattered. They have very extraordinary customs. They principally +use the calumet. They do not speak at great feasts, and when a stranger +arrives give him to eat of a wooden fork, as we would a child. All the +lake tribes make war on them, but with small success. They have false +oats (wild rice,) use little canoes, _and keep their word strictly_." +_Neill's Hist. Minn._, p. III. + +[85] _Michâbo_ or _Manni-bozo_--the Good Spirit of the Algonkins. In +autumn, in the moon of the falling leaf, ere he composes himself to his +winter's sleep, he fills his great pipe and takes a god-like smoke. The +balmy clouds from his pipe float over the hills and woodland, filling +the air with the haze of "Indian Summer." _Brinton's Myths of the New +World_, p. 163. + +[86] Pronounced _Kah-tháh-gah_--literally, _the place of waves and foam_. +This was the principal village of the _Isantee_ band of Dakotas two +hundred years ago, and was located at the Falls of St. Anthony, which +the Dakotas called the _Ha-ha_,--pronounced _Rhah-rhah_,--the +_loud-laughing waters_. The Dakotas believed that the Falls were in the +center of the earth. Here dwelt the _Great Unktéhee_, the creator of the +earth and man: and from this place a path led to the Spirit-land. DuLuth +undoubtedly visited Kathâga in the year 1679. In his "Memoir" (Archives +of the Ministry of the Marine) addressed to Seignelay, 1685, he says: +"On the 2nd of July, 1679, I had the honor to plant his Majesty's arms +in the great village of the Nadouecioux called Izatys, where never had a +Frenchman been, etc." _Izatys_ is here used not as the name of the +village, but as the name of the band--the _Isantees_. _Nadouecioux_ was +a name given the Dakotas generally by the early French traders and the +Ojibways. See _Shea's Hennepin's Description of Louisiana_, pp. 203 and +375. The villages of the Dakotas were not permanent towns. They were +hardly more than camping grounds, occupied at intervals and for longer +or shorter periods, as suited the convenience of the hunters; yet there +were certain places, like Mille Lacs, the Falls of St. Anthony, _Kapoza_ +(near St. Paul), _Remnica_ (where the city of Red Wing now stands), and +_Keuxa_ (or _Keoza_) on the site of the city of Winona, so frequently +occupied by several of the bands as to be considered their chief +villages respectively. + +Mr. Neill, usually very accurate and painstaking, has fallen into an +error in his prefatory notes to the last edition of his valuable +_History of Minnesota_. Speaking of DuLuth, he says: + +"He appears to have entered Minnesota by way of the Pigeon or St. Louis +River, and to have explored where no Frenchman had been, and on July 2, +1679, was at _Kathio_ (_Kathâga_) perhaps on Red Lake or Lake of the +Woods, which was called 'the great village of the Wadouessioux,' one +hundred and twenty leagues from the _Songaskicons_ and _Houetepons_ who +were dwellers _in the Mille Lac region_." + +Now _Kathâga_ (Mr. Neill's _Kathio_) was located at the Falls of St. +Anthony on the Mississippi as the whole current of Dakota traditions +clearly shows and DuLuth's dispatches clearly indicate. Besides, the +_Songaskicons_ and _Houetepons_ were _not_ and never were "dwellers in +the Mille Lac region." The Songaskicons (Sissetons) were at that time +located on the Des Moines river (in Iowa), and the Houetabons +(Ouadebatons) at and around Big Stone Lake. The Isantees occupied the +region lying between the mouth of the Minnesota River and Spirit Lake +(Mille Lacs) with their principal village--_Kathága_--where the city of +Minneapolis now stands. These facts account for the "one hundred and +twenty leagues" as distances were roughly reckoned by the early French +explorers. + +September 1, 1678, Daniel Greysolon DuLuth, a native of Lyons, France, +left Quebec to explore the country of the Dakotas. "The next year (1679) +on the 2nd day of July, he caused the king's arms to be planted in the +great village of the Nadouessioux (Dakotas) called Kathio" (_Kathága_) +"where no Frenchman had ever been, also at the Songaskicons and +Houetabons, one hundred and twenty leagues distant from the former. * * +* * On this tour he visited Mille Lacs, which he called Lake Buade, the +family name of Frontenac, governor of Canada." _Neill''s History of +Minnesota_, p. 122. This is correct, except the name of the +village--_Kathio_, which is a misprint or perhaps an error of a copyist. +It should be _Kathága_. DuLuth was again at the Falls of St. Anthony in +1680 and returned to Lake Superior via the Mississippi, Rum River and +Mille Lacs, according to his own dispatches. + +Franquelin's "_Carte de la Louisiane_" printed at Paris A.D. 1684, from +information derived from DuLuth, who visited France in 1682-3, and +conferred with the minister of the Colonies and the minister of +Marine--shows the inaccuracy, as to points of compass at least, of the +early French explorers. According to this map, Lake Buade (Mille Lacs) +lies north-west of Lake Superior and Lake Pepin lies due west of it. + +DuLuth was afterward appointed to the command of Fort Frontenac near +Niagara Falls, and died there in 1710. The official dispatch from the +Governor of Canada to the French Government is, as regards the great +explorer, brief and expressive--"Captain DuLuth is dead. He was an +honest man." + +To Daniel Greysolon DuLuth, and not to Father Hennepin, whom he rescued +from his captors at Mille Lacs, belongs the credit of the first +exploration of Minnesota by white men. + +Father Hennepin was a self-conceited and self-convicted liar. Daniel +Greysolon DuLuth "was an honest man." + + + + +NOTES TO THE SEA-GULL + + +[1] _Kay-óshk_ is the Ojibway name for the sea-gull. + +[2] _Gitchee_--great,--_Gumee_--sea or lake,--Lake Superior; also often +called _Ochipwè Gitchee Gúmee_, Great lake (or sea) of the Ojibways. + +[3] _Né-mè-Shómis_--my grandfather. "In the days of my grandfather" is +the Ojibway's preface to all his traditions and legends. + +[4] _Waub_--white--_O-jeeg_--fisher, (a furred animal). White Fisher was +the name of a noted Ojibway chief who lived on the south shore of Lake +Superior many years ago. Schoolcraft married one of his descendants. + +[5] _Ma-kwa_ or _mush-kwa_--the bear. + +[6] The _Te-ke-nâh-gun_ is a board upon one side of which a sort of basket +is fastened or woven with thongs of skin or strips of cloth. In this the +babe is placed and the mother carries it on her back. In the wigwam the +_tekenagun_ is often suspended by a cord to the lodge-poles and the +mother swings her babe in it. + +[7] _Wabóse_ (or _Wabos_)-the rabbit. _Penáy_, the pheasant. At certain +seasons the pheasant drums with his wings. + +[8] _Kaug_, the porcupine. _Kenéw_, the war-eagle. + +[9] _Ka-be-bon-ik-ka_ is the god of storms, thunder, lightning, etc. His +home is on Thunder-Cap at Thunder-Bay, Lake Superior. By his magic the +giant that lies on the mountain was turned to stone. He always sends +warnings before he finally sends the severe cold of winter, in order to +give all creatures time to prepare for it. + +[10] _Kewáydin_ or _Kewáytin_, is the North wind or North-west wind. + +[11] _Algónkin_ is the general name applied to all tribes that speak the +Ojibway language or dialects of it. + +[12] This is the favorite "love-broth" of the Ojibway squaws. The warrior +who drinks it immediately falls desperately in love with the woman who +gives it to him. Various tricks are devised to conceal the nature of the +"medicine" and to induce the warrior to drink it; but when it is mixed +with a liberal quantity of "fire-water" it is considered irresistible. + +[13] Translation: + + Woe-is-me! Woe-is-me! + Great Spirit, behold me! + Look, Father; have pity upon me! + Woe-is-me! Woe-is-me! + +[14] Snow-storms from the North-west. + +[15] The Ojibways, like the Dakotas, call the _Via Lactea_ (Milky Way) the +Pathway of the Spirits. + +[16] _Shinge-bis_, the diver, is the only water-fowl that remains about +Lake Superior all winter. + +[17] _Waub-èsé_--the white swan. + +[18] _Pé-boân_, Winter, is represented as an old man with long white hair +and beard. + +[19] _Según_ is Spring (or Summer). This beautiful allegory has been "done +into verse" by Longfellow in _Hiawatha_. Longfellow evidently took his +version from Schoolcraft. I took mine originally from the lips of +_Pah-go-nay-gie-shiek_--"Hole-in-the-day"--(the elder) in his day +head-chief of the Ojibways. I afterward submitted it to _Gitche +Shabásh-Konk_, head-chief of the _Misse-sah-ga-é-gun_--(Mille Lacs band +of Ojibways), who pronounced it correct. + +"Hole-in-the-day," although sanctioned by years of unchallenged use, is +a bad translation of _Pah-go-nay-gie-shiek_, which means a _clear spot +in the sky_. + +[Illustration: HOLE-IN-THE-DAY. _From an original photograph in the +author's possession._] + +He was a very intelligent man; had been in Washington several times on +business connected with his people, and was always shrewd enough to +look out for himself in all his treaties and transactions with the +Government. He stood six feet two inches in his moccasins, was +well-proportioned, and had a remarkably fine face. He had a +nickname--_Que-we-zánc_--(Little Boy) by which he was familiarly called +by his people. + +The Pillagers--_Nah-kánd-tway-we-nin-ni-wak_--who live about Leech Lake +(_Kah-sah-gah-squah-g-me-cock_) were opposed to _Pa-go-nay-gie-shiek_, +but he compelled them through fear to recognize him as Head-Chief. At +the time of the "Sioux outbreak" in 1862 "Hole-in-the-day" for a time +apparently meditated an alliance with the _Po-áh-nuck_ (Dakotas) and war +upon the whites. The Pillagers and some other bands urged him strongly +to this course, and his supremacy as head-chief was threatened unless he +complied. Messengers from the Dakotas were undoubtedly received by him, +and he, for a time at least, led the Dakotas to believe that their +hereditary enemies, the Ojibways, would bury the hatchet and join them +in a war of extermination against the whites. "Hole-in-the-day," with a +band of his warriors, appeared opposite Fort Ripley (situated on the +west bank of the Mississippi River between Little Falls and Crow Wing), +and assumed a threatening attitude toward the fort, then garrisoned by +volunteer troops. The soldiers were drawn up on the right bank and +"Hole-in-the-day" and his warriors on the left. A little speech-making +settled the matter for the time being and very soon thereafter a new +treaty was made with "Hole-in-the-day" and his head men, by which their +friendship and allegiance were secured to the whites. It was claimed by +the Pillagers that "Hole-in-the-day" seized the occasion to profit +personally in his negotiations with the agents of the Government. + +In 1867 "Hole-in-the-day" took "another wife." He married Helen McCarty, +a white woman, in Washington, D.C., and took her to his home at Gull +Lake (_Ka-ga-ya-skúnc-cock_) literally, _plenty of little gulls_. + +She bore him a son who is known as Joseph H. Woodbury, and now (1891) +resides in the city of Minneapolis. His marriage with a white woman +increased the hatred of the Pillagers, and they shot him from ambush and +killed him near _Ninge-tá-we-de-guá-yonk_--Crow Wing--on the 27th day of +June, 1868. + +At the time of his death, "Hole-in-the-day" was only thirty-seven years +old but had been recognized as Head-Chief for a long time. He could +speak some English, and was far above the average of white men in +native shrewdness and intelligence. He was thoroughly posted in the +traditions and legends of his people. + +The Ojibways have for many years been cursed by contact with the worst +elements of the whites, and seem to have adopted the vices rather than +the virtues of civilization. I once spoke of this to "Hole-in-the-day." +His reply was terse and truthful--"_Mádgè tche-mó-ko-mon, mádgè +a-nische-nábé: menógé tche-mó-ko-mon, menó a-nischè-nábè_.--Bad white +men, bad Indians: good white men, good Indians." + +[20] _Nah_--look, see. _Nashké_--behold. + +[21] _Kee-zis_--the sun,--the father of life. _Waubúnong_--or +_Waub-ó-nong_--is the White Land or Land of Light,--the Sun-rise, the +East. + +[22] The Bridge of Stars spans the vast sea of the skies, and the sun and +moon walk over on it. + +[23] The _Miscodeed_ is a small white flower with a pink border. It is the +earliest blooming wild flower on the shores of Lake Superior, and +belongs to the crocus family. + +[24] The _Ne-be-naw-baigs_, are Water-spirits; they dwell in caverns in +the depths of the lake, and in some respects resemble the _Unktéhee_ of +the Dakotas. + +[25] _Ogema_, Chief,--_Oge-má-kwá_--female Chief. Among the Algonkin +tribes women are sometimes made chiefs. _Net-nó-kwa_, who adopted Tanner +as her son, was _Oge-mâ-kwá_ of a band of Ottawas. See _John Tanner's +Narrative_, p. 36. + +[26] The "Bridge of Souls" leads from the earth over dark and stormy +waters to the spirit-land. The "Dark River" seems to have been a part of +the superstitions of all nations. + +[27] The _Jossakeeds_ of the Ojibways are soothsayers who are able, by the +aid of spirits, to read the past as well as the future. + +FINIS + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Feast of the Virgins and Other +Poems, by H. L. Gordon + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS *** + +***** This file should be named 15205-8.txt or 15205-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/5/2/0/15205/ + +Produced by Eric Eldred, Susan Skinner and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/15205-8.zip b/15205-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..b8e2da6 --- /dev/null +++ b/15205-8.zip diff --git a/15205-h.zip b/15205-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f93a046 --- /dev/null +++ b/15205-h.zip diff --git a/15205-h/15205-h.htm b/15205-h/15205-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f97c5d8 --- /dev/null +++ b/15205-h/15205-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,13277 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?> +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Feast Of The Virgins and Other Poems, by H.L. Gordon. + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + } + HR { width: 33%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + li {list-style: none;} + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .note {margin-left: 2em; margin-right: 2em; margin-bottom: 1em;} /* footnote */ + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + .pagenum {position: absolute; left: 92%; font-size: smaller; text-align: right;} /* page numbers */ + .sidenote {width: 20%; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; padding-left: 1em; font-size: smaller; float: right; clear: right;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span {display: block; margin: 0; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em;} + .poem span.i1 {display: block; margin-left: 1em;} + .poem span.i11 {display: block; margin-left: 11em;} + .poem span.i13 {display: block; margin-left: 13em;} + .poem span.i14 {display: block; margin-left: 14em;} + .poem span.i15 {display: block; margin-left: 15em;} + .poem span.i18 {display: block; margin-left: 18em;} + .poem span.i21 {display: block; margin-left: 21em;} + .poem span.i22 {display: block; margin-left: 22em;} + .poem span.i23 {display: block; margin-left: 23em;} + .poem span.i24 {display: block; margin-left: 24em;} + .poem span.i25 {display: block; margin-left: 25em;} + .poem span.i30 {display: block; margin-left: 30em;} + .poem span.i31 {display: block; margin-left: 31em;} + .poem span.i32 {display: block; margin-left: 32em;} + .poem span.i5 {display: block; margin-left: 5em;} + .poem span.i7 {display: block; margin-left: 7em;} + .poem span.i9 {display: block; margin-left: 9em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +Project Gutenberg's The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems, by H. L. Gordon + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems + +Author: H. L. Gordon + +Release Date: February 28, 2005 [EBook #15205] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS *** + + + + +Produced by Eric Eldred, Susan Skinner and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. Produced from images generously made available +by the Canadiana.org. + + + + + + +</pre> + +<br /> + +<p>[Illustration: H. L. Gordon]</p> + +<h1>THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS</h1> + +<h2>AND OTHER POEMS</h2> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>H.L. GORDON</h2> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<br /><br /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza" style="text-align: center"> +<span><i>I had rather write one word upon the rock</i><br /></span> +<span><i>Of ages, than ten thousand in the sand.</i><br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /><br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> +<br /><br /> + +<p>Entered according to act of Congress in the year 1891 by H.L. GORDON in +the office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D.C.</p> +<br /><br /><hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<h2>TABLE OF CONTENTS</h2> + +<ul><li><a href="#ADDRESS_TO_THE_FLAG">Address to the Flag</a></li> +<li><a href="#A_MILLION_MORE">A Million More</a></li> +<li><a href="#AN_OLD_ENGLISH_OAK">An Old English Oak</a></li> +<li><a href="#ANTHEM">Anthem</a></li> +<li><a href="#BETZKO">Betzko</a></li> +<li><a href="#BEYOND">Beyond</a></li> +<li><a href="#BYRON_AND_THE_ANGEL">Byron and the Angel</a></li> +<li><a href="#CHANGE">Change</a></li> +<li><a href="#CHARGE_OF_THE_BLACK_HORSEquot">Charge of the "Black-Horse"</a></li> +<li><a href="#CHARGE_OF_FREMONTS_BODY_GUARD">Charge of Fremont's Body-Guard</a></li> +<li><a href="#CHARITY1">Charity</a></li> +<li><a href="#CHICKADEE">Chickadee</a></li> +<li><a href="#CHRISTMAS_EVE">Christmas Eve [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#DANIEL">Daniel</a></li> +<li><a href="#DO_THEY_THINK_OF_US">Do They Think of Us?</a></li> +<li><a href="#DUST_TO_DUST">Dust to Dust</a></li> +<li><a href="#FAME">Fame</a></li> +<li><a href="#FIDO">Fido</a></li> +<li><a href="#GETTYSBURG_CHARGE_OF_THE_FIRST_MINNESOTA">Gettysburg: Charge of the First Minnesota</a></li> +<li><a href="#HELOISE">Heloise</a></li> +<li><a href="#HOPE">Hope</a></li> +<li><a href="#HURRAH_FOR_THE_VOLUNTEERS">Hurrah for the Volunteers!</a></li> +<li><a href="#ISABEL">Isabel</a></li> +<li><a href="#LINES">Lines on the Death of Captain Coats</a></li> +<li><a href="#LOVE_WILL_FIND">Love will Find</a></li> +<li><a href="#MAULEY">Mauley [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#MEN">Men</a></li> +<li><a href="#MINNETONKA">Minnetonka [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#MRS_MCNAIR">Mrs. McNair</a></li> +<li><a href="#MY_DEAD">My Dead</a></li> +<li><a href="#MY_FATHER_LAND">My Father-Land</a></li> +<li><a href="#MY_HEARTS_ON_THE_RHINE">My Heart's on the Rhine</a></li> +<li><a href="#NIGHT_THOUGHTS">Night Thoughts</a></li> +<li><a href="#NEW_YEARS_ADDRESS_JANUARY_1_1866">New Years Address, 1866 [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#O_LET_ME_DREAM_THE_DREAMS_OF_LONG_AGO">O Let Me Dream the Dreams of Long Ago</a></li> +<li><a href="#ONLY_A_PRIVATE_KILLED">Only a Private Killed</a></li> +<li><a href="#ON_READING_PRESIDENT_LINCOLNS_LETTER">On Reading President Lincoln's Letter</a></li> +<li><a href="#OUT_OF_THE_DEPTHS">Out of the Depths</a></li> +<li><a href="#PAT_AND_THE_PIG">Pat and the Pig</a></li> +<li><a href="#PAULINE">Pauline [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#POETRY">Poetry</a></li> +<li><a href="#PRELUDE">Prelude—The Mississippi</a></li> +<li><a href="#SAILOR_BOYS_SONG">Sailor Boy's Song</a></li> +<li><a href="#SPRING">Spring [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#THANKSGIVING">Thanksgiving</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_DEVIL_AND_THE_MONK">The Devil and the Monk [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_DRAFT">The Draft</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_DYING_VETERAN">The Dying Veteran</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_FEAST_OF_THE_VIRGINS1">The Feast of the Virgins [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_LEGEND_OF_THE_FALLS">The Legend of the Falls [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_MINSTREL">The Minstrel</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_OLD_FLAG">The Old Flag</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_PIONEER">The Pioneer [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_REIGN_OF_REASON">The Reign of Reason</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_SEA_GULL1">The Sea-Gull [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#THE_TARIFF_ON_TIN">The Tariff on Tin [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#TO_MOLLIE">To Mollie</a></li> +<li><a href="#TO_SYLVA">To Sylva</a></li> +<li><a href="#TWENTY_YEARS_AGO">Twenty Years Ago [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#WESSELENYI">Wesselenyi [Illustrated]</a></li> +<li><a href="#WINONA">Winona [Illustrated]</a></li></ul> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h3>PREFACE</h3> + +<p>At odd hours during an active and busy life I have dallied with the +Muses. I found in them, in earlier years, rest from toil and drudgery +and, later, relief from physical suffering.</p> + +<p>Broken by over-work and compelled to abandon the practice of my +profession—the law, I wrote <i>Pauline</i> after I had been given up to die +by my physicians. It proved to be a better 'medicine' for me than all +the quackeries of the quacks. It diverted my mind from myself and, +perhaps, saved my life. When published, its reception by the best +journals of this country and England was so flattering and, at the same +time, the criticisms of some were so just, that I have been induced to +carefully revise the poem and to publish my re-touched <i>Pauline</i> in this +volume. I hope and believe I have greatly improved it. Several of the +minor poems have been published heretofore in journals and magazines; +others of equal or greater age flap their wings herein for the first +time; a few peeped from the shell but yesterday.</p> + +<p>I am aware that this volume contains several poems that a certain class +of critics will condemn, but they are my "chicks" and I will gather them +under my wings.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"None but an author knows an author's cares,<br /></span> +<span>Or Fancy's fondness for the child she bears."—<i>Cowper.</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Much of my life has been spent in the Northwest—on the frontier of +civilization, and I became personally acquainted with many of the chiefs +and braves of the Dakota and Ojibway (Chippewa) Indians. I have written +of them largely from my own personal knowledge, and endeavored, above +all things, to be accurate, and to present them true to the life.</p> + +<p>For several years I devoted my leisure hours to the study of the +language, history, traditions, customs and superstitions of the Dakotas. +These Indians are now commonly called the "<i>Sioux</i>"—a name given them +by the early French traders and <i>voyageurs</i>. "Dakota" signifies +<i>alliance</i> or <i>confederation</i>. Many separate bands, all having a common +origin and speaking a common tongue, were united under this name. See +"<i>Tah-Koo Wah-Kan,</i>" or "<i>The Gospel Among the Dakotas,</i>" by Stephen R. +Riggs, pp. 1 to 6 inc.</p> + +<p>They were but yesterday the occupants and owners of the fair forests and +fertile prairies of Minnesota—a brave, hospitable and generous +people—barbarians, indeed, but noble in their barbarism. They may be +fitly called the Iroquois of the West. In form and features, in language +and traditions, they are distinct from all other Indian tribes. When +first visited by white men, and for many years afterwards, the Falls of +St. Anthony (by them called the <i>Ha Ha</i>) was the center of their +country. They cultivated corn and tobacco, and hunted the elk, the +beaver and the bison. They were open-hearted, truthful and brave. In +their wars with other tribes they seldom slew women or children, and +rarely sacrificed the lives of their prisoners.</p> + +<p>For many years their chiefs and head men successfully resisted the +attempts to introduce spirituous liquors among them. More than a century +ago an English trader was killed at Mendota, near the present city of +St. Paul, because he persisted, after repeated warnings by the chiefs, +in dealing out <i>mini wakan</i> (Devil-water) to the Dakota braves.</p> + +<p>With open arms and generous hospitality they welcomed the first white +men to their land, and were ever faithful in their friendship, till +years of wrong and robbery, and want and insult, drove them to +desperation and to war. They were barbarians, and their warfare was +barbarous, but not more barbarous than the warfare of our Saxon, Celtic +and Norman ancestors. They were ignorant and superstitious. Their +condition closely resembled the condition of our British forefathers at +the beginning of the Christian era. Macaulay says of Britain: "Her +inhabitants, when first they became known to the Tyrian mariners, were +little superior to the natives of the Sandwich Islands." And again: +"While the German princes who reigned at Paris, Toledo, Aries and +Ravenna listened with reverence to the instructions of bishops, adored +the relics of martyrs, and took part eagerly in disputes touching the +Nicene theology, the rulers of Wessex and Mercia were still performing +savage rites in the temples of Thor and Woden."</p> + +<p>The days of the Dakotas are done. The degenerate remnants of that once +powerful and warlike people still linger around the forts and agencies +of the Northwest, or chase the caribou and the elk on the banks of the +Saskatchewan, but the Dakotas of old are no more. The brilliant defeat +of Custer, by Sitting Bull and his braves, was their last grand rally +against the resistless march of the sons of the Saxons. The plow-shares +of a superior race are fast leveling the sacred mounds of their dead. +But yesterday, the shores of our lakes and our rivers were dotted with +their <i>teepees,</i> their light canoes glided over our waters, and their +hunters chased the deer and the buffalo on the sites of our cities. +To-day, they are not. Let us do justice to their memory, for there was +much that was noble in their natures.</p> + +<p>In the Dakota Legends, I have endeavored to faithfully present many of +the customs and superstitions, and some of the traditions, of that +people. I have taken very little 'poetic license' with their traditions; +none, whatever, with their customs and superstitions. In my studies for +these Legends I was greatly aided by the Rev. S.R. Riggs, author of the +<i>"Grammar and Dictionary of the Dakota Language" "Tah-Koo Wah-Kan,"</i> +&c., and for many years a missionary among the Dakotas. He patiently +answered my numerous inquiries and gave me valuable information. I am +also indebted to the late Gen. H.H. Sibley, one of the earliest +American traders among them, and to Rev. S.W. Pond, of Shakopee, one of +the first Protestant missionaries to these people, and himself the +author of poetical versions of some of their principal legends; to Mrs. +Eastman's <i>"Dacotah,"</i> and last, but not least, to the Rev. E.D. Neill, +whose admirable <i>"History of Minnesota"</i> so fully and faithfully +presents almost all that is known of the history, traditions, customs, +manners and superstitions of the Dakotas.</p> + +<p>In <i>Winona</i> I have "tried my hand" on a new hexameter verse. With what +success, I leave to those who are better able to judge than I. If I have +failed, I have but added another failure to the numerous attempts to +naturalize hexameter verse in the English language.</p> + +<p>It will be observed that I have slightly changed the length and the +rhythm of the old hexameter line; but it is still hexameter, and, I +think, improved.</p> + +<p>I have not written for profit nor published for fame. Fame is a coy +goddess that rarely bestows her favors on him who seeks her—a phantom +that many pursue and but few overtake.</p> + +<p>She delights to hover for a time, like a ghost, over the graves of dead +men who know not and care not: to the living she is a veritable <i>Ignis +Fatuus</i>. But every man owes something to his fellowmen, and I owe much.</p> + +<p>If my friends find half the pleasure in reading these poems that I have +found in writing them, I shall have paid my debt and achieved success.</p> + +<p>H.L. GORDON.</p> + +<p>Minneapolis, November 1, 1891.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="PRELUDE"></a><h2>PRELUDE</h2> + +<h3>THE MISSISSIPPI</h3> + +<h5>The numerals refer to <i>Notes</i> in appendix.</h5> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Onward rolls the Royal River, proudly sweeping to the sea,<br /></span> +<span>Dark and deep and grand, forever wrapt in myth and mystery.<br /></span> +<span>Lo he laughs along the highlands, leaping o'er the granite walls;<br /></span> +<span>Lo he sleeps among the islands, where the loon her lover calls.<br /></span> +<span>Still like some huge monster winding downward through the prairied plains,<br /></span> +<span>Seeking rest but never finding, till the tropic gulf he gains.<br /></span> +<span>In his mighty arms he claspeth now an empire broad and grand;<br /></span> +<span>In his left hand lo he graspeth leagues of fen and forest land;<br /></span> +<span>In his right the mighty mountains, hoary with eternal snow,<br /></span> +<span>Where a thousand foaming fountains singing seek the plains below.<br /></span> +<span>Fields of corn and feet of cities lo the mighty river laves,<br /></span> +<span>Where the Saxon sings his ditties o'er the swarthy warriors' graves.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Aye, before the birth of Moses—ere the Pyramids were piled—<br /></span> +<span>All his banks were red with roses from the sea to nor'lands wild,<br /></span> +<span>And from forest, fen and meadows, in the deserts of the north,<br /></span> +<span>Elk and bison stalked like shadows, and the tawny tribes came forth;<br /></span> +<span>Deeds of death and deeds of daring on his leafy banks were done,<br /></span> +<span>Women loved and men went warring, ere the siege of Troy begun.<br /></span> +<span>Where his foaming waters thundered, roaring o'er the rocky walls,<br /></span> +<span>Dusky hunters sat and wondered, listening to the spirits' calls.<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Ha-ha!</i>"<a name='FNanchor_76'></a><a href='#Footnote_76'><sup>[76]</sup></a> cried the warrior greeting from afar the cataract's roar;<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Ha-ha!</i>" rolled the answer beating down the rock-ribbed leagues of shore.<br /></span> +<span>Now, alas, the bow and quiver and the dusky braves have fled,<br /></span> +<span>And the sullen, shackled river drives the droning mills instead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Where the war-whoop rose, and after women wailed their warriors slain,<br /></span> +<span>List the Saxon's silvery laughter, and his humming hives of gain.<br /></span> +<span>Swiftly sped the tawny runner o'er the pathless prairies then,<br /></span> +<span>Now the iron-reindeer sooner carries weal or woe to men.<br /></span> +<span>On thy bosom, Royal River, silent sped the birch canoe<br /></span> +<span>Bearing brave with bow and quiver on his way to war or woo;<br /></span> +<span>Now with flaunting flags and streamers—mighty monsters of the deep—<br /></span> +<span>Lo the puffing, panting steamers through thy foaming waters sweep;<br /></span> +<span>And behold the grain-fields golden, where the bison grazed of eld;<br /></span> +<span>See the fanes of forests olden by the ruthless Saxon felled.<br /></span> +<span>Plumèd pines that spread their shadows ere Columbus spread his sails,<br /></span> +<span>Firs that fringed the mossy meadows ere the Mayflower braved the gales,<br /></span> +<span>Iron oaks that nourished bruin while the Vikings roamed the main,<br /></span> +<span>Crashing fall in broken ruin for the greedy marts of gain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Still forever and forever rolls the restless river on,<br /></span> +<span>Slumbering oft but ceasing never while the circling centuries run.<br /></span> +<span>In his palm the lakelet lingers, in his hair the brooklets hide,<br /></span> +<span>Grasped within his thousand fingers lies a continent fair and wide—<br /></span> +<span>Yea, a mighty empire swarming with its millions like the bees,<br /></span> +<span>Delving, drudging, striving, storming, all their lives, for golden ease.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Still, methinks, the dusky shadows of the days that are no more,<br /></span> +<span>Stalk around the lakes and meadows, haunting oft the wonted shore:<br /></span> +<span>Hunters from the land of spirits seek the bison and the deer<br /></span> +<span>Where the Saxon now inherits golden field and silver mere;<br /></span> +<span>And beside the mound where buried lies the dark-eyed maid he loves,<br /></span> +<span>Some tall warrior, wan and wearied, in the misty moonlight moves.<br /></span> +<span>See—he stands erect and lingers—stoic still, but loth to go—<br /></span> +<span>Clutching in his tawny fingers feathered shaft and polished bow.<br /></span> +<span>Never wail or moan he utters and no tear is on his face,<br /></span> +<span>But a warrior's curse he mutters on the crafty Saxon race.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>O thou dark, mysterious River, speak and tell thy tales to me;<br /></span> +<span>Seal not up thy lips forever—veiled in mist and mystery.<br /></span> +<span>I will sit and lowly listen at the phantom-haunted falls<br /></span> +<span>Where thy waters foam and glisten o'er the rugged, rocky walls,<br /></span> +<span>Till some spirit of the olden, mystic, weird, romantic days<br /></span> +<span>Shall emerge and pour her golden tales and legends through my lays.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then again the elk and bison on thy grassy banks shall feed,<br /></span> +<span>And along the low horizon shall the plumed hunter speed;<br /></span> +<span>Then again on lake and river shall the silent birch canoe<br /></span> +<span>Bear the brave with bow and quiver on his way to war or woo:<br /></span> +<span>Then the beaver on the meadow shall rebuild his broken wall,<br /></span> +<span>And the wolf shall chase his shadow and his mate the panther call.<br /></span> +<span>From the prairies and the regions where the pine-plumed forest grows<br /></span> +<span>Shall arise the tawny legions with their lances and their bows;<br /></span> +<span>And again the cries of battle shall resound along the plain,<br /></span> +<span>Bows shall twang and quivers rattle, women wail their warriors slain;<br /></span> +<span>And by lodge-fire lowly burning shall the mother from afar<br /></span> +<span>List her warrior's steps returning from the daring deeds of war.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> + +<p>[Illustration: THE GAME OF BALL]</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="THE_FEAST_OF_THE_VIRGINS1"></a><h2>THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS<a name='FNanchor_1'></a><a href='#Footnote_1'><sup>[1]</sup></a></h2> + +<h3>A LEGEND OF THE DAKOTAS</h3> + + +<p>In pronouncing Dakota words give "a" the sound of "ah",—"e" the sound +of "a",—"i" the sound of "e" and "u" the sound of "oo;" sound "ee" as +in English. The numerals refer to <i>Notes</i> in appendix.</p> + + +<h4>THE GAME OF BALL<a name='FNanchor_2'></a><a href='#Footnote_2'><sup>[2]</sup></a></h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Clear was the sky as a silver shield;<br /></span> +<span>The bright sun blazed on the frozen field.<br /></span> +<span>On ice-bound river and white-robed prairie<br /></span> +<span>The diamonds gleamed in the flame of noon;<br /></span> +<span>But cold and keen were the breezes airy<br /></span> +<span><i>Wa-zi-ya</i><a name='FNanchor_3'></a><a href='#Footnote_3'><sup>[3]</sup></a> blew from his icy throne.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the solid ice of the silent river<br /></span> +<span>The bounds are marked, and a splendid prize,<br /></span> +<span>A robe of black-fox lined with beaver,<br /></span> +<span>Is hung in view of the eager eyes;<br /></span> +<span>And fifty merry Dakota maidens,<br /></span> +<span>The fairest-molded of womankind<br /></span> +<span>Are gathered in groups on the level ice.<br /></span> +<span>They look on the robe and its beauty gladdens<br /></span> +<span>And maddens their hearts for the splendid prize.<br /></span> +<span>Lo the rounded ankles and raven hair<br /></span> +<span>That floats at will on the wanton wind,<br /></span> +<span>And the round, brown arms to the breezes bare,<br /></span> +<span>And breasts like the mounds where the waters meet,<a name='FNanchor_4'></a><a href='#Footnote_4'><sup>[4]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And feet as fleet as the red deer's feet,<br /></span> +<span>And faces that glow like the full, round moon<br /></span> +<span>When she laughs in the luminous skies of June.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The leaders are chosen and swiftly divide<br /></span> +<span>The opposing parties on either side.<br /></span> +<span>Wiwâstè<a name='FNanchor_5'></a><a href='#Footnote_5'><sup>[5]</sup></a> is chief of a nimble band,<br /></span> +<span>The star-eyed daughter of Little Crow;<a name='FNanchor_6'></a><a href='#Footnote_6'><sup>[6]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And the leader chosen to hold command<br /></span> +<span>Of the band adverse is a haughty foe—<br /></span> +<span>The dusky, impetuous Hârpstinà,<a name='FNanchor_7'></a><a href='#Footnote_7'><sup>[7]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>The queenly cousin of Wâpasà.<a name='FNanchor_8'></a><a href='#Footnote_8'><sup>[8]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Kapoza's</i> chief and his tawny hunters<br /></span> +<span>Are gathered to witness the queenly game.<br /></span> +<span>The ball is thrown and a net encounters,<br /></span> +<span>And away it flies with a loud acclaim.<br /></span> +<span>Swift are the maidens that follow after,<br /></span> +<span>And swiftly it flies for the farther bound;<br /></span> +<span>And long and loud are the peals of laughter,<br /></span> +<span>As some fair runner is flung to ground;<br /></span> +<span>While backward and forward, and to and fro,<br /></span> +<span>The maidens contend on the trampled snow.<br /></span> +<span>With loud "<i>Ihó!—Itó!—Ihó</i>!"<a name='FNanchor_9'></a><a href='#Footnote_9'><sup>[9]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And waving the beautiful prize anon,<br /></span> +<span>The dusky warriors cheer them on.<br /></span> +<span>And often the limits are almost passed,<br /></span> +<span>As the swift ball flies and returns. At last<br /></span> +<span>It leaps the line at a single bound<br /></span> +<span>From the fair Wiwâstè's sturdy arm<br /></span> +<span>Like a fawn that flies from the baying hound.<br /></span> +<span>The wild cheers broke like a thunder storm<br /></span> +<span>On the beetling bluffs and the hills profound,<br /></span> +<span>An echoing, jubilant sea of sound.<br /></span> +<span>Wakâwa, the chief, and the loud acclaim<br /></span> +<span>Announced the end of the hard-won game,<br /></span> +<span>And the fair Wiwâstè was victor crowned.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dark was the visage of Hârpstinà<br /></span> +<span>When the robe was laid at her rival's feet,<br /></span> +<span>And merry maidens and warriors saw<br /></span> +<span>Her flashing eyes and her look of hate,<br /></span> +<span>As she turned to Wakâwa, the chief, and said:<br /></span> +<span>"The game was mine were it fairly played.<br /></span> +<span>I was stunned by a blow on my bended head,<br /></span> +<span>As I snatched the ball from slippery ground<br /></span> +<span>Not half a fling from Wiwâstè's bound.<br /></span> +<span>The cheat—behold her! for there she stands<br /></span> +<span>With the prize that is mine in her treacherous hands.<br /></span> +<span>The fawn may fly, but the wolf is fleet;<br /></span> +<span>The fox creeps sly on <i>Magâ's</i><a name='FNanchor_10'></a><a href='#Footnote_10'><sup>[10]</sup></a> retreat,<br /></span> +<span>And a woman's revenge—it is swift and sweet."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>She turned to her lodge, but a roar of laughter<br /></span> +<span>And merry mockery followed after.<br /></span> +<span>Little they heeded the words she said,<br /></span> +<span>Little they cared for her haughty tread,<br /></span> +<span>For maidens and warriors and chieftain knew<br /></span> +<span>That her lips were false and her charge untrue.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Wiwâstè, the fairest Dakota maiden,<br /></span> +<span>The sweet-faced daughter of Little Crow,<br /></span> +<span>To her <i>teepee</i><a name='FNanchor_11'></a><a href='#Footnote_11'><sup>[11]</sup></a> turned with her trophy laden,<br /></span> +<span>The black robe trailing the virgin snow.<br /></span> +<span>Beloved was she by her princely father,<br /></span> +<span>Beloved was she by the young and old,<br /></span> +<span>By merry maidens and many a mother,<br /></span> +<span>And many a warrior bronzed and bold.<br /></span> +<span>For her face was as fair as a beautiful dream,<br /></span> +<span>And her voice like the song of the mountain stream;<br /></span> +<span>And her eyes like the stars when they glow and gleam<br /></span> +<span>Through the somber pines of the nor'land wold,<br /></span> +<span>When the winds of winter are keen and cold.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Mah-pí-ya Dú-ta<a name='FNanchor_12'></a><a href='#Footnote_12'><sup>[12]</sup></a>, the tall Red Cloud,<br /></span> +<span>A hunter swift and a warrior proud,<br /></span> +<span>With many a scar and many a feather,<br /></span> +<span>Was a suitor bold and a lover fond.<br /></span> +<span>Long had he courted Wiwâstè's father,<br /></span> +<span>Long had he sued for the maiden's hand.<br /></span> +<span>Aye, brave and proud was the tall Red Cloud,<br /></span> +<span>A peerless son of a giant race,<br /></span> +<span>And the eyes of the panther were set in his face:<br /></span> +<span>He strode like a stag, and he stood like a pine;<br /></span> +<span>Ten feathers he wore of the great <i>Wanmdeè</i>;<a name='FNanchor_13'></a><a href='#Footnote_13'><sup>[13]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>With crimsoned quills of the porcupine<br /></span> +<span>His leggins were worked to his brawny knee.<br /></span> +<span>The bow he bent was a giant's bow;<br /></span> +<span>The swift, red elk could he overtake,<br /></span> +<span>And the necklace that girdled his brawny neck<br /></span> +<span>Was the polished claws of the great <i>Mató</i><a name='FNanchor_14'></a><a href='#Footnote_14'><sup>[14]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>He grappled and slew in the northern snow.<br /></span> +<span>Wiwâstè looked on the warrior tall;<br /></span> +<span>She saw he was brawny and brave and great,<br /></span> +<span>But the eyes of the panther she could but hate,<br /></span> +<span>And a brave <i>Hóhè</i><a name='FNanchor_15'></a><a href='#Footnote_15'><sup>[15]</sup></a> loved she better than all.<br /></span> +<span>Loved was Mahpíya by Hârpstinà<br /></span> +<span>But the warrior she never could charm or draw;<br /></span> +<span>And bitter indeed was her secret hate<br /></span> +<span>For the maiden she reckoned so fortunate.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> + +<h3>HEYOKA WACIPEE<a name='FNanchor_16'></a><a href='#Footnote_16'><sup>[16]</sup></a></h3> + +<h4>THE GIANT'S DANCE.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>The night-sun<a name='FNanchor_17'></a><a href='#Footnote_17'><sup>[17]</sup></a> sails in his gold canoe,<br /></span> +<span>The spirits<a name='FNanchor_18'></a><a href='#Footnote_18'><sup>[18]</sup></a> walk in the realms of air<br /></span> +<span>With their glowing faces and flaming hair,<br /></span> +<span>And the shrill, chill winds o'er the prairies blow.<br /></span> +<span>In the <i>Tee</i><a name='FNanchor_19'></a><a href='#Footnote_19'><sup>[19]</sup></a> <i>of the Council</i> the Virgins light<br /></span> +<span>The Virgin-fire<a name='FNanchor_20'></a><a href='#Footnote_20'><sup>[20]</sup></a> for the feast to-night;<br /></span> +<span>For the <i>Sons of Heyóka</i> will celebrate<br /></span> +<span>The sacred dance to the giant great.<br /></span> +<span>The kettle boils on the blazing fire,<br /></span> +<span>And the flesh is done to the chief's desire.<br /></span> +<span>With his stoic face to the sacred East,<a name='FNanchor_21'></a><a href='#Footnote_21'><sup>[21]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>He takes his seat at the Giant's Feast.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>For the feast of <i>Heyóka</i><a name='FNanchor_22'></a><a href='#Footnote_22'><sup>[22]</sup></a> the braves are dressed<br /></span> +<span>With crowns from the bark of the white-birch trees,<br /></span> +<span>And new skin leggins that reach the knees;<br /></span> +<span>With robes of the bison and swarthy bear,<br /></span> +<span>And eagle-plumes in their coal-black hair,<br /></span> +<span>And marvelous rings in their tawny ears<br /></span> +<span>That were pierced with the points of their shining spears.<br /></span> +<span>To honor <i>Heyóka</i> Wakâwa lifts<br /></span> +<span>His fuming pipe from the Red-stone Quarry.<a name='FNanchor_23'></a><a href='#Footnote_23'><sup>[23]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>The warriors follow. The white cloud drifts<br /></span> +<span>From the Council-lodge to the welkin starry,<br /></span> +<span>Like a fog at morn on the fir-clad hill,<br /></span> +<span>When the meadows are damp and the winds are still.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>They dance to the tune of their wild "<i>Há-há</i>"<br /></span> +<span>A warrior's shout and a raven's caw—<br /></span> +<span>Circling the pot and the blazing fire<br /></span> +<span>To the tom-tom's bray and the rude bassoon;<br /></span> +<span>Round and round to their heart's desire,<br /></span> +<span>And ever the same wild chant and tune—<br /></span> +<span>A warrior's shout and a raven's caw—<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Há-há,—há-há,—há-há,—há!</i>"<br /></span> +<span>They crouch, they leap, and their burning eyes<br /></span> +<span>Flash fierce in the light of the flaming fire,<br /></span> +<span>As fiercer and fiercer and higher and higher<br /></span> +<span>The rude, wild notes of their chant arise.<br /></span> +<span>They cease, they sit, and the curling smoke<br /></span> +<span>Ascends again from their polished pipes,<br /></span> +<span>And upward curls from their swarthy lips<br /></span> +<span>To the god whose favor their hearts invoke.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then tall Wakâwa arose and said:<br /></span> +<span>"Brave warriors, listen, and give due heed.<br /></span> +<span>Great is <i>Heyóka</i>, the magical god;<br /></span> +<span>He can walk on the air; he can float on the flood.<br /></span> +<span>He's a worker of magic and wonderful wise;<br /></span> +<span>He cries when he laughs and he laughs when he cries;<br /></span> +<span>He sweats when he's cold, and he shivers when hot,<br /></span> +<span>And the water is cold in his boiling pot.<br /></span> +<span>He hides in the earth and he walks in disguise,<br /></span> +<span>But he loves the brave and their sacrifice.<br /></span> +<span>We are sons of <i>Heyóka</i>. The Giant commands<br /></span> +<span>In the boiling water to thrust our hands;<br /></span> +<span>And the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire<br /></span> +<span><i>Heyóka</i> will crown with his heart's desire."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>They thrust their hands in the boiling pot;<br /></span> +<span>They swallow the bison-meat steaming hot;<br /></span> +<span>Not a wince on their stoical faces bold,<br /></span> +<span>For the meat and the water, they say, are cold:<br /></span> +<span>And great is <i>Heyóka</i> and wonderful wise;<br /></span> +<span>He floats on the flood and he walks on the skies,<br /></span> +<span>And ever appears in a strange disguise;<br /></span> +<span>But he loves the brave and their sacrifice,<br /></span> +<span>And the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire<br /></span> +<span>Heyóka will crown with his heart's desire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Proud was the chief of his warriors proud,<br /></span> +<span>The sinewy sons of the Giant's race;<br /></span> +<span>But the bravest of all was the tall Red Cloud;<br /></span> +<span>The eyes of the panther were set in his face;<br /></span> +<span>He strode like a stag and he stood like a pine;<br /></span> +<span>Ten feathers he wore of the great <i>Wanmdeé</i>,<a name='FNanchor_13'></a><a href='#Footnote_13'><sup>[13]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>With crimsoned quills of the porcupine<br /></span> +<span>His leggins were worked to his brawny knee.<br /></span> +<span>Blood-red were the stripes on his swarthy cheek,<br /></span> +<span>And the necklace that girdled his brawny neck<br /></span> +<span>Was the polished claws of the great Mató<a name='FNanchor_14'></a><a href='#Footnote_14'><sup>[14]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>He grappled and slew in the northern snow.<br /></span> +<span>Proud Red Cloud turned to the braves and said,<br /></span> +<span>As he shook the plumes on his haughty head:<br /></span> +<span>"Ho! the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire<br /></span> +<span><i>Heyóka</i> will crown with his heart's desire!"<br /></span> +<span>He snatched from the embers a red-hot brand,<br /></span> +<span>And held it aloft in his naked hand.<br /></span> +<span>He stood like a statue in bronze or stone—<br /></span> +<span>Not a muscle moved, and the braves looked on.<br /></span> +<span>He turned to the chieftain—"I scorn the fire—<br /></span> +<span>Ten feathers I wear of the great <i>Wanmdeé</i>;<br /></span> +<span>Then grant me, Wakâwa, my heart's desire;<br /></span> +<span>Let the sunlight shine in my lonely tee.<a name='FNanchor_19'></a><a href='#Footnote_19'><sup>[19]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>I laugh at red death and I laugh at red fire;<br /></span> +<span>Brave Red Cloud is only afraid of fear;<br /></span> +<span>But Wiwâstè is fair to his heart and dear;<br /></span> +<span>Then grant him, Wakâwa, his heart's desire."<br /></span> +<span>The warriors applauded with loud "<i>Ho! Ho!</i>"<a name='FNanchor_24'></a><a href='#Footnote_24'><sup>[24]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And he flung the brand to the drifting snow.<br /></span> +<span>Three times Wakâwa puffed forth the smoke<br /></span> +<span>From his silent lips; then he slowly spoke:<br /></span> +<span>"Mâhpíya is strong as the stout-armed oak<br /></span> +<span>That stands on the bluff by the windy plain,<br /></span> +<span>And laughs at the roar of the hurricane.<br /></span> +<span>He has slain the foe and the great <i>Mató</i><br /></span> +<span>With his hissing arrow and deadly stroke<br /></span> +<span>My heart is swift but my tongue is slow.<br /></span> +<span>Let the warrior come to my lodge and smoke;<br /></span> +<span>He may bring the gifts;<a name='FNanchor_25'></a><a href='#Footnote_25'><sup>[25]</sup></a> but the timid doe<br /></span> +<span>May fly from the hunter and say him no."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Wiwâstè sat late in the lodge alone,<br /></span> +<span>Her dark eyes bent on the glowing fire:<br /></span> +<span>She heard not the wild winds shrill and moan;<br /></span> +<span>She heard not the tall elms toss and groan;<br /></span> +<span>Her face was lit like the harvest moon;<br /></span> +<span>For her thoughts flew far to her heart's desire.<br /></span> +<span>Far away in the land of the <i>Hóhè</i><a name='FNanchor_15'></a><a href='#Footnote_15'><sup>[15]</sup></a> dwelt<br /></span> +<span>The warrior she held in her secret heart;<br /></span> +<span>But little he dreamed of the pain she felt,<br /></span> +<span>For she hid her love with a maiden's art.<br /></span> +<span>Not a tear she shed, not a word she said,<br /></span> +<span>When the brave young chief from the lodge departed;<br /></span> +<span>But she sat on the mound when the day was dead,<br /></span> +<span>And gazed at the full moon mellow-hearted.<br /></span> +<span>Fair was the chief as the morning-star;<br /></span> +<span>His eyes were mild and his words were low,<br /></span> +<span>But his heart was stouter than lance or bow;<br /></span> +<span>And her young heart flew to her love afar<br /></span> +<span>O'er his trail long covered with drifted snow.<br /></span> +<span>She heard a warrior's stealthy tread,<br /></span> +<span>And the tall Wakâwa appeared, and said:<br /></span> +<span>"Is Wiwâstè afraid of the spirit dread<br /></span> +<span>That fires the sky in the fatal north?<a name='FNanchor_26'></a><a href='#Footnote_26'><sup>[26]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Behold the mysterious lights. Come forth:<br /></span> +<span>Some evil threatens, some danger nears,<br /></span> +<span>For the skies are pierced by the burning spears."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The warriors rally beneath the moon;<br /></span> +<span>They shoot their shafts at the evil spirit.<br /></span> +<span>The spirit is slain and the flame is gone,<br /></span> +<span>But his blood lies red on the snow-fields near it;<br /></span> +<span>And again from the dead will the spirit rise,<br /></span> +<span>And flash his spears in the northern skies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then the chief and the queenly Wiwâstè stood<br /></span> +<span>Alone in the moon-lit solitude,<br /></span> +<span>And she was silent and he was grave.<br /></span> +<span>"And fears not my daughter the evil spirit?<br /></span> +<span>The strongest warriors and bravest fear it.<br /></span> +<span>The burning spears are an evil omen;<br /></span> +<span>They threaten the wrath of a wicked woman,<br /></span> +<span>Or a treacherous foe; but my warriors brave,<br /></span> +<span>When danger nears, or the foe appears,<br /></span> +<span>Are a cloud of arrows—a grove of spears."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"My Father," she said, and her words were low,<br /></span> +<span>"Why should I fear? for I soon will go<br /></span> +<span>To the broad, blue lodge in the Spirit-land,<br /></span> +<span>Where my fond-eyed mother went long ago,<br /></span> +<span>And my dear twin-sisters walk hand in hand.<br /></span> +<span>My Father, listen—my words are true,"<br /></span> +<span>And sad was her voice as the whippowil<br /></span> +<span>When she mourns her mate by the moon-lit rill,<br /></span> +<span>"Wiwâstè lingers alone with you;<br /></span> +<span>The rest are sleeping on yonder hill—<br /></span> +<span>Save one—and he an undutiful son—<br /></span> +<span>And you, my Father, will sit alone<br /></span> +<span>When <i>Sisóka</i><a name='FNanchor_27'></a><a href='#Footnote_27'><sup>[27]</sup></a> sings and the snow is gone.<br /></span> +<span>I sat, when the maple leaves were red,<br /></span> +<span>By the foaming falls of the haunted river;<br /></span> +<span>The night-sun was walking above my head,<br /></span> +<span>And the arrows shone in his burnished quiver;<br /></span> +<span>And the winds were hushed and the hour was dread<br /></span> +<span>With the walking ghosts of the silent dead.<br /></span> +<span>I heard the voice of the Water-Fairy;<a name='FNanchor_28'></a><a href='#Footnote_28'><sup>[28]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>I saw her form in the moon-lit mist,<br /></span> +<span>As she sat on a stone with her burden weary,<br /></span> +<span>By the foaming eddies of amethyst.<br /></span> +<span>And robed in her mantle of mist the sprite<br /></span> +<span>Her low wail poured on the silent night.<br /></span> +<span>Then the spirit spake, and the floods were still—<br /></span> +<span>They hushed and listened to what she said,<br /></span> +<span>And hushed was the plaint of the whippowil<br /></span> +<span>In the silver-birches above her head:<br /></span> +<span>'Wiwâstè, the prairies are green and fair<br /></span> +<span>When the robin sings and the whippowil;<br /></span> +<span>But the land of the Spirits is fairer still,<br /></span> +<span>For the winds of winter blow never there;<br /></span> +<span>And forever the songs of the whippowils<br /></span> +<span>And the robins are heard on the leafy hills.<br /></span> +<span>Thy mother looks from her lodge above—<br /></span> +<span>Her fair face shines in the sky afar,<br /></span> +<span>And the eyes of thy sisters are bright with love,<br /></span> +<span>As they peep from the <i>tee</i> of the mother-star.<br /></span> +<span>To her happy lodge in the Spirit land<br /></span> +<span>She beckons Wiwâstè with shining hand.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"My Father—my Father, her words were true;<br /></span> +<span>And the death of Wiwâstè will rest on you.<br /></span> +<span>You have pledged me as wife to the tall Red Cloud;<br /></span> +<span>You will take the gifts of the warrior proud;<br /></span> +<span>But I, Wakâwa,—I answer—never!<br /></span> +<span>I will stain your knife in my heart's red blood,<br /></span> +<span>I will plunge and sink in the sullen river<br /></span> +<span>Ere I will be wife to the dark Red Cloud!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Wiwâstè," he said, and his voice was low,<br /></span> +<span>"Let it be as you will, for Wakâwa's tongue<br /></span> +<span>Has spoken no promise;—his lips are slow,<br /></span> +<span>And the love of a father is deep and strong.<br /></span> +<span>Be happy, Micúnksee;<a name='FNanchor_29'></a><a href='#Footnote_29'><sup>[29]</sup></a> the flames are gone—<br /></span> +<span>They flash no more in the northern sky.<br /></span> +<span>See the smile on the face of the watching moon;<br /></span> +<span>No more will the fatal, red arrows fly;<br /></span> +<span>For the singing shafts of my warriors sped<br /></span> +<span>To the bad spirit's bosom and laid him dead,<br /></span> +<span>And his blood on the snow of the North lies red.<br /></span> +<span>Go—sleep in the robe that you won to-day,<br /></span> +<span>And dream of your hunter—the brave Chaskè."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Light was her heart as she turned away;<br /></span> +<span>It sang like the lark in the skies of May.<br /></span> +<span>The round moon laughed, but a lone, red star,<a name='FNanchor_30'></a><a href='#Footnote_30'><sup>[30]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>As she turned to the <i>teepee</i> and entered in,<br /></span> +<span>Fell flashing and swift in the sky afar,<br /></span> +<span>Like the polished point of a javelin.<br /></span> +<span>Nor chief nor daughter the shadow saw<br /></span> +<span>Of the crouching listener, Hârpstinà.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Wiwâstè, wrapped in her robe and sleep,<br /></span> +<span>Heard not the storm-sprites wail and weep,<br /></span> +<span>As they rode on the winds in the frosty air;<br /></span> +<span>But she heard the voice of her hunter fair;<br /></span> +<span>For a fairy spirit with silent fingers<br /></span> +<span>The curtains drew from the land of dreams;<br /></span> +<span>And lo in her <i>teepee</i> her lover lingers;<br /></span> +<span>In his tender eyes all the love-light beams,<br /></span> +<span>And his voice is the music of mountain streams.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And then with her round, brown arms she pressed<br /></span> +<span>His phantom form to her throbbing breast,<br /></span> +<span>And whispered the name, in her happy sleep,<br /></span> +<span>Of her <i>Hóhè</i> hunter so fair and far:<br /></span> +<span>And then she saw in her dreams the deep<br /></span> +<span>Where the spirit wailed, and a falling star;<br /></span> +<span>Then stealthily crouching under the trees,<br /></span> +<span>By the light of the moon, the <i>Kan-é-ti-dan</i>, <a name='FNanchor_31'></a><a href='#Footnote_31'><sup>[31]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>The little, wizened, mysterious man,<br /></span> +<span>With his long locks tossed by the moaning breeze.<br /></span> +<span>Then a flap of wings, like a thunder-bird, <a name='FNanchor_32'></a><a href='#Footnote_32'><sup>[32]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And a wailing spirit the sleeper heard;<br /></span> +<span>And lo, through the mists of the moon, she saw<br /></span> +<span>The hateful visage of Hârpstinà.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But waking she murmured—"And what are these——<br /></span> +<span>The flap of wings and the falling star,<br /></span> +<span>The wailing spirit that's never at ease,<br /></span> +<span>The little man crouching under the trees,<br /></span> +<span>And the hateful visage of Hârpstinà?<br /></span> +<span>My dreams are like feathers that float on the breeze,<br /></span> +<span>And none can tell what the omens are——<br /></span> +<span>Save the beautiful dream of my love afar<br /></span> +<span>In the happy land of the tall <i>Hóhè</i>——<br /></span> +<span>My handsome hunter—my brave Chaskè."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>[Illustration: BUFFALO CHASE]<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>"Ta-tánka! Ta-tánka!"</i><a name='FNanchor_33'></a><a href='#Footnote_33'><sup>[33]</sup></a> the hunters cried,<br /></span> +<span>With a joyous shout at the break of dawn<br /></span> +<span>And darkly lined on the white hill-side,<br /></span> +<span>A herd of bison went marching on<br /></span> +<span>Through the drifted snow like a caravan.<br /></span> +<span>Swift to their ponies the hunters sped,<br /></span> +<span>And dashed away on the hurried chase.<br /></span> +<span>The wild steeds scented the game ahead,<br /></span> +<span>And sprang like hounds to the eager race.<br /></span> +<span>But the brawny bulls in the swarthy van<br /></span> +<span>Turned their polished horns on the charging foes<br /></span> +<span>And reckless rider and fleet footman<br /></span> +<span>Were held at bay in the drifted snows,<br /></span> +<span>While the bellowing herd o'er the hilltops ran,<br /></span> +<span>Like the frightened beasts of a caravan<br /></span> +<span>On Sahara's sands when the simoon blows.<br /></span> +<span>Sharp were the twangs of the hunters' bows,<br /></span> +<span>And swift and humming the arrows sped,<br /></span> +<span>Till ten huge bulls on the bloody snows<br /></span> +<span>Lay pierced with arrows and dumb and dead.<br /></span> +<span>But the chief with the flankers had gained the rear,<br /></span> +<span>And flew on the trail of the flying herd.<br /></span> +<span>The shouts of the riders rang loud and clear,<br /></span> +<span>As their foaming steeds to the chase they spurred.<br /></span> +<span>And now like the roar of an avalanche<br /></span> +<span>Rolls the bellowing wrath of the maddened bulls<br /></span> +<span>They charge on the riders and runners stanch,<br /></span> +<span>And a dying steed in the snow drift rolls,<br /></span> +<span>While the rider, flung to the frozen ground,<br /></span> +<span>Escapes the horns by a panther's bound.<br /></span> +<span>But the raging monsters are held at bay,<br /></span> +<span>While the flankers dash on the swarthy rout:<br /></span> +<span>With lance and arrow they slay and slay;<br /></span> +<span>And the welkin rings to the gladsome shout——<br /></span> +<span>To the loud <i>Iná's</i> and the wild <i>Ihó's</i>, <a name='FNanchor_34'></a><a href='#Footnote_34'><sup>[34]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And dark and dead, on the bloody snows,<br /></span> +<span>Lie the swarthy heaps of the buffaloes.<br /></span> +<span>All snug in the <i>teepee</i> Wiwâstè lay,<br /></span> +<span>All wrapped in her robe, at the dawn of day,<br /></span> +<span>All snug and warm from the wind and snow,<br /></span> +<span>While the hunters followed the buffalo.<br /></span> +<span>Her dreams and her slumber their wild shouts broke;<br /></span> +<span>The chase was afoot when the maid awoke;<br /></span> +<span>She heard the twangs of the hunters' bows,<br /></span> +<span>And the bellowing bulls and the loud <i>Ihó</i>'s,<br /></span> +<span>And she murmured—"My hunter is far away<br /></span> +<span>In the happy land of the tall <i>Hóhè</i>——<br /></span> +<span>My handsome hunter, my brave Chaskè;<br /></span> +<span>But the robins will come and my warrior too,<br /></span> +<span>And Wiwâstè will find her a way to woo."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And long she lay in a reverie,<br /></span> +<span>And dreamed, wide-awake, of the brave Chaskè,<br /></span> +<span>Till a trampling of feet on the crispy snow<br /></span> +<span>She heard, and the murmur of voices low:——<br /></span> +<span>Then the warriors' greeting—<i>Ihó! Ihó!</i><br /></span> +<span>And behold, in the blaze of the risen day,<br /></span> +<span>With the hunters that followed the buffalo——<br /></span> +<span>Came her tall, young hunter—her brave Chaskè.<br /></span> +<span>Far south has he followed the bison-trail<br /></span> +<span>With his band of warriors so brave and true.<br /></span> +<span>Right glad is Wakâwa his friend to hail,<br /></span> +<span>And Wiwâstè will find her a way to woo.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Tall and straight as the larch-tree stood<br /></span> +<span>The manly form of the brave young chief,<br /></span> +<span>And fair as the larch in its vernal leaf,<br /></span> +<span>When the red fawn bleats in the feathering wood.<br /></span> +<span>Mild was his face as the morning skies,<br /></span> +<span>And friendship shone in his laughing eyes;<br /></span> +<span>But swift were his feet o'er the drifted snow<br /></span> +<span>On the trail of the elk or the buffalo,<br /></span> +<span>And his heart was stouter than lance or bow,<br /></span> +<span>When he heard the whoop of his enemies.<br /></span> +<span>Five feathers he wore of the great Wanmdeè<br /></span> +<span>And each for the scalp of a warrior slain,<br /></span> +<span>When down on his camp from the northern plain,<br /></span> +<span>With their murder-cries rode the bloody <i>Cree</i>.<a name='FNanchor_35'></a><a href='#Footnote_35'><sup>[35]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>But never the stain of an infant slain,<br /></span> +<span>Or the blood of a mother that plead in vain,<br /></span> +<span>Soiled the honored plumes of the brave <i>Hóhè</i>.<br /></span> +<span>A mountain bear to his enemies,<br /></span> +<span>To his friends like the red fawn's dappled form;<br /></span> +<span>In peace, like the breeze from the summer seas——<br /></span> +<span>In war, like the roar of the mountain storm.<br /></span> +<span>His fame in the voice of the winds went forth<br /></span> +<span>From his hunting grounds in the happy North,<br /></span> +<span>And far as the shores of the <i>Great Medè</i> <a name='FNanchor_36'></a><a href='#Footnote_36'><sup>[36]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>The nations spoke of the brave Chaskè.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dark was the visage of grim Red Cloud,<br /></span> +<span>Fierce were the eyes of the warrior proud,<br /></span> +<span>When the chief to his lodge led the brave <i>Hóhè</i>,<br /></span> +<span>And Wiwâstè smiled on the tall Chaskè.<br /></span> +<span>Away he strode with a sullen frown,<br /></span> +<span>And alone in his <i>teepee</i> he sat him down.<br /></span> +<span>From the gladsome greeting of braves he stole,<br /></span> +<span>And wrapped himself in his gloomy soul.<br /></span> +<span>But the eagle eyes of the Hârpstinà<br /></span> +<span>The clouded face of the warrior saw.<br /></span> +<span>Softly she spoke to the sullen brave:<br /></span> +<span>"Mah-pí-ya Dúta—his face is sad;<br /></span> +<span>And why is the warrior so glum and grave?<br /></span> +<span>For the fair Wiwâstè is gay and glad;<br /></span> +<span>She will sit in the <i>teepee</i> the live-long day,<br /></span> +<span>And laugh with her lover—the brave <i>Hóhè</i><br /></span> +<span>Does the tall Red Cloud for the false one sigh?<br /></span> +<span>There are fairer maidens than she, and proud<br /></span> +<span>Were their hearts to be loved by the brave Red Cloud.<br /></span> +<span>And trust not the chief with the smiling eyes;<br /></span> +<span>His tongue is swift, but his words are lies;<br /></span> +<span>And the proud Mah-pí-ya will surely find<br /></span> +<span>That Wakâwa's promise is hollow wind.<br /></span> +<span>Last night I stood by his lodge, and lo<br /></span> +<span>I heard the voice of the Little Crow;<br /></span> +<span>But the fox is sly and his words were low.<br /></span> +<span>But I heard her answer her father—'Never!<br /></span> +<span>I will stain your knife in my heart's red blood,<br /></span> +<span>I will plunge and sink in the sullen river,<br /></span> +<span>Ere I will be wife to the dark Red Cloud!'<br /></span> +<span>Then he spake again, and his voice was low,<br /></span> +<span>But I heard the answer of Little Crow:<br /></span> +<span>'Let it be as you will, for Wakâwa's tongue<br /></span> +<span>Has spoken no promise—his lips are slow,<br /></span> +<span>And the love of a father is deep and strong.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Mah-pí-ya Dúta, they scorn your love,<br /></span> +<span>But the false chief covets the warrior's gifts.<br /></span> +<span>False to his promise the fox will prove,<br /></span> +<span>And fickle as snow in <i>Wo-kâ-da-weè</i>, <a name='FNanchor_37'></a><a href='#Footnote_37'><sup>[37]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>That slips into brooks when the gray cloud lifts,<br /></span> +<span>Or the red sun looks through the ragged rifts.<br /></span> +<span>Mah-pí-ya Dúta will listen to me.<br /></span> +<span>There are fairer birds in the bush than she,<br /></span> +<span>And the fairest would gladly be Red Cloud's wife.<br /></span> +<span>Will the warrior sit like a girl bereft,<br /></span> +<span>When fairer and truer than she are left,<br /></span> +<span>That love Red Cloud as they love their life?<br /></span> +<span>Mah-pí-ya Dúta will listen to me.<br /></span> +<span>I love him well—I have loved him long:<br /></span> +<span>A woman is weak, but a warrior is strong,<br /></span> +<span>And a love-lorn brave is a scorn to see.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Mah-pí-ya Dúta, O listen to me!<br /></span> +<span>Revenge is swift and revenge is strong,<br /></span> +<span>And sweet as the hive in the hollow tree;<br /></span> +<span>The proud Red Cloud will avenge his wrong.<br /></span> +<span>Let the brave be patient, it is not long<br /></span> +<span>Till the leaves be green on the maple tree,<br /></span> +<span>And the Feast of the Virgins is then to be—<br /></span> +<span>The Feast of the Virgins is then to be!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Proudly she turned from the silent brave,<br /></span> +<span>And went her way; but the warrior's eyes—<br /></span> +<span>They flashed with the flame of a sudden fire,<br /></span> +<span>Like the lights that gleam in the Sacred Cave<a name='FNanchor_38'></a><a href='#Footnote_38'><sup>[38]</sup></a>,<br /></span> +<span>When the black night covers the autumn skies,<br /></span> +<span>And the stars from their welkin watch retire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Three nights he tarried—the brave Chaskè;<br /></span> +<span>Winged were the hours and they flitted away;<br /></span> +<span>On the wings of <i>Wakândee</i><a name='FNanchor_39'></a><a href='#Footnote_39'><sup>[39]</sup></a> they silently flew,<br /></span> +<span>For Wiwâstè had found her a way to woo.<br /></span> +<span>Ah little he cared for the bison-chase,<br /></span> +<span>For the red lilies bloomed on the fair maid's face;<br /></span> +<span>Ah little he cared for the winds that blew,<br /></span> +<span>For Wiwâstè had found her a way to woo.<br /></span> +<span>Brown-bosomed she sat on her fox-robe dark,<br /></span> +<span>Her ear to the tales of the brave inclined,<br /></span> +<span>Or tripped from the <i>tee</i> like the song of a lark,<br /></span> +<span>And gathered her hair from the wanton wind.<br /></span> +<span>Ah little he thought of the leagues of snow<br /></span> +<span>He trod on the trail of the buffalo;<br /></span> +<span>And little he recked of the hurricanes<br /></span> +<span>That swept the snow from the frozen plains<br /></span> +<span>And piled the banks of the Bloody River.<a name='FNanchor_40'></a><a href='#Footnote_40'><sup>[40]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>His bow unstrung and forgotten hung<br /></span> +<span>With his beaver hood and his otter quiver;<br /></span> +<span>He sat spell-bound by the artless grace<br /></span> +<span>Of her star-lit eyes and her moon-lit face.<br /></span> +<span>Ah little he cared for the storms that blew,<br /></span> +<span>For Wiwâstè had found her a way to woo.<br /></span> +<span>When he spoke with Wakâwa her sidelong eyes<br /></span> +<span>Sought the handsome chief in his hunter-guise.<br /></span> +<span>Wakâwa marked, and the lilies fair<br /></span> +<span>On her round cheeks spread to her raven hair.<br /></span> +<span>They feasted on rib of the bison fat,<br /></span> +<span>On the tongue of the <i>Ta</i><a name='FNanchor_41'></a><a href='#Footnote_41'><sup>[41]</sup></a> that the hunters prize,<br /></span> +<span>On the savory flesh of the red <i>Hogan</i>,<a name='FNanchor_42'></a><a href='#Footnote_42'><sup>[42]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>On sweet <i>tipsanna</i><a name='FNanchor_43'></a><a href='#Footnote_43'><sup>[43]</sup></a> and pemmican<br /></span> +<span>And the dun-brown cakes of the golden maize;<br /></span> +<span>And hour after hour the young chief sat,<br /></span> +<span>And feasted his soul on her love-lit eyes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The sweeter the moments the swifter they fly;<br /></span> +<span>Love takes no account of the fleeting hours;<br /></span> +<span>He walks in a dream 'mid the blooming of flowers,<br /></span> +<span>And never awakes till the blossoms die.<br /></span> +<span>Ah lovers are lovers the wide world over—<br /></span> +<span>In the hunter's lodge and the royal palace.<br /></span> +<span>Sweet are the lips of his love to the lover—<br /></span> +<span>Sweet as new wine in a golden chalice<br /></span> +<span>From the Tajo's<a name='FNanchor_44'></a><a href='#Footnote_44'><sup>[44]</sup></a> slope or the hills beyond;<br /></span> +<span>And blindly he sips from his loved one's lips,<br /></span> +<span>In lodge or palace the wide world over,<br /></span> +<span>The maddening honey of Trebizond.<a name='FNanchor_45'></a><a href='#Footnote_45'><sup>[45]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>O what are leagues to the loving hunter,<br /></span> +<span>Or the blinding drift of the hurricane,<br /></span> +<span>When it raves and roars o'er the frozen plain!<br /></span> +<span>He would face the storm—he would death encounter<br /></span> +<span>The darling prize of his heart to gain.<br /></span> +<span>But his hunters chafed at the long delay,<br /></span> +<span>For the swarthy bison were far away,<br /></span> +<span>And the brave young chief from the lodge departed.<br /></span> +<span>He promised to come with the robins in May<br /></span> +<span>With the bridal gifts for the bridal day;<br /></span> +<span>And the fair Wiwâstè was happy-hearted,<br /></span> +<span>For Wakâwa promised the brave Chaskè.<br /></span> +<span>Birds of a feather will flock together.<br /></span> +<span>The robin sings to his ruddy mate,<br /></span> +<span>And the chattering jays, in the winter weather,<br /></span> +<span>To prate and gossip will congregate;<br /></span> +<span>And the cawing crows on the autumn heather,<br /></span> +<span>Like evil omens, will flock together,<br /></span> +<span>In common council for high debate;<br /></span> +<span>And the lass will slip from a doting mother<br /></span> +<span>To hang with her lad on the garden gate.<br /></span> +<span>Birds of a feather will flock together—<br /></span> +<span>'Tis an adage old—it is nature's law,<br /></span> +<span>And sure as the pole will the needle draw,<br /></span> +<span>The fierce Red Cloud with the flaunting feather,<br /></span> +<span>Will follow the finger of Hârpstinà.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The winter wanes and the south-wind blows<br /></span> +<span>From the Summer Islands legendary;<br /></span> +<span>The <i>skéskas</i><a name='FNanchor_46'></a><a href='#Footnote_46'><sup>[46]</sup></a> fly and the melted snows<br /></span> +<span>In lakelets lie on the dimpled prairie.<br /></span> +<span>The frost-flowers<a name='FNanchor_47'></a><a href='#Footnote_47'><sup>[47]</sup></a> peep from their winter sleep<br /></span> +<span>Under the snow-drifts cold and deep.<br /></span> +<span>To the April sun and the April showers,<br /></span> +<span>In field and forest, the baby flowers<br /></span> +<span>Lift their blushing faces and dewy eyes;<br /></span> +<span>And wet with the tears of the winter-fairies,<br /></span> +<span>Soon bloom and blossom the emerald prairies,<br /></span> +<span>Like the fabled Garden of Paradise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The plum-trees, white with their bloom in May,<br /></span> +<span>Their sweet perfume on the vernal breeze<br /></span> +<span>Wide strew like the isles of the tropic seas<br /></span> +<span>Where the paroquet chatters the livelong day.<br /></span> +<span>But the May-days pass and the brave Chaskè <a name='FNanchor_17'></a><a href='#Footnote_17'><sup>[17]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>O why does the lover so long delay?<br /></span> +<span>Wiwâstè waits in the lonely <i>tee</i>.<br /></span> +<span>Has her fair face fled from his memory?<br /></span> +<span>For the robin cherups his mate to please,<br /></span> +<span>The blue-bird pipes in the poplar-trees,<br /></span> +<span>The meadow lark warbles his jubilees,<br /></span> +<span>Shrilling his song in the azure seas<br /></span> +<span>Till the welkin throbs to his melodies,<br /></span> +<span>And low is the hum of the humble-bees,<br /></span> +<span>And the Feast of the Virgins is now to be.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h3>THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>The sun sails high in his azure realms;<br /></span> +<span>Beneath the arch of the breezy elms<br /></span> +<span>The feast is spread by the murmuring river.<br /></span> +<span>With his battle-spear and his bow and quiver,<br /></span> +<span>And eagle-plumes in his ebon hair,<br /></span> +<span>The chief Wakâwa himself is there;<br /></span> +<span>And round the feast, in the Sacred Ring,<a name='FNanchor_48'></a><a href='#Footnote_48'><sup>[48]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Sit his weaponed warriors witnessing.<br /></span> +<span>Not a morsel of food have the Virgins tasted<br /></span> +<span>For three long days ere the holy feast;<br /></span> +<span>They sat in their <i>teepee</i> alone and fasted,<br /></span> +<span>Their faces turned to the Sacred East.<a name='FNanchor_21'></a><a href='#Footnote_21'><sup>[21]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>In the polished bowls lies the golden maize,<br /></span> +<span>And the flesh of fawn on the polished trays.<br /></span> +<span>For the Virgins the bloom of the prairies wide—<br /></span> +<span>The blushing pink and the meek blue-bell,<br /></span> +<span>The purple plumes of the prairie's pride,<a name='FNanchor_49'></a><a href='#Footnote_49'><sup>[49]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>The wild, uncultured asphodel,<br /></span> +<span>And the beautiful, blue-eyed violet<br /></span> +<span>That the Virgins call "Let-me-not forget,"<br /></span> +<span>In gay festoons and garlands twine<br /></span> +<span>With the cedar sprigs<a name='FNanchor_50'></a><a href='#Footnote_50'><sup>[50]</sup></a> and the wildwood vine.<br /></span> +<span>So gaily the Virgins are decked and dressed,<br /></span> +<span>And none but a virgin may enter there;<br /></span> +<span>And clad is each in a scarlet vest,<br /></span> +<span>And a fawn-skin frock to the brown calves bare.<br /></span> +<span>Wild rose-buds peep from their flowing hair,<br /></span> +<span>And a rose half blown on the budding breast;<br /></span> +<span>And bright with the quills of the porcupine<br /></span> +<span>The moccasined feet of the maidens shine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hand in hand round the feast they dance,<br /></span> +<span>And sing to the notes of a rude bassoon,<br /></span> +<span>And never a pause or a dissonance<br /></span> +<span>In the merry dance or the merry tune.<br /></span> +<span>Brown-bosomed and fair as the rising moon,<br /></span> +<span>When she peeps o'er the hills of the dewy east,<br /></span> +<span>Wiwâstè sings at the Virgins' Feast;<br /></span> +<span>And bright is the light in her luminous eyes;<br /></span> +<span>They glow like the stars in the winter skies;<br /></span> +<span>And the lilies that bloom in her virgin heart<br /></span> +<span>Their golden blush to her cheeks impart—<br /></span> +<span>Her cheeks half-hid in her midnight hair.<br /></span> +<span>Fair is her form—as the red fawn's fair—<br /></span> +<span>And long is the flow of her raven hair;<br /></span> +<span>It falls to her knees and it streams on the breeze<br /></span> +<span>Like the path of a storm on the swelling seas.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Proud of their rites are the Virgins fair,<br /></span> +<span>For none but a virgin may enter there.<br /></span> +<span>'Tis a custom of old and a sacred thing;<br /></span> +<span>Nor rank nor beauty the warriors spare,<br /></span> +<span>If a tarnished maiden should enter there.<br /></span> +<span>And her that enters the Sacred Ring<br /></span> +<span>With a blot that is known or a secret stain<br /></span> +<span>The warrior who knows is bound to expose,<br /></span> +<span>And lead her forth from the ring again.<br /></span> +<span>And the word of a brave is the fiat of law;<br /></span> +<span>For the Virgins' Feast is a sacred thing.<br /></span> +<span>Aside with the mothers sat Hârpstinà;<br /></span> +<span>She durst not enter the Virgins' ring.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Round and round to the merry song<br /></span> +<span>The maidens dance in their gay attire,<br /></span> +<span>While the loud <i>Ho-Ho's</i> of the tawny throng<br /></span> +<span>Their flying feet and their song inspire.<br /></span> +<span>They have finished the song and the sacred dance,<br /></span> +<span>And hand in hand to the feast advance—<br /></span> +<span>To the polished bowls of the golden maize,<br /></span> +<span>And the sweet fawn-meat in the polished trays.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then up from his seat in the silent crowd<br /></span> +<span>Rose the frowning, fierce-eyed, tall Red Cloud;<br /></span> +<span>Swift was his stride as the panther's spring,<br /></span> +<span>When he leaps on the fawn from his cavern lair;<br /></span> +<span>Wiwâstè he caught by her flowing hair,<br /></span> +<span>And dragged her forth from the Sacred Ring.<br /></span> +<span>She turned on the warrior, her eyes flashed fire;<br /></span> +<span>Her proud lips quivered with queenly ire;<br /></span> +<span>And her sun-browned cheeks were aflame with red.<br /></span> +<span>Her hand to the spirits she raised and said:<br /></span> +<span>"I am pure!—I am pure as the falling snow!<br /></span> +<span>Great <i>Tâku-skán-skán</i><a name='FNanchor_51'></a><a href='#Footnote_51'><sup>[51]</sup></a> will testify!<br /></span> +<span>And dares the tall coward to say me no?"<br /></span> +<span>But the sullen warrior made no reply.<br /></span> +<span>She turned to the chief with her frantic cries:<br /></span> +<span>"Wakâwa,—my Father! he lies,—he lies!<br /></span> +<span>Wiwâstè is pure as the fawn unborn;<br /></span> +<span>Lead me back to the feast or Wiwâstè dies!"<br /></span> +<span>But the warriors uttered a cry of scorn,<br /></span> +<span>And he turned his face from her pleading eyes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then the sullen warrior, the tall Red Cloud,<br /></span> +<span>Looked up and spoke and his voice was loud;<br /></span> +<span>But he held his wrath and he spoke with care:<br /></span> +<span>"Wiwâstè is young; she is proud and fair,<br /></span> +<span>But she may not boast of the virgin snows.<br /></span> +<span>The Virgins' Feast is a sacred thing;<br /></span> +<span>How durst she enter the Virgins' ring?<br /></span> +<span>The warrior would fain, but he dares not spare;<br /></span> +<span>She is tarnished and only the Red Cloud knows."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>She clutched her hair in her clinchèd hand;<br /></span> +<span>She stood like a statue bronzed and grand;<br /></span> +<span><i>Wakân-deè</i><a name='FNanchor_39'></a><a href='#Footnote_39'><sup>[39]</sup></a> flashed in her fiery eyes;<br /></span> +<span>Then swift as the meteor cleaves the skies—<br /></span> +<span>Nay, swift as the fiery <i>Wakinyan's</i><a name='FNanchor_32'></a><a href='#Footnote_32'><sup>[32]</sup></a> dart,<br /></span> +<span>She snatched the knife from the warrior's belt,<br /></span> +<span>And plunged it clean to the polished hilt—<br /></span> +<span>With a deadly cry—in the villain's heart.<br /></span> +<span>Staggering he clutched the air and fell;<br /></span> +<span>His life-blood smoked on the trampled sand,<br /></span> +<span>And dripped from the knife in the virgin's hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then rose his kinsmen's savage yell.<br /></span> +<span>Swift as the doe's Wiwâstè's feet<br /></span> +<span>Fled away to the forest. The hunters fleet<br /></span> +<span>In vain pursue, and in vain they prowl<br /></span> +<span>And lurk in the forest till dawn of day.<br /></span> +<span>They hear the hoot of the mottled owl;<br /></span> +<span>They hear the were-wolf's<a name='FNanchor_52'></a><a href='#Footnote_52'><sup>[52]</sup></a> winding howl;<br /></span> +<span>But the swift Wiwâstè is far away.<br /></span> +<span>They found no trace in the forest land;<br /></span> +<span>They found no trail in the dew-damp grass;<br /></span> +<span>They found no track in the river sand,<br /></span> +<span>Where they thought Wiwâstè would surely pass.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The braves returned to the troubled chief;<br /></span> +<span>In his lodge he sat in his silent grief.<br /></span> +<span>"Surely," they said, "she has turned a spirit.<br /></span> +<span>No trail she left with her flying feet;<br /></span> +<span>No pathway leads to her far retreat.<br /></span> +<span>She flew in the air, and her wail—we could hear it,<br /></span> +<span>As she upward rose to the shining stars;<br /></span> +<span>And we heard on the river, as we stood near it,<br /></span> +<span>The falling drops of Wiwâstè's tears."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Wakâwa thought of his daughter's words<br /></span> +<span>Ere the south-wind came and the piping birds—<br /></span> +<span>"My Father, listen—my words are true,"<br /></span> +<span>And sad was her voice as the whippowil<br /></span> +<span>When she mourns her mate by the moon-lit rill,<br /></span> +<span>"Wiwâstè lingers alone with you;<br /></span> +<span>The rest are sleeping on yonder hill—<br /></span> +<span>Save one—and he an undutiful son—<br /></span> +<span>And you, my Father, will sit alone<br /></span> +<span>When <i>Sisóka</i><a name='FNanchor_53'></a><a href='#Footnote_53'><sup>[53]</sup></a> sings and the snow is gone."<br /></span> +<span>His broad breast heaved on his troubled soul,<br /></span> +<span>The shadow of grief o'er his visage stole<br /></span> +<span>Like a cloud on the face of the setting sun.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>[Illustration]<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"She has followed the years that are gone," he said;<br /></span> +<span>"The spirits the words of the witch fulfill;<br /></span> +<span>For I saw the ghost of my father dead,<br /></span> +<span>By the moon's dim light on the misty hill.<br /></span> +<span>He shook the plumes on his withered head,<br /></span> +<span>And the wind through his pale form whistled shrill.<br /></span> +<span>And a low, sad voice on the hill I heard,<br /></span> +<span>Like the mournful wail of a widowed bird."<br /></span> +<span>Then lo, as he looked from his lodge afar,<br /></span> +<span>He saw the glow of the Evening-star;<br /></span> +<span>"And yonder," he said, "is Wiwâstè's face;<br /></span> +<span>She looks from her lodge on our fading race,<br /></span> +<span>Devoured by famine, and fraud, and war,<br /></span> +<span>And chased and hounded by fate and woe,<br /></span> +<span>As the white wolves follow the buffalo;"<br /></span> +<span>And he named the planet the <i>Virgin Star</i>.<a name='FNanchor_54'></a><a href='#Footnote_54'><sup>[54]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Wakâwa," he muttered, "the guilt is thine!<br /></span> +<span>She was pure—she was pure as the fawn unborn.<br /></span> +<span>O why did I hark to the cry of scorn,<br /></span> +<span>Or the words of the lying libertine?<br /></span> +<span>Wakâwa, Wakâwa, the guilt is thine!<br /></span> +<span>The springs will return with the voice of birds,<br /></span> +<span>But the voice of my daughter will come no more.<br /></span> +<span>She wakened the woods with her musical words,<br /></span> +<span>And the sky-lark, ashamed of his voice, forbore.<br /></span> +<span>She called back the years that had passed, and long<br /></span> +<span>I heard their voice in her happy song.<br /></span> +<span>O why did the chief of the tall <i>Hóhè</i><br /></span> +<span>His feet from <i>Kapóza</i><a name='FNanchor_6'></a><a href='#Footnote_6'><sup>[6]</sup></a> so long delay?<br /></span> +<span>For his father sat at my father's feast,<br /></span> +<span>And he at Wakâwa's—an honored guest.<br /></span> +<span>He is dead!—he is slain on the Bloody Plain,<br /></span> +<span>By the hand of the treacherous Chippeway;<br /></span> +<span>And the face shall I never behold again<br /></span> +<span>Of my brave young brother—the chief Chaskè.<br /></span> +<span>Death walks like a shadow among my kin;<br /></span> +<span>And swift are the feet of the flying years<br /></span> +<span>That cover Wakâwa with frost and tears,<br /></span> +<span>And leave their tracks on his wrinkled skin.<br /></span> +<span>Wakâwa, the voice of the years that are gone<br /></span> +<span>Will follow thy feet like the shadow of death,<br /></span> +<span>Till the paths of the forest and desert lone<br /></span> +<span>Shall forget thy footsteps. O living breath,<br /></span> +<span>Whence are thou, and whither so soon to fly?<br /></span> +<span>And whence are the years? Shall I overtake<br /></span> +<span>Their flying feet in the star-lit sky?<br /></span> +<span>From his last long sleep will the warrior wake?<br /></span> +<span>Will the morning break in Wakâwa's tomb,<br /></span> +<span>As it breaks and glows in the eastern skies?<br /></span> +<span>Is it true?—will the spirits of kinsmen come<br /></span> +<span>And bid the bones of the brave arise?<br /></span> +<span>Wakâwa, Wakâwa, for thee the years<br /></span> +<span>Are red with blood and bitter with tears.<br /></span> +<span>Gone—brothers, and daughters, and wife—all gone<br /></span> +<span>That are kin to Wakâwa—but one—but one—<br /></span> +<span>Wakínyan Tânka—undutiful son!<br /></span> +<span>And he estranged from his father's <i>tee</i>,<br /></span> +<span>Will never return till the chief shall die.<br /></span> +<span>And what cares he for his father's grief?<br /></span> +<span>He will smile at my death—it will make him chief.<br /></span> +<span>Woe burns in my bosom. Ho, warriors—Ho!<br /></span> +<span>Raise the song of red war; for your chief must go<br /></span> +<span>To drown his grief in the blood of the foe!<br /></span> +<span>I shall fall. Raise my mound on the sacred hill.<br /></span> +<span>Let my warriors the wish of their chief fulfill;<br /></span> +<span>For my fathers sleep in the sacred ground.<br /></span> +<span>The Autumn blasts o'er Wakâwa's mound<br /></span> +<span>Will chase the hair of the thistles' head,<br /></span> +<span>And the bare-armed oak o'er the silent dead,<br /></span> +<span>When the whirling snows from the north descend,<br /></span> +<span>Will wail and moan in the midnight wind.<br /></span> +<span>In the famine of winter the wolf will prowl,<br /></span> +<span>And scratch the snow from the heap of stones,<br /></span> +<span>And sit in the gathering storm and howl,<br /></span> +<span>On the frozen mound, for Wakâwa's bones.<br /></span> +<span>But the years that are gone shall return again,<br /></span> +<span>As the robin returns and the whippowil,<br /></span> +<span>When my warriors stand on the sacred hill<br /></span> +<span>And remember the deeds of their brave chief slain."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Beneath the glow of the Virgin Star<br /></span> +<span>They raised the song of the red war-dance.<br /></span> +<span>At the break of dawn with the bow and lance<br /></span> +<span>They followed the chief on the path of war.<br /></span> +<span>To the north—to the forests of fir and pine—<br /></span> +<span>Led their stealthy steps on the winding trail,<br /></span> +<span>Till they saw the Lake of the Spirit<a name='FNanchor_55'></a><a href='#Footnote_55'><sup>[55]</sup></a> shine<br /></span> +<span>Through somber pines of the dusky dale.<br /></span> +<span>Then they heard the hoot of the mottled owl;<a name='FNanchor_56'></a><a href='#Footnote_56'><sup>[56]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>They heard the gray wolf's dismal howl;<br /></span> +<span>Then shrill and sudden the war-whoop rose<br /></span> +<span>From an hundred throats of their swarthy foes,<br /></span> +<span>In ambush crouched in the tangled wood.<br /></span> +<span>Death shrieked in the twang of their deadly bows,<br /></span> +<span>And their hissing arrows drank brave men's blood.<br /></span> +<span>From rock, and thicket, and brush, and brakes,<br /></span> +<span>Gleamed the burning eyes of the "forest-snakes."<a name='FNanchor_57'></a><a href='#Footnote_57'><sup>[57]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>From brake, and thicket, and brush, and stone,<br /></span> +<span>The bow-string hummed and the arrow hissed,<br /></span> +<span>And the lance of a crouching Ojibway shone,<br /></span> +<span>Or the scalp-knife gleamed in a swarthy fist.<br /></span> +<span>Undaunted the braves of Wakâwa's band<br /></span> +<span>Leaped into the thicket with lance and knife,<br /></span> +<span>And grappled the Chippeways hand to hand;<br /></span> +<span>And foe with foe, in the deadly strife,<br /></span> +<span>Lay clutching the scalp of his foe and dead,<br /></span> +<span>With a tomahawk sunk in his ghastly head,<br /></span> +<span>Or his still heart sheathing a bloody blade.<br /></span> +<span>Like a bear in the battle Wakâwa raves,<br /></span> +<span>And cheers the hearts of his falling braves.<br /></span> +<span>But a panther crouches along his track—<br /></span> +<span>He springs with a yell on Wakâwa's back!<br /></span> +<span>The tall chief, stabbed to the heart, lies low;<br /></span> +<span>But his left hand clutches his deadly foe,<br /></span> +<span>And his red right clinches the bloody hilt<br /></span> +<span>Of his knife in the heart of the slayer dyed.<br /></span> +<span>And thus was the life of Wakâwa spilt,<br /></span> +<span>And slain and slayer lay side by side.<br /></span> +<span>The unscalped corpse of their honored chief<br /></span> +<span>His warriors snatched from the yelling pack,<br /></span> +<span>And homeward fled on their forest track<br /></span> +<span>With their bloody burden and load of grief.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The spirits the words of the brave fulfill—<br /></span> +<span>Wakâwa sleeps on the sacred hill,<br /></span> +<span>And Wakínyan Tânka, his son, is chief.<br /></span> +<span>Ah soon shall the lips of men forget<br /></span> +<span>Wakâwa's name, and the mound of stone<br /></span> +<span>Will speak of the dead to the winds alone,<br /></span> +<span>And the winds will whistle their mock regret.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The speckled cones of the scarlet berries<a name='FNanchor_58'></a><a href='#Footnote_58'><sup>[58]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Lie red and ripe in the prairie grass.<br /></span> +<span>The <i>Si-yo</i><a name='FNanchor_59'></a><a href='#Footnote_59'><sup>[59]</sup></a> clucks on the emerald prairies<br /></span> +<span>To her infant brood. From the wild morass,<br /></span> +<span>On the sapphire lakelet set within it,<br /></span> +<span><i>Magâ</i> sails forth with her wee ones daily.<br /></span> +<span>They ride on the dimpling waters gaily,<br /></span> +<span>Like a fleet of yachts and a man-of-war.<br /></span> +<span>The piping plover, the light-winged linnet,<br /></span> +<span>And the swallow sail in the sunset skies.<br /></span> +<span>The whippowil from her cover hies,<br /></span> +<span>And trills her song on the amber air.<br /></span> +<span>Anon to her loitering mate she cries:<br /></span> +<span>"Flip, O Will!—trip, O Will!—skip, O Will!"<br /></span> +<span>And her merry mate from afar replies:<br /></span> +<span>"Flip I will—skip I will—trip I will;"<br /></span> +<span>And away on the wings of the wind he flies.<br /></span> +<span>And bright from her lodge in the skies afar<br /></span> +<span>Peeps the glowing face of the Virgin Star.<br /></span> +<span>The fox-pups<a name='FNanchor_60'></a><a href='#Footnote_60'><sup>[60]</sup></a> creep from their mother's lair,<br /></span> +<span>And leap in the light of the rising moon;<br /></span> +<span>And loud on the luminous, moonlit lake<br /></span> +<span>Shrill the bugle-notes of the lover loon;<br /></span> +<span>And woods and waters and welkin break<br /></span> +<span>Into jubilant song—it is joyful June.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But where is Wiwâstè? O where is she—<br /></span> +<span>The virgin avenged—the queenly queen—<br /></span> +<span>The womanly woman—the heroine?<br /></span> +<span>Has she gone to the spirits? and can it be<br /></span> +<span>That her beautiful face is the Virgin Star<br /></span> +<span>Peeping out from the door of her lodge afar,<br /></span> +<span>Or upward sailing the silver sea,<br /></span> +<span>Star-beaconed and lit like an avenue,<br /></span> +<span>In the shining stern of her gold canoe?<br /></span> +<span>No tidings came—nor the brave Chaskè:<br /></span> +<span>O why did the lover so long delay?<br /></span> +<span>He promised to come with the robins in May<br /></span> +<span>With the bridal gifts for the bridal day;<br /></span> +<span>But the fair May-mornings have slipped away,<br /></span> +<span>And where is the lover—the brave Chaskè?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But what of the venomous Hârpstinà—<br /></span> +<span>The serpent that tempted the proud Red Cloud,<br /></span> +<span>And kindled revenge in his savage soul?<br /></span> +<span>He paid for his crime with his own heart's blood,<br /></span> +<span>But his angry spirit has brought her dole;<a name='FNanchor_61'></a><a href='#Footnote_61'><sup>[61]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>It has entered her breast and her burning head,<br /></span> +<span>And she raves and burns on her fevered bed.<br /></span> +<span>"He is dead! He is dead!" is her wailing cry,<br /></span> +<span>"And the blame is mine—it was I—it was I!<br /></span> +<span>I hated Wiwâstè, for she was fair,<br /></span> +<span>And my brave was caught in her net of hair.<br /></span> +<span>I turned his love to a bitter hate;<br /></span> +<span>I nourished revenge, and I pricked his pride;<br /></span> +<span>Till the Feast of the Virgins I bade him wait.<br /></span> +<span>He had his revenge, but he died—he died!<br /></span> +<span>And the blame is mine—it was I—it was I!<br /></span> +<span>And his spirit burns me; I die—I die!"<br /></span> +<span>Thus, alone in her lodge and her agonies,<br /></span> +<span>She wails to the winds of the night, and dies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But where is Wiwâstè? Her swift feet flew<br /></span> +<span>To the somber shades of the tangled thicket.<br /></span> +<span>She hid in the copse like a wary cricket,<br /></span> +<span>And the fleetest hunters in vain pursue.<br /></span> +<span>Seeing unseen from her hiding place,<br /></span> +<span>She sees them fly on the hurried chase;<br /></span> +<span>She sees their dark eyes glance and dart,<br /></span> +<span>As they pass and peer for a track or trace,<br /></span> +<span>And she trembles with fear in the copse apart,<br /></span> +<span>Lest her nest be betrayed by her throbbing heart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Weary the hours; but the sun at last<br /></span> +<span>Went down to his lodge in the west, and fast<br /></span> +<span>The wings of the spirits of night were spread<br /></span> +<span>O'er the darkling woods and Wiwâstè's head.<br /></span> +<span>Then slyly she slipped from her snug retreat,<br /></span> +<span>And guiding her course by Wazíya's star,<a name='FNanchor_62'></a><a href='#Footnote_62'><sup>[62]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>That shone through the shadowy forms afar,<br /></span> +<span>She northward hurried with silent feet;<br /></span> +<span>And long ere the sky was aflame in the east,<br /></span> +<span>She was leagues from the spot of the fatal feast.<br /></span> +<span>'Twas the hoot of the owl that the hunters heard,<br /></span> +<span>And the scattering drops of the threat'ning shower,<br /></span> +<span>And the far wolf's cry to the moon preferred.<br /></span> +<span>Their ears were their fancies—the scene was weird,<br /></span> +<span>And the witches<a name='FNanchor_63'></a><a href='#Footnote_63'><sup>[63]</sup></a> dance at the midnight hour.<br /></span> +<span>She leaped the brook and she swam the river;<br /></span> +<span>Her course through the forest Wiwâstè wist<br /></span> +<span>By the star that gleamed through the glimmering mist<br /></span> +<span>That fell from the dim moon's downy quiver.<br /></span> +<span>In her heart she spoke to her spirit-mother:<br /></span> +<span>"Look down from your <i>teepee</i>, O starry spirit.<br /></span> +<span>The cry of Wiwâstè. O mother, hear it;<br /></span> +<span>And touch the heart of my cruel father.<br /></span> +<span>He hearkened not to a virgin's words;<br /></span> +<span>He listened not to a daughter's wail.<br /></span> +<span>O give me the wings of the thunder-birds,<br /></span> +<span>For his were wolves<a name='FNanchor_52'></a><a href='#Footnote_52'><sup>[52]</sup></a> follow Wiwâstè's trail;<br /></span> +<span>And guide my flight to the far <i>Hóhè</i>—<br /></span> +<span>To the sheltering lodge of my brave Chaskè."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The shadows paled in the hazy east,<br /></span> +<span>And the light of the kindling morn increased.<br /></span> +<span>The pale-faced stars fled one by one,<br /></span> +<span>And hid in the vast from the rising sun.<br /></span> +<span>From woods and waters and welkin soon<br /></span> +<span>Fled the hovering mists of the vanished moon.<br /></span> +<span>The young robins chirped in their feathery beds,<br /></span> +<span>The loon's song shrilled like a winding horn,<br /></span> +<span>And the green hills lifted their dewy heads<br /></span> +<span>To greet the god of the rising morn.<br /></span> +<span>She reached the rim of the rolling prairie—<br /></span> +<span>The boundless ocean of solitude;<br /></span> +<span>She hid in the feathery hazel-wood,<br /></span> +<span>For her heart was sick and her feet were weary;<br /></span> +<span>She fain would rest, and she needed food.<br /></span> +<span>Alone by the billowy, boundless prairies,<br /></span> +<span>She plucked the cones of the scarlet berries;<br /></span> +<span>In feathering copse and the grassy field<br /></span> +<span>She found the bulbs of the young <i>Tipsânna</i>,<a name='FNanchor_43'></a><a href='#Footnote_43'><sup>[43]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And the sweet <i>medó</i> <a name='FNanchor_64'></a><a href='#Footnote_64'><sup>[64]</sup></a> that the meadows yield.<br /></span> +<span>With the precious gift of his priceless manna<br /></span> +<span>God fed his fainting and famished child.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>At night again to the northward far<br /></span> +<span>She followed the torch of Wazíya's star;<br /></span> +<span>For leagues away o'er the prairies green,<br /></span> +<span>On the billowy vast, may a man be seen,<br /></span> +<span>When the sun is high and the stars are low;<br /></span> +<span>And the sable breast of the strutting crow<br /></span> +<span>Looms up like the form of the buffalo.<br /></span> +<span>The Bloody River <a name='FNanchor_40'></a><a href='#Footnote_40'><sup>[40]</sup></a> she reached at last,<br /></span> +<span>And boldly walked in the light of day,<br /></span> +<span>On the level plain of the valley vast;<br /></span> +<span>Nor thought of the terrible Chippeway.<br /></span> +<span>She was safe from the wolves of her father's band,<br /></span> +<span>But she trod on the treacherous "Bloody Land."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>[Illustration]<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And lo—from afar o'er the level plain—<br /></span> +<span>As far as the sails of a ship at sea<br /></span> +<span>May be seen as they lift from the rolling main—<br /></span> +<span>A band of warriors rode rapidly.<br /></span> +<span>She shadowed her eyes with her sun-browned hand;<br /></span> +<span>All backward streamed on the wind her hair,<br /></span> +<span>And terror spread o'er her visage fair,<br /></span> +<span>As she bent her brow to the far-off band.<br /></span> +<span>For she thought of the terrible Chippeway—<br /></span> +<span>The fiends that the babe and the mother slay;<br /></span> +<span>And yonder they came in their war-array!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>She hid like a grouse in the meadow-grass,<br /></span> +<span>And moaned—"I am lost!—I am lost! alas,<br /></span> +<span>And why did I fly from my native land<br /></span> +<span>To die by the cruel Ojibway's hand?"<br /></span> +<span>And on rode the braves. She could hear the steeds<br /></span> +<span>Come galloping on o'er the level meads;<br /></span> +<span>And lowly she crouched in the waving grass,<br /></span> +<span>And hoped against hope that the braves would pass.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>They have passed; she is safe—she is safe!<br /></span> +<span>Ah no! They have struck her trail and the hunters halt.<br /></span> +<span>Like wolves on the track of the bleeding doe,<br /></span> +<span>That grappled breaks from the dread assault,<br /></span> +<span>Dash the warriors wild on Wiwâstè's trail.<br /></span> +<span>She flies—but what can her flight avail?<br /></span> +<span>Her feet are fleet, but the flying feet<br /></span> +<span>Of the steeds of the prairies are fleeter still;<br /></span> +<span>And where can she fly for a safe retreat?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But hark to the shouting—"<i>Ihó!—Ihó!</i>"<a name='FNanchor_22'></a><a href='#Footnote_22'><sup>[22]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Rings over the wide plain sharp and shrill.<br /></span> +<span>She halts, and the hunters come riding on;<br /></span> +<span>But the horrible fear from her heart is gone,<br /></span> +<span>For it is not the shout of the dreaded foe;<br /></span> +<span>'Tis the welcome shout of her native land!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Up galloped the chief of the band, and lo—<br /></span> +<span>The clutched knife dropped from her trembling hand;<br /></span> +<span>She uttered a cry and she swooned away;<br /></span> +<span>For there, on his steed in the blaze of day,<br /></span> +<span>On the boundless prairie so far away,<br /></span> +<span>With his polished bow and his feathers gay,<br /></span> +<span>Sat the manly form of her own Chaskè!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>There's a mote in my eye or a blot on the page,<br /></span> +<span>And I cannot tell of the joyful greeting;<br /></span> +<span>You may take it for granted, and I will engage,<br /></span> +<span>There were kisses and tears at the strange, glad meeting;<br /></span> +<span>For aye since the birth of the swift-winged years,<br /></span> +<span>In the desert drear, in the field of clover,<br /></span> +<span>In the cot, in the palace, and all the world over—<br /></span> +<span>Yea, away on the stars to the ultimate spheres,<br /></span> +<span>The greeting of love to the long-sought lover—<br /></span> +<span>Is tears and kisses and kisses and tears.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But why did the lover so long delay?<br /></span> +<span>And whitherward rideth the chief to-day?<br /></span> +<span>As he followed the trail of the buffalo,<br /></span> +<span>From the <i>tees</i> of <i>Kapóza</i> a maiden, lo,<br /></span> +<span>Came running in haste o'er the drifted snow.<br /></span> +<span>She spoke to the chief of the tall <i>Hóhè</i>:<br /></span> +<span>"Wiwâstè requests that the brave Chaskè<br /></span> +<span>Will abide with his band and his coming delay<br /></span> +<span>Till the moon when the strawberries are ripe and red,<br /></span> +<span>And then will the chief and Wiwâstè wed—<br /></span> +<span>When the Feast of the Virgins is past," she said.<br /></span> +<span>Wiwâstè's wish was her lover's law;<br /></span> +<span>And so his coming the chief delayed<br /></span> +<span>Till the mid May blossoms should bloom and fade—<br /></span> +<span>But the lying runner was Hârpstinà.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And now with the gifts for the bridal day<br /></span> +<span>And his chosen warriors he took his way,<br /></span> +<span>And followed his heart to his moon-faced maid.<br /></span> +<span>And thus was the lover so long delayed;<br /></span> +<span>And so as he rode with his warriors gay,<br /></span> +<span>On that bright and beautiful summer day,<br /></span> +<span>His bride he met on the trail mid-way.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>God arms the innocent. He is there—<br /></span> +<span>In the desert vast, in the wilderness,<br /></span> +<span>On the bellowing sea, in the lion's lair,<br /></span> +<span>In the mist of battle, and everywhere.<br /></span> +<span>In his hand he holds with a father's care<br /></span> +<span>The tender hearts of the motherless;<br /></span> +<span>The maid and the mother in sore distress<br /></span> +<span>He shields with his love and his tenderness;<br /></span> +<span>He comforts the widowed—the comfortless—<br /></span> +<span>And sweetens her chalice of bitterness;<br /></span> +<span>He clothes the naked—the numberless—<br /></span> +<span>His charity covers their nakedness—<br /></span> +<span>And he feeds the famished and fatherless<br /></span> +<span>With the hand that feedeth the birds of air.<br /></span> +<span>Let the myriad tongues of the earth confess<br /></span> +<span>His infinite love and his holiness;<br /></span> +<span>For his pity pities the pitiless,<br /></span> +<span>His mercy flows to the merciless;<br /></span> +<span>And the countless worlds in the realms above,<br /></span> +<span>Revolve in the light of his boundless love.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And what of the lovers? you ask, I trow.<br /></span> +<span>She told him all ere the sun was low—<br /></span> +<span>Why she fled from the Feast to a safe retreat.<br /></span> +<span>She laid her heart at her lover's feet,<br /></span> +<span>And her words were tears and her lips were slow.<br /></span> +<span>As she sadly related the bitter tale<br /></span> +<span>His face was aflame and anon grew pale,<br /></span> +<span>And his dark eyes flashed with a brave desire,<br /></span> +<span>Like the midnight gleam of the sacred fire. <a name='FNanchor_65'></a><a href='#Footnote_65'><sup>[65]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>"<i>Mitâwin,</i>"<a name='FNanchor_66'></a><a href='#Footnote_66'><sup>[66]</sup></a> he said, and his voice was low,<br /></span> +<span>"Thy father no more is the false Little Crow;<br /></span> +<span>But the fairest plume shall Wiwâstè wear<br /></span> +<span>Of the great <i>Wanmdeè</i> in her midnight hair.<br /></span> +<span>In my lodge, in the land of the tall <i>Hóhè</i>,<br /></span> +<span>The robins will sing all the long summer day<br /></span> +<span>To the happy bride of the brave Chaskè.'"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Aye, love is tested by stress and trial<br /></span> +<span>Since the finger of time on the endless dial<br /></span> +<span>Began its rounds, and the orbs to move<br /></span> +<span>In the boundless vast, and the sunbeams clove<br /></span> +<span>The chaos; but only by fate's denial<br /></span> +<span>Are fathomed the fathomless depths of love.<br /></span> +<span>Man is the rugged and wrinkled oak,<br /></span> +<span>And woman the trusting and tender vine<br /></span> +<span>That clasps and climbs till its arms entwine<br /></span> +<span>The brawny arms of the sturdy stock.<br /></span> +<span>The dimpled babes are the flowers divine<br /></span> +<span>That the blessing of God on the vine and oak<br /></span> +<span>With their cooing and blossoming lips invoke.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>To the pleasant land of the brave <i>Hóhè</i><br /></span> +<span>Wiwâstè rode with her proud Chaskè.<br /></span> +<span>She ruled like a queen in his bountiful <i>tee</i>,<br /></span> +<span>And the life of the twain was a jubilee<br /></span> +<span>Their wee ones climbed on the father's knee,<br /></span> +<span>And played with his plumes of the great <i>Wanmdeè</i>.<br /></span> +<span>The silken threads of the happy years<br /></span> +<span>They wove into beautiful robes of love<br /></span> +<span>That the spirits wear in the lodge above;<br /></span> +<span>And time from the reel of the rolling spheres<br /></span> +<span>His silver threads with the raven wove;<br /></span> +<span>But never the stain of a mother's tears<br /></span> +<span>Soiled the shining web of their happy years.<br /></span> +<span>When the wrinkled mask of the years they wore,<br /></span> +<span>And the raven hair of their youth was gray,<br /></span> +<span>Their love grew deeper, and more and more;<br /></span> +<span>For he was a lover for aye and aye,<br /></span> +<span>And ever her beautiful, brave Chaskè.<br /></span> +<span>Through the wrinkled mask of the hoary years<br /></span> +<span>To the loving eyes of the lover aye<br /></span> +<span>The blossom of beautiful youth appears.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>At last, when their locks were as white as snow,<br /></span> +<span>Beloved and honored by all the band,<br /></span> +<span>They silently slipped from their lodge below,<br /></span> +<span>And walked together, and hand in hand,<br /></span> +<span>O'er the Shining Path<a name='FNanchor_68'></a><a href='#Footnote_68'><sup>[68]</sup></a> to the Spirit-land,<br /></span> +<span>Where the hills and the meadows for aye and aye<br /></span> +<span>Are clad with the verdure and flowers of May,<br /></span> +<span>And the unsown prairies of Paradise<br /></span> +<span>Yield the golden maize and the sweet wild rice.<br /></span> +<span>There, ever ripe in the groves and prairies,<br /></span> +<span>Hang the purple plums and the luscious berries,<br /></span> +<span>And the swarthy herds of the bison feed<br /></span> +<span>On the sun-lit slope and the waving mead;<br /></span> +<span>The dappled fawns from their coverts peep,<br /></span> +<span>And countless flocks on the waters sleep;<br /></span> +<span>And the silent years with their fingers trace<br /></span> +<span>No furrows for aye on the hunter's face.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h4><span style="font-size: 80%">TO</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">THE MEMORY OF</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">MY DEVOTED WIFE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">DEAD AND GONE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">YET ALWAYS WITH ME</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">I DEDICATE</span><br /> +<br /> +PAULINE<br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">THE FLOWER OF MY HEART</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">NURSED INTO BLOOM BY HER LOVING CARE</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 80%">AND OFTTIMES WATERED WITH HER TEARS</span><br /> +<br /> +<span style="font-size: 95%">H.L.G.</span></h4> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<br /><br /> +<h2><a name="PAULINE" id="PAULINE" />PAULINE</h2> + +<h3><i>PART I</i></h3> + +<h4>INTRODUCTION</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Fair morning sat upon the mountain-top,<br /></span> +<span>Night skulking crept into the mountain-chasm.<br /></span> +<span>The silent ships slept in the silent bay;<br /></span> +<span>One broad blue bent of ether domed the heavens,<br /></span> +<span>One broad blue distance lay the shadowy land,<br /></span> +<span>One broad blue vast of silence slept the sea.<br /></span> +<span>Now from the dewy groves the joyful birds<br /></span> +<span>In carol-concert sang their matin songs<br /></span> +<span>Softly and sweetly—full of prayer and praise.<br /></span> +<span>Then silver-chiming, solemn-voiced bells<br /></span> +<span>Rung out their music on the morning air,<br /></span> +<span>And Lisbon gathered to the festival<br /></span> +<span>In chapel and cathedral. Choral hymns<br /></span> +<span>And psalms of sea-toned organs mingling rose<br /></span> +<span>With sweetest incense floating up to heaven,<br /></span> +<span>Bearing the praises of the multitudes;<br /></span> +<span>And all was holy peace and holy happiness.<br /></span> +<span>A rumbling of deep thunders in the deep;<br /></span> +<span>The vast sea shuddered and the mountains groaned;<br /></span> +<span>Up-heaved the solid earth—the nether rocks<br /></span> +<span>Burst—and the sea—the earth—the echoing heavens<br /></span> +<span>Thundered infernal ruin. On their knees<br /></span> +<span>The trembling multitudes received the shock,<br /></span> +<span>And dumb with sudden terror bowed their heads<br /></span> +<span>To toppling spire and plunging wall and dome.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>So shook the mighty North the sudden roar<br /></span> +<span>Of Treason thundering on the April air—<br /></span> +<span>An earthquake shock that jarred the granite hills<br /></span> +<span>And westward rolled against th' eternal walls<br /></span> +<span>Rock-built Titanic—for a moment shook:<br /></span> +<span>Uprose a giant and with iron hands<br /></span> +<span>Grasped his huge hammer, claspt his belt of steel,<br /></span> +<span>And o'er the Midgard-monster mighty Thor<br /></span> +<span>Loomed for the combat.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">Peace—O blessed Peace!<br /></span> +<span>The war-worn veterans hailed thee with a shout<br /></span> +<span>Of Alleluias;—homeward wound the trains,<br /></span> +<span>And homeward marched the bayonet-bristling columns<br /></span> +<span>To "<i>Hail Columbia</i>" from a thousand horns—<br /></span> +<span>Marched to the jubilee of chiming bells,<br /></span> +<span>Marched to the joyful peals of cannon, marched<br /></span> +<span>With blazing banners and victorious songs<br /></span> +<span>Into the outstretched arms of love and home.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But there be columns—columns of the dead<br /></span> +<span>That slumber on an hundred battle-fields—<br /></span> +<span>No bugle-blast shall waken till the trump<br /></span> +<span>Of the Archangel. O the loved and lost!<br /></span> +<span>For them no jubilee of chiming bells;<br /></span> +<span>For them no cannon-peal of victory;<br /></span> +<span>For them no outstretched arms of love and home.<br /></span> +<span>God's peace be with them. Heroes who went down,<br /></span> +<span>Wearing their stars, live in the nation's songs<br /></span> +<span>And stories—there be greater heroes still,<br /></span> +<span>That molder in unnumbered nameless graves<br /></span> +<span>Erst bleached unburied on the fields of fame<br /></span> +<span>Won by their valor. Who will sing of these—<br /></span> +<span>Sing of the patriot-deeds on field and flood—<br /></span> +<span>Of these—the truer heroes—all unsung?<br /></span> +<span>Where sleeps the modest bard in Quaker gray<br /></span> +<span>Who blew the pibroch ere the battle lowered,<br /></span> +<span>Then pitched his tent upon the balmy beach?<br /></span> +<span>"Snow-bound," I ween, among his native hills.<br /></span> +<span>And where the master hand that swept the lyre<br /></span> +<span>Till wrinkled critics cried "Excelsior"?<br /></span> +<span>Gathering the "Aftermath" in frosted fields.<br /></span> +<span>Then, timid Muse, no longer shake thy wings<br /></span> +<span>For airy realms and fold again in fear;<br /></span> +<span>A broken flight is better than no flight;<br /></span> +<span>Be thine the task, as best you may, to sing<br /></span> +<span>The deeds of one who sleeps at Gettysburg<br /></span> +<span>Among the thousands in a common grave.<br /></span> +<span>The story of his life I bid you tell<br /></span> +<span>As it was told one windy winter night<br /></span> +<span>To veterans gathered around the festal board,<br /></span> +<span>Fighting old battles over where the field<br /></span> +<span>Ran red with wine, and all the battle-blare<br /></span> +<span>Was merry laughter and the merry songs—<br /></span> +<span>Told when the songs were sung by him who heard<br /></span> +<span>The pith of it from the dying soldier's lips—<br /></span> +<span>His Captain—tell it as the Captain told.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4>THE CAPTAIN'S STORY</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Well, comrades, let us fight one battle more;<br /></span> +<span>Let the cock crow—we'll guard the camp till morn.<br /></span> +<span>And—since the singers and the merry ones<br /></span> +<span>Are <i>hors de combat</i>—fill the cups again;<br /></span> +<span>Nod if you must, but listen to a tale<br /></span> +<span>Romantic—but the warp thereof is truth.<br /></span> +<span>When the old Flag on Sumter's sea-girt walls<br /></span> +<span>From its proud perch a fluttering ruin fell,<br /></span> +<span>I swore an oath as big as Bunker Hill;<br /></span> +<span>For I was younger then, nor battle-scarred,<br /></span> +<span>And full of patriot-faith and patriot-fire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I raised a company of riflemen,<br /></span> +<span>Marched to the front, and proud of my command,<br /></span> +<span>Nor seeking higher, led them till the day<br /></span> +<span>Of triumph and the nation's jubilee.<br /></span> +<span>Among the first that answered to my call<br /></span> +<span>The hero came whose story you shall hear.<br /></span> +<span>'Tis better I describe him: He was young—<br /></span> +<span>Near two and twenty—neither short nor tall—<br /></span> +<span>A slender student, and his tapering hands<br /></span> +<span>Had better graced a maiden than a man:<br /></span> +<span>Sad, thoughtful face—a wealth of raven hair<br /></span> +<span>Brushed back in waves from forehead prominent;<br /></span> +<span>A classic nose—half Roman and half Greek;<br /></span> +<span>Dark, lustrous eyes beneath dark, jutting brows,<br /></span> +<span>Wearing a shade of sorrow, yet so keen,<br /></span> +<span>And in the storm of battle flashing fire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'Well, boy,' I said, 'I doubt if you will do;<br /></span> +<span>I need stout men for picket-line and march—<br /></span> +<span>Men that have bone and muscle—men inured<br /></span> +<span>To toil and hardships—men, in short, my boy,<br /></span> +<span>To march and fight and march and fight again.'<br /></span> +<span>A queer expression lit his earnest face—<br /></span> +<span>Half frown—half smile.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i15">"'Well <i>try</i> me.' That was all<br /></span> +<span>He answered, and I put him on the roll—<br /></span> +<span><i>Paul Douglas, private</i>—and he donned the blue.<br /></span> +<span>Paul proved himself the best in my command;<br /></span> +<span>I found him first at <i>reveille</i>, and first<br /></span> +<span>In all the varied duties of the day.<br /></span> +<span>His rough-hewn comrades, bred to boisterous ways,<br /></span> +<span>Jeered at the slender youth with maiden hands,<br /></span> +<span>Nicknamed him 'Nel,' and for a month or more<br /></span> +<span>Kept up a fusillade of jokes and jeers.<br /></span> +<span>Their jokes and jeers he heard but heeded not,<br /></span> +<span>Or heeding did a kindly act for him<br /></span> +<span>That jeered him loudest; so the hardy men<br /></span> +<span>Came to look up to Paul as one above<br /></span> +<span>The level of their rough and roistering ways.<br /></span> +<span>He never joined the jolly soldier-sports,<br /></span> +<span>But ever was the first at bugle-call,<br /></span> +<span>Mastered the drill and often drilled the men.<br /></span> +<span>Fatigued with duty, weary with the march<br /></span> +<span>Under the blaze of the midsummer sun,<br /></span> +<span>He murmured not—alike in sun or rain<br /></span> +<span>His utmost duty eager to perform,<br /></span> +<span>And ever ready—always just the same<br /></span> +<span>Patient and earnest, sad and silent Paul.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The day of battle came—that Sabbath day,<br /></span> +<span>Midsummer.<a name='FNanchor_A'></a><a href='#Footnote_A'><sup>[A]</sup></a> Hot and blistering as the flames<br /></span> +<span>Of prairie-fires wind-driven, the burning sun<br /></span> +<span>Blazed down upon us and the blinding dust<br /></span> +<span>Wheeled in dense clouds and covered all our ranks,<br /></span> +<span>As we marched on to battle. Then the roar<br /></span> +<span>Of batteries broke upon us. Glad indeed<br /></span> +<span>That music to my soldiers, and they cheered<br /></span> +<span>And cheered again and boasted—all but Paul—<br /></span> +<span>And shouted <i>'On to Richmond!'</i>—He alone<br /></span> +<span>Was silent—but his eyes were full of fire.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Then came the order—<i>'Forward, double quick!'</i><br /></span> +<span>And we rushed into battle—formed our line<br /></span> +<span>Facing the foe—the ambushed, deadly foe,<br /></span> +<span>Hid in the thicket, with the Union flag—<br /></span> +<span>A cheat—hung out before it—luring us<br /></span> +<span>Into a blazing hell. The battle broke<br /></span> +<span>With wildest fury on us—crashed and roared<br /></span> +<span>The rolling thunder of continuous fire.<br /></span> +<span>We broke and rallied—charged and broke again,<br /></span> +<span>And rallied still—broke counter-charge and charged<br /></span> +<span>Loud-yelling, furious, on the hidden foe;—<br /></span> +<span>Met thrice our numbers and came flying back<br /></span> +<span>Disordered and disheartened. Yet again<br /></span> +<span>I strove to rally my discouraged men,<br /></span> +<span>But hell was fairly howling;—only Paul—<br /></span> +<span>Eager, but bleeding from a bullet-wound<br /></span> +<span>In the left arm—came bounding to my side.<br /></span> +<span>But at that moment I was struck and fell—<br /></span> +<span>Fell prostrate; and a swooning sense of death<br /></span> +<span>Came on me, and I saw and heard no more<br /></span> +<span>Of battle on that Sabbath.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"I awoke,<br /></span> +<span>Confined and jolted in an ambulance<br /></span> +<span>Piled with the wounded—driven recklessly<br /></span> +<span>By one who chiefly cared to save himself.<br /></span> +<span>Dizzy and faint I raised my head: my wound<br /></span> +<span>Was not as dangerous as it might have been—<br /></span> +<span>A scalp-wound on the temple; there, you see—"<br /></span> +<span>He put his finger on the ugly scar—<br /></span> +<span>"Half an inch deeper and some soldier friend,<br /></span> +<span>Among the veterans gathered here to-night,<br /></span> +<span>Perchance had told a briefer tale than mine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"In front and rear I saw the reckless rout—<br /></span> +<span>A broken army flying panic-struck—<br /></span> +<span>Our proud brigades of undulating steel<br /></span> +<span>That marched at sunrise under blazoned flags,<br /></span> +<span>Singing the victory ere the cannon roared,<br /></span> +<span>And eager for the honors of the day—<br /></span> +<span>Like bison Indian-chased on windy plains,<br /></span> +<span>Now broken and commingled fled the field.<br /></span> +<span>Words of command were only wasted breath;<br /></span> +<span>Colonels and brigadiers, on foot and soiled,<br /></span> +<span>Were pushed and jostled by the hurrying hordes.<br /></span> +<span>Anon the cry of <i>'Cavalry!'</i> arose,<br /></span> +<span>And army-teams came dashing down the road<br /></span> +<span>And plunged into the panic. All the way<br /></span> +<span>Was strewn with broken wagons, battery-guns,<br /></span> +<span>Tents, muskets, knapsacks and exhausted men.<br /></span> +<span>My men were mingled with the lawless crowd,<br /></span> +<span>And in the swarm behind us, there was Paul—<br /></span> +<span>Silent and soldier-like, with knapsack on<br /></span> +<span>And rifle on his shoulder, guarding me<br /></span> +<span>And marching on behind the ambulance.<br /></span> +<span>So all that dark and dreadful night we marched,<br /></span> +<span>Each man a captain—captain of himself—<br /></span> +<span>Nor cared for orders on that wild retreat<br /></span> +<span>To safety from disaster. All that night,<br /></span> +<span>Silent and soldier-like my wounded Paul<br /></span> +<span>Marched close behind and kept his faithful watch.<br /></span> +<span>For ever and anon the jaded men,<br /></span> +<span>Clamorous and threat'ning, sought to clamber in;<br /></span> +<span>Whom Paul drove off at point of bayonet,<br /></span> +<span>Wielding his musket with his good right arm.<br /></span> +<span>But when the night was waning to the morn<br /></span> +<span>I saw that he was weary and I made<br /></span> +<span>A place for Paul and begged him to get in.<br /></span> +<span>'No, Captain; no,' he answered,—'I will walk—<br /></span> +<span>I'm making bone and muscle—learning how<br /></span> +<span>To march and fight and march and fight again.'<br /></span> +<span>That silenced me, and we went rumbling on.<br /></span> +<span>Till morning found us safe at Arlington.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"A month off duty and a faithful nurse<br /></span> +<span>Worked wonders and my head was whole again—<br /></span> +<span>Nay—to be candid—cracked a little yet.<br /></span> +<span>My nurse was Paul. Albeit his left arm,<br /></span> +<span>Flesh-wounded, pained him sorely for a time,<br /></span> +<span>With filial care he dressed my battered head,<br /></span> +<span>And wrote for me to anxious friends at home—<br /></span> +<span>But never wrote a letter for himself.<br /></span> +<span>Thinking of this one day, I spoke of it:—<br /></span> +<span>A cloud came o'er his face.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"'My friends,' he said,<br /></span> +<span>'Are here among my comrades in the camp.'<br /></span> +<span>That made a mystery and I questioned him:<br /></span> +<span>He gave no answer—or evasive ones—<br /></span> +<span>Seeming to shrink from question, and to wrap<br /></span> +<span>Himself within himself and live within.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Again we joined our regiment and marched;<br /></span> +<span>Over the hills and dales of Maryland<br /></span> +<span>Along the famous river wound our way.<br /></span> +<span>On picket-duty at the frequent fords<br /></span> +<span>For weary, laggard months were we employed<br /></span> +<span>Guarding the broad Potomac, while our foes,<br /></span> +<span>Stealthily watching for their human game,<br /></span> +<span>Lurked like Apaches on the wooded shores.<br /></span> +<span>Bands of enemy's cavalry by night<br /></span> +<span>Along the line of river prowled, and sought<br /></span> +<span>To dash across and raid in Maryland.<br /></span> +<span>Three regiments guarded miles of river-bank,<br /></span> +<span>And drilled alternately, and one was ours.<br /></span> +<span>Off picket duty, alike in fair or foul,<br /></span> +<span>With knapsacks on and bearing forty rounds,<br /></span> +<span>From morn till night we drilled—battalion-drill—<br /></span> +<span>Often at double-quick for weary hours—<br /></span> +<span>Bearing our burdens in the blazing sun,<br /></span> +<span>Till strong men staggered from the ranks and fell.<br /></span> +<span>Aye, many a hardy man in those hard days<br /></span> +<span>Was drilled and disciplined into his grave. Arose<br /></span> +<span>Murmurs of discontent, and loud complaints<br /></span> +<span>Fell on dull ears till patience was worn out<br /></span> +<span>And mutiny was hinted. As for Paul<br /></span> +<span>I never heard a murmur from his lips;<br /></span> +<span>Nor did he ask a reason for the things<br /></span> +<span>Unreasonable and hard required of him,<br /></span> +<span>But straightway did his duty just as if<br /></span> +<span>The nation's fate hung on it. I pitied Paul;<br /></span> +<span>Slender of form and delicate, he bore<br /></span> +<span>The toils and duties of the hardiest.<br /></span> +<span>Ill from exposure, or fatigued and worn,<br /></span> +<span>On picket hungered, shivering in the rain,<br /></span> +<span>Or sweltering in full dress, with knapsack on,<br /></span> +<span>Beneath the blaze of the mid-summer sun,<br /></span> +<span>He held his spirit—always still the same<br /></span> +<span>Patient and earnest, sad and silent Paul.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"We posted pickets two by two. At night,<br /></span> +<span>By turns each comrade slept and took the watch.<br /></span> +<span>Once in September, in a drenching storm,<br /></span> +<span>Three days and nights with neither tent nor fire<br /></span> +<span>Paul and a comrade held a picket-post.<br /></span> +<span>The equinox raged madly. Chilling winds<br /></span> +<span>In angry gusts roared from the northern hills,<br /></span> +<span>Dashing the dismal rain-clouds into showers<br /></span> +<span>That fell in torrents over all the land.<br /></span> +<span>In camp the soldiers crouched in dripping tents,<br /></span> +<span>Or shivered by the camp-fires. I was ill<br /></span> +<span>And gladly sought the shelter of a hut.<br /></span> +<span>Orders were strict and often hard to bear—<br /></span> +<span>Nor tents nor fire upon the picket-posts—<br /></span> +<span>Cold rations and a canopy of storms.<br /></span> +<span>I pitied Paul and would have called him in,<br /></span> +<span>But that I had no man to take his place;<br /></span> +<span>Nor did I know he took upon himself<br /></span> +<span>A double task. His comrade on the post<br /></span> +<span>Was ill, and so he made a shelter for him<br /></span> +<span>With his own blankets and a bed within;<br /></span> +<span>And took the watch of both upon himself.<br /></span> +<span>And on the third night near the dawn of day,<br /></span> +<span>In rubber cloak stole in upon the post<br /></span> +<span>A pompous major, on the nightly round,<br /></span> +<span>Unchallenged. All fatigued and drenched with rain,<br /></span> +<span>Still on his post with rifle in his hand—<br /></span> +<span>Against a sheltering elm Paul stood and slept.<br /></span> +<span>Muttering of death the brutal major stormed,<br /></span> +<span>Then pitiless pricked the comrade with his sword,<br /></span> +<span>And from his shelter drove him to the watch,<br /></span> +<span>Burning with fever. There Paul interposed<br /></span> +<span>And said:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i7">"'I ask no mercy at your hands;<br /></span> +<span>I shall not whimper, but my comrade here<br /></span> +<span>Is ill of fever; I have stood his watch:<br /></span> +<span>Sir, if a human heart beats in your breast,<br /></span> +<span>Send him to camp, or he will surely die.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The pompous brute—vaingloriously great<br /></span> +<span>In straps and buttons—haughtily silenced Paul,<br /></span> +<span>Hand-bound and sent him guarded to the camp,<br /></span> +<span>And the poor comrade shivering stood the watch<br /></span> +<span>Till dawn of day and I was made aware.<br /></span> +<span>Among the true were some vainglorious fools<br /></span> +<span>Called by the fife and drum from native mire<br /></span> +<span>To lord and strut in shoulder-straps and buttons.<br /></span> +<span>Scrubs, born to brush the boots of gentlemen,<br /></span> +<span>By sudden freak of fortune found themselves<br /></span> +<span>Masters of better men, and lorded it<br /></span> +<span>As only base and brutish natures can—<br /></span> +<span>Braves on parade and cowards under fire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I interceded in my Paul's behalf,<br /></span> +<span>Else he had suffered graver punishment,<br /></span> +<span>But as himself for mercy would not beg—<br /></span> +<span>'A stubborn boy,' our bluff old colonel said—<br /></span> +<span>To extra duty for a month he went<br /></span> +<span>Unmurmuring, storm or shine. When the cold rain<br /></span> +<span>Poured down most pitiless Paul, drenched and wan,<br /></span> +<span>Guarded the baggage and the braying mules.<br /></span> +<span>When the hot sun at mid-day blazed and burned,<br /></span> +<span>Like the red flame on Mauna Loa's top,<br /></span> +<span>Withering the grass and parching earth and air,<br /></span> +<span>I often saw him knapsacked and full-dressed,<br /></span> +<span>Drilling the raw recruits at double-quick;<br /></span> +<span>And yet he wore a patient countenance,<br /></span> +<span>And went about his duty earnestly<br /></span> +<span>As if it were a pleasure to obey.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The month wore off and mad disaster came—<br /></span> +<span>Gorging the blood of heroes at Ball's Bluff.<br /></span> +<span>'Twas there the brave, unfaltering Baker fell<br /></span> +<span>Fighting despair between the jaws of death.<br /></span> +<span>Quenched was the flame that fired a thousand hearts;<br /></span> +<span>Hushed was the voice that shook the senate-walls,<br /></span> +<span>And rang defiance like a bugle-blast.<br /></span> +<span>Broad o'er the rugged mountains to the north<br /></span> +<span>Fell the incessant rain till, like a sea,<br /></span> +<span>Him and the deadly ambush of the foe<br /></span> +<span>The swollen river rolled and roared between.<br /></span> +<span>Brave Baker saw the peril, but not his<br /></span> +<span>The soul to shrink or falter, though he saw<br /></span> +<span>His death-warrant in his orders. Forth he led<br /></span> +<span>His proud brigade across the roaring chasm,<br /></span> +<span>Firm and unfaltering into the chasm of death.<br /></span> +<span>From morn till mid-day in a single boat<br /></span> +<span>Unfit, by companies, the fearless band<br /></span> +<span>Passed over the raging river; then advanced<br /></span> +<span>Upon the ambushed foe. We heard the roll<br /></span> +<span>Of volleys in the forest, and uprose,<br /></span> +<span>From out the wood, a cloud of battle-smoke.<br /></span> +<span>Then came the yell of foemen charging down<br /></span> +<span>Rank upon rank and furious. Hand to hand,<br /></span> +<span>The little band of heroes, flanked and pressed,<br /></span> +<span>Fought thrice their numbers; fearless Baker led<br /></span> +<span>In prodigies of valor; front and flank<br /></span> +<span>Volleyed the deadly rifles; in the rear<br /></span> +<span>The rapid, raging river rolled and roared.<br /></span> +<span>Along the Maryland shore a mile below,<br /></span> +<span>Eager to cross and reinforce our friends,<br /></span> +<span>Ten thousand soldiers lay upon their arms;<br /></span> +<span>And we had boats to spare. In all our ranks<br /></span> +<span>There was not one who did not comprehend<br /></span> +<span>The peril and the instant need of aid.<br /></span> +<span>Chafing we waited orders. We could see<br /></span> +<span>That Baker's men were fighting in retreat;<br /></span> +<span>For ever nearer o'er the forest rolled<br /></span> +<span>The smoke of battle. Orders came at last,<br /></span> +<span>And up along the shore our regiment ran,<br /></span> +<span>Eager to aid our comrades, but too late!<br /></span> +<span>Baker had fallen in the battle-front;<br /></span> +<span>He fought like Spartan and like Spartan fell<br /></span> +<span>Defiant, clutching at the throat of fate.<br /></span> +<span>Their leader lost, confusion followed fast;<br /></span> +<span>Wild panic and red slaughter swept the field.<br /></span> +<span>Powerless to saves we saw the farther shore<br /></span> +<span>Covered with wounded and wild fugitives—<br /></span> +<span>Our own defeated and defenseless friends.<br /></span> +<span>Shattered and piled with wounded men the boat<br /></span> +<span>Pushed off to brave the river, while the foe<br /></span> +<span>Pressed on the charge with fury, and refused<br /></span> +<span>Mercy to the vanquished. Officers and men,<br /></span> +<span>Cheating the savage foemen of their spoils,<br /></span> +<span>Their flags and arms into the gurgling depths<br /></span> +<span>Despairing hurled, and following plunged amain.<br /></span> +<span>As numerous as the wild aquatic flocks<br /></span> +<span>That float in autumn on Lake Nepigon,<br /></span> +<span>The heads of swimmers moved upon the flood.<br /></span> +<span>And still upon the shore a Spartan few—<br /></span> +<span>Shoulder to shoulder—back to back, as one—<br /></span> +<span>Amid the din and clang of clashing steel,<br /></span> +<span>Surrounded held the swarming foes at bay.<br /></span> +<span>As in the pre-historic centuries—<br /></span> +<span>Unnumbered ages ere the Pyramids—<br /></span> +<span>Whereof we read on pre-diluvian bones<br /></span> +<span>And fretted flints in excavated caves,<br /></span> +<span>When savage men abode in rocky dens,<br /></span> +<span>And wrought their weapons from the fiery flint,<br /></span> +<span>And clothed their tawny thighs in lion-skins—<br /></span> +<span>Before the mouth of some well-guarded cave,<br /></span> +<span>Where smoked the savory flesh of mammoth, came<br /></span> +<span>The great cave-bear unbidden to the feast.<br /></span> +<span>Around the monster swarm the brawny men,<br /></span> +<span>Wielding with sinewy arms and savage cries<br /></span> +<span>Their flinty spears and tomahawks of stone.<br /></span> +<span>Erect old bruin growls upon his foes,<br /></span> +<span>And swings with mighty power his ponderous paws—<br /></span> +<span>Woe unto him who feels the crushing blow—<br /></span> +<span>Till, bleeding from an hundred wounds and blind,<br /></span> +<span>With sudden plunge he falls at last, and dies<br /></span> +<span>Amid the shouts of his wild enemies.<br /></span> +<span>So fought the Spartan few, till one by one,<br /></span> +<span>They fell surrounded by a wall of foes.<br /></span> +<span>The river boiled beneath the storm of lead;<br /></span> +<span>Weighed down with wounded comrades many sunk,<br /></span> +<span>But more went down with bullets in their heads.<br /></span> +<span>O! it was pitiful. The outstretched hands<br /></span> +<span>Of men that erst had faced the battle-storm<br /></span> +<span>Unshaken, grasping now in wild despair,<br /></span> +<span>Wrung cries of pity from us. Vain our fire—<br /></span> +<span>The range too long—it fell upon our friends;<br /></span> +<span>At which the foemen yelled their mad delight.<br /></span> +<span>A storm of bullets poured upon the boat,<br /></span> +<span>Mangling the mangled on her, till at last,<br /></span> +<span>Shattered and over-laden, suddenly<br /></span> +<span>She made a lurch to leeward and went down.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"A shallow boat lay moored upon the shore;<br /></span> +<span>Our gallant Colonel called for volunteers<br /></span> +<span>In mercy's name to man it and push out.<br /></span> +<span>But all could see the peril. Stout the heart<br /></span> +<span>Would dare to face the raging flood and fire,<br /></span> +<span>And to his call responded not a man—<br /></span> +<span>Save Paul and one who perished at the helm.<br /></span> +<span>They went as if at bugle-call to drill;<br /></span> +<span>Their comrades said, 'They never will return.'<br /></span> +<span>Stoutly and steadily Paul rowed the boat<br /></span> +<span>Athwart the turbid river's sullen tide,<br /></span> +<span>And reached the wounded struggling in the flood.<br /></span> +<span>Bravely they worked away and lifted in<br /></span> +<span>The helpless till the boat would hold no more;<br /></span> +<span>Others they helped to holds upon the rails,<br /></span> +<span>Then pulled away the over-laden craft.<br /></span> +<span>We cheered them from the shore. The maddened foe<br /></span> +<span>With furious volleys answered—hitting oft<br /></span> +<span>The little craft of mercy—hands anon<br /></span> +<span>Let go their holds and sunk into the deep.<br /></span> +<span>And in that storm Paul's gallant comrade fell.<br /></span> +<span>Trimming his craft with caution Paul could make<br /></span> +<span>But little headway with a single oar—<br /></span> +<span>Clutched in despair and madly wrenched away<br /></span> +<span>By drowning souls the other. Firm and cool<br /></span> +<span>Paul stood unscathed; then fell a sudden shower<br /></span> +<span>That broke his bended oar-stem at the blade.<br /></span> +<span>Down to the brink we crept and stretched our hands,<br /></span> +<span>And shouted, 'Overboard, Paul! and save yourself.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"He stood a moment as if all were lost,<br /></span> +<span>Then caught the rope, and stretching forth his hand,<br /></span> +<span>Waved to the foe and plunged into the flood.<br /></span> +<span>Slowly he towed the clumsy craft and swam,<br /></span> +<span>Down-drifting with the rapid, rolling stream.<br /></span> +<span>Cheering him on adown the shore we ran;<br /></span> +<span>The current lent its aid and bore him in<br /></span> +<span>Toward us, and beyond the range at last<br /></span> +<span>Of foemen's fire he safely came to land,<br /></span> +<span>Mooring his boat amid a storm of cheers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Confined in hospital three days he lay<br /></span> +<span>Fatigued and feverous, but tender hands<br /></span> +<span>Nursed and restored him. Our old Colonel came<br /></span> +<span>And thanked him—patting Paul paternally—<br /></span> +<span>And praised his daring. 'My brave boy,' he said,<br /></span> +<span>'Had I a regiment of such men, by Jove!<br /></span> +<span>I'd hew a path to Richmond and to fame.'<br /></span> +<span>Paul made reply, and in his smile and tone<br /></span> +<span>Mingled a touch of sarcasm:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"'Thank you, sir;<br /></span> +<span>But let me add—I fear the wary foe<br /></span> +<span>Would nab your regiment napping on the field.<br /></span> +<span>You have forgotten, Colonel—not so fast—<br /></span> +<span>I am the man that slept upon his post.'<br /></span> +<span>Our bluff old Colonel laughed and turned away;<br /></span> +<span>Ten minutes later came his kind reply—<br /></span> +<span>A basketful of luxuries from his mess.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Paul marched and fought and marched and fought again,<br /></span> +<span>Patient and earnest through the bootless toils<br /></span> +<span>And fiery trials of that dread campaign<br /></span> +<span>Upon the Peninsula. 'Twas fitly called<br /></span> +<span>'Campaign of Battles.' Aye, it sorely pierced<br /></span> +<span>The scarred and bleeding nation, and drew blood<br /></span> +<span>Deep from her vitals till she shook and reeled,<br /></span> +<span>Like some huge giant staggering to his fall—<br /></span> +<span>Blinded with blood, yet struggling with his soul,<br /></span> +<span>And stretching forth his ponderous, brawny arms,<br /></span> +<span>Like Samson in the Temple, to o'erwhelm<br /></span> +<span>And crush his mocking enemies in his fall.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Ah, Malvern! you remember Malvern Hill—<br /></span> +<span>That night of dreadful butchery! Round the top<br /></span> +<span>Of the entrenchèd summit, parked and aimed,<br /></span> +<span>Blazed like Vesuvius when he bellows fire<br /></span> +<span>And molten lava into the midnight heavens,<br /></span> +<span>An hundred crashing cannon, and the hill<br /></span> +<span>Shook to the thunder of the mighty guns,<br /></span> +<span>As ocean trembles to the bursting throes<br /></span> +<span>Of submarine volcanoes; and the shells<br /></span> +<span>From the embattled gun-boats—fiery fiends—<br /></span> +<span>Shrieked on the night and through the ether hissed<br /></span> +<span>Like hell's infernals. Line supporting line,<br /></span> +<span>From base to summit round the blazing hill,<br /></span> +<span>Our infantry was posted. Crowned with fire,<br /></span> +<span>And zoned by many a burning, blazing belt<br /></span> +<span>From head to foot, and belching sulphurous flames,<br /></span> +<span>The embattled hill appeared a raging fiend—<br /></span> +<span>The Lucifer of hell let loose to reign<br /></span> +<span>Over a world wrapt in the final fires.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"In solid columns massed our frenzied foes<br /></span> +<span>Beat out their life against the blazing hill—<br /></span> +<span>Broke and re-formed and madly charged again,<br /></span> +<span>And thundered like the storm-lashed, furious sea<br /></span> +<span>Beating in vain against the solid cliffs.<br /></span> +<span>Foremost in from our veteran regiment<br /></span> +<span>Breasted the brunt of battle, but we bent<br /></span> +<span>Beneath the onsets as the red-hot bar<br /></span> +<span>Bends to the sledge, until our furious foes—<br /></span> +<span>Mown as the withered prairie-grass is mown<br /></span> +<span>By wild October fires—fell back and left<br /></span> +<span>A field of bloody agony and death<br /></span> +<span>About the base, and victory on the hill.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I lost a score of riflemen that night;<br /></span> +<span>My first lieutenant—his last battle over—<br /></span> +<span>Lay cut in twain upon the battle-line.<br /></span> +<span>With lantern dim wide o'er the slaughter-field<br /></span> +<span>I searched at midnight for my wounded men,<br /></span> +<span>But chiefly searched for Paul. An hour or more<br /></span> +<span>I sought among the groaning and the dead,<br /></span> +<span>Stooping and to the dim light turning up<br /></span> +<span>The ghastly faces, till at last I found<br /></span> +<span>Him whom I sought, and on the outer line—<br /></span> +<span>Feet to the foe and silent face to heaven—<br /></span> +<span>Death pale and bleeding from a ragged wound<br /></span> +<span>Pleading with feeble voice to let him be<br /></span> +<span>And die upon the field, we bore him thence;<br /></span> +<span>And tenderly his comrades carried him,<br /></span> +<span>Sheltered with blankets, on the weary march<br /></span> +<span>At dead of night in dismal storm begun.<br /></span> +<span>We made a stand at Harrison's, and there<br /></span> +<span>With careful hands we laid him on a cot.<br /></span> +<span>Now I had learned to prize the noble boy;<br /></span> +<span>My heart was touched with pity. Patiently<br /></span> +<span>I watched o'er Paul and bathed his fevered brow,<br /></span> +<span>And pressed the cooling sponge upon his lips,<br /></span> +<span>And washed his wound and gave him nourishment.<br /></span> +<span>'Twas all in vain, the surgeon said. I felt<br /></span> +<span>That I could save him and I kept my watch.<br /></span> +<span>A rib was crushed—beneath it one could see<br /></span> +<span>The throbbing vitals—torn as we supposed,<br /></span> +<span>But found unwounded. In his feverish sleep<br /></span> +<span>He often moaned and muttered mysteries,<br /></span> +<span>And, dreaming, spoke in low and tender tones<br /></span> +<span>As if some loved one sat beside his cot.<br /></span> +<span>I questioned him and sought the secret key<br /></span> +<span>To solve his mystery, but all in vain.<br /></span> +<span>A month of careful nursing turned the scale,<br /></span> +<span>And he began to gain upon his wound.<br /></span> +<span>Propt in his cot one evening as he sat<br /></span> +<span>And I sat by him, thus I questioned him:<br /></span> +<span>'There is a mystery about your life<br /></span> +<span>That I would gladly fathom. Paul, I think<br /></span> +<span>You well may trust me, and I fain would hear<br /></span> +<span>The story of your life; right well I know<br /></span> +<span>There is a secret sorrow in your heart.'<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: STOOPING AND TO THE DIM LIGHT TURNING UP THE GHASTLY +FACES, TILL I AT LAST I FOUND HIM WHOM I SOUGHT.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"He turned his face and fixed his lustrous eyes<br /></span> +<span>Upon mine own inquiringly, and held<br /></span> +<span>His gaze upon me till his vacant stare<br /></span> +<span>Told me full well his thoughts had wandered back<br /></span> +<span>Into the depth of his own silent soul;<br /></span> +<span>Then he looked down and sadly smiled and said:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'Captain, I have no history—not one page;<br /></span> +<span>My book of life is but a blotted blank.<br /></span> +<span>Let it be sealed; I would not open it,<br /></span> +<span>Even to one who saved a worthless life,<br /></span> +<span>Only to add a few more leaves in blank<br /></span> +<span>To the blank volume. All that I now am<br /></span> +<span>I offer to my country. If I live<br /></span> +<span>And from this cot walk forth, 'twill only be<br /></span> +<span>To march and fight and march and fight again,'<br /></span> +<span>Until a surer aim shall bring me down<br /></span> +<span>Where care and kindness can no more avail.<br /></span> +<span>Under our country's flag a soldier's death<br /></span> +<span>I hope to die and leave no name behind.<br /></span> +<span>My only wish is this—for what I am,<br /></span> +<span>Or have been, or have hoped to be, is now<br /></span> +<span>A blank misfortune. I will say no more.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I questioned Paul and pressed him further still<br /></span> +<span>To tell his story, but he only shook<br /></span> +<span>His head in silence sadly and lay back<br /></span> +<span>And closed his eyes and whispered—'All is blank.'<br /></span> +<span>That night he muttered often in his sleep;<br /></span> +<span>I could not catch the sense of what he said;<br /></span> +<span>I caught a name that he repeated oft—<br /></span> +<span><i>Pauline</i>—so softly whispered that I knew<br /></span> +<span>She was the blissful burden of his dreams.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Two moons had waxed and waned, and Paul arose,<br /></span> +<span>Came to the camp and shared my tent and bed.<br /></span> +<span>While in the hospital he helpless lay—<br /></span> +<span>To him unknown, and as the choice of all—<br /></span> +<span>Came his promotion to the vacant rank<br /></span> +<span>Of him who fell at Malvern. But, alas,<br /></span> +<span>Say what we would he would not take the place.<br /></span> +<span>To us who importuned him, he replied:<br /></span> +<span>'Comrades and friends, I did not join your ranks<br /></span> +<span>For honor or for profit. All I am—<br /></span> +<span>A wreck perhaps of what I might have been—<br /></span> +<span>I freely offer in our country's cause;<br /></span> +<span>And in her cause it is my wish to serve<br /></span> +<span>A private soldier; I aspire to naught<br /></span> +<span>But victory—and there be better men—<br /></span> +<span>Braver and hardier—such should have the place.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"His comrades cheered, but Paul, methought, was sad.<br /></span> +<span>One evening as he sat upon his couch,<br /></span> +<span>Communing with himself as he was wont,<br /></span> +<span>I stood before him; looking in his face,<br /></span> +<span>I said, '<i>Pauline</i>—her name is then, <i>Pauline</i>.'<br /></span> +<span>All of a sudden up he rose amazed,<br /></span> +<span>And looked upon me with such startled eyes<br /></span> +<span>That I was pained and feared that I had done<br /></span> +<span>A wrong to him whom I had learned to love.<br /></span> +<span>Then he sat down upon his couch and groaned,<br /></span> +<span>Pressing his hand upon his wound, and said:<br /></span> +<span>'Captain, I pray you, tell me truthfully,<br /></span> +<span>Wherefore you speak that name.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i15">"I told him all<br /></span> +<span>That I had heard him mutter in his dreams.<br /></span> +<span>He listened calmly to the close and said:<br /></span> +<span>'My friend, if you have any kind regard<br /></span> +<span>For me who suffer more than you may know,<br /></span> +<span>I pray you utter not that name again.'<br /></span> +<span>And thereupon he turned and hid his face.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"There was a mystery I might not fathom,<br /></span> +<span>There was a history I might not hear:<br /></span> +<span>Nor could I further press that saddened heart<br /></span> +<span>To pour its secret sorrow in my ears.<br /></span> +<span>Thereafter Paul was tenant of my tent—<br /></span> +<span>Sat at my mess and slept upon my couch,<br /></span> +<span>Save when his duty called him from my side,<br /></span> +<span>And not a word escaped his lips or mine<br /></span> +<span>About his secret—yet how oft I found<br /></span> +<span>My eyes upon him and my bridled tongue<br /></span> +<span>Prone to a question; but that solemn face<br /></span> +<span>Forbade me and he wore his mystery.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"At that stern battle on Antietam's banks,<br /></span> +<span>Where gallant Hooker led the fierce attack,<br /></span> +<span>Paul bore a glorious part. Our starry flag,<br /></span> +<span>Before a whirlwind of terrific fire,<br /></span> +<span>Advancing proudly on the foe, went down.<br /></span> +<span>Grim death and pale-faced panic seized the ranks.<br /></span> +<span>Paul caught the flag and waving it aloft<br /></span> +<span>Rallied our regiment. He came out unscathed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"At Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville he fought:<br /></span> +<span>Grim in disaster—bravest in defeat,<br /></span> +<span>He leaped not into danger without cause,<br /></span> +<span>Nor shrunk he from it though a gulf of fire,<br /></span> +<span>When duty bade him face it. All his aim—<br /></span> +<span>To win the victory; applause and praise<br /></span> +<span>He almost hated; grimly he endured<br /></span> +<span>The fulsome flattery of his comrades nerved<br /></span> +<span>By his calm courage up to manlier deeds.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I saw him angered once—if one might call<br /></span> +<span>His sullen silence anger—as by night<br /></span> +<span>Across the Rappahannock, from the field<br /></span> +<span>Where brave and gallant 'Stonewall' Jackson fell,<br /></span> +<span>With hopeless hearts and heavy steps we marched.<br /></span> +<span>Such sullen wrath on other human face<br /></span> +<span>I never saw in all those bloody years.<br /></span> +<span>One evening after, as he read to me<br /></span> +<span>The fulsome General Order of our Chief—<br /></span> +<span>Congratulating officers and men<br /></span> +<span>On their achievements in the late defeat—<br /></span> +<span>His handsome face grew rigid as he read,<br /></span> +<span>And as he closed, down like a thunder-clap<br /></span> +<span>Upon the mess-chest fell his clinchèd fist:<br /></span> +<span>'Fit pap for fools!' he said—'an Iron Duke<br /></span> +<span>Had ground the Southern legions into dust,<br /></span> +<span>Or, by the gods!—the field of Chancellorsville<br /></span> +<span>Had furnished graves for ninety thousand men!'<a name='FNanchor_B'></a><a href='#Footnote_B'><sup>[B]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"That dark disaster sickened many a soul;<br /></span> +<span>Stout hearts were sad and cowards cried for peace.<br /></span> +<span>The vulture, perched hard by the eagle's crag,<br /></span> +<span>Loud cawed his fellows from afar to feast.<br /></span> +<span>Ill-omened bird—his carrion-cries were vain!<br /></span> +<span>Again our veteran eagles plumed their wings,<br /></span> +<span>And forth he fled from Montezuma's shores—<br /></span> +<span>A dastard flight—betraying unto death<br /></span> +<span>Him whom he dazzled with a bauble crown.<br /></span> +<span>Just retribution followed swift and sure—<br /></span> +<span>Germania's eagles plucked him at Sedan.<br /></span> +<span>A gloomy month wore off, and then the news<br /></span> +<span>That Lee, emboldened by his late success,<br /></span> +<span>Had poured his legions upon Northern soil,<br /></span> +<span>Rung through the camps, and thrilled the mighty heart<br /></span> +<span>Of the Grand Army. Louder than the roar<br /></span> +<span>Of brazen cannon on the battle-field.<br /></span> +<span>Then rose and rolled our thunder-rounds of cheers.<br /></span> +</div> +<div class="stanza"> +<span>We saw the dawn of victory—we should meet<br /></span> +<span>Our wary foe upon familiar soil.<br /></span> +<span>We cheered the news, we cheered the marching-orders,<br /></span> +<span>We cheered our brave commander till the tears<br /></span> +<span>Ran down his cheeks. Up from its sullen gloom<br /></span> +<span>Leaped the Grand Army, as if God had writ<br /></span> +<span>With fiery finger 'thwart the vault of heaven<br /></span> +<span>A solemn promise of swift victory.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"We marched. As rolls the deep, resistless flood<br /></span> +<span>Of Mississippi, when the rains of June<br /></span> +<span>Have swelled his thousand northern fountain-lakes<br /></span> +<span>Above their barriers—rolls with restless roar,<br /></span> +<span>Anon through rock-built gorges, and anon<br /></span> +<span>Down through the prairied valley to the sea,<br /></span> +<span>Gleaming and glittering in the summer sun,<br /></span> +<span>By field and forest on his winding way,<br /></span> +<span>So stretched and rolled the mighty column forth,<br /></span> +<span>Winding among the hills and pouring out<br /></span> +<span>Along the vernal valleys; so the sheen<br /></span> +<span>Of moving bayonets glittered in the sun.<br /></span> +<span>And as we marched there rolled upon the air,<br /></span> +<span>Up from the vanguard-corps, a choral chant,<br /></span> +<span>Feeble at first and far and far away,<br /></span> +<span>But gathering volume as it rolled along<br /></span> +<span>And regiment after regiment joined the choir,<br /></span> +<span>Until an hundred thousand voices swelled<br /></span> +<span>The surging chorus, and the solid hills<br /></span> +<span>Shook to the thunder of the mighty song.<br /></span> +<span>And ere it died away along the line,<br /></span> +<span>The hill-tops caught the chorus—rolled away<br /></span> +<span>From peak to peak the pealing thunder-chant,<br /></span> +<span>Clear as the chime of bells on Sabbath morn:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave;<br /></span> +<span>John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave;<br /></span> +<span>John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But his soul is marching on.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Glory, Glory, Halleluia!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Glory, Glory, Halleluia!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Glory, Glory, Halleluia!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His soul is marching on!'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"And far away<br /></span> +<span>The mountains echoed and re-echoed still—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">"'<i>Glory, Glory, Halleluia!</i><br /></span> +<span class="i4"><i>Glory, Glory, Halleluia!</i><br /></span> +<span class="i4"><i>Glory, Glory, Halleluia!</i><br /></span> +<span class="i2"><i>His soul is marching on!'</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"Until the winds<br /></span> +<span>Bore the retreating echoes southward far,<br /></span> +<span>And the dull distance murmured in our ears.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Fast by the field where gallant Baker fell,<br /></span> +<span>We crossed the famous river and advanced<br /></span> +<span>To Frederick. There a transitory cloud<br /></span> +<span>Gloomed the Grand Army—Hooker was relieved:<br /></span> +<span>Fell from command at victory's open gate<br /></span> +<span>The dashing, daring, soul-inspiring chief,<br /></span> +<span>The idol of his soldiers, and they mourned.<br /></span> +<span>He had his faults—they were not faults of heart—<br /></span> +<span>His gravest—fiery valor. Since that day,<br /></span> +<span>The self-same fault—or virtue—crowned a chief<br /></span> +<span>With laurel plucked on rugged Kenesaw.<br /></span> +<span>Envy it was that wrought the hero's fall,<br /></span> +<span>Envy, with hydra-heads and serpent-tongues,<br /></span> +<span>Hissed on the wolfish clamors of the Press.<br /></span> +<span>O fickle Fortune, how thy favors fall—<br /></span> +<span>Like rain upon the just and the unjust!<br /></span> +<span>Throughout the army, as the soldiers read<br /></span> +<span>The farewell-order, gloomy murmurs ran;<br /></span> +<span>But our new chieftain cheered our drooping hearts.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"That Meade would choose his battle-ground we knew,<br /></span> +<span>And if not his the gallant dash and dare<br /></span> +<span>That on Antietam's bloody battle-field<br /></span> +<span>Snatched victory from defeat, our faith was firm<br /></span> +<span>That he would fight to win, and hold the reins<br /></span> +<span>Firmly in hand, nor sacrifice our lives<br /></span> +<span>In wild assaults and fruitless daring deeds.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"From Taneytown, at mid-day, on the hills<br /></span> +<span>Of Gettysburg we heard the cannon boom.<br /></span> +<span>Our gallant Hancock rode full speed away;<br /></span> +<span>We under Gibbon swiftly following him<br /></span> +<span>At midnight camped on Cemetery Hill.<br /></span> +<span>Sharp the initial combat of the grand<br /></span> +<span>On-coming battle, and the sulphurous smoke<br /></span> +<span>Hung in blue wreaths above the silent vale<br /></span> +<span>Between two hostile armies, mightier far<br /></span> +<span>Than met upon the field of Marathon.<br /></span> +<span>Or where the proud Carthago bowed to Rome.<br /></span> +<span>Hope of the North and Liberty—the one;<br /></span> +<span>Pride of the South—the other. On the hills—<br /></span> +<span>A rolling range of rugged, broken hills,<br /></span> +<span>Stretching from Round-Top northward, bending off<br /></span> +<span>And butting down upon a silver stream—<br /></span> +<span>In open field our veteran regiments lay.<br /></span> +<span>Facing our battle-line and parallel—<br /></span> +<span>Beyond the golden valley to the west—<br /></span> +<span>Lay Seminary Ridge—a crest of hills<br /></span> +<span>Covered with emerald groves and fields of gold<br /></span> +<span>Ripe for the harvest: on this rolling range,<br /></span> +<span>As numerous as the swarming ocean-fowl<br /></span> +<span>That perch in squadrons on some barren isle<br /></span> +<span>Far in the Arctic sea when summer's sun<br /></span> +<span>With slanting spears invades the icy realm,<br /></span> +<span>The Southern legions lay upon their arms.<br /></span> +<span>As countless as the winter-evening stars<br /></span> +<span>That glint and glow above the frosted fields<br /></span> +<span>Twinkled and blazed upon that crest of hills<br /></span> +<span>The camp-fires of the foe. Two mighty hosts,<br /></span> +<span>Ready and panoplied for deadliest war,<br /></span> +<span>And eager for the combat where the prize<br /></span> +<span>Of victory was empire—for the foe<br /></span> +<span>An empire borne upon the bended backs<br /></span> +<span>Of toiling slaves in millions—but for us,<br /></span> +<span>An empire grounded on the rights of man—<br /></span> +<span>Lay on their arms awaiting innocent morn<br /></span> +<span>To light the field for slaughter to begin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Silent above us spread the dusky heavens,<br /></span> +<span>Silent below us lay the smoky vale,<br /></span> +<span>Silent beyond, the dreadful crest of hills.<br /></span> +<span>Anon the neigh of horse, a sentry's call,<br /></span> +<span>Or rapid hoof-beats of a flying steed<br /></span> +<span>Bearing an aid and orders, broke the dread,<br /></span> +<span>Portentous silence. I was worn and slept.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The call of bugles wakened me. The dawn<br /></span> +<span>Was stealing softly o'er the shadowy land,<br /></span> +<span>And morning grew apace. Broad in the east<br /></span> +<span>Uprose above the crest of hazy hills<br /></span> +<span>Like some broad shield by fabled giant borne,<br /></span> +<span>The golden sun, and flashed upon the field.<br /></span> +<span>Ripe for the harvest stood the golden grain,<br /></span> +<span>Nodding on gentle slopes and dewy hills.<br /></span> +<span>Ready for the harvest death's grim reapers stood<br /></span> +<span>Waiting the signal with impatient steel;<br /></span> +<span>And morning passed, and mid-day. Here and there<br /></span> +<span>The crack of rifles on the picket-line,<br /></span> +<span>Or boom of solitary cannon broke<br /></span> +<span>The myriad-voiced and dreadful monotone.<br /></span> +<span>So fled the anxious hours until the hills<br /></span> +<span>Sent forth their silent shadows to the east—<br /></span> +<span>And then their batteries opened on our left<br /></span> +<span>Advanced into the valley. All along<br /></span> +<span>The rolling crest of Seminary Ridge<br /></span> +<span>Rolled up the smoke of cannon. Answered then<br /></span> +<span>The grim artillery on our chain of hills'<br /></span> +<span>And heaven was hideous with the bellowing boom,<br /></span> +<span>The whiz of shot, the infernal shrieks of shells.<br /></span> +<span>Down from the hills their charging columns came<br /></span> +<span>A glittering mass of steel. As when the snow<br /></span> +<span>Piled by an hundred winters on the peak<br /></span> +<span>Of cloud-robed Bernard thunders down the cliffs,<br /></span> +<span>Nor rocks nor forests stay the mighty mass,<br /></span> +<span>And men and flocks in terror fly the death,<br /></span> +<span>So thundering fell the columns of the foe,<br /></span> +<span>Crushing through Sickles' corps in front and flank;<br /></span> +<span>And, roaring onward like a mighty wind,<br /></span> +<span>They rushed for Little Round-Top—rugged hill,<br /></span> +<span>Key to our left and center—all exposed—<br /></span> +<span>Manned by a broken battery half unmanned.<br /></span> +<span>But Hancock saw the peril. On stalwart steed<br /></span> +<span>Foam-flecked, wide-nostriled, panting like a hound,<br /></span> +<span>That stalwart soldier—Spartan to the soles—<br /></span> +<span>Came dashing down where, prone along the ridge<br /></span> +<span>Upon the right, our sheltered regiment lay.<br /></span> +<span>'<i>By the left flank, forward—double-quick!</i>'—We sprang<br /></span> +<span>And dashed for Little Round-Top; formed our line<br /></span> +<span>Flanking the broken battery. Up the slope,<br /></span> +<span>Like frightened sheep when howling wolves pursue,<br /></span> +<span>Fled Sickles' men in panic: hard behind<br /></span> +<span>On came the Rebel columns. Hat in hand<br /></span> +<span>Waving and shouting to his eager corps—<br /></span> +<span>Rode gallant Longstreet leading on the foe.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Where yonder field-wall bounds the trampled wheat<br /></span> +<span>By grove and meadow, see—among the trees—<br /></span> +<span>Their bayonets gleam advancing. Line on line,<br /></span> +<span>Column on column, in the field beyond,<br /></span> +<span>Their hurrying ranks crowd glittering on and on.<br /></span> +<span>High at the head their flaunting colors fly;<br /></span> +<span>High o'er the roar their wild, triumphant yell<br /></span> +<span>Shrills like the scream of panthers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"Hancock's voice<br /></span> +<span>Rang down our lines above the cannons' roar:<br /></span> +<span><i>'Advance, and take those colors'</i><a name='FNanchor_C'></a><a href='#Footnote_C'><sup>[C]</sup></a>—Adown the slope<br /></span> +<span>Like Bengal tigers springing at the hounds,<br /></span> +<span>We sprang and met them at the border wall:<br /></span> +<span>Muzzle to muzzle—steel to steel—we met,<br /></span> +<span>And fought like Romans and like Romans fell.<br /></span> +<span>Even as a cyclone, growling thunder, roars<br /></span> +<span>Down through a dusky forest, and its path<br /></span> +<span>Is strown with broken and uprooted pines<br /></span> +<span>Promiscuous piled in broad and broken swaths,<br /></span> +<span>So crashed our volleys through their serried ranks,<br /></span> +<span>Mowing great swaths of death; yet on and on,<br /></span> +<span>Closing the gaps and yelling like the fiends<br /></span> +<span>That Dante heard along the gulf of hell,<br /></span> +<span>Still came our furious foes. A cloud of smoke—<br /></span> +<span>Dense, sulphurous, stifling—covered all our ranks.<br /></span> +<span>Our steady, deadly rifles crackled still,<br /></span> +<span>And still their crashing volleys rolled and roared.<br /></span> +<span>Our rifles blazed upon the blaze below;<br /></span> +<span>The blaze below upon the blaze above,<br /></span> +<span>And in the blaze the buzz of myriad bees<br /></span> +<span>Whose stings were deadlier than the Libyan asp.<br /></span> +<span>Five times our colors fell—five times arose<br /></span> +<span>Defiant, flapping on the broken wall.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"We hold the perilous breach; on either hand<br /></span> +<span>Our foes out-flank us, leap the sheltering wall<br /></span> +<span>And pour their deadly, enfilading fire.<br /></span> +<span>God shield our shattered ranks!—God help us!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i21">"Ho!<br /></span> +<span>'Stars and Stripes' on the right!—Hurra!—Hurra!<br /></span> +<span>The Green Mountain Boys to our aid!—Hurra!—Hurra.<br /></span> +<span>Cannon-roar down on the left!—Our batteries are there—<br /></span> +<span>Hurling hot hell-fire'—See!—like sickled corn<br /></span> +<span>The close-ranked foemen fall in toppling swaths:<br /></span> +<span>But still with hurried steps and steady steel<br /></span> +<span>They close the gaps—like madmen they press on!<br /></span> +<span>With one wild yell they rush upon the wall!<br /></span> +<span>Lo from our lines a sheet of crackling fire<br /></span> +<span>Scorches their grimy faces—back they reel<br /></span> +<span>And tumble—down and down—a writhing mass<br /></span> +<span>Of slaughter and defeat!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"Leaped on the wall<br /></span> +<span>A thousand Blues and swung their caps in air,<br /></span> +<span>Thundering their wild <i>Hurra!</i> above the roar<br /></span> +<span>And crash of cannon;—victory was ours.<br /></span> +<span>Back to his crest of hills the baffled foe<br /></span> +<span>Reluctant turned and fled the storm of death.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The smoke of battle floated from the field,<br /></span> +<span>And lo the woodside piled with slaughter-heaps!<br /></span> +<span>And lo the meadow dotted with the slain!<br /></span> +<span>And lo the ranks of dead and dying men<br /></span> +<span>That fighting fell behind the broken wall!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Only a handful of my men remained;<br /></span> +<span>The rest lay dead or wounded on the field;<br /></span> +<span>Nor skulked their captain, but by grace was spared.<br /></span> +<span>Behold the miracle!—This Bible holds,<br /></span> +<span>Embedded in its leaves, the Rebel lead<br /></span> +<span>Aimed at my heart. But here a scratch and there—<br /></span> +<span>Not worth the mention where so many fell.<br /></span> +<span>Paul, foremost ever in the deadly hail,<br /></span> +<span>As if protected by a shield unseen,<br /></span> +<span>Escaped unscathed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i13">"We camped upon the hill.<br /></span> +<span>Night hovered o'er us on her dusky wings;<br /></span> +<span>Then all along our lines upon the hills<br /></span> +<span>Blazed up the evening camp-fires. Facing us<br /></span> +<span>Beyond the smoke-robed valley sparkled up<br /></span> +<span>A chain of fires on Seminary Ridge.<br /></span> +<span>A hum of mingled voices filled the air.<br /></span> +<span>As when upon the vast, hoarse-moaning sea<br /></span> +<span>And all along the rock-built somber shore<br /></span> +<span>Murmurs the menace of the coming storm—<br /></span> +<span>The muttering of the tempest from afar,<br /></span> +<span>The plash and seethe of surf upon the sand,<br /></span> +<span>The roll of distant thunder in the heavens,<br /></span> +<span>Unite and blend in one prevailing voice—<br /></span> +<span>So rose the mingled murmurs of our camps,<br /></span> +<span>So rose the groans and moans of wounded men<br /></span> +<span>Along the slope and valley, and so rolled<br /></span> +<span>From yonder frowning parallel of hills<br /></span> +<span>The muttered menace of our baffled foes;<br /></span> +<span>And so from camp to camp and hill to hill<br /></span> +<span>Rolled the deep mutter and the dreadful moan<br /></span> +<span>Of an hundred thousand voices blent in one.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"That night a multitude of friends and foes<br /></span> +<span>Slept soundly—but they slept to wake no more.<br /></span> +<span>But few indeed among the living slept;<br /></span> +<span>We lay upon our arms and courted sleep<br /></span> +<span>With open eyes and ears: the fears and hopes<br /></span> +<span>That centered in the half-fought battle held<br /></span> +<span>The balm of slumber from our weary limbs.<br /></span> +<span>Anon the rattle of the random fire<br /></span> +<span>Broke on our drowsy ears and startled us,<br /></span> +<span>As one is startled by some horrid dream;<br /></span> +<span>Whereat old veterans muttered in their sleep.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Midnight had passed, and I lay wakeful still,<br /></span> +<span>When Paul arose and sat upon the sward.<br /></span> +<span>He said: 'I cannot sleep; unbidden thoughts<br /></span> +<span>That will not down crowd on my restless brain.<br /></span> +<span>Captain, I know not how, but still I know<br /></span> +<span>That I shall see but one more sunrise. Morn<br /></span> +<span>Will bring the clash of arms—to-morrow's sun<br /></span> +<span>Will look upon unnumbered ghastly heaps<br /></span> +<span>And gory ranks of dead and dying men,<br /></span> +<span>And ere it sink beyond the western hills<br /></span> +<span>Up from this field will roll a mighty shout<br /></span> +<span>Victorious, echoed over all the land,<br /></span> +<span>Proclaiming joy to freemen everywhere.<br /></span> +<span>And I shall fall. I cannot tell you how<br /></span> +<span>I know it—but I feel it in my soul.<br /></span> +<span>I pray that death may spare me till I hear<br /></span> +<span>Our shout of <i>"Victory!"</i> rolling o'er these hills:<br /></span> +<span>Then will I lay me down and die in peace.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I lightly said—'Sheer superstition, Paul;<br /></span> +<span>I'll wager a month's pay you'll live to fight<br /></span> +<span>A dozen battles yet. They ill become<br /></span> +<span>A gallant soldier on the battle field—<br /></span> +<span>Such grandam superstitions. You have fought<br /></span> +<span>Ever like a hero—do you falter now?'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'Captain,' he said, 'I shall not falter now,<br /></span> +<span>But gladlier will I hail the rising sun.<br /></span> +<span>Death has no terror for a heart like mine:<br /></span> +<span>Say what you may and call it what you will—<br /></span> +<span>I know that I shall fall to rise no more<br /></span> +<span>Before the sunset of the coming day.<br /></span> +<span>If this be superstition—still I know;<br /></span> +<span>If this be fear it will not hold me back.'<br /></span> +<span>I answered:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i7">"'Friend, I hope this prophecy<br /></span> +<span>Will prove you a false prophet; but, my Paul,<br /></span> +<span>Have you no farewells for your friends at home?<br /></span> +<span>No message for a nearer, dearer one?'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'None; there is none I knew in other days<br /></span> +<span>Knows where or what I am. So let it be.<br /></span> +<span>If there be those—not many—who may care<br /></span> +<span>For one who cares so little for himself,<br /></span> +<span>Surely my soldier-name in the gazette<br /></span> +<span>Among the killed will bring no pang to them.<br /></span> +<span>And then he laid himself upon the sward;<br /></span> +<span>Perhaps he slept—I know not, for fatigue<br /></span> +<span>O'ercame me and I slept.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"The picket guns<br /></span> +<span>At random firing wakened me. The morn<br /></span> +<span>Came stealing softly o'er the somber hills;<br /></span> +<span>Dark clouds of smoke hung hovering o'er the field.<br /></span> +<span>Blood-red as risen from a sea of blood,<br /></span> +<span>The tardy sun as if in dread arose,<br /></span> +<span>And hid his face in the uprising smoke.<br /></span> +<span>As when the pale moon, envious of the glow<br /></span> +<span>And gleam and glory of the god of day,<br /></span> +<span>Creeps in by stealth between the earth and him,<br /></span> +<span>Eclipsing all his glory, and the green<br /></span> +<span>Of hills and dales is changed to yellowish dun,<br /></span> +<span>So fell the strange and lurid light of morn.<br /></span> +<span>And as I gazed I heard the hunger-cries<br /></span> +<span>Of vultures circling on their dusky wings<br /></span> +<span>Above the smoke-hid valley; then they plunged<br /></span> +<span>To gorge themselves upon the slaughter-heaps,<br /></span> +<span>As at the Buddhist temples in Siam<br /></span> +<span>Whereto the hideous vultures flock to feast<br /></span> +<span>With famished dogs upon the pauper dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The day wore on. Two mighty armies stood<br /></span> +<span>Defiant—watching—dreading to assault;<br /></span> +<span>Each hoping that the other would assault<br /></span> +<span>And madly dash against its glittering steel.<br /></span> +<span>As in the jungles of the Chambezè—<br /></span> +<span>Glaring defiance with their fiery eyes—<br /></span> +<span>Two tawny lions—rival monarchs—meet<br /></span> +<span>And fright the forest with their horrid roar;<br /></span> +<span>But ere they close in bloody combat crouch<br /></span> +<span>And wait and watch for vantage in attack;<br /></span> +<span>So on their bannered hills the opposing hosts,<br /></span> +<span>Eager to grapple in the tug of death,<br /></span> +<span>Waited and watched for vantage in the fight.<br /></span> +<span>Noon came. The fire of pickets died away.<br /></span> +<span>All eyes were turned to Seminary Ridge,<br /></span> +<span>For lo our sullen foemen—park on park—<br /></span> +<span>Had massed their grim artillery on our corps.<br /></span> +<span>Hoarse voices sunk to whispers or were hushed;<br /></span> +<span>The rugged hills stood listening in awe;<br /></span> +<span>So dread the ominous silence that I heard<br /></span> +<span>The hearts of soldiers throbbing along the line.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Up from yon battery curled a cloud of smoke,<br /></span> +<span>Shrieked o'er our heads a solitary shell,—<br /></span> +<span>Then instantly in horrid concert roared<br /></span> +<span>Two hundred cannon on the Rebel hills—<br /></span> +<span>Hurling their hissing thunderbolts—and then<br /></span> +<span>An hundred bellowing cannon from our lines<br /></span> +<span>Thundered their iron answer. Horrible<br /></span> +<span>Rolled in the heavens the infernal thunders—rolled<br /></span> +<span>From hill to hill the reverberating roar,<br /></span> +<span>As if the earth were bursting with the throes<br /></span> +<span>Of some vast pent volcano; rocked and reeled,<br /></span> +<span>As in an earthquake-shock, the solid hills;<br /></span> +<span>Anon huge fragments of the hillside rocks,<br /></span> +<span>And limbs and splinters of shot-shattered trees<br /></span> +<span>Danced in the smoke like demons; hissed and howled<br /></span> +<span>The crashing shell-storm bursting over us.<br /></span> +<span>Prone on the earth awaiting the grand charge,<br /></span> +<span>To which we knew the heavy cannonade<br /></span> +<span>Was but a prelude, for two hours we lay—<br /></span> +<span>Two hours that tried the very souls of men—<br /></span> +<span>And many a brave man never rose again.<br /></span> +<span>Then ceased our guns to swell the infernal roar;<br /></span> +<span>The roll and crash of cannon in our front<br /></span> +<span>Lulled, and we heard the foeman's bugle-calls.<br /></span> +<span>Then from the slopes of Seminary Ridge<br /></span> +<span>Poured down the storming columns of the foe.<br /></span> +<span>As when the rain-clouds from the rim of heaven<br /></span> +<span>Are gathered by the four contending winds,<br /></span> +<span>And madly whirled until they meet and clash<br /></span> +<span>Above the hills and burst—down pours a sea<br /></span> +<span>And plunges roaring down through gorge and glen,<br /></span> +<span>So poured the surging columns of our foes<br /></span> +<span>Adown the slopes and spread along the vale<br /></span> +<span>In glittering ranks of battle—line on line—<br /></span> +<span>Mile-long. Above the roar of cannon rose<br /></span> +<span>In one wild yell the Rebel battle-cry.<br /></span> +<span>Flash in the sun their serried ranks of steel;<br /></span> +<span>Before them swarm a cloud of skirmishers.<br /></span> +<span>That eager host the gallant Pickett leads;<br /></span> +<span>He right and left his fiery charger wheels;<br /></span> +<span>Steadies the lines with clarion voice; anon<br /></span> +<span>His outstretched saber gleaming points the way.<br /></span> +<span>As mid the myriad twinkling stars of heaven<br /></span> +<span>Flashes the blazing comet, and a column<br /></span> +<span>Of fiery fury follows it, so flashed<br /></span> +<span>The dauntless chief, so followed his wild host.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"We waited grim and silent till they crossed<br /></span> +<span>The center and began the dread ascent.<br /></span> +<span>Then brazen bugles rang the clarion call;<br /></span> +<span>Arose as one twice twenty thousand men,<br /></span> +<span>And all our hillsides blazed with crackling fire.<br /></span> +<span>With sudden crash and simultaneous roar<br /></span> +<span>An hundred cannon opened instantly,<br /></span> +<span>And all the vast hills shuddered under us.<br /></span> +<span>Yelling their mad defiance to our fire<br /></span> +<span>Still on and upward came our daring foes.<br /></span> +<span>As when upon the wooded mountain-side<br /></span> +<span>The unchained Loki<a name='FNanchor_D'></a><a href='#Footnote_D'><sup>[D]</sup></a> riots and the winds<br /></span> +<span>Of an autumnal tempest lash the flames,<br /></span> +<span>Whirling the burning fragments through the air—<br /></span> +<span>Huge blazing limbs and tops of blasted pines—<br /></span> +<span>Mowing wide swaths with circling scythes of fire,<br /></span> +<span>So fell our fire upon the advancing host,<br /></span> +<span>And lashed their ranks and mowed them into heaps,<br /></span> +<span>Cleaving broad avenues of death. Still on<br /></span> +<span>And up they come undaunted, closing up<br /></span> +<span>The ghastly gaps and firing as they come.<br /></span> +<span>As if protected by the hand of heaven,<br /></span> +<span>Rides at their head their gallant leader still;<br /></span> +<span>The tempest drowns his voice—his naming sword<br /></span> +<span>Gleams in the flash of rifles. One wild yell—Like<br /></span> +<span>the mad hunger-howl of famished wolves<br /></span> +<span>Midwinter on the flying cabris'<a name='FNanchor_E'></a><a href='#Footnote_E'><sup>[E]</sup></a> trail,<br /></span> +<span>Swelled by ten thousand hideous voices, shrills,<br /></span> +<span>And through the battle-smoke the bravest burst.<br /></span> +<span>Flutters their tattered banner on our wall!<br /></span> +<span>Thunders their shout of victory! Appalled<br /></span> +<span>Our serried ranks are broken—but in vain!<br /></span> +<span>On either hand our cannon enfilade,<br /></span> +<span>Crushing great gaps along the stalwart lines;<br /></span> +<span>In front our deadly rifles volley still,<br /></span> +<span>Mowing the toppling swaths of daring men.<br /></span> +<span>Behold—they falter!—Ho!—they break!—they fly!<br /></span> +<span>With one wild cheer that shakes the solid hills<br /></span> +<span>Spring to the charge our eager infantry.<br /></span> +<span>Headlong we press them down the bloody slope,<br /></span> +<span>Headlong they fall before our leveled steel<br /></span> +<span>And break in wild disorder, cast away<br /></span> +<span>Their arms and fly in panic. All the vale<br /></span> +<span>Is spread with slaughter and wild fugitives.<br /></span> +<span>Wide o'er the field the scattered foemen fly;<br /></span> +<span>Dread havoc and mad terror swift pursue<br /></span> +<span>Till battle is but slaughter. Thousands fall—<br /></span> +<span>Thousands surrender, and the Southern flag<br /></span> +<span>Is trailed upon the field.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"The day was ours,<br /></span> +<span>And well we knew the worth of victory.<br /></span> +<span>Loud rolled the rounds of cheers from corps to corps;<br /></span> +<span>Comrades embraced each other; iron men<br /></span> +<span>Shed tears of joy like women; men profane<br /></span> +<span>Fell on their knees and thanked Almighty God.<br /></span> +<span>Then <i>'Hail Columbia'</i> rang the brazen horns,<br /></span> +<span>And all the hill-tops shouted unto heaven;<br /></span> +<span>The welkin shouted to the shouting hills—And<br /></span> +<span>heavens and hill-tops shouted <i>'Victory!'</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Night with her pall had wrapped the bloody field.<br /></span> +<span>The little remnants of our regiment<br /></span> +<span>Were gathered and encamped upon the hill.<br /></span> +<span>Paul was not with them, and they could not tell<br /></span> +<span>Aught of him. I had seen him in the fight<br /></span> +<span>Bravest of all the brave. I saw him last<br /></span> +<span>When first the foremost foemen reached our wall,<br /></span> +<span>Thrusting them off with bloody bayonet,<br /></span> +<span>And shouting to his comrades, <i>'Steady, men!'</i><br /></span> +<span>Sadly I wandered back where we had met<br /></span> +<span>The onset of the foe. The rounds of cheers<br /></span> +<span>Repeated oft still swept from corps to corps,<br /></span> +<span>And as I passed along the line I saw<br /></span> +<span>Our dying comrades raise their weary heads,<br /></span> +<span>And cheer with feeble voices. Even in death<br /></span> +<span>The cry of victory warmed their hearts again.<br /></span> +<span>Paul lay upon the ground where he had fought,<br /></span> +<span>Fast by the flag that floated on the line.<br /></span> +<span>He slept—or seemed to sleep, but on his brow<br /></span> +<span>Sat such a deadly pallor that I feared<br /></span> +<span>My Paul would never march and fight again.<br /></span> +<span>I raised his head—he woke as from a dream;<br /></span> +<span>I said, 'Be quiet—you are badly hurt;<br /></span> +<span>I'll call a surgeon; we will dress your wound.'<br /></span> +<span class="i14">He gravely said:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'Tis vain; for I have done<br /></span> +<span>With camp and march and battle. Ere the dawn<br /></span> +<span>Shall I be mustered out of your command,<br /></span> +<span>And mustered into the Grand Host of heaven.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I sought a surgeon on the field and found;<br /></span> +<span>With me he came and opened the bloody blouse,<br /></span> +<span>Felt the dull pulse and sagely shook his head.<br /></span> +<span>A musket ball had done its deadly work;<br /></span> +<span>There was no hope, he said, the man might live<br /></span> +<span>A day perchance—but had no need of him.<br /></span> +<span>I called his comrades and we carried him,<br /></span> +<span>Stretched on his blankets, gently to our camp,<br /></span> +<span>And laid him by the camp-fire. As the light<br /></span> +<span>Fell on Paul's face he took my hand and said:<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> + +<h3>PART II</h3> + +<h4>PAUL' S HISTORY</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Captain, I hear the cheers. My soul is glad.<br /></span> +<span>My days are numbered, but this glorious day—<br /></span> +<span>Like some far beacon on a shadowy cape<br /></span> +<span>That cheers at night the storm-belabored ships—<br /></span> +<span>Will light the misty ages from afar.<br /></span> +<span>This field shall be the Mecca. Here shall rise<br /></span> +<span>A holier than the Caaba where men kiss<br /></span> +<span>The sacred stone that flaming fell from heaven.<br /></span> +<span>But O how many sad and aching hearts<br /></span> +<span>Will mourn the loved ones never to return!<br /></span> +<span>Thank God—no heart will hope for my return!<br /></span> +<span>Thank God—no heart will mourn because I die!<br /></span> +<span>Captain, at life's mid-summer flush and glow,<br /></span> +<span>For him to die who leaves his golden hopes,<br /></span> +<span>His mourning friends and idol-love behind,<br /></span> +<span>It must be hard and seem a cruel thing.<br /></span> +<span>After the victory—upon this field—For<br /></span> +<span>me to die hath more of peace than pain;<br /></span> +<span>For I shall leave no golden hopes behind,<br /></span> +<span>No idol-love to pine because I die,<br /></span> +<span>No friends to wait my coming or to mourn.<br /></span> +<span>They wait my coming in the world beyond;<br /></span> +<span>And wait not long, for I am almost there.<br /></span> +<span>'Tis but a gasp, and I shall pass the bound<br /></span> +<span>'Twixt life and death—through death to life again—<br /></span> +<span>Where sorrow cometh never. Pangs and pains<br /></span> +<span>Of flesh or spirit will not pierce me there;<br /></span> +<span>And two will greet me from the jasper walls—<br /></span> +<span>God's angels—with a song of holy peace,<br /></span> +<span>And haste to meet me at the pearly gate,<br /></span> +<span>And kiss the death-damp from my silent lips,<br /></span> +<span>And lead me through the golden avenues—<br /></span> +<span>Singing Hosanna—to the Great White Throne."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>So there he paused and calmly closed his eyes,<br /></span> +<span>And silently I sat and held his hand.<br /></span> +<span>After a time, when we were left alone,<br /></span> +<span>He spoke again with calmer voice and said:<br /></span> +<span>"Captain, you oft have asked my history,<br /></span> +<span>And I as oft refused. There is no cause<br /></span> +<span>Why I should longer hold it from my friend<br /></span> +<span>Who reads the closing chapter. It may teach<br /></span> +<span>One soul to lean upon the arm of Christ—<br /></span> +<span>That hope and happiness find anchorage<br /></span> +<span>Only in heaven. While my lonesome life<br /></span> +<span>Saw death but dimly in the dull distance<br /></span> +<span>My lips were sealed to the unhappy tale;<br /></span> +<span>Under my pride I hid a heavy heart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I was ambitious in my boyhood days,<br /></span> +<span>And dreamed of fame and honors—misty fogs<br /></span> +<span>That climb at morn the ragged cliffs of life,<br /></span> +<span>Veiling the ragged rocks and gloomy chasms,<br /></span> +<span>And shaping airy castles on the top<br /></span> +<span>With bristling battlements and looming towers;<br /></span> +<span>But melt away into ethereal air<br /></span> +<span>Beneath the blaze of the mid-summer sun,<br /></span> +<span>Till cliffs and chasms and all the ragged rocks<br /></span> +<span>Are bare, and all the castles crumbled away.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"There winds a river 'twixt two chains of hills—<br /></span> +<span>Fir-capped and rugged monuments of time;<br /></span> +<span>A level vale of rich alluvial land,<br /></span> +<span>Washed from the slopes through circling centuries,<br /></span> +<span>And sweet with clover and the hum of bees,<br /></span> +<span>Lies broad between the rugged, somber hills.<br /></span> +<span>Beneath a shade of willows and of elms<br /></span> +<span>The river slumbers in this meadowy lap.<br /></span> +<span>Down from the right there winds a babbling branch,<br /></span> +<span>Cleaving a narrower valley through the hills.<br /></span> +<span>A grand bald-headed hill-cone on the right<br /></span> +<span>Looms like a patriarch, and above the branch<br /></span> +<span>There towers another. I have seen the day<br /></span> +<span>When those bald heads were plumed with lofty pines.<br /></span> +<span>Below the branch and near the river bank,<br /></span> +<span>Hidden among the elms and butternuts,<br /></span> +<span>The dear old cottage stands where I was born.<br /></span> +<span>An English ivy clambers to the eaves;<br /></span> +<span>An English willow planted by my hand<br /></span> +<span>Now spreads its golden branches o'er the roof<br /></span> +<span>Not far below the cottage thrives a town,<br /></span> +<span>A busy town of mills and merchandise—<br /></span> +<span>Belle Meadows, fairest village of the vale.<br /></span> +<span>Behind it looms the hill-cone, and in front<br /></span> +<span>The peaceful river winds its silent way.<br /></span> +<span>Beyond the river spreads a level plain—<br /></span> +<span>Once hid with somber firs—a tangled marsh—<br /></span> +<span>Now beautiful with fields and cottages,<br /></span> +<span>And sweet in spring-time with the blooming plum,<br /></span> +<span>And white with apple-blossoms blown like snow.<br /></span> +<span>Beyond the plain a lower chain of hills,<br /></span> +<span>In summer gemmed with fields of golden grain<br /></span> +<span>Set in the emerald of the beechen woods.<br /></span> +<span>In other days the village school-house stood<br /></span> +<span>Below our cottage on a grassy mound<br /></span> +<span>That sloped away unto the river's marge;<br /></span> +<span>And on the slope a cluster of tall pines<br /></span> +<span>Crowning a copse of beech and evergreen.<br /></span> +<span>There in my boyhood days I went to school;<br /></span> +<span>A maiden mistress ruled the little realm;<br /></span> +<span>She taught the rudiments to rompish rogues,<br /></span> +<span>And walked a queen with magic wand of birch.<br /></span> +<span>My years were hardly ten when father died.<br /></span> +<span>Sole tenants of our humble cottage home<br /></span> +<span>My sorrowing mother and myself remained;<br /></span> +<span>But she was all economy, and kept<br /></span> +<span>With my poor aid a comfortable house.<br /></span> +<span>I was her idol and she wrought at night<br /></span> +<span>To keep me at my books, and used to boast<br /></span> +<span>That I should rise above our humble lot.<br /></span> +<span>How oft I listened to her hopeful words—<br /></span> +<span>Poured from the fountain of a mother's heart<br /></span> +<span>Until I longed to wing the sluggard years<br /></span> +<span>That bore me on to what I hoped to be.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"We had a garden-plat behind the house—<br /></span> +<span>Beyond, an orchard and a pasture-lot;<br /></span> +<span>In front a narrow meadow—here and there<br /></span> +<span>Shaded with elms and branching butternuts.<br /></span> +<span>In spring and summer in the garden-plat<br /></span> +<span>I wrought my morning and my evening hours<br /></span> +<span>And kept myself at school—no idle boy.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"One bright May morning when the robins sang<br /></span> +<span>There came to school a stranger queenly fair,<br /></span> +<span>With eyes that shamed the ethereal blue of heaven,<br /></span> +<span>And golden hair in ringlets—cheeks as soft,<br /></span> +<span>As fresh and rosy as the velvet blush<br /></span> +<span>Of summer sunrise on the dew-damp hills.<br /></span> +<span>Hers was the name I muttered in my dreams.<br /></span> +<span>For days my bashful heart held me aloof<br /></span> +<span>Although her senior by a single year;<br /></span> +<span>But we were brought together oft in class,<br /></span> +<span>And when she learned my name she spoke to me,<br /></span> +<span>And then my tongue was loosed and we were friends.<br /></span> +<span>Before the advent of the steeds of steel<br /></span> +<span>Her sire—a shrewd and calculating man—<br /></span> +<span>Had lately come and purchased timbered-lands<br /></span> +<span>And idle mills, and made the town his home.<br /></span> +<span>And he was well-to-do and growing rich,<br /></span> +<span>And she her father's pet and only child.<br /></span> +<span>In mind and stature for two happy years<br /></span> +<span>We grew together at the village school.<br /></span> +<span>We grew together!—aye, our tender hearts<br /></span> +<span>There grew together till they beat as one.<br /></span> +<span>Her tasks were mine, and mine alike were hers;<br /></span> +<span>We often stole away among the pines—<br /></span> +<span>That stately cluster on the sloping hill—<br /></span> +<span>And conned our lessons from the selfsame book,<br /></span> +<span>And learned to love each other o'er our tasks,<br /></span> +<span>While in the pine-tops piped the oriole,<br /></span> +<span>And from his branch the chattering squirrel chid<br /></span> +<span>Our guileless love and artless innocence.<br /></span> +<span>'Twas childish love perhaps, but day by day<br /></span> +<span>It grew into our souls as we grew up.<br /></span> +<span>Then there was opened in the prospering town<br /></span> +<span>A grammar school, and thither went Pauline.<br /></span> +<span>I missed her and was sad for many a day,<br /></span> +<span>Till mother gave me leave to follow her.<br /></span> +<span>In autumn—in vacation—she would come<br /></span> +<span>With girlish pretext to our cottage home.<br /></span> +<span>She often brought my mother little gifts,<br /></span> +<span>And cheered her with sweet songs and happy words;<br /></span> +<span>And I would pluck the fairest meadow-flowers<br /></span> +<span>To grace a garland for her golden hair,<br /></span> +<span>And fill her basket from the butternuts<br /></span> +<span>That flourished in our little meadow field.<br /></span> +<span>I found in her all I had dreamed of heaven.<br /></span> +<span>So garlanded with latest-blooming flowers,<br /></span> +<span>Chanting the mellow music of our hopes,<br /></span> +<span>The silver-sandaled Autumn-hours tripped by.<br /></span> +<span>And mother learned to love her; but she feared,<br /></span> +<span>Knowing her heart and mine, that one rude hand<br /></span> +<span>Might break our hopes asunder. Like a thief<br /></span> +<span>I often crept about her father's house,<br /></span> +<span>Under the evening shadows, eager-eyed,<br /></span> +<span>Peering for one dear face, and lingered late<br /></span> +<span>To catch the silver music of one voice<br /></span> +<span>That from her chamber nightly rose to heaven.<br /></span> +<span>Her father's face I feared—a silent man,<br /></span> +<span>Cold-faced, imperative, by nature prone<br /></span> +<span>To set his will against the beating world;<br /></span> +<span>Warm-hearted but heart-crusted.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: WE OFTEN STOLE AWAY AMONG THE PINES, AND CONNED OUR +LESSONS FROM THE SELF-SAME BOOK]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"Two years more<br /></span> +<span>Thus wore away. Pauline grew up a queen.<br /></span> +<span>A shadow fell across my sunny path;—<br /></span> +<span>A hectic flush burned on my mother's cheeks;<br /></span> +<span>She daily failed and nearer drew to death.<br /></span> +<span>Pauline would often come with sun-lit face,<br /></span> +<span>Cheating the day of half its languid hours<br /></span> +<span>With cheering chapters from the holy book,<br /></span> +<span>And border tales and wizard minstrelsy:<br /></span> +<span>And mother loved her all the better for it.<br /></span> +<span>With feeble hands upon our sad-bowed heads,<br /></span> +<span>And in a voice all tremulous with tears,<br /></span> +<span>She said to us: 'Dear children, love each other—<br /></span> +<span>Bear and forbear, and come to me in heaven;'<br /></span> +<span>And praying for us daily—drooped and died.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: "'DEAR CHILDREN? LOVE EACH OTHER,—BEAR AND FORBEAR, AND +COME TO ME IN HEAVEN'"]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"After the sad and solemn funeral,<br /></span> +<span>Alone and weeping and disconsolate,<br /></span> +<span>I sat at evening by the cottage door.<br /></span> +<span>I felt as if a dark and bitter fate<br /></span> +<span>Had fallen on me in my tender years.<br /></span> +<span>I seemed an aimless wanderer doomed to grope<br /></span> +<span>In vain among the darkling years and die.<br /></span> +<span>One only star shone through the shadowy mists.<br /></span> +<span>The moon that wandered in the gloomy heavens<br /></span> +<span>Was robed in shrouds; the rugged, looming hills<br /></span> +<span>Looked desolate;—the silent river seemed<br /></span> +<span>A somber chasm, while my own pet lamb,<br /></span> +<span>Mourning disconsolate among the trees,<br /></span> +<span>As if he followed some dim phantom-form,<br /></span> +<span>Bleated in vain and would not heed my call.<br /></span> +<span>On weary hands I bent my weary head;<br /></span> +<span>In gloomy sadness fell my silent tears.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"An angel's hand was laid upon my head—<br /></span> +<span>There in the moonlight stood my own Pauline—<br /></span> +<span>Angel of love and hope and holy faith—<br /></span> +<span>She flashed upon me bowed in bitter grief,<br /></span> +<span>As falls the meteor down the night-clad heavens—<br /></span> +<span>In silence. Then about my neck she clasped<br /></span> +<span>Her loving arms and on my shoulder drooped<br /></span> +<span>Her golden tresses, while her silent tears<br /></span> +<span>Fell warm upon my cheek like summer rain.<br /></span> +<span>Heart clasped to heart and cheek to cheek we sat;<br /></span> +<span>The moon no longer gloomed—her face was cheer;<br /></span> +<span>The rugged hills were old-time friends again;<br /></span> +<span>The peaceful river slept beneath the moon,<br /></span> +<span>And my pet lamb came bounding to our side<br /></span> +<span>And kissed her hand and mine as he was wont.<br /></span> +<span>Then I awoke as from a dream and said:<br /></span> +<span>'Tell me, beloved, why you come to me<br /></span> +<span>In this dark hour—so late—so desolate?'<br /></span> +<span>And she replied:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i11">"'My darling, can I rest<br /></span> +<span>While you are full of sorrow? In my ear<br /></span> +<span>A spirit seemed to whisper—"Arise and go<br /></span> +<span>To comfort him disconsolate." Tell me, Paul,<br /></span> +<span>Why should you mourn your tender life away?<br /></span> +<span>I will be mother to you; nay, dear boy,<br /></span> +<span>I will be more. Come, brush away these tears.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"My heart was full; I kissed her pleading eyes:<br /></span> +<span>'You are an angel sent by one in heaven,'<br /></span> +<span>I said,'to heal my heart, but I have lost<br /></span> +<span>More than you know. The cruel hand of death<br /></span> +<span>Hath left me orphan, friendless—poor indeed,<br /></span> +<span>Saving the precious jewel of your love.<br /></span> +<span>And what to do? I know not what to do,<br /></span> +<span>I feel so broken by a heavy hand.<br /></span> +<span>My mother hoped that I would work my way<br /></span> +<span>To competence and honor at the bar.<br /></span> +<span>But shall I toil in poverty for years<br /></span> +<span>To learn a science that so seldom yields<br /></span> +<span>Or wealth or honor save to silvered heads?<br /></span> +<span>I know that path to fame and fortune leads<br /></span> +<span>Through thorns and brambles over ragged rocks;<br /></span> +<span>But can I follow in the common path<br /></span> +<span>Trod by the millions, never to lift my head<br /></span> +<span>Above the busy hordes that delve and drudge<br /></span> +<span>For bare existence in this bitter world—<br /></span> +<span>And be a mite, a midge, a worthless worm,<br /></span> +<span>No more distinguished from the common mass<br /></span> +<span>Than one poor polyp in the coral isle<br /></span> +<span>Is marked amid the myriads teeming there?<br /></span> +<span>Yet 'tis not for myself. For you, Pauline,<br /></span> +<span>Far up the slippery heights of wealth and fame<br /></span> +<span>Would I climb bravely; but if I would climb<br /></span> +<span>By any art or science, I must train<br /></span> +<span>Unto the task my feet for many years,<br /></span> +<span>Else I should slip and fall from rugged ways,<br /></span> +<span>Too badly bruised to ever mount again.'<br /></span> +<span>Then she:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'O Paul, if wealth were mine to give!<br /></span> +<span>O if my father could but know my heart!<br /></span> +<span>But fear not, Paul, our <i>Father</i> reigns in heaven.<br /></span> +<span>Follow your bent—'twill lead you out aright;<br /></span> +<span>The highest mountain lessens as we climb;<br /></span> +<span>Persistent courage wins the smile of fate.<br /></span> +<span>Apply yourself to law and master it,<br /></span> +<span>And I will wait. This sad and solemn hour<br /></span> +<span>Is dark with doubt and gloom, but by and by<br /></span> +<span>The clouds will lift and you will see God's face.<br /></span> +<span>For there is one in heaven whose pleading tongue<br /></span> +<span>Will pray for blessings on her only son<br /></span> +<span>Of Him who heeds the little sparrow's fall;—<br /></span> +<span>And O if He will listen to my prayers,<br /></span> +<span>The gates of heaven shall echo to my voice<br /></span> +<span>Morning and evening,—only keep your heart.'<br /></span> +<span>I said:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'Pauline, your prayers had rolled away<br /></span> +<span>The ponderous stone that closed the tomb of Christ;<br /></span> +<span>And while they rise to heaven for my success<br /></span> +<span>I cannot doubt, or I should doubt my God.<br /></span> +<span>I think I see a pathway through this gloom;<br /></span> +<span>I have a kinsman'—and I told her where—<br /></span> +<span>'A lawyer; I have heard my mother say—<br /></span> +<span>A self-made man with charitable heart;<br /></span> +<span>And I might go and study under him;<br /></span> +<span>I think he would assist me.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"Then she sighed:<br /></span> +<span>'Paul, can you leave me? You may study here<br /></span> +<span>And here you are among your boyhood friends,<br /></span> +<span>And here I should be near to cheer you on.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I promised her that I would think of it—<br /></span> +<span>Would see what prospect offered in the town;<br /></span> +<span>And then we walked together half-embraced,<br /></span> +<span>But when we neared her vine-arched garden gate,<br /></span> +<span>She bade me stay and kissed me a good-night<br /></span> +<span>And bounded through the moonlight like a fawn.<br /></span> +<span>I watched her till she flitted from my sight,<br /></span> +<span>Then slowly homeward turned my lingering steps.<br /></span> +<span>I wrote my kinsman on the morrow morn,<br /></span> +<span>And broached my project to a worthy man<br /></span> +<span>Who kept an office and a case of books—<br /></span> +<span>An honest lawyer. People called him learn'd,<br /></span> +<span>But wanting tact and ready speech he failed.<br /></span> +<span>The rest were pettifoggers—scurrilous rogues<br /></span> +<span>Who plied the village justice with their lies,<br /></span> +<span>And garbled law to suit the case in hand—<br /></span> +<span>Mean, querulous, small-brained delvers in the mire<br /></span> +<span>Of men's misfortunes—crafty, cunning knaves,<br /></span> +<span>Versed in chicane and trickery that schemed<br /></span> +<span>To keep the evil passions of weak men<br /></span> +<span>In petty wars, and plied their tongues profane<br /></span> +<span>With cunning words to argue honest fools<br /></span> +<span>Into their spider-meshes to be fleeced.<br /></span> +<span>I laid my case before him; took advice—<br /></span> +<span>Well-meant advice—to leave my native town,<br /></span> +<span>And study with my kinsman whom he knew.<br /></span> +<span>A week rolled round and brought me a reply—<br /></span> +<span>A frank and kindly letter—giving me<br /></span> +<span>That which I needed most—encouragement.<br /></span> +<span>But hard it was to fix my mind to go;<br /></span> +<span>For in my heart an angel whispered 'Stay.'<br /></span> +<span>It might be better for my after years,<br /></span> +<span>And yet perhaps,'twere better to remain.<br /></span> +<span>I balanced betwixt my reason and my heart,<br /></span> +<span>And hesitated. Her I had not seen<br /></span> +<span>Since that sad night, and so I made resolve<br /></span> +<span>That we should meet, and at her father's house.<br /></span> +<span>So whispering courage to my timid heart<br /></span> +<span>I went. With happy greeting at the door<br /></span> +<span>She met me, but her face was wan and pale—<br /></span> +<span>So pale and wan I feared that she was ill.<br /></span> +<span>I read the letter to her, and she sighed,<br /></span> +<span>And sat in silence for a little time,<br /></span> +<span>Then said:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'God bless you, Paul, may be 'tis best—<br /></span> +<span>I sometimes feel it is not for the best,<br /></span> +<span>But I am selfish—thinking of myself.<br /></span> +<span>Go like a man, but keep your boyish heart—<br /></span> +<span>Your boyish heart is all the world to me.<br /></span> +<span>Remember, Paul, how I shall watch and wait;<br /></span> +<span>So write me often: like the dew of heaven<br /></span> +<span>To withering grass will come your cheering words.<br /></span> +<span>To know that you are well and happy, Paul,<br /></span> +<span>And good and true, will wing the weary months.<br /></span> +<span>And let me beg you as a sister would—<br /></span> +<span>Not that I doubt you but because I love—<br /></span> +<span>Beware of wine—touch not the treacherous cup,<br /></span> +<span>And guard your honor as you guard your life.<br /></span> +<span>The years will glide away like scudding clouds<br /></span> +<span>That fleetly chase each other o'er the hills,<br /></span> +<span>And you will be a man before you know,<br /></span> +<span>And I will be a woman. God will crown<br /></span> +<span>Our dearest hopes if we but trust in Him.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"We sat in silence for a little time,<br /></span> +<span>And she was weeping, so I raised her face<br /></span> +<span>And kissed away her tears. She softly said:<br /></span> +<span>'Paul, there is something I must say to you—<br /></span> +<span>Something I have no time to tell you now;<br /></span> +<span>But we must meet again before you go—<br /></span> +<span>Under the pines where we so oft have met.<br /></span> +<span>Be this the sign,'—She waved her graceful hand,<br /></span> +<span>'Come when the shadows gather on the pines,<br /></span> +<span>And silent stars stand sentinel in heaven;<br /></span> +<span>Now Paul, forgive me—I must say—good-bye.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I read her fear upon her anxious brow.<br /></span> +<span>Lingering and clasped within her loving arms<br /></span> +<span>I, through her dewy, deep, blue eyes, beheld<br /></span> +<span>Her inmost soul, and knew that love was there.<br /></span> +<span>Ah, then and there her father blustered in,<br /></span> +<span>And caught us blushing in each other's arms!<br /></span> +<span>He stood a moment silent and amazed:<br /></span> +<span>Then kindling wrath distorted all his face,<br /></span> +<span>He showered his anger with a tongue of fire.<br /></span> +<span>O cruel words that stung my boyish pride!<br /></span> +<span>O dagger words that stabbed my very soul!<br /></span> +<span>I strove, but fury mastered—up I sprang,<br /></span> +<span>And felt a giant as I stood before him.<br /></span> +<span>My breath was hot with anger;—impious boy—<br /></span> +<span>Frenzied—forgetful of his silvered hairs—<br /></span> +<span>Forgetful of her presence, too, I raved,<br /></span> +<span>And poured a madman's curses on his head.<br /></span> +<span>A moan of anguish brought me to myself;<br /></span> +<span>I turned and saw her sad, imploring face,<br /></span> +<span>And tears that quenched the wild fire in my heart.<br /></span> +<span>I pressed her hand and passed into the hall,<br /></span> +<span>While she stood sobbing in a flood of tears,<br /></span> +<span>And he stood choked with anger and amazed.<br /></span> +<span>But as I passed the ivied porch he came<br /></span> +<span>With bated breath and muttered in my ear—<br /></span> +<span>'<i>Beggar!</i>'—It stung me like a serpent's fang.<br /></span> +<span>Pride-pricked and muttering like a maniac,<br /></span> +<span>I almost flew the street and hurried home<br /></span> +<span>To vent my anger to the silent elms.<br /></span> +<span><i>'Beggar!</i>'—an hundred times that long, mad night<br /></span> +<span>I muttered with hot lips and burning breath;<br /></span> +<span>I paced the walk with hurried tread, and raved;<br /></span> +<span>I threw myself beneath the willow-tree,<br /></span> +<span>And muttered like the muttering of a storm.<br /></span> +<span>My little lamb came bleating mournfully;<br /></span> +<span>Angered I struck him;—out among the trees<br /></span> +<span>I wandered mumbling 'beggar' as I went,<br /></span> +<span>And beating in through all my burning soul<br /></span> +<span>The bitter thoughts it conjured, till my brain<br /></span> +<span>Reeled and I sunk upon the dew-damp grass,<br /></span> +<span>And—utterly exhausted—slept till morn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I dreamed a dream—all mist and mystery.<br /></span> +<span>I saw a sunlit valley beautiful<br /></span> +<span>With purple vineyards and with garden-plats;<br /></span> +<span>And in the vineyards and the garden-plats<br /></span> +<span>Were happy-hearted youths and merry girls<br /></span> +<span>Toiling and singing. Grandsires too were there,<br /></span> +<span>Sitting contented under their own vines<br /></span> +<span>And fig-trees, while about them merrily played<br /></span> +<span>Their children's children like the sportive lambs<br /></span> +<span>That frolicked on the foot-hills. Low of kine,<br /></span> +<span>Full-uddered, homeward-wending from the meads,<br /></span> +<span>Fell on the ear as soft as Hulder's loor<br /></span> +<span>Tuned on the Norse-land mountains. Like a nest<br /></span> +<span>Hid in a hawthorn-hedge a cottage stood<br /></span> +<span>Embowered with vines beneath broad-branching elms<br /></span> +<span>Sweet-voiced with busy bees.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: PAUL'S DREAM]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"On either hand<br /></span> +<span>Rose steep and barren mountains—mighty cliffs<br /></span> +<span>Cragged and chasm'd and over-grown with thorns;<br /></span> +<span>And on the topmost peak a golden throne<br /></span> +<span>Blazoned with burning characters that read—<br /></span> +<span>'Climb'—it is yours.' Not far above the vale<br /></span> +<span>I saw a youth, fair-browed and raven-haired,<br /></span> +<span>Clambering among the thorns and ragged rocks;<br /></span> +<span>And from his brow with torn and bleeding hand<br /></span> +<span>He wiped great drops of sweat. Down through the vale<br /></span> +<span>I saw a rapid river, broad and deep,<br /></span> +<span>Winding in solemn silence to the sea—<br /></span> +<span>The sea all mist and fog. Lo as I stood<br /></span> +<span>Viewing the river and the moaning sea,<br /></span> +<span>A sail—and then another—flitted down<br /></span> +<span>And plunged into the mist. A moment more,<br /></span> +<span>Like shapeless shadows of the by-gone years,<br /></span> +<span>I saw them in the mist and they were gone—<br /></span> +<span>Gone!—and the sea moaned on and seemed to say—<br /></span> +<span><i>'Gone—and forever!</i>'—So I gladly turned<br /></span> +<span>To look upon the throne—the blazoned throne<br /></span> +<span>That sat upon the everlasting cliff.<br /></span> +<span>The throne had vanished!—Lo where it had stood,<br /></span> +<span>A bed of ashes and a gray-haired man<br /></span> +<span>Sitting upon it bowed and broken down.<br /></span> +<span>And so the vision passed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"The rising sun<br /></span> +<span>Beamed full upon my face and wakened me,<br /></span> +<span>And there beside me lay my pet—the lamb—<br /></span> +<span>Gazing upon me with his wondering eyes,<br /></span> +<span>And all the fields were bright and beautiful,<br /></span> +<span>And brighter seemed the world. I rose resolved.<br /></span> +<span>I let the cottage and disposed of all;<br /></span> +<span>The lamb went bleating to a neighbor's field;<br /></span> +<span>And oft my heart ached, but I mastered it.<br /></span> +<span>This was the constant burden of my brain—<br /></span> +<span><i>'Beggar!</i>'—I'll teach him that I am a man;<br /></span> +<span>I'll speak and he shall listen; I will rise,<br /></span> +<span>And he shall see my course as I go up<br /></span> +<span>Round after round the ladder of success.<br /></span> +<span>Even as the pine upon the mountain-top<br /></span> +<span>Towers o'er the maple on the mountain-side,<br /></span> +<span>I'll tower above him. Then will I look down<br /></span> +<span>And call him <i>Father</i>:—He shall call me <i>Son</i>.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Thus hushing my sad heart the day drew nigh<br /></span> +<span>Of parting, and the promised sign was given.<br /></span> +<span>The night was dismal darkness—not one star<br /></span> +<span>Twinkled in heaven; the sad, low-moaning wind<br /></span> +<span>Played like a mournful harp among the pines.<br /></span> +<span>I groped and listened through the darkling grove,<br /></span> +<span>Peering with eager eyes among the trees,<br /></span> +<span>And calling as I peered with anxious voice<br /></span> +<span>One darling name. No answer but the moan<br /></span> +<span>Of the wind-shaken pines. I sat me down<br /></span> +<span>Under the dusky shadows waiting for her,<br /></span> +<span>And lost myself in gloomy reverie.<br /></span> +<span>Dim in the darksome shadows of the night,<br /></span> +<span>While thus I dreamed, my darling came and crept<br /></span> +<span>Beneath the boughs as softly as a hare,<br /></span> +<span>And whispered 'Paul'—and I was at her side.<br /></span> +<span>We sat upon a mound moss-carpeted—<br /></span> +<span>No eyes but God's upon us, and no voice<br /></span> +<span>Spake to us save the moaning of the pines.<br /></span> +<span>Few were the words we spoke; her silent tears,<br /></span> +<span>Our clasping, trembling, lingering embrace,<br /></span> +<span>Were more than words. Into one solemn hour,<br /></span> +<span>Were pressed the fears and hopes of coming years.<br /></span> +<span>Two tender hearts that only dared to hope<br /></span> +<span>There swelled and throbbed to the electric touch<br /></span> +<span>Of love as holy as the love of Christ.<br /></span> +<span>She gave her picture and I gave a ring—<br /></span> +<span>My mother's—almost with her latest breath<br /></span> +<span>She gave it me and breathed my darling's name.<br /></span> +<span>I girt her finger, and she kissed the ring<br /></span> +<span>In solemn pledge, and said:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"'I bring a gift—<br /></span> +<span>The priceless gift of God unto his own:<br /></span> +<span>O may it prove a precious gift to you,<br /></span> +<span>As it has proved a precious gift to me;<br /></span> +<span>And promise me to read it day by day—<br /></span> +<span>Beginning on the morrow—every day<br /></span> +<span>A chapter—and I too will read the same.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I took the gift—a precious gift indeed—<br /></span> +<span>And you may see how I have treasured it.<br /></span> +<span>Here, Captain, put your hand upon my breast—<br /></span> +<span>An inner pocket—you will find it there."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I opened the bloody blouse and thence drew forth<br /></span> +<span>The Book of Christ all stained with Christian blood.<br /></span> +<span>He laid his hand upon the holy book,<br /></span> +<span>And closed his eyes as if in silent prayer.<br /></span> +<span>I held his weary head and bade him rest.<br /></span> +<span>He lay a moment silent and resumed:<br /></span> +<span>"Let me go on if you would hear the tale;<br /></span> +<span>I soon shall sleep the sleep that wakes no more.<br /></span> +<span>O there were promises and vows as solemn<br /></span> +<span>As Christ's own promises; but as we sat<br /></span> +<span>The pattering rain-drops fell among the pines,<br /></span> +<span>And in the branches the foreboding owl<br /></span> +<span>With dismal hooting hailed the coming storm.<br /></span> +<span>So in that dreary hour and desolate<br /></span> +<span>We parted in the silence of our tears.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"And on the morrow morn I bade adieu<br /></span> +<span>To the old cottage home I loved so well—<br /></span> +<span>The dear old cottage home where I was born.<br /></span> +<span>Then from my mother's grave I plucked a rose<br /></span> +<span>Bursting in bloom—Pauline had planted it—<br /></span> +<span>And left my little hill-girt boyhood world.<br /></span> +<span>I journeyed eastward to my journey's end;<br /></span> +<span>At first by rail for many a flying mile,<br /></span> +<span>By mail-coach thence from where the hurrying train<br /></span> +<span>Leaps a swift river that goes tumbling on<br /></span> +<span>Between a village and a mountain-ledge,<br /></span> +<span>Chafing its rocky banks. There seethes and foams<br /></span> +<span>The restless river round the roaring rocks,<br /></span> +<span>And then flows on a little way and pours<br /></span> +<span>Its laughing waters into a bridal lap.<br /></span> +<span>Its flood is fountain-fed among the hills;<br /></span> +<span>Far up the mossy brooks the timid trout<br /></span> +<span>Lie in the shadow of vine-tangled elms.<br /></span> +<span>Out from the village-green the roadway leads<br /></span> +<span>Along the river up between the hills,<br /></span> +<span>Then climbs a wooded mountain to its top,<br /></span> +<span>And gently winds adown the farther side<br /></span> +<span>Unto a valley where the bridal stream<br /></span> +<span>Flows rippling, meadow-flower-and-willow-fringed,<br /></span> +<span>And dancing onward with a merry song,<br /></span> +<span>Hastes to the nuptials. From the mountain-top—<br /></span> +<span>A thousand feet above the meadowy vale—<br /></span> +<span>She seems a chain of fretted silver wound<br /></span> +<span>With artless art among the emerald hills.<br /></span> +<span>Thence up a winding valley of grand views—<br /></span> +<span>Hill-guarded—firs and rocks upon the hills,<br /></span> +<span>And here and there a solitary pine<br /></span> +<span>Majestic—silent—mourns its slaughtered kin,<br /></span> +<span>Like the last warrior of some tawny tribe<br /></span> +<span>Returned from sunset mountains to behold<br /></span> +<span>Once more the spot where his brave fathers sleep.<br /></span> +<span>The farms along the valley stretch away<br /></span> +<span>On either hand upon the rugged hills—<br /></span> +<span>Walled into fields. Tall elms and willow-trees<br /></span> +<span>Huge-trunked and ivy-hung stand sentinel<br /></span> +<span>Along the roadway walls—storm-wrinkled trees<br /></span> +<span>Planted by men who slumber on the hills.<br /></span> +<span>Amid such scenes all day we rolled along,<br /></span> +<span>And as the shadows of the western hills<br /></span> +<span>Across the valley crept and climbed the slopes,<br /></span> +<span>The sunset blazed their hazy tops and fell<br /></span> +<span>Upon the emerald like a mist of gold.<br /></span> +<span>And at that hour I reached my journey's end.<br /></span> +<span>The village is a gem among the hills—<br /></span> +<span>Tall, towering hills that reach into the blue.<br /></span> +<span>One grand old mountain-cone looms on the left<br /></span> +<span>Far up toward heaven, and all around are hills.<br /></span> +<span>The river winds among the leafy hills<br /></span> +<span>Adown the meadowy dale; a shade of elms<br /></span> +<span>And willows fringe it. In this lap of hills<br /></span> +<span>Cluster the happy homes of men content<br /></span> +<span>To let the great world worry as it will.<br /></span> +<span>The court-house park, the broad, bloom-bordered streets,<br /></span> +<span>Are avenues of maples and of elms—<br /></span> +<span>Grander than Tadmor's pillared avenue—<br /></span> +<span>Fair as the fabled garden of the gods.<br /></span> +<span>Beautiful villas, tidy cottages,<br /></span> +<span>Flower gardens, fountains, offices and shops,<br /></span> +<span>All nestle in a dreamy wealth of woods.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Kind hearts received me. All that wealth could bring—<br /></span> +<span>Refinement, luxury and ease—was theirs;<br /></span> +<span>But I was proud and felt my poverty,<br /></span> +<span>And gladly mured myself among the books<br /></span> +<span>To master 'the lawless science of the law.'<br /></span> +<span>I plodded through the ponderous commentaries—<br /></span> +<span>Some musty with the mildew of old age;<br /></span> +<span>And these I found the better for their years,<br /></span> +<span>Like olden wine in cobweb-covered flasks.<br /></span> +<span>The blush of sunrise found me at my books;<br /></span> +<span>The midnight cock-crow caught me reading still;<br /></span> +<span>And oft my worthy master censured me:<br /></span> +<span>'A time for work,' he said, 'a time for play;<br /></span> +<span>Unbend the bow or else the bow will break.'<br /></span> +<span>But when I wearied—needing sleep and rest—<br /></span> +<span>A single word seemed whispered in my ear—<br /></span> +<span>'<i>Beggar</i>,' it stung me to redoubled toil.<br /></span> +<span>I trod the ofttimes mazy labyrinths<br /></span> +<span>Of legal logic—mined the mountain-mass<br /></span> +<span>Of precedents conflicting—found the rule,<br /></span> +<span>Then branched into the exceptions; split the hair<br /></span> +<span>Betwixt this case and that—ran parallels—<br /></span> +<span>Traced from a 'leading case' through many tomes<br /></span> +<span>Back to the first decision on the 'point,'<br /></span> +<span>And often found a pyramid of law<br /></span> +<span>Built with bad logic on a broken base<br /></span> +<span>Of careless '<i>dicta;</i>'—saw how narrow minds<br /></span> +<span>Spun out the web of technicalities<br /></span> +<span>Till common sense and common equity<br /></span> +<span>Were strangled in its meshes. Here and there<br /></span> +<span>I came upon a broad, unfettered mind<br /></span> +<span>Like Murray's—cleaving through the spider-webs<br /></span> +<span>Of shallower brains, and bravely pushing out<br /></span> +<span>Upon the open sea of common sense.<br /></span> +<span>But such were rare. The olden precedents—<br /></span> +<span>Oft stepping-stones of tyranny and wrong—<br /></span> +<span>Marked easy paths to follow, and they ruled<br /></span> +<span>The course of reason as the iron rails<br /></span> +<span>Rule the swift wheels of the down-thundering train.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I rose at dawn. First in this holy book<br /></span> +<span>I read my chapter. How the happy thought<br /></span> +<span>That my Pauline would read—the self-same morn<br /></span> +<span>The self-same chapter—gave the sacred text,<br /></span> +<span>Though I had heard my mother read it oft,<br /></span> +<span>New light and import never seen before.<br /></span> +<span>For I would ponder over every verse,<br /></span> +<span>Because I felt that she was reading it,<br /></span> +<span>And when I came upon dear promises<br /></span> +<span>Of Christ to man, I read them o'er and o'er,<br /></span> +<span>Till in a holy and mysterious way<br /></span> +<span>They seemed the whisperings of Pauline to me.<br /></span> +<span>Later I learned to lay up for myself<br /></span> +<span>'Treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust<br /></span> +<span>Corrupteth, and where thieves do not break through,<br /></span> +<span>Nor steal'—and where my treasures all are laid<br /></span> +<span>My heart is, and my spirit longs to go.<br /></span> +<span>O friend, if Jesus was but man of man—<br /></span> +<span>And if indeed his wondrous miracles<br /></span> +<span>Were mythic tales of priestly followers<br /></span> +<span>To chain the brute till Reason came from heaven—<br /></span> +<span>Yet was his mission unto man divine.<br /></span> +<span>Man's pity wounds, but Jesus' pity heals:<br /></span> +<span>He gave us balm beyond all earthly balm;<br /></span> +<span>He gave us strength beyond all human strength;<br /></span> +<span>He taught us love above the low desires;<br /></span> +<span>He taught us hope beyond all earthly hope;<br /></span> +<span>He taught us charity wherewith to build<br /></span> +<span>From out the broken walls of barbarism,<br /></span> +<span>The holy temple of the perfect man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"On every Sabbath-eve I wrote Pauline.<br /></span> +<span>Page after page was burdened with my love,<br /></span> +<span>My glowing hopes of golden days to come,<br /></span> +<span>And frequent boast of rapid progress made.<br /></span> +<span>With hungry heart and eager I devoured<br /></span> +<span>Her letters; I re-read them twenty times.<br /></span> +<span>At morning when I laid the Gospel down<br /></span> +<span>I read her latest answer, and again<br /></span> +<span>At midnight by my lamp I read it over,<br /></span> +<span>And murmuring 'God bless her,' fell asleep<br /></span> +<span>To dream that I was with her under the pines.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Thus fled four years—four years of patient toil<br /></span> +<span>Sweetened with love and hope, and I had made<br /></span> +<span>Swift progress in my studies. Master said<br /></span> +<span>Another year would bring me to the bar—<br /></span> +<span>No fledgeling but full-feathered for the field.<br /></span> +<span>And then her letters ceased. I wrote and wrote<br /></span> +<span>Again, but still no answer. Day after day<br /></span> +<span>The tardy mail-coach lagged a mortal hour,<br /></span> +<span>While I sat listening for its welcome horn;<br /></span> +<span>And when it came I hastened from my books<br /></span> +<span>With hope and fear contending in my soul.<br /></span> +<span>Day after day—no answer—back again<br /></span> +<span>I turned my footsteps with a weary sigh.<br /></span> +<span>It wore upon me and I could not rest;<br /></span> +<span>It gnawed me to the marrow of my bones.<br /></span> +<span>The heavy tomes grew dull and wearisome,<br /></span> +<span>And sometimes hateful;—then I broke away<br /></span> +<span>As from a prison and rushed wildly out<br /></span> +<span>Among the elms along the river-bank—<br /></span> +<span>Baring my burning temples to the breeze—<br /></span> +<span>And drank the air of heaven like sparkling wine—<br /></span> +<span>Conjuring excuses for her;—was she ill?<br /></span> +<span>Perhaps forbidden. Had another heart<br /></span> +<span>Come in between us?—No, that could not be;<br /></span> +<span>She was all constancy and promise-bound.<br /></span> +<span>A month, which seemed to me a laggard year,<br /></span> +<span>Thus wore away. At last a letter came.<br /></span> +<span>O with what springing step I hurried back—<br /></span> +<span>Back to my private chamber and my desk!<br /></span> +<span>With what delight—what eager, trembling hand—<br /></span> +<span>The well-known seal that held my hopes I broke!<br /></span> +<span>Thus ran the letter:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i9">"'Paul, the time has come<br /></span> +<span>When we must both forgive while we forget.<br /></span> +<span>Mine was a girlish fancy. We outgrow<br /></span> +<span>Such childish follies in our later years.<br /></span> +<span>Now I have pondered well and made an end.<br /></span> +<span>I cannot wed myself to want, and curse<br /></span> +<span>My life life-long, because a girlish freak<br /></span> +<span>Of folly made a promise. So—farewell.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"My eyes were blind with passion as I read.<br /></span> +<span>I tore the letter into bits and stamped<br /></span> +<span>Upon them, ground my teeth and cursed the day<br /></span> +<span>I met her, to be jilted. All that night<br /></span> +<span>My thoughts ran riot. Round the room I strode<br /></span> +<span>A raving madman—savage as a Sioux;<br /></span> +<span>Then flung myself upon my couch in tears,<br /></span> +<span>And wept in silence, and then stormed again.<br /></span> +<span>'<i>Beggar!</i>'—it raised the serpent in my breast—<br /></span> +<span>Mad pride—bat-blind. I seized her pictured face<br /></span> +<span>And ground it under my heel. With impious hand<br /></span> +<span>I caught the book—the precious gift she gave,<br /></span> +<span>And would have burned it, but that still small voice<br /></span> +<span>Spake in my heart and bade me spare the book.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Then with this Gospel clutched in both my hands,<br /></span> +<span>I swore a solemn oath that I would rise,<br /></span> +<span>If God would spare me;—she should see me rise,<br /></span> +<span>And learn what she had lost.—Yes, I would mount<br /></span> +<span>Merely to be revenged. I would not cringe<br /></span> +<span>Down like a spaniel underneath the lash,<br /></span> +<span>But like a man would teach my proud Pauline<br /></span> +<span>And her hard father to repent the day<br /></span> +<span>They called me '<i>beggar</i>.' Thus I raved and stormed<br /></span> +<span>That mad night out;—forgot at dawn of morn<br /></span> +<span>This holy book, but fell to a huge tome<br /></span> +<span>And read two hundred pages in a day.<br /></span> +<span>I could not keep the thread of argument;<br /></span> +<span>I could not hold my mind upon the book;<br /></span> +<span>I could not break the silent under-tow<br /></span> +<span>That swept all else from out my throbbing brain<br /></span> +<span>But false Pauline. I read from morn till night,<br /></span> +<span>But having closed the book I could not tell<br /></span> +<span>Aught of its contents. Then I cursed myself,<br /></span> +<span>And muttered—'Fool—can you not shake it off—<br /></span> +<span>This nightmare of your boyhood?—Brave, indeed—<br /></span> +<span>Crushed like a spaniel by this false Pauline!<br /></span> +<span>Crushed am I?—By the gods, I'll make an end,<br /></span> +<span>And she shall never know it nettled me!'<br /></span> +<span>So passed the weary days. My cheeks grew thin;<br /></span> +<span>I needed rest, I said, and quit my books<br /></span> +<span>To range the fields and hills with fowling-piece<br /></span> +<span>And '<i>mal prepense</i>' toward the feathery flocks.<br /></span> +<span>The pigeons flew from tree-tops o'er my head;<br /></span> +<span>I heard the flap of wings—and they were gone;<br /></span> +<span>The pheasant whizzed from bushes at my feet<br /></span> +<span>Unseen until its sudden whir of wings<br /></span> +<span>Startled and broke my wandering reverie;<br /></span> +<span>And then I whistled and relapsed to dreams,<br /></span> +<span>Wandering I cared not whither—wheresoe'er<br /></span> +<span>My silent gun still bore its primal charge.<br /></span> +<span>So gameless, but with cheeks and forehead tinged<br /></span> +<span>By breeze and sunshine, I returned to books.<br /></span> +<span>But still a phantom haunted all my dreams—<br /></span> +<span>Awake or sleeping, for awake I dreamed—<br /></span> +<span>A spectre that I could not chase away—<br /></span> +<span>The phantom-form of my own false Pauline.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Six months wore off—six long and weary months;<br /></span> +<span>Then came a letter from a school-boy friend—<br /></span> +<span>In answer to the queries I had made—<br /></span> +<span>Filled with the gossip of my native town.<br /></span> +<span>Unto her father's friend—a bachelor,<br /></span> +<span>Her senior by full twenty years at least—<br /></span> +<span>Dame Rumor said Pauline had pledged her hand.<br /></span> +<span>I knew him well—a sly and cunning man—<br /></span> +<span>A honey-tongued, false-hearted flatterer.<br /></span> +<span>And he my rival—carrying off my prize?<br /></span> +<span>But what cared I? 'twas all the same to me—<br /></span> +<span>Yea, better for the sweet revenge to come.<br /></span> +<span>So whispered pride, but in my secret heart<br /></span> +<span>I cared, and hoped whatever came to pass<br /></span> +<span>She might be happy all her days on earth,<br /></span> +<span>And find a happy haven at the end.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"My thoughtful master bade me quit my books<br /></span> +<span>A month at least, for I was wearing out.<br /></span> +<span>'Unbend the bow,' he said. His watchful eye<br /></span> +<span>Saw toil and care at work upon my cheeks;<br /></span> +<span>He could not see the canker at my heart,<br /></span> +<span>But he had seen pale students wear away<br /></span> +<span>With overwork the vigor of their lives;<br /></span> +<span>And so he gave me means and bade me go<br /></span> +<span>To romp a month among my native hills.<br /></span> +<span>I went, but not as I had left my home—<br /></span> +<span>A bashful boy, uncouth and coarsely clad,<br /></span> +<span>But clothed and mannered like a gentleman.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"My school-boy friend gave me a cordial greeting;<br /></span> +<span>That honest lawyer bade me welcome, too,<br /></span> +<span>And doted on my progress and the advice<br /></span> +<span>He gave me ere I left my native town.<br /></span> +<span>Since first the iron-horse had coursed the vale<br /></span> +<span>Five years had fled—five prosperous, magic years,<br /></span> +<span>And well nigh five since I had left my home.<br /></span> +<span>These prosperous years had wrought upon the place<br /></span> +<span>Their wonders till I hardly knew the town.<br /></span> +<span>The broad and stately blocks of brick that shamed<br /></span> +<span>The weather-beaten wooden shops I knew<br /></span> +<span>Seemed the creation of some magic hand.<br /></span> +<span>Adown the river bank the town had stretched,<br /></span> +<span>Sweeping away the quiet grove of pines<br /></span> +<span>Where I had loved to ramble when a boy<br /></span> +<span>And see the squirrels leap from tree to tree<br /></span> +<span>With reckless venture, hazarding a fall<br /></span> +<span>To dodge the ill-aimed arrows from my bow.<br /></span> +<span>The dear old school-house on the hill was gone:<br /></span> +<span>A costly church, tall-spired and built of stone<br /></span> +<span>Stood in its stead—a monument to man.<br /></span> +<span>Unholy greed had felled the stately pines,<br /></span> +<span>And all the slope was bare and desolate.<br /></span> +<span>Old faces had grown older; some were gone,<br /></span> +<span>And many unfamiliar ones had come.<br /></span> +<span>Boys in their teens had grown to bearded men,<br /></span> +<span>And girls to womanhood, and all was changed,<br /></span> +<span>Save the old cottage-home where I was born.<br /></span> +<span>The elms and butternuts in the meadow-field<br /></span> +<span>Still wore the features of familiar friends;<br /></span> +<span>The English ivy clambered to the roof,<br /></span> +<span>The English willow spread its branches still,<br /></span> +<span>And as I stood before the cottage-door<br /></span> +<span>My heart-pulse quickened, for methought I heard<br /></span> +<span>My mother's footsteps on the ashen floor.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The rumor I had heard was verified;<br /></span> +<span>The wedding-day was named and near at hand.<br /></span> +<span>I met my rival: gracious were his smiles:<br /></span> +<span>Glad as a boy that robs the robin's nest<br /></span> +<span>He grasped the hands of half the men he met.<br /></span> +<span>Pauline, I heard, but seldom ventured forth,<br /></span> +<span>Save when her doting father took her out<br /></span> +<span>On Sabbath morns to breathe the balmy air,<br /></span> +<span>And grace with her sweet face his cushioned pew.<br /></span> +<span>The smooth-faced suitor, old dame Gossip said,<br /></span> +<span>Made daily visits to her father's house,<br /></span> +<span>And played the boy at forty years or more,<br /></span> +<span>While she had held him off to draw him on.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I would not fawn upon the hand that smote;<br /></span> +<span>I would not cringe beneath its cruel blow,<br /></span> +<span>Nor even let her know I cared for it.<br /></span> +<span>I kept aloof—as proud as Lucifer.<br /></span> +<span>But when the church-bells chimed on Sabbath morn<br /></span> +<span>To that proud monument of stone I went—<br /></span> +<span>Her father's pride, since he had led the list<br /></span> +<span>Of wealthy patrons who had builded it—<br /></span> +<span>To hear the sermon—for methought Pauline<br /></span> +<span>Would hear it too. Might I not see her face,<br /></span> +<span>And she not know I cared to look upon it?<br /></span> +<span>She came not, and the psalms and sermon fell<br /></span> +<span>Upon me like an autumn-mist of rain.<br /></span> +<span>I met her once by chance upon the street—<br /></span> +<span>The day before the appointed wedding-day—<br /></span> +<span>Her and her father—she upon his arm.<br /></span> +<span>'Paul—O Paul!' she said and gave her hand.<br /></span> +<span>I took it with a cold and careless air—<br /></span> +<span>Begged pardon—had forgotten;—'Ah—Pauline?—<br /></span> +<span>Yes, I remembered;—five long years ago—<br /></span> +<span>And I had made so many later friends,<br /></span> +<span>And she had lost so much of maiden bloom!'<br /></span> +<span>Then turning met her father face to face,<br /></span> +<span>Bowed with cold grace and haughtily passed on.<br /></span> +<span>'This is revenge,' I muttered. Even then<br /></span> +<span>My heart ached as I thought of her pale face,<br /></span> +<span>Her pleading eyes, her trembling, clasping hand!<br /></span> +<span>And then and there I would have turned about<br /></span> +<span>To beg her pardon and an interview,<br /></span> +<span>But pride—that serpent ever in my heart—<br /></span> +<span>Hissed '<i>beggar</i>,' and I cursed her with the lips<br /></span> +<span>That oft had poured my love into her ears.<br /></span> +<span>'She marries gold to-morrow—let her wed!<br /></span> +<span>She will not wed a beggar, but I think<br /></span> +<span>She'll wed a life-long sorrow—let her wed!<br /></span> +<span>Aye—aye—I hope she'll live to curse the day<br /></span> +<span>Whereon she broke her sacred promises.<br /></span> +<span>And I forgive her?—yea, but not forget.<br /></span> +<span>I'll take good care that she shall not forget;<br /></span> +<span>I'll prick her memory with a bitter thorn<br /></span> +<span>Through all her future. Let her marry gold!'<br /></span> +<span>Thus ran my muttered words, but in my heart<br /></span> +<span>There ran a counter-current; ere I slept<br /></span> +<span>Its silent under-tow had mastered all—<br /></span> +<span>'Forgive and be forgiven.' I resolved<br /></span> +<span>That on the morning of her wedding-day<br /></span> +<span>Would I go kindly and forgive Pauline,<br /></span> +<span>And send her to the altar with my blessing.<br /></span> +<span>That night I read a chapter in this book—<br /></span> +<span>The first for many months, and fell asleep<br /></span> +<span>Beseeching God to bless her.<br /></span> +<span class="i14">Then I dreamed<br /></span> +<span>That we were kneeling at my mother's bed—<br /></span> +<span>Her death-bed, and the feeble, trembling hands<br /></span> +<span>Of her who loved us rested on our heads,<br /></span> +<span>And in a voice all tremulous with tears<br /></span> +<span>My mother said: 'Dear children, love each other;<br /></span> +<span>Bear and forbear, and come to me in heaven.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I wakened once—at midnight—a wild cry—<br /></span> +<span>'<i>Paul, O Paul!</i>' rang through my dreams and broke<br /></span> +<span>My slumber. I arose, but all was still,<br /></span> +<span>And then I, slept again and dreamed till morn.<br /></span> +<span>In all my dreams her dear, sweet face appeared—<br /></span> +<span>Now radiant as a star, and now all pale—<br /></span> +<span>Now glad with smiles and now all wet with tears.<br /></span> +<span>Then came a dream that agonized my soul,<br /></span> +<span>While every limb was bound as if in chains.<br /></span> +<span>Methought I saw her in the silent night<br /></span> +<span>Leaning o'er misty waters dark and deep:<br /></span> +<span>A moan—a plash of waters—and, O Christ!—<br /></span> +<span>Her agonized face upturned—imploring hands<br /></span> +<span>Stretched out toward me, and a wailing cry—<br /></span> +<span>'<i>Paul, O Paul!</i>' Then face and hands went down,<br /></span> +<span>And o'er her closed the deep and dismal flood<br /></span> +<span>Forever—but it could not drown the cry:<br /></span> +<span>'<i>Paul, O Paul!</i>' was ringing in my ears;<br /></span> +<span>'<i>Paul, O Paul!</i>' was throbbing in my heart;<br /></span> +<span>And moaning, sobbing in my shuddering soul<br /></span> +<span>Trembled the wail of anguish—'<i>Paul, O Paul!</i>'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Then o'er the waters stole the silver dawn,<br /></span> +<span>And lo a fairy boat with silken sail!<br /></span> +<span>And in the boat an angel at the helm,<br /></span> +<span>And at her feet the form of her I loved.<br /></span> +<span>The white mists parted as the boat sped on<br /></span> +<span>In silence, lessening far and far away.<br /></span> +<span>And then the sunrise glimmered on the sail<br /></span> +<span>A moment, and the angel turned her face:<br /></span> +<span>My mother!—and I gave a joyful cry,<br /></span> +<span>And stretched my hands, but lo the hovering mists<br /></span> +<span>Closed in around them and the vision passed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The morning sun stole through the window-blinds<br /></span> +<span>And fell upon my face and wakened me,<br /></span> +<span>And I lay musing—thinking of Pauline.<br /></span> +<span>Yes, she should know the depths of all my heart—<br /></span> +<span>The love I bore her all those lonely years;<br /></span> +<span>The hope that held me steadfast to my toil,<br /></span> +<span>And feel the higher and the holier love<br /></span> +<span>Her precious gift had wakened in my soul.<br /></span> +<span>Yea, I would bless her for that precious gift—<br /></span> +<span>I had not known its treasures but for her,<br /></span> +<span>And O for that would I forgive her all,<br /></span> +<span>And bless the hand that smote me to the soul.<br /></span> +<span>That would be comfort to me all my days,<br /></span> +<span>And if there came a bitter time to her,<br /></span> +<span>'Twould pain her less to know that I forgave.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"A hasty rapping at my chamber-door;<br /></span> +<span>In came my school-boy friend whose guest I was,<br /></span> +<span>And said:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">'Come, Paul, the town is all ablaze!<br /></span> +<span>A sad—a strange—a marvelous suicide!<br /></span> +<span>Pauline, who was to be a bride to-day,<br /></span> +<span>Was missed at dawn and after sunrise found—<br /></span> +<span>Traced by her robe and bonnet on the bridge,<br /></span> +<span>Whence she had thrown herself and made an end—'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"And he went on, but I could hear no more;<br /></span> +<span>It fell upon me like a flash from heaven.<br /></span> +<span>As one with sudden terror dumb, I turned<br /></span> +<span>And in my pillow buried up my face.<br /></span> +<span>Tears came at last, and then my friend passed out<br /></span> +<span>In silence. O the agony of that hour!<br /></span> +<span>O doubts and fears and half-read mysteries<br /></span> +<span>That tore my heart and tortured all my soul!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I arose. About the town the wildest tales<br /></span> +<span>And rumors ran; dame Gossip was agog.<br /></span> +<span>Some said she had been ill and lost her mind,<br /></span> +<span>Some whispered hints, and others shook their heads<br /></span> +<span>But none could fathom the marvelous mystery.<br /></span> +<span>Bearing a bitter anguish in my heart,<br /></span> +<span>Half-crazed with dread and doubt and boding fears,<br /></span> +<span>Hour after hour alone, disconsolate,<br /></span> +<span>Among the scenes where we had wandered oft<br /></span> +<span>I wandered, sat where once the stately pines<br /></span> +<span>Domed the fair temple where we learned to love.<br /></span> +<span>O spot of sacred memories—how changed!<br /></span> +<span>Yet chiefly wanting one dear, blushing face<br /></span> +<span>That, in those happy days, made every place<br /></span> +<span>Wherever we might wander—hill or dale—<br /></span> +<span>Garden of love and peace and happiness.<br /></span> +<span>So heavy-hearted I returned. My friend<br /></span> +<span>Had brought for me a letter with his mail.<br /></span> +<span>I knew the hand upon the envelope—<br /></span> +<span>With throbbing heart I hastened to my room;<br /></span> +<span>With trembling hands I broke the seal and read.<br /></span> +<span>One sheet inclosed another—one was writ<br /></span> +<span>At midnight by my loved and lost Pauline.<br /></span> +<span>Inclosed within, a letter false and forged,<br /></span> +<span>Signed with my name—such perfect counterfeit,<br /></span> +<span>At sight I would have sworn it was my own.<br /></span> +<span>And thus her letter ran:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">"'Beloved Paul,<br /></span> +<span>May God forgive you as my heart forgives.<br /></span> +<span>Even as a vine that winds about an oak,<br /></span> +<span>Rot-struck and hollow-hearted, for support,<br /></span> +<span>Clasping the sapless branches as it climbs<br /></span> +<span>With tender tendrils and undoubting faith,<br /></span> +<span>I leaned upon your troth; nay, all my hopes—<br /></span> +<span>My love, my life, my very hope of heaven—<br /></span> +<span>I staked upon your solemn promises.<br /></span> +<span>I learned to love you better than my God;<br /></span> +<span>My God hath sent me bitter punishment.<br /></span> +<span>O broken pledges! what have I to live<br /></span> +<span>And suffer for? Half mad in my distress,<br /></span> +<span>Yielding at last to father's oft request,<br /></span> +<span>I pledged my hand to one whose very love<br /></span> +<span>Would be a curse upon me all my days.<br /></span> +<span>To-morrow is the promised wedding day;<br /></span> +<span>To morrow!—but to-morrow shall not come!<br /></span> +<span>Come gladlier, death, and make an end of all!<br /></span> +<span>How many weary days and patiently<br /></span> +<span>I waited for a letter, and at last<br /></span> +<span>It came—a message crueler than death.<br /></span> +<span>O take it back!—and if you have a heart<br /></span> +<span>Yet warm to pity her you swore to love,<br /></span> +<span>Read it—and think of those dear promises—<br /></span> +<span>O sacred as the Savior's promises—<br /></span> +<span>You whispered in my ear that solemn night<br /></span> +<span>Beneath the pines, and kissed away my tears.<br /></span> +<span>And know that I forgive, belovèd Paul:<br /></span> +<span>Meet me in heaven. God will not frown upon<br /></span> +<span>The sin that saves me from a greater sin,<br /></span> +<span>And sends my soul to Him. Farewell—Farewell.'"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Here he broke down. Unto his pallid lips<br /></span> +<span>I held a flask of wine. He sipped the wine<br /></span> +<span>And closed his eyes in silence for a time,<br /></span> +<span>Resuming thus:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i11">"You see the wicked plot.<br /></span> +<span>We both were victims of a crafty scheme<br /></span> +<span>To break our hearts asunder. Forgery<br /></span> +<span>Had done its work and pride had aided it.<br /></span> +<span>The spurious letter was a cruel one—<br /></span> +<span>Casting her off with utter heartlessness,<br /></span> +<span>And boasting of a later, dearer love,<br /></span> +<span>And begging her to burn the <i>billets-doux</i><br /></span> +<span>A moon-struck boy had sent her ere he found<br /></span> +<span>That pretty girls were plenty in the world.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Think you my soul was roiled with anger?—No;—<br /></span> +<span>God's hand was on my head. A keen remorse<br /></span> +<span>Gnawed at my heart. O false and fatal pride<br /></span> +<span>That blinded me, else I had seen the plot<br /></span> +<span>Ere all was lost—else I had saved a life<br /></span> +<span>To me most precious of all lives on earth—<br /></span> +<span>Yea, dearer then than any soul in heaven!<br /></span> +<span>False pride—the ruin of unnumbered souls—<br /></span> +<span>Thou art the serpent ever tempting me;<br /></span> +<span>God, chastening me, has bruised thy serpent head.<br /></span> +<span>O faithful heart in silence suffering—<br /></span> +<span>True unto death to one she could but count<br /></span> +<span>A perjured villain, cheated as she was!<br /></span> +<span>Captain, I prayed—'twas all that I could do.<br /></span> +<span>God heard my prayer, and with a solemn heart,<br /></span> +<span>Bearing the letters in my hand, I went<br /></span> +<span>To ask a favor of the man who crushed<br /></span> +<span>And cursed my life—to look upon her face—<br /></span> +<span>Only to look on her dear face once more.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I rung the bell—a servant bade me in.<br /></span> +<span>I waited long. At last the father came—<br /></span> +<span>All pale and suffering. I could see remorse<br /></span> +<span>Was gnawing at his heart; as I arose<br /></span> +<span>He trembled like a culprit on the drop.<br /></span> +<span>'O, sir,' he said, 'whatever be your quest,<br /></span> +<span>I pray you leave me with my dead to-day;<br /></span> +<span>I cannot look on any living face<br /></span> +<span>Till her dead face is gone forevermore.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'And who hath done this cruel thing?' I said.<br /></span> +<span>'Explain,' he faltered. 'Pray <i>you</i>, sir, explain!'<br /></span> +<span>I said, and thrust the letters in his hand.<br /></span> +<span>And as he sat in silence reading hers,<br /></span> +<span>I saw the pangs of conscience on his face;<br /></span> +<span>I saw him tremble like a stricken soul;<br /></span> +<span>And then a tear-drop fell upon his hand;<br /></span> +<span>And there we sat in silence. Then he groaned<br /></span> +<span>And fell upon his knees and hid his face,<br /></span> +<span>And stretched his hand toward me wailing out—<br /></span> +<span>'I cannot bear this burden on my soul;<br /></span> +<span>O Paul!—O God!—forgive me or I die.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"His anguish touched my heart. I took his hand,<br /></span> +<span>And kneeling by him prayed a solemn prayer—<br /></span> +<span>'Father, forgive him, for he knew not what<br /></span> +<span>He did who broke the bond that bound us twain.<br /></span> +<span>O may her spirit whisper in his ear<br /></span> +<span>Forever—God is love and all is well.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"The iron man—all bowed and broken down—<br /></span> +<span>Sobbed like a child. He laid his trembling hand<br /></span> +<span>With many a fervent blessing on my head,<br /></span> +<span>And, with the crust all crumbled from his heart,<br /></span> +<span>Arose and led me to her silent couch;<br /></span> +<span>And I looked in upon my darling dead.<br /></span> +<span>Mine—O mine in heaven forevermore!<br /></span> +<span>God's angel sweetly smiling in her sleep;<br /></span> +<span>How beautiful—how radiant of heaven!<br /></span> +<span>The ring I gave begirt her finger still;<br /></span> +<span>Her golden hair was wreathed with immortelles;<br /></span> +<span>The lips half-parted seemed to move in psalm<br /></span> +<span>Or holy blessing. As I kissed her brow,<br /></span> +<span>It seemed as if her dead cheeks flushed again<br /></span> +<span>As in those happy days beneath the pines;<br /></span> +<span>And as my warm tears fell upon her face,<br /></span> +<span>Methought I heard that dear familiar voice<br /></span> +<span>So full of love and faith and calmest peace,<br /></span> +<span>So near and yet so far and far away,<br /></span> +<span>So mortal, yet so spiritual—like an air<br /></span> +<span>Of softest music on the slumbering bay<br /></span> +<span>Wafted on midnight wings to silent shores,<br /></span> +<span>When myriad stars are twinkling in the sea:<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: 'AND I LOOKED IN UPON MY DARLING DEAD.']</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"'<i>Paul, O Paul, forgive and be forgiven;</i><br /></span> +<span><i>Earth is all trial;—there is peace in heaven</i>.'<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Aye, Captain, in that sad and solemn hour<br /></span> +<span>I laid my hand upon the arm of Christ,<br /></span> +<span>And he hath led me all the weary way<br /></span> +<span>To this last battle. I shall win through Him;<br /></span> +<span>And ere you hear the <i>reveille</i> again<br /></span> +<span>Paul and Pauline, amid the psalms of heaven,<br /></span> +<span>Embraced will kneel and at the feet of God<br /></span> +<span>Receive His benediction. Let me sleep.<br /></span> +<span>You know the rest;—I'm weary and must sleep.<br /></span> +<span>An angel's bugle-blast will waken me,<br /></span> +<span>But not to pain, for there is peace in heaven."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>He slept, but not the silent sleep of death.<br /></span> +<span>I felt his fitful pulse and caught anon<br /></span> +<span>The softly-whispered words "<i>Pauline</i>," and "<i>Peace</i>."<br /></span> +<span>Anon he clutched with eager, nervous hand,<br /></span> +<span>And in hoarse whisper shouted—"<i>Steady, men</i>!"<br /></span> +<span>Then sunk again. Thus passed an hour or more<br /></span> +<span>And he woke, half-raised himself and said<br /></span> +<span>With feeble voice and eyes strange luster-lit:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Captain, my boat is swiftly sailing out<br /></span> +<span>Into the misty and eternal sea<br /></span> +<span>From out whose waste no mortal craft returns.<br /></span> +<span>The fog is closing round me and the mist<br /></span> +<span>Is damp and cold upon my hands and face.<br /></span> +<span>Why should I fear?—the loved have gone before:<br /></span> +<span>I seem to hear the plash of coming oars;<br /></span> +<span>The mists are lifting and the boat is near.<br /></span> +<span>'Tis well. To die as I am dying now—<br /></span> +<span>A soldier's death amid the gladsome shouts<br /></span> +<span>Of victory for which my puny hands<br /></span> +<span>Did their full share, albeit it was small,<br /></span> +<span>Was all my late ambition. Bring the Flag,<br /></span> +<span>And hold it over my head. Let me die thus<br /></span> +<span>Under the stars I've followed. Dear old Flag—"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But here his words became inaudible,<br /></span> +<span>As in the mazes of the Mammoth Cave,<br /></span> +<span>Fainter and fainter on the listening ear,<br /></span> +<span>The low, retreating voices die away.<br /></span> +<span>His eyes were closed; a gentle smile of peace<br /></span> +<span>Sat on his face. I held his nerveless hand,<br /></span> +<span>And bent my ear to catch his latest breath;<br /></span> +<span>And as the spirit fled the pulseless clay,<br /></span> +<span>I heard—or thought I heard—his wonder-words—<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Pauline,—how beautiful!</i>"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">As I arose<br /></span> +<span>The gray dawn paled the shadows in the east.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> +<a name='Footnote_A'></a><a href='#FNanchor_A'>[A]</a><div class='note'><p>The first battle of Bull Run, July 21, 1861.</p></div> +<a name='Footnote_B'></a><a href='#FNanchor_B'>[B]</a><div class='note'><p>Hooker had 90,000 men at Chancellorsville.</p></div> +<a name='Footnote_C'></a><a href='#FNanchor_C'>[C]</a><div class='note'><p>These are the very words used by General Hancock on this occasion.</p></div> +<a name='Footnote_D'></a><a href='#FNanchor_D'>[D]</a><div class='note'><p>Norse fire-fiend</p></div> +<a name='Footnote_E'></a><a href='#FNanchor_E'>[E]</a><div class='note'><p>Cabri—the small, fleet antelope of the northern plains, so called +by the Crees and half-breeds.</p></div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<br /><br /> +<a name="THE_SEA_GULL1"></a><h2>THE SEA-GULL.<a name='FNanchor_S1'></a><a href='#Footnote_S1'><sup>[1]</sup></a></h2> + +<h3>THE LEGEND OF THE PICTURED ROCKS OF LAKE SUPERIOR. OJIBWAY</h3> + +<h4><i>In the measure of Hiawatha.</i></h4> + +<p>[The numerals refer to Notes to The Sea-Gull, in Appendix.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the shore of Gitchee Gumee<a name='FNanchor_S2'></a><a href='#Footnote_S2'><sup>[2]</sup></a>—<br /></span> +<span>Deep, mysterious, mighty waters—<br /></span> +<span>Where the mânitoes—the spirits—<br /></span> +<span>Ride the storms and speak in thunder,<br /></span> +<span>In the days of Némè-Shómis,<a name='FNanchor_S3'></a><a href='#Footnote_S3'><sup>[3]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>In the days that are forgotten,<br /></span> +<span>Dwelt a tall and tawny hunter—<br /></span> +<span>Gitchee Péz-ze-u the Panther,<br /></span> +<span>Son of Waub-Ojeeg,<a name='FNanchor_S4'></a><a href='#Footnote_S4'><sup>[4]</sup></a> the warrior,<br /></span> +<span>Famous Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior.<br /></span> +<span>Strong was he and fleet as roebuck,<br /></span> +<span>Brave was he and very stealthy;<br /></span> +<span>On the deer crept like a panther;<br /></span> +<span>Grappled with Makwâ,<a name='FNanchor_S5'></a><a href='#Footnote_S5'><sup>[5]</sup></a> the monster,<br /></span> +<span>Grappled with the bear and conquered;<br /></span> +<span>Took his black claws for a necklet,<br /></span> +<span>Took his black hide for a blanket.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>When the Panther wed the Sea-Gull,<br /></span> +<span>Young was he and very gladsome;<br /></span> +<span>Fair was she and full of laughter;<br /></span> +<span>Like the robin in the spring-time,<br /></span> +<span>Sang from sunrise till the sunset;<br /></span> +<span>For she loved the handsome hunter.<br /></span> +<span>Deep as Gitchee Gumee's waters<br /></span> +<span>Was her love—as broad and boundless;<br /></span> +<span>And the wedded twain were happy—<br /></span> +<span>Happy as the mated robins.<br /></span> +<span>When their first-born saw the sunlight<br /></span> +<span>Joyful was the heart of Panther,<br /></span> +<span>Proud and joyful was the mother.<br /></span> +<span>All the days were full of sunshine,<br /></span> +<span>All the nights were full of starlight.<br /></span> +<span>Nightly from the land of spirits<br /></span> +<span>On them smiled the starry faces—<br /></span> +<span>Faces of their friends departed.<br /></span> +<span>Little moccasins she made him,<br /></span> +<span>Feathered cap and belt of wampum;<br /></span> +<span>From the hide of fawn a blanket,<br /></span> +<span>Fringed with feathers, soft as sable;<br /></span> +<span>Singing at her pleasant labor,<br /></span> +<span>By her side the tekenâgun, <a name='FNanchor_S6'></a><a href='#Footnote_S6'><sup>[6]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And the little hunter in it,<br /></span> +<span>Oft the Panther smiled and fondled,<br /></span> +<span>Smiled upon the babe and mother,<br /></span> +<span>Frolicked with the boy and fondled,<br /></span> +<span>Tall he grew and like his father,<br /></span> +<span>And they called the boy the Raven—<br /></span> +<span>Called him Kâk-kâh-gè—the Raven.<br /></span> +<span>Happy hunter was the Panther.<br /></span> +<span>From the woods he brought the pheasant,<br /></span> +<span>Brought the red deer and the rabbit,<br /></span> +<span>Brought the trout from Gitchee Gumee—<br /></span> +<span>Brought the mallard from the marshes—<br /></span> +<span>Royal feast for boy and mother:<br /></span> +<span>Brought the hides of fox and beaver,<br /></span> +<span>Brought the skins of mink and otter,<br /></span> +<span>Lured the loon and took his blanket,<br /></span> +<span>Took his blanket for the Raven.<br /></span> +<span>Winter swiftly followed winter,<br /></span> +<span>And again the tekenâgun<br /></span> +<span>Held a babe—a tawny daughter,<br /></span> +<span>Held a dark-eyed, dimpled daughter;<br /></span> +<span>And they called her Waub-omeé-meé<br /></span> +<span>Thus they named her—the White-Pigeon.<br /></span> +<span>But as winter followed winter<br /></span> +<span>Cold and sullen grew the Panther;<br /></span> +<span>Sat and smoked his pipe in silence;<br /></span> +<span>When he spoke he spoke in anger;<br /></span> +<span>In the forest often tarried<br /></span> +<span>Many days, and homeward turning,<br /></span> +<span>Brought no game unto his wigwam;<br /></span> +<span>Only brought his empty quiver,<br /></span> +<span>Brought his dark and sullen visage.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Sad at heart and very lonely<br /></span> +<span>Sat the Sea-Gull in the wigwam;<br /></span> +<span>Sat and swung the tekenâgun<br /></span> +<span>Sat and sang to Waub-omeé-meé:<br /></span> +<span>Thus she sang to Waub-omeé-meé,<br /></span> +<span>Thus the lullaby she chanted:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Wâ-wa, wâ-wa, wâ-we-yeà;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Kah-wéen, nee-zhéka kè-diaus-âi,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ke-gáh nau-wâi, ne-mé-go s'wéen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ne-bâun, ne-bâun, ne-dâun-is âis,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wâ-wa, wâ-wa, wâ-we-yeà;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ne-bâun, ne-bâun, ne-dâun-is-âis,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">E-we wâ-wa, wâ-we-yeà,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">E-we wâ-wa, wâ-we-yeà.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>TRANSLATION<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Swing, swing, little one, lullaby;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou'rt not left alone to weep;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mother cares for you—she is nigh;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sleep, my little one, sweetly sleep;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Swing, swing, little one, lullaby;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mother watches you—she is nigh;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gently, gently, wee one, swing;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gently, gently, while I sing<br /></span> +<span class="i2">E-we wâ-wa—lullaby,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">E-we wâ-wa—lullaby.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Homeward to his lodge returning<br /></span> +<span>Kindly greeting found the hunter,<br /></span> +<span>Fire to warm and food to nourish,<br /></span> +<span>Golden trout from Gitchee Gumee,<br /></span> +<span>Caught by Kâh-kâh-gè—the Raven.<br /></span> +<span>With a snare he caught the rabbit—<br /></span> +<span>Caught Wabóse,<a name='FNanchor_S7'></a><a href='#Footnote_S7'><sup>[7]</sup></a> the furry-footed,<br /></span> +<span>Caught Penây,<a name='FNanchor_S7'></a><a href='#Footnote_S7'><sup>[7]</sup></a> the forest-drummer;<br /></span> +<span>Sometimes with his bow and arrows,<br /></span> +<span>Shot the red deer in the forest,<br /></span> +<span>Shot the squirrel in the pine-top,<br /></span> +<span>Shot Ne-kâ, the wild-goose, flying.<br /></span> +<span>Proud as Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior,<br /></span> +<span>To the lodge he bore his trophies.<br /></span> +<span>So when homeward turned the Panther,<br /></span> +<span>Ever found he food provided,<br /></span> +<span>Found the lodge-fire brightly burning,<br /></span> +<span>Found the faithful Sea-Gull waiting.<br /></span> +<span>"You are cold," she said, "and famished;<br /></span> +<span>Here are fire and food, my husband."<br /></span> +<span>Not by word or look he answered;<br /></span> +<span>Only ate the food provided,<br /></span> +<span>Filled his pipe and pensive puffed it,<br /></span> +<span>Sat and smoked in sullen silence.<br /></span> +<span>Once—her dark eyes full of hunger—<br /></span> +<span>Thus she spoke and thus besought him:<br /></span> +<span>"Tell me, O my silent Panther,<br /></span> +<span>Tell me, O beloved husband,<br /></span> +<span>What has made you sad and sullen?<br /></span> +<span>Have you met some evil spirit—<br /></span> +<span>Met some goblin in the forest?<br /></span> +<span>Has he put a spell upon you—<br /></span> +<span>Filled your heart with bitter waters,<br /></span> +<span>That you sit so sad and sullen,<br /></span> +<span>Sit and smoke, but never answer,<br /></span> +<span>Only when the storm is on you?"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Gruffly then the Panther answered:<br /></span> +<span>"Brave among the brave is Panther<br /></span> +<span>Son of Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior,<br /></span> +<span>And the brave are ever silent;<br /></span> +<span>But a whining dog is woman,<br /></span> +<span>Whining ever like a coward."<br /></span> +<span>Forth into the tangled forest,<br /></span> +<span>Threading through the thorny thickets,<br /></span> +<span>Treading trails on marsh and meadow,<br /></span> +<span>Sullen strode the moody hunter.<br /></span> +<span>Saw he not the bear or beaver,<br /></span> +<span>Saw he not the elk or roebuck;<br /></span> +<span>From his path the red fawn scampered,<br /></span> +<span>But no arrow followed after;<br /></span> +<span>From his den the sly wolf listened,<br /></span> +<span>But no twang of bow-string heard he.<br /></span> +<span>Like one walking in his slumber,<br /></span> +<span>Listless, dreaming, walked the Panther;<br /></span> +<span>Surely had some witch bewitched him,<br /></span> +<span>Some bad spirit of the forest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>When the Sea-Gull wed the Panther,<br /></span> +<span>Fair was she and full of laughter;<br /></span> +<span>Like the robin in the spring-time,<br /></span> +<span>Sang from sunrise till the sunset;<br /></span> +<span>But the storms of many winters<br /></span> +<span>Sifted frost upon her tresses,<br /></span> +<span>Seamed her tawny face with wrinkles.<br /></span> +<span>Not alone the storms of winters<br /></span> +<span>Seamed her tawny face with wrinkles.<br /></span> +<span>Twenty winters for the Panther<br /></span> +<span>Had she ruled the humble wigwam;<br /></span> +<span>For her haughty lord and master<br /></span> +<span>Borne the burdens on the journey,<br /></span> +<span>Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire,<br /></span> +<span>Tanned the skins of bear and beaver,<br /></span> +<span>Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer;<br /></span> +<span>Made him moccasins and leggins,<br /></span> +<span>Decked his hood with quills and feathers—<br /></span> +<span>Colored quills of Kaug,<a name='FNanchor_S8'></a><a href='#Footnote_S8'><sup>[8]</sup></a> the thorny,<br /></span> +<span>Feathers from Kenéw,<a name='FNanchor_S8'></a><a href='#Footnote_S8'><sup>[8]</sup></a> the eagle.<br /></span> +<span>For a warrior brave was Panther;<br /></span> +<span>Often had he met the foemen,<br /></span> +<span>Met the bold and fierce Dakotas,<br /></span> +<span>Westward on the war-path met them;<br /></span> +<span>And the scalps he won were numbered,<br /></span> +<span>Numbered seven by Kenéw-feathers.<br /></span> +<span>Sad at heart was Sea-Gull waiting,<br /></span> +<span>Watching, waiting in the wigwam;<br /></span> +<span>Not alone the storms of winters<br /></span> +<span>Sifted frost upon her tresses.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Ka-be-bón-ík-ka, the mighty,<a name='FNanchor_S9'></a><a href='#Footnote_S9'><sup>[9]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>He that sends the cruel winter,<br /></span> +<span>He that turned to stone the Giant,<br /></span> +<span>From the distant Thunder-mountain,<br /></span> +<span>Far across broad Gitchee Gumee,<br /></span> +<span>Sent his warning of the winter,<br /></span> +<span>Sent the white frost and Kewâydin,<a name='FNanchor_S10'></a><a href='#Footnote_S10'><sup>[10]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Sent the swift and hungry North-wind.<br /></span> +<span>Homeward to the South the Summer<br /></span> +<span>Turned and fled the naked forests.<br /></span> +<span>With the Summer flew the robin,<br /></span> +<span>Flew the bobolink and blue-bird.<br /></span> +<span>Flock-wise following chosen leaders,<br /></span> +<span>Like the shaftless heads of arrows<br /></span> +<span>Southward cleaving through the ether,<br /></span> +<span>Soon the wild-geese followed after.<br /></span> +<span>One long moon the Sea-Gull waited,<br /></span> +<span>Watched and waited for her husband,<br /></span> +<span>Till at last she heard his footsteps,<br /></span> +<span>Heard him coming through the thicket.<br /></span> +<span>Forth she went to met her husband,<br /></span> +<span>Joyful went to greet her husband.<br /></span> +<span>Lo behind the haughty hunter,<br /></span> +<span>Closely following in his footsteps,<br /></span> +<span>Walked a young and handsome woman,<br /></span> +<span>Walked the Red Fox from the island—<br /></span> +<span>Gitchee Ménis the Grand Island—<br /></span> +<span>Followed him into the wigwam,<br /></span> +<span>Proudly took her seat beside him.<br /></span> +<span>On the Red Fox smiled the hunter,<br /></span> +<span>On the hunter smiled the woman.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Old and wrinkled was the Sea-Gull,<br /></span> +<span>Good and true, but old and wrinkled.<br /></span> +<span>Twenty winters for the Panther<br /></span> +<span>Had she ruled the humble wigwam,<br /></span> +<span>Borne the burdens on the journey,<br /></span> +<span>Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire,<br /></span> +<span>Tanned the skins of bear and beaver,<br /></span> +<span>Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer,<br /></span> +<span>Made him moccasins and leggins,<br /></span> +<span>Decked his hood with quills and feathers,<br /></span> +<span>Colored quills of Kaug, the thorny,<br /></span> +<span>Feathers from the great war-eagle;<br /></span> +<span>Ever diligent and faithful,<br /></span> +<span>Ever patient, ne'er complaining.<br /></span> +<span>But like all brave men the Panther<br /></span> +<span>Loved a young and handsome woman;<br /></span> +<span>So he dallied with the danger,<br /></span> +<span>Dallied with the fair Algónkin,<a name='FNanchor_S11'></a><a href='#Footnote_S11'><sup>[11]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Till a magic mead she gave him,<br /></span> +<span>Brewed of buds of birch and cedar.<a name='FNanchor_S12'></a><a href='#Footnote_S12'><sup>[12]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Madly then he loved the woman;<br /></span> +<span>Then she ruled him, then she held him<br /></span> +<span>Tangled in her raven tresses,<br /></span> +<span>Tied and tangled in her tresses.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Ah, the tall and tawny Panther!<br /></span> +<span>Ah, the brave and brawny Panther!<br /></span> +<span>Son of Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior!<br /></span> +<span>With a slender hair she led him,<br /></span> +<span>With a slender hair she drew him,<br /></span> +<span>Drew him often to her wigwam;<br /></span> +<span>There she bound him, there she held him<br /></span> +<span>Tangled in her raven tresses,<br /></span> +<span>Tied and tangled in her tresses.<br /></span> +<span>Ah, the best of men are tangled—<br /></span> +<span>Sometimes tangled in the tresses<br /></span> +<span>Of a fair and crafty woman.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>So the Panther wed the Red Fox,<br /></span> +<span>And she followed to his wigwam.<br /></span> +<span>Young again he seemed and gladsome,<br /></span> +<span>Glad as Raven when the father<br /></span> +<span>Made his first bow from the elm-tree,<br /></span> +<span>From the ash-tree made his arrows,<br /></span> +<span>Taught him how to aim his arrows,<br /></span> +<span>How to shoot Wabóse—the rabbit.<br /></span> +<span>Then again the brawny hunter<br /></span> +<span>Brought the black bear and the beaver,<br /></span> +<span>Brought the haunch of elk and red-deer,<br /></span> +<span>Brought the rabbit and the pheasant—<br /></span> +<span>Choicest bits of all for Red Fox.<br /></span> +<span>For her robes he brought the sable,<br /></span> +<span>Brought the otter and the ermine,<br /></span> +<span>Brought the black-fox tipped with silver.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But the Sea-Gull murmured never,<br /></span> +<span>Not a word she spoke in anger,<br /></span> +<span>Went about her work as ever,<br /></span> +<span>Tanned the skins of bear and beaver,<br /></span> +<span>Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer,<br /></span> +<span>Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire,<br /></span> +<span>Gathered rushes from the marshes;<br /></span> +<span>Deftly into mats she wove them;<br /></span> +<span>Kept the lodge as bright as ever.<br /></span> +<span>Only to herself she murmured,<br /></span> +<span>All alone with Waub-omeé-meé,<br /></span> +<span>On the tall and toppling highland,<br /></span> +<span>O'er the wilderness of waters;<br /></span> +<span>Murmured to the murmuring waters,<br /></span> +<span>Murmured to the Nébe-nâw-baigs—<br /></span> +<span>To the spirits of the waters;<br /></span> +<span>On the wild waves poured her sorrow.<br /></span> +<span>Save the infant on her bosom<br /></span> +<span>With her dark eyes wide with wonder,<br /></span> +<span>None to hear her but the spirits,<br /></span> +<span>And the murmuring pines above her.<br /></span> +<span>Thus she cast away her burdens,<br /></span> +<span>Cast her burdens on the waters;<br /></span> +<span>Thus unto the good Great Spirit,<br /></span> +<span>Made her lowly lamentation:<br /></span> +<span>"Wahonówin!—showiness!<a name='FNanchor_S13'></a><a href='#Footnote_S13'><sup>[13]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Gitchee Mânito, benâ-nin!<br /></span> +<span>Nah, Ba-bâ, showâin neméshin!<br /></span> +<span>Wahonówin!—Wahonówin!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Ka-be-bón-ík-ka,<a name='FNanchor_S9'></a><a href='#Footnote_S9'><sup>[9]</sup></a> the mighty,<br /></span> +<span>He that sends the cruel winter,<br /></span> +<span>From the distant Thunder-mountain<br /></span> +<span>On the shore of Gitchee Gumee,<br /></span> +<span>On the rugged northern border,<br /></span> +<span>Sent his solemn, final warning,<br /></span> +<span>Sent the white wolves of the Nor'land.<a name='FNanchor_S14'></a><a href='#Footnote_S14'><sup>[14]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Like the dust of stars in ether—<br /></span> +<span>In the Pathway of the Spirits,<a name='FNanchor_S15'></a><a href='#Footnote_S15'><sup>[15]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Like the sparkling dust of diamonds,<br /></span> +<span>Fell the frost upon the forest,<br /></span> +<span>On the mountains and the meadows,<br /></span> +<span>On the wilderness of woodland,<br /></span> +<span>On the wilderness of waters.<br /></span> +<span>All the lingering fowls departed—<br /></span> +<span>All that seek the South in winter,<br /></span> +<span>All but Shingebís, the diver;<a name='FNanchor_S16'></a><a href='#Footnote_S16'><sup>[16]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>He defies the Winter-maker,<br /></span> +<span>Sits and laughs at Winter-maker.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Ka-be-bón-ík-ka, the mighty,<br /></span> +<span>From his wigwam called Kewâydin—<br /></span> +<span>From his home among the icebergs,<br /></span> +<span>From the sea of frozen waters,<br /></span> +<span>Called the swift and hungry North-wind.<br /></span> +<span>Then he spread his mighty pinions<br /></span> +<span>Over all the land and shook them.<br /></span> +<span>Like the white down of Waubésè<a name='FNanchor_S17'></a><a href='#Footnote_S17'><sup>[17]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Fell the feathery snow and covered<br /></span> +<span>All the marshes and the meadows,<br /></span> +<span>All the hill-tops and the highlands.<br /></span> +<span>Then old Péböán<a name='FNanchor_S18'></a><a href='#Footnote_S18'><sup>[18]</sup></a>—the winter—<br /></span> +<span>Laughed along the stormy waters,<br /></span> +<span>Danced upon the windy headlands,<br /></span> +<span>On the storm his white hair streaming,<br /></span> +<span>And his steaming breath, ascending,<br /></span> +<span>On the pine-tops and the cedars<br /></span> +<span>Fell in frosty mists of silver,<br /></span> +<span>Sprinkling spruce and fir with silver,<br /></span> +<span>Sprinkling all the woods with silver.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>By the lodge-fire all the winter<br /></span> +<span>Sat the Sea-Gull and the Red Fox,<br /></span> +<span>Sat and kindly spoke and chatted,<br /></span> +<span>Till the twain seemed friends together.<br /></span> +<span>Friends they seemed in word and action,<br /></span> +<span>But within the breast of either<br /></span> +<span>Smoldered still the baneful embers—<br /></span> +<span>Fires of jealousy and hatred—<br /></span> +<span>Like a camp-fire in the forest<br /></span> +<span>Left by hunters and deserted;<br /></span> +<span>Only seems a bed of ashes,<br /></span> +<span>But the East wind, Wâbun-noódin,<br /></span> +<span>Scatters through the woods the ashes,<br /></span> +<span>Fans to flame the sleeping embers,<br /></span> +<span>And the wild-fire roars and rages,<br /></span> +<span>Roars and rages through the forest.<br /></span> +<span>So the baneful embers smoldered,<br /></span> +<span>Smoldered in the breast of either.<br /></span> +<span>From the far-off Sunny Islands,<br /></span> +<span>From the pleasant land of Summer,<br /></span> +<span>Where the spirits of the blessed<br /></span> +<span>Feel no more the fangs of hunger,<br /></span> +<span>Or the cold breath of Kewâydin,<br /></span> +<span>Came a stately youth and handsome,<br /></span> +<span>Came Según,<a name='FNanchor_S19'></a><a href='#Footnote_S19'><sup>[19]</sup></a> the foe of Winter.<br /></span> +<span>Like the rising sun his face was,<br /></span> +<span>Like the shining stars his eyes were,<br /></span> +<span>Light his footsteps as the Morning's,<br /></span> +<span>In his hand were buds and blossoms,<br /></span> +<span>On his brow a blooming garland.<br /></span> +<span>Straightway to the icy wigwam<br /></span> +<span>Of old Péböán, the Winter,<br /></span> +<span>Strode Según and quickly entered.<br /></span> +<span>There old Péböán sat and shivered,<br /></span> +<span>Shivered o'er his dying lodge-fire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Ah, my son, I bid you welcome;<br /></span> +<span>Sit and tell me your adventures;<br /></span> +<span>I will tell you of my power;<br /></span> +<span>We will pass the night together."<br /></span> +<span>Thus spake Péböán—the Winter;<br /></span> +<span>Then he filled his pipe and lighted;<br /></span> +<span>Then by sacred custom raised it<br /></span> +<span>To the spirits in the ether;<br /></span> +<span>To the spirits in the caverns<br /></span> +<span>Of the hollow earth he lowered it.<br /></span> +<span>Thus he passed it to the spirits,<br /></span> +<span>And the unseen spirits puffed it.<br /></span> +<span>Next himself old Péböán honored;<br /></span> +<span>Thrice he puffed his pipe and passed it,<br /></span> +<span>Passed it to the handsome stranger.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Lo I blow my breath," said Winter,<br /></span> +<span>"And the laughing brooks are silent.<br /></span> +<span>Hard as flint become the waters,<br /></span> +<span>And the rabbit runs upon them."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then Según, the fair youth, answered:<br /></span> +<span>"Lo I breathe upon the hillsides,<br /></span> +<span>On the valleys and the meadows,<br /></span> +<span>And behold as if by magic—<br /></span> +<span>By the magic of the spirits,<br /></span> +<span>Spring the flowers and tender grasses."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then old Péböán replying:<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Nah!</i><a name='FNanchor_S20'></a><a href='#Footnote_S20'><sup>[20]</sup></a> I breathe upon the forests,<br /></span> +<span>And the leaves fall sere and yellow;<br /></span> +<span>Then I shake my locks and snow falls,<br /></span> +<span>Covering all the naked landscape."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then Según arose and answered:<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Nashké!</i><a name='FNanchor_S20'></a><a href='#Footnote_S20'><sup>[20]</sup></a>—see!—I shake my ringlets;<br /></span> +<span>On the earth the warm rain falleth,<br /></span> +<span>And the flowers look up like children<br /></span> +<span>Glad-eyed from their mother's bosom.<br /></span> +<span>Lo my voice recalls the robin,<br /></span> +<span>Brings the bobolink and bluebird,<br /></span> +<span>And the woods are full of music.<br /></span> +<span>With my breath I melt their fetters,<br /></span> +<span>And the brooks leap laughing onward."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then old Péböán looked upon him,<br /></span> +<span>Looked and knew Según, the Summer.<br /></span> +<span>From his eyes the big tears started<br /></span> +<span>And his boastful tongue was silent.<br /></span> +<span>Now Keezís—the great life-giver,<br /></span> +<span>From his wigwam in Waubú-nong<a name='FNanchor_S21'></a><a href='#Footnote_S21'><sup>[21]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Rose and wrapped his shining blanket<br /></span> +<span>Round his giant form and started,<br /></span> +<span>Westward started on his journey,<br /></span> +<span>Striding on from hill to hill-top.<br /></span> +<span>Upward then he climbed the ether—<br /></span> +<span>On the Bridge of Stars<a name='FNanchor_S22'></a><a href='#Footnote_S22'><sup>[22]</sup></a> he traveled,<br /></span> +<span>Westward traveled on his journey<br /></span> +<span>To the far-off Sunset Mountains—<br /></span> +<span>To the gloomy land of shadows.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the lodge-poles sang the robin—<br /></span> +<span>And the brooks began to murmur.<br /></span> +<span>On the South-wind floated fragrance<br /></span> +<span>Of the early buds and blossoms.<br /></span> +<span>From old Péböán's eyes the tear-drops<br /></span> +<span>Down his pale face ran in streamlets;<br /></span> +<span>Less and less he grew in stature<br /></span> +<span>Till he melted down to nothing;<br /></span> +<span>And behold, from out the ashes,<br /></span> +<span>From the ashes of his lodge-fire,<br /></span> +<span>Sprang the Miscodeed<a name='FNanchor_S23'></a><a href='#Footnote_S23'><sup>[23]</sup></a> and, blushing,<br /></span> +<span>Welcomed Según to the North-land.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>So from Sunny Isles returning,<br /></span> +<span>From the Summer-Land of spirits,<br /></span> +<span>On the poles of Panther's wigwam<br /></span> +<span>Sang Opeé-chee—sang the robin.<br /></span> +<span>In the maples cooed the pigeons—<br /></span> +<span>Cooed and wooed like silly lovers.<br /></span> +<span>"Hah!—hah!" laughed the crow derisive,<br /></span> +<span>In the pine-top, at their folly—<br /></span> +<span>Laughed and jeered the silly lovers.<br /></span> +<span>Blind with love were they, and saw not;<br /></span> +<span>Deaf to all but love, and heard not;<br /></span> +<span>So they cooed and wooed unheeding,<br /></span> +<span>Till the gray hawk pounced upon them,<br /></span> +<span>And the old crow shook with laughter.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: SEGUN AND PEBOAN]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the tall cliff by the sea-shore<br /></span> +<span>Red Fox made a swing. She fastened<br /></span> +<span>Thongs of moose-hide to the pine-tree,<br /></span> +<span>To the strong arm of the pine-tree.<br /></span> +<span>Like a hawk, above the waters,<br /></span> +<span>There she swung herself and fluttered,<br /></span> +<span>Laughing at the thought of danger,<br /></span> +<span>Swung and fluttered o'er the waters.<br /></span> +<span>Then she bantered Sea-Gull, saying,<br /></span> +<span>"See!—I swing above the billows!<br /></span> +<span>Dare you swing above the billows—<br /></span> +<span>Swing like me above the billows?"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>To herself said Sea-Gull—"Surely<br /></span> +<span>I will dare whatever danger<br /></span> +<span>Dares the Red Fox—dares my rival;<br /></span> +<span>She shall never call me coward."<br /></span> +<span>So she swung above the waters—<br /></span> +<span>Dizzy height above the waters,<br /></span> +<span>Pushed and aided by her rival,<br /></span> +<span>To and fro with reckless daring,<br /></span> +<span>Till the strong tree rocked and trembled,<br /></span> +<span>Rocked and trembled with its burden.<br /></span> +<span>As above the yawning billows<br /></span> +<span>Flew the Sea-Gull like a whirlwind,<br /></span> +<span>Red Fox, swifter than red lightning,<br /></span> +<span>Cut the thongs, and headlong downward,<br /></span> +<span>Like an osprey from the ether,<br /></span> +<span>Like a wild-goose pierced with arrows,<br /></span> +<span>Fluttering fell the frantic woman,<br /></span> +<span>Fluttering fell into the waters—<br /></span> +<span>Plunged and sunk beneath the waters!<br /></span> +<span>Hark!—the wailing of the West-wind!<br /></span> +<span>Hark!—the wailing of the waters,<br /></span> +<span>And the beating of the billows!<br /></span> +<span>But no more the voice of Sea-Gull.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: FLUTTERING FELL THE FRANTIC WOMAN]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the wigwam sat the Red Fox,<br /></span> +<span>Hushed the wail of Waub-omeé-meé,<br /></span> +<span>Weeping for her absent mother.<br /></span> +<span>With the twinkling stars the hunter<br /></span> +<span>From the forest came and Raven.<br /></span> +<span>"Sea-Gull wanders late," said Red Fox,<br /></span> +<span>"Late she wanders by the sea-shore,<br /></span> +<span>And some evil may befall her."<br /></span> +<span>In the misty morning twilight<br /></span> +<span>Forth went Panther and the Raven,<br /></span> +<span>Searched the forest and the marshes,<br /></span> +<span>Searched for leagues along the lake-shore,<br /></span> +<span>Searched the islands and the highlands;<br /></span> +<span>But they found no trace or tidings,<br /></span> +<span>Found no track in marsh or meadow,<br /></span> +<span>Found no trail in fen or forest,<br /></span> +<span>On the shore-sand found no footprints.<br /></span> +<span>Many days they sought and found not.<br /></span> +<span>Then to Panther spoke the Raven:<br /></span> +<span>"She is in the Land of Spirits—<br /></span> +<span>Surely in the Land of Spirits.<br /></span> +<span>High at midnight I beheld her—<br /></span> +<span>Like a flying star beheld her—<br /></span> +<span>To the waves of Gitchee Gumee<br /></span> +<span>Downward flashing through the ether.<br /></span> +<span>Thus she flashed that I might see her,<br /></span> +<span>See and know my mother's spirit;<br /></span> +<span>Thus she pointed to the waters,<br /></span> +<span>And beneath them lies her body,<br /></span> +<span>In the wigwam of the spirits—<br /></span> +<span>In the lodge of Nebe-nâw-baigs."<a name='FNanchor_S24'></a><a href='#Footnote_S24'><sup>[24]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then spoke Panther to the Raven:<br /></span> +<span>"On the tall cliff by the waters<br /></span> +<span>Wait and watch with Waub-omeé-meé.<br /></span> +<span>If the Sea-Gull hear the wailing<br /></span> +<span>Of her infant she will answer."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the tall cliff by the waters<br /></span> +<span>So the Raven watched and waited;<br /></span> +<span>All the day he watched and waited,<br /></span> +<span>But the hungry infant slumbered,<br /></span> +<span>Slumbered by the side of Raven,<br /></span> +<span>Till the pines' gigantic shadows<br /></span> +<span>Stretched and pointed to Waubú-nong<a name='FNanchor_S21'></a><a href='#Footnote_S21'><sup>[21]</sup></a>—<br /></span> +<span>To the far-off land of Sunrise;<br /></span> +<span>Then the wee one woke and, famished,<br /></span> +<span>Made a long and piteous wailing.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>From afar where sky and waters<br /></span> +<span>Meet in misty haze and mingle,<br /></span> +<span>Straight toward the rocky highland,<br /></span> +<span>Straight as flies the feathered arrow,<br /></span> +<span>Straight to Raven and the infant,<br /></span> +<span>Swiftly flew a snow-white sea-gull—<br /></span> +<span>Flew and touched the earth a woman.<br /></span> +<span>And behold, the long-lost mother<br /></span> +<span>Caught her wailing child and nursed her,<br /></span> +<span>Sang a lullaby and nursed her.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Thrice was wound a chain of silver<br /></span> +<span>Round her waist and strongly fastened.<br /></span> +<span>Far away into the waters—<br /></span> +<span>To the wigwam of the spirits—<br /></span> +<span>To the lodge of Nebe-nâw-baigs—<br /></span> +<span>Stretched the magic chain of silver.<br /></span> +<span>Spoke the mother to the Raven:<br /></span> +<span>"O my son—my brave young hunter,<br /></span> +<span>Feed my tender little orphan;<br /></span> +<span>Be a father to my orphan;<br /></span> +<span>Be a mother to my orphan—<br /></span> +<span>For the crafty Red Fox robbed us—<br /></span> +<span>Robbed the Sea-Gull of her husband,<br /></span> +<span>Robbed the infant of her mother.<br /></span> +<span>From this cliff the treacherous woman<br /></span> +<span>Headlong into Gitchee Gumee<br /></span> +<span>Plunged the mother of my orphan.<br /></span> +<span>Then a Nebe-nâw-baig caught me—<br /></span> +<span>Chief of all the Nebe-nâw-baigs—<br /></span> +<span>Took me to his shining wigwam,<br /></span> +<span>In the cavern of the waters,<br /></span> +<span>Deep beneath the mighty waters.<br /></span> +<span>All below is burnished copper,<br /></span> +<span>All above is burnished silver<br /></span> +<span>Gemmed with amethyst and agates.<br /></span> +<span>As his wife the Spirit holds me;<br /></span> +<span>By this silver chain he holds me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"When my little one is famished,<br /></span> +<span>When with long and piteous wailing<br /></span> +<span>Cries the orphan for her mother,<br /></span> +<span>Hither bring her, O my Raven;<br /></span> +<span>I will hear her—I will answer.<br /></span> +<span>Now the Nebe-nâw-baig calls me—<br /></span> +<span>Pulls the chain—I must obey him."<br /></span> +<span>Thus she spoke, and in the twinkling<br /></span> +<span>Of a star the spirit-woman<br /></span> +<span>Changed into a snow-white sea-gull,<br /></span> +<span>Spread her wings and o'er the waters<br /></span> +<span>Swiftly flew and swiftly vanished.<br /></span> +<span>Then in secret to the Panther<br /></span> +<span>Raven told his tale of wonder.<br /></span> +<span>Sad and sullen was the hunter;<br /></span> +<span>Sorrow gnawed his heart like hunger;<br /></span> +<span>All the old love came upon him,<br /></span> +<span>And the new love was a hatred.<br /></span> +<span>Hateful to his heart was Red Fox,<br /></span> +<span>But he kept from her the secret—<br /></span> +<span>Kept his knowledge of the murder.<br /></span> +<span>Vain was she and very haughty—<br /></span> +<span>Oge-mâ-kwa<a name='FNanchor_S25'></a><a href='#Footnote_S25'><sup>[25]</sup></a> of the wigwam.<br /></span> +<span>All in vain her fond caresses<br /></span> +<span>On the Panther now she lavished;<br /></span> +<span>When she smiled his face was sullen,<br /></span> +<span>When she laughed he frowned upon her;<br /></span> +<span>In her net of raven tresses<br /></span> +<span>Now no more she held him tangled.<br /></span> +<span>Now through all her fair disguises<br /></span> +<span>Panther saw an evil spirit,<br /></span> +<span>Saw the false heart of the woman.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the tall cliff o'er the waters<br /></span> +<span>Raven sat with Waub-omeé-meé,<br /></span> +<span>Sat and watched again and waited,<br /></span> +<span>Till the wee one, faint and famished,<br /></span> +<span>Made a long and piteous wailing.<br /></span> +<span>Then again the snow-white Sea-Gull,<br /></span> +<span>From afar where sky and waters<br /></span> +<span>Meet in misty haze and mingle,<br /></span> +<span>Straight toward the rocky highland,<br /></span> +<span>Straight as flies the feathered arrow,<br /></span> +<span>Straight to Raven and the infant,<br /></span> +<span>With the silver chain around her,<br /></span> +<span>Flew and touched the earth a woman.<br /></span> +<span>In her arms she caught her infant—<br /></span> +<span>Caught the wailing Waub-omeé-meé,<br /></span> +<span>Sang a lullaby and nursed her.<br /></span> +<span>Sprang the Panther from the thicket—<br /></span> +<span>Sprang and broke the chain of silver!<br /></span> +<span>With his tomahawk he broke it.<br /></span> +<span>Thus he freed the willing Sea-Gull—<br /></span> +<span>From the Water-Spirit freed her,<br /></span> +<span>From the Chief of Nebe-nâw-baigs.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Very angry was the Spirit;<br /></span> +<span>When he drew the chain of silver,<br /></span> +<span>Drew and found that it was broken,<br /></span> +<span>Found that he had lost the woman,<br /></span> +<span>Very angry was the Spirit.<br /></span> +<span>Then he raged beneath the waters,<br /></span> +<span>Raged and smote the mighty waters,<br /></span> +<span>Till the big sea boiled and bubbled,<br /></span> +<span>Till the white-haired, bounding billows<br /></span> +<span>Roared around the rocky headlands,<br /></span> +<span>Rolled and roared upon the shingle.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>To the wigwam happy Panther,<br /></span> +<span>As when first he wooed and won her<br /></span> +<span>Led his wife—as young and handsome.<br /></span> +<span>For the waves of Gitchee Gumee<br /></span> +<span>Washed away the frost and wrinkles,<br /></span> +<span>And the spirits by their magic<br /></span> +<span>Made her young and fair forever.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the wigwam sat the Red Fox,<br /></span> +<span>Sat and sang a song of triumph,<br /></span> +<span>For she little dreamed of danger,<br /></span> +<span>Till the haughty hunter entered,<br /></span> +<span>Followed by the happy mother,<br /></span> +<span>Holding in her arms her infant.<br /></span> +<span>When the Red Fox saw the Sea-Gull—<br /></span> +<span>Saw the dead a living woman,<br /></span> +<span>One wild cry she gave despairing,<br /></span> +<span>One wild cry as of a demon.<br /></span> +<span>Up she sprang and from the wigwam<br /></span> +<span>To the tall cliff flew in terror;<br /></span> +<span>Frantic sprang upon the margin,<br /></span> +<span>Frantic plunged into the waters,<br /></span> +<span>Headlong plunged into the waters.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dead she tossed upon the billows;<br /></span> +<span>For the Nebe-nâw-baigs knew her,<br /></span> +<span>Knew the crafty, wicked woman,<br /></span> +<span>And they cast her from the waters,<br /></span> +<span>Spurned her from their shining wigwams;<br /></span> +<span>Far away upon the shingle<br /></span> +<span>With the roaring waves they cast her.<br /></span> +<span>There upon her bloated body<br /></span> +<span>Fed the cawing crows and ravens,<br /></span> +<span>Fed the hungry wolves and foxes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the shore of Gitchee Gumee,<br /></span> +<span>Ever young and ever handsome,<br /></span> +<span>Long and happy lived the Sea-Gull,<br /></span> +<span>Long and happy with the Panther.<br /></span> +<span>Evermore the happy hunter<br /></span> +<span>Loved the mother of his children.<br /></span> +<span>Like a red star many winters<br /></span> +<span>Blazed their lodge-fire on the sea-shore.<br /></span> +<span>O'er the Bridge of Souls<a name='FNanchor_S26'></a><a href='#Footnote_S26'><sup>[26]</sup></a> together<br /></span> +<span>Walked the Sea-Gull and the Panther.<br /></span> +<span>To the far-off Sunny Islands—<br /></span> +<span>To the Summer-Land of Spirits,<br /></span> +<span>Sea-Gull journeyed with her husband—<br /></span> +<span>Where no more the happy hunter<br /></span> +<span>Feels the fangs of frost or famine,<br /></span> +<span>Or the keen blasts of Kewâydin,<br /></span> +<span>Where no pain or sorrow enters,<br /></span> +<span>And no crafty, wicked woman.<br /></span> +<span>There she rules his lodge forever,<br /></span> +<span>And the twain are very happy,<br /></span> +<span>On the far-off Sunny Islands,<br /></span> +<span>In the Summer-Land of Spirits.<br /></span> +<span>On the rocks of Gitchee Gumee—<br /></span> +<span>On the Pictured Rocks—the legend<br /></span> +<span>Long ago was traced and written,<br /></span> +<span>Pictured by the Water-Spirits;<br /></span> +<span>But the storms of many winters<br /></span> +<span>Have bedimmed the pictured story,<br /></span> +<span>So that none can read the legend<br /></span> +<span>But the Jossakeeds,<a name='FNanchor_S27'></a><a href='#Footnote_S27'><sup>[27]</sup></a> the prophets.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="POETRY" id="POETRY" />POETRY.</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>I had rather write one word upon the rock<br /></span> +<span>Of ages than ten thousand in the sand.<br /></span> +<span>The rock of ages! lo I cannot reach<br /></span> +<span>Its lofty shoulders with my puny hand:<br /></span> +<span>I can but touch the sands about its feet.<br /></span> +<span>Yea, I have painted pictures for the blind,<br /></span> +<span>And sung my sweetest songs to ears of stone.<br /></span> +<span>What matter if the dust of ages drift<br /></span> +<span>Five fathoms deep above my grave unknown,<br /></span> +<span>For I have sung and loved the songs I sung.<br /></span> +<span>Who sings for fame the Muses may disown;<br /></span> +<span>Who sings for gold will sing an idle song;<br /></span> +<span>But he who sings because sweet music springs<br /></span> +<span>Unbidden from his heart and warbles long,<br /></span> +<span>May haply touch another heart unknown.<br /></span> +<span>There is sweeter poetry in the hearts of men<br /></span> +<span>Than ever poet wrote or minstrel sung;<br /></span> +<span>For words are clumsy wings for burning thought.<br /></span> +<span>The full heart falters on the stammering tongue,<br /></span> +<span>And silence is more eloquent than song<br /></span> +<span>When tender souls are wrung by grief or shameful wrong.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The grandest poem is God's Universe:<br /></span> +<span>In measured rhythm the planets whirl their course:<br /></span> +<span>Rhythm swells and throbs in every sun and star,<br /></span> +<span>In mighty ocean's organ-peals and roar,<br /></span> +<span>In billows bounding on the harbor-bar,<br /></span> +<span>In the blue surf that rolls upon the shore,<br /></span> +<span>In the low zephyr's sigh, the tempest's sob,<br /></span> +<span>In the rain's patter and the thunder's roar;<br /></span> +<span>Aye, in the awful earthquake's shuddering throb,<br /></span> +<span>When old Earth cracks her bones and trembles to her core.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I hear a piper piping on a reed<br /></span> +<span>To listening flocks of sheep and bearded goats;<br /></span> +<span>I hear the larks shrill-warbling o'er the mead<br /></span> +<span>Their silver sonnets from their golden throats;<br /></span> +<span>And in my boyhood's clover-fields I hear<br /></span> +<span>The twittering swallows and the hum of bees.<br /></span> +<span>Ah, sweeter to my heart and to my ear<br /></span> +<span>Than any idyl poet ever sung,<br /></span> +<span>The low, sweet music of their melodies;<br /></span> +<span>Because I listened when my soul was young,<br /></span> +<span>In those dear meadows under maple trees.<br /></span> +<span>My heart they molded when its clay was moist,<br /></span> +<span>And all my life the hum of honey-bees<br /></span> +<span>Hath waked in me a spirit that rejoiced,<br /></span> +<span>And touched the trembling chords of tenderest memories.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I hear loud voices and a clamorous throng<br /></span> +<span>With braying bugles and with bragging drums—<br /></span> +<span>Bards and bardies laboring at a song.<br /></span> +<span>One lifts his locks, above the rest preferred,<br /></span> +<span>And to the buzzing flies of fashion thrums<br /></span> +<span>A banjo. Lo him follow all the herd.<br /></span> +<span>When Nero's wife put on her auburn wig,<br /></span> +<span>And at the Coliseum showed her head,<br /></span> +<span>The hair of every dame in Rome turned red;<br /></span> +<span>When Nero fiddled all Rome danced a jig.<br /></span> +<span>Novelty sets the gabbling geese agape,<br /></span> +<span>And fickle fashion follows like an ape.<br /></span> +<span>Aye, brass is plenty; gold is scarce and dear;<br /></span> +<span>Crystals abound, but diamonds still are rare.<br /></span> +<span>Is this the golden age, or the age of gold?<br /></span> +<span>Lo by the page or column fame is sold.<br /></span> +<span>Hear the big journal braying like an ass;<br /></span> +<span>Behold the brazen statesmen as they pass;<br /></span> +<span>See dapper poets hurrying for their dimes<br /></span> +<span>With hasty verses hammered out in rhymes:<br /></span> +<span>The Muses whisper—'"Tis the age of brass."<br /></span> +<span>Workmen are plenty, but the masters few—<br /></span> +<span>Fewer to-day than in the days of old.<br /></span> +<span>Rare blue-eyed pansies peeping pearled with dew,<br /></span> +<span>And lilies lifting up their heads of gold,<br /></span> +<span>Among the gaudy cockscombs I behold,<br /></span> +<span>And here and there a lotus in the shade;<br /></span> +<span>And under English oaks a rose that ne'er will fade.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Fair barks that flutter in the sun your sails,<br /></span> +<span>Piping anon to gay and tented shores<br /></span> +<span>Sweet music and low laughter, it is well<br /></span> +<span>Ye hug the haven when the tempest roars,<br /></span> +<span>For only stalwart ships of oak or steel<br /></span> +<span>May dare the deep and breast the billowy sea<br /></span> +<span>When sweeps the thunder-voiced, dark hurricane,<br /></span> +<span>And the mad ocean shakes his shaggy mane,<br /></span> +<span>And roars through all his grim and vast immensity.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The stars of heaven shine not till it is dark.<br /></span> +<span>Seven cities strove for Homer's bones, 'tis said,<br /></span> +<span>"Through which the living Homer begged for bread."<br /></span> +<span>When in their coffins they lay dumb and stark<br /></span> +<span>Shakespeare began to live, Dante to sing,<br /></span> +<span>And Poe's sweet lute began its werbelling.<br /></span> +<span>Rear monuments of fame or flattery—<br /></span> +<span>Think ye their sleeping souls are made aware?<br /></span> +<span>Heap o'er their heads sweet praise or calumny—<br /></span> +<span>Think ye their moldering ashes hear or care?<br /></span> +<span>Nay, praise and fame are by the living sought;<br /></span> +<span>But he is wise who scorns their flattery,<br /></span> +<span>And who escapes the tongue of calumny<br /></span> +<span>May count himself an angel or a naught:<br /></span> +<span>Lo over Byron's grave a maggot writhes distraught.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Genius is patience, labor and good sense.<br /></span> +<span>Steel and the mind grow bright by frequent use;<br /></span> +<span>In rest they rust. A goodly recompense<br /></span> +<span>Comes from hard toil, but not from its abuse.<br /></span> +<span>The slave, the idler, are alike unblessed;<br /></span> +<span>Aye, in loved labor only is there rest.<br /></span> +<span>But he will read and range and rhyme in vain<br /></span> +<span>Who hath no dust of diamonds in his brain;<br /></span> +<span>And untaught genius is a gem undressed.<br /></span> +<span>The life of man is short, but Art is long,<br /></span> +<span>And labor is the lot of mortal man,<br /></span> +<span>Ordained by God since human time began:<br /></span> +<span>Day follows day and brings its toil and song.<br /></span> +<span>Behind the western mountains sinks the moon,<br /></span> +<span>The silver dawn steals in upon the dark,<br /></span> +<span>Up from the dewy meadow wheels the lark<br /></span> +<span>And trills his welcome to the rising sun,<br /></span> +<span>And lo another day of labor is begun.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Poets are born, not made, some scribbler said,<br /></span> +<span>And every rhymester thinks the saying true:<br /></span> +<span>Better unborn than wanting labor's aid:<br /></span> +<span>Aye, all great poets—all great men—are made<br /></span> +<span>Between the hammer and the anvil. Few<br /></span> +<span>Have the true metal, many have the fire.<br /></span> +<span>No slave or savage ever proved a bard;<br /></span> +<span>Men have their bent, but labor its reward,<br /></span> +<span>And untaught fingers cannot tune the lyre.<br /></span> +<span>The poet's brain with spirit-vision teems;<br /></span> +<span>The voice of nature warbles in his heart;<br /></span> +<span>A sage, a seer, he moves from men apart,<br /></span> +<span>And walks among the shadows of his dreams;<br /></span> +<span>He sees God's light that in all nature beams;<br /></span> +<span>And when he touches with the hand of art<br /></span> +<span>The song of nature welling from his heart,<br /></span> +<span>And guides it forth in pure and limpid streams,<br /></span> +<span>Truth sparkles in the song and like a diamond gleams.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Time and patience change the mulberry-leaf<br /></span> +<span>To shining silk; the lapidary's skill<br /></span> +<span>Makes the rough diamond sparkle at his will,<br /></span> +<span>And cuts a gem from quartz or coral-reef.<br /></span> +<span>Better a skillful cobbler at his last<br /></span> +<span>Than unlearned poet twangling on the lyre;<br /></span> +<span>Who sails on land and gallops on the blast,<br /></span> +<span>And mounts the welkin on a braying ass,<br /></span> +<span>Clattering a shattered cymbal bright with brass,<br /></span> +<span>And slips his girth and tumbles in the mire.<br /></span> +<span>All poetry must be, if it be true,<br /></span> +<span>Like the keen arrows of the—Grecian god<br /></span> +<span>Apollo, that caught fire as they flew.<br /></span> +<span>Ah, such was Byron's, but alas he trod<br /></span> +<span>Ofttimes among the brambles and the rue,<br /></span> +<span>And sometimes dived full deep and brought up mud.<br /></span> +<span>But when he touched with tears, as only he<br /></span> +<span>Could touch, the tender chords of sympathy,<br /></span> +<span>His coldest critics warmed and marveled much,<br /></span> +<span>And all old England's heart throbbed to his thrilling touch.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Truth is the touchstone of all genius Art,<br /></span> +<span>In poet, painter, sculptor, is the same:<br /></span> +<span>What cometh from the heart goes to the heart,<br /></span> +<span>What comes from effort only is but tame.<br /></span> +<span>Nature the only perfect artist is:<br /></span> +<span>Who studies Nature may approach her skill;<br /></span> +<span>Perfection hers, but never can be his,<br /></span> +<span>Though her sweet voice his very marrow thrill;<br /></span> +<span>The finest works of art are Nature's shadows still.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Look not for faultless men or faultless art;<br /></span> +<span>Small faults are ever virtue's parasites:<br /></span> +<span>As in a picture shadows show the lights,<br /></span> +<span>So human foibles show a human heart.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>O while I live and linger on the brink<br /></span> +<span>Let the dear Muses be my company;<br /></span> +<span>Their nectared goblets let my parched lips drink;<br /></span> +<span>Ah, let me drink the <i>soma</i> of their lips!<br /></span> +<span>As humming-bird the lily's nectar sips,<br /></span> +<span>Or <i>Houris</i> sip the wine of Salsabil.<br /></span> +<span>Aye, let me to their throbbing music thrill,<br /></span> +<span>And let me never for one moment think,<br /></span> +<span>Although no laurel crown my constancy,<br /></span> +<span>Their gracious smiles are false, their dearest kiss a lie.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="TWENTY_YEARS_AGO" id="TWENTY_YEARS_AGO" />TWENTY YEARS AGO</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>I am growing old and weary<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ere yet my locks are gray;<br /></span> +<span>Before me lies eternity,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Behind me—but a day.<br /></span> +<span>How fast the years are vanishing!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They melt like April snow:<br /></span> +<span>It seems to me but yesterday—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>There's the school-house on the hill-side,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the romping scholars all;<br /></span> +<span>Where we used to con our daily tasks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And play our games of ball.<br /></span> +<span>They rise to me in visions—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In sunny dreams—and ho'<br /></span> +<span>I sport among the boys and girls<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>We played at ball in summer time—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We boys—with hearty will;<br /></span> +<span>With merry shouts in winter time<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We coasted on the hill.<br /></span> +<span>We would choose our chiefs, divide in bands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And build our forts of snow,<br /></span> +<span>And storm those forts right gallantly—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Last year in June I visited<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That dear old sacred spot,<br /></span> +<span>But the school-house on the hill-side<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the merry shouts were not.<br /></span> +<span>A church was standing where it stood;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I looked around, but no—<br /></span> +<span>I could not see the boys and girls<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>There was sister dear, and brother,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Around the old home-hearth;<br /></span> +<span>And a tender, Christian mother,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Too angel-like for earth.<br /></span> +<span>She used to warn me from the paths<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where thorns and brambles grow,<br /></span> +<span>And lead me in the "narrow way"—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I loved her and I honored her<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Through all my boyhood years;<br /></span> +<span>I knew her joys—I knew her cares—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I knew her hopes and fears.<br /></span> +<span>But alas, one autumn morning<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She left her home below,<br /></span> +<span>And she left us there a-weeping—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>They bore her to the church-yard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With slow and solemn pace;<br /></span> +<span>And there I took my last fond look<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On her dear, peaceful face.<br /></span> +<span>They lowered her in her silent grave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While we bowed our heads in woe,<br /></span> +<span>And they heaped the sods above her head—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>That low, sweet voice—my mother's voice—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I never can forget;<br /></span> +<span>And in those loving eyes I see<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The big tears trembling yet.<br /></span> +<span>I try to tread the "narrow way;"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I stumble oft I know:<br /></span> +<span>I miss—how much!—the helping hand<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Mary—(Mary I will call you—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">'Tis not the old-time name)<br /></span> +<span>Sainted Mary—blue-eyed Mary—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are you in heaven the same?<br /></span> +<span>Are your eyes as bright and beautiful,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your cheeks as full of glow,<br /></span> +<span>As when the school-boy kissed you, May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>How we swung upon the grape-vine<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Down by the Genesee;<br /></span> +<span>And I caught the speckled trout for you,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While you gathered flowers for me:<br /></span> +<span>How we rambled o'er the meadows<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With brows and cheeks aglow,<br /></span> +<span>And hearts like God's own angels—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: HOW, WE SWUNG UPON THE GRAPE-VINE DOWN BY THE GENESEE, +AND I CAUGHT THE SPECKLED TROUT FOR YOU, WHILE YOU GATHERED FLOWERS FOR +ME]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>How our young hearts grew together<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Until they beat as one;<br /></span> +<span>Distrust it could not enter;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cares and fears were none.<br /></span> +<span>All my love was yours, dear Mary,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">'Twas boyish love, I know;<br /></span> +<span>But I ne'er have loved as then I loved—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>How we pictured out the future—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The golden coming years,<br /></span> +<span>And saw no cloud in all our sky,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No gloomy mist of tears;<br /></span> +<span>But ah—how vain are human hopes!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The angels came—and O—<br /></span> +<span>They bore my darling up to heaven—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I will not tell—I cannot tell—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What anguish wrung my soul;<br /></span> +<span>But a silent grief is on my heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though the years so swiftly roll;<br /></span> +<span>And I cannot shake it off, May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This lingering sense of woe,<br /></span> +<span>Though I try to drown the memory<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I am fighting life's stern battle, May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With all my might and main;<br /></span> +<span>But a seat by you and mother there<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is the dearest prize to gain;<br /></span> +<span>And I know you both are near me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whatever winds may blow,<br /></span> +<span>For I feel your spirits cheer me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like twenty years ago.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="BETZKO" id="BETZKO" />BETZKO</h3> + +<h4>A HUNGARIAN LEGEND</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Stibor had led in many a fight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And broken a score of swords<br /></span> +<span>In furious frays and bloody raids<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Against the Turkish hordes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And Sigismund, the Polish king,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who joined the Magyar bands,<br /></span> +<span>Bestowed upon the valiant knight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A broad estate of lands.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Once when the wars were o'er, the knight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was holding wassail high,<br /></span> +<span>And the valiant men that followed him<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Were at the revelry.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Betzko, his Jester, pleased him so<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He vowed it his the task<br /></span> +<span>To do whatever in human power<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His witty Fool might ask.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Build on yon cliff," the Jester cried,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In drunken jollity,<br /></span> +<span>"A mighty castle high and wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And name it after me."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Ah, verily a Jester's prayer,"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Exclaimed the knightly crew,<br /></span> +<span>"To ask of such a noble lord<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What you know he cannot do."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Who says I cannot," Stibor cried,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Do whatsoe'er I will?<br /></span> +<span>Within one year a castle shall stand<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On yonder rocky hill—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"A castle built of ponderous stones,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To give me future fame;<br /></span> +<span>In honor of my witty Fool,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Betzko shall be its name."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now the cliff was high three hundred feet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And perpendicular;<br /></span> +<span>And the skill that could build a castle there<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Must come from lands afar.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And craftsmen came from foreign lands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Italian, German and Jew—<br /></span> +<span>Apprentices and fellow-craftsmen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And master-masons, too.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And every traveler journeying<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Along the mountain-ways<br /></span> +<span>Was held to pay his toll of toil<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the castle for seven days.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Slowly they raised the massive towers<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the steep ascent,<br /></span> +<span>And all around a thousand hands<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Built up the battlement.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Three hundred feet above the glen—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(By the steps five hundred feet)—<br /></span> +<span>The castle stood upon the cliff<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At the end of the year—complete.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now throughout all the Magyar land<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There's none other half so high,<br /></span> +<span>So massive built, so strong and grand;—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It reaches the very sky.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But from that same high battlement<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(Say tales by gypsies told)<br /></span> +<span>The valiant Stibor met his death<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When he was cross and old.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I'll tell you the tale as they told it to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I doubt not it is true,<br /></span> +<span>For 'twas handed down from the middle ages<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From the lips of knights who knew.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>One day when the knight was old and cross,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a little the worse for grog,<br /></span> +<span>Betzko, the Jester, thoughtlessly<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Struck Stibor's favorite dog.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now the dog was a hound and Stibor's pet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And as white as Carpathian snow,<br /></span> +<span>And Stibor hurled old Betzko down<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From the walls to the rocks below.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And as the Jester headlong fell<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From the dizzy, dreadful height,<br /></span> +<span>He muttered a curse with his latest breath<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the head of the cruel knight.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>One year from that day old Stibor held<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His drunken wassail long,<br /></span> +<span>And spent the hours till the cock crew morn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In jest and wine and song.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then he sought his garden on the cliff,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lay down under a vine<br /></span> +<span>To sleep away the lethargy<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of a wassail-bowl of wine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>While sleeping soundly under the shade,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And dreaming of revelries,<br /></span> +<span>An adder crawled upon his breast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bit him in both his eyes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Blinded and mad with pain he ran<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Toward the precipice,<br /></span> +<span>Unheeding till he headlong fell<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Adown the dread abyss.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Just where old Betzko's blood had dyed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With red the old rocks gray,<br /></span> +<span>Quivering and bleeding and dumb and dead<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Old Stibor's body lay.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="WESSELENYI" id="WESSELENYI" />WESSELENYI</h3> + +<h4>A HUNGARIAN TALE</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>When madly raged religious war<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O'er all the Magyar land<br /></span> +<span>And royal archer and hussar<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Met foemen hand to hand,<br /></span> +<span>A princess fair in castle strong<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The royal troops defied<br /></span> +<span>And bravely held her fortress long<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though help was all denied.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Princess Maria was her name—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Brave daughter nobly sired;<br /></span> +<span>She caught her father's trusty sword<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When bleeding he expired,<br /></span> +<span>And bravely rallied warders all<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To meet the storming foe,<br /></span> +<span>And hurled them from the rampart-wall<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the crags below.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Prince Casimir—her father—built<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Murana high and wide;<br /></span> +<span>It sat among the mountain cliffs—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Magyars' boast and pride.<br /></span> +<span>Bold Wesselenyi—stalwart knight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Young, famed and wondrous fair,<br /></span> +<span>With a thousand men besieged the height,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And led the bravest there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And long he tried the arts of war<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To take that castle-hold,<br /></span> +<span>Till many a proud and plumed hussar<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was lying stiff and cold;<br /></span> +<span>And still the frowning castle stood<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A grim, unbroken wall,<br /></span> +<span>Like some lone rock in stormy seas<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That braves the billows all.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Bold Wesselenyi's cheeks grew thin;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A solemn oath he sware<br /></span> +<span>That if he failed the prize to win<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His bones should molder there.<br /></span> +<span>Two toilsome months had worn away,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Two hundred men were slain,<br /></span> +<span>His bold assaults were baffled still,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all his arts were vain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But love is mightier than the sword,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He clad him in disguise—<br /></span> +<span>In the dress of an inferior lord—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To win the noble prize.<br /></span> +<span>He bade his armed men to wait,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To cease the battle-blare<br /></span> +<span>And sought alone the castle-gate<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To hold a parley there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Aloft a flag of truce he bore:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her warders bade him pass;<br /></span> +<span>Within he met the princess fair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All clad in steel and brass.<br /></span> +<span>Her bright, black eyes and queenly art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweet lips and raven hair,<br /></span> +<span>Smote bold young Wesselenyi's heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While he held parley there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Cunning he talked of great reward<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And royal favor, too,<br /></span> +<span>If she would yield her father's sword;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She sternly answered "No."<br /></span> +<span>But even while they parleyed there<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Maria's lustrous eyes<br /></span> +<span>Looked tenderly and lovingly<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the chieftain in disguise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Go tell your gallant chief," she said,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"To keep his paltry pelf;<br /></span> +<span>The knight who would my castle win,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Must dare to come himself."<br /></span> +<span>And forth she sternly bade him go,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But followed with her eyes.<br /></span> +<span>I ween she knew the brave knight well<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Through all his fair disguise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But when had dawned another morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He bade his bugleman<br /></span> +<span>To sound again the parley-horn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ere yet the fray began.<br /></span> +<span>And forth he sent a trusty knight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To seek the castle-gate<br /></span> +<span>And to the princess privately<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His message to relate;—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>That he it was who in disguise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her warders bade to pass,<br /></span> +<span>And while he parleyed there her eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had pierced his plates of brass.<br /></span> +<span>His heart he offered and his hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pledged a signet-ring<br /></span> +<span>If she would yield her brave command<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unto his gracious king.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Go tell your chief," Maria cried—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Audacious as he is—<br /></span> +<span>If he be worthy such a bride<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My castle and hand are his.<br /></span> +<span>But he should know that lady fair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By faint heart ne'er was won;<br /></span> +<span>So let your gallant chieftain, sir,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Come undisguised alone.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"And he may see in the northern tower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Over yonder precipice,<br /></span> +<span>A lone, dim light at the midnight hour<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shine down the dark abyss.<br /></span> +<span>And over the chasm's dungeon-gloom<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall a slender ladder hang;<br /></span> +<span>And if alone he dare to come,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unarmed—without a clang,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"More of his suit your chief shall hear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perhaps may win the prize;<br /></span> +<span>Tell him the way is hedged with fear,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One misstep and he dies.<br /></span> +<span>Nor will I pledge him safe retreat<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From out yon guarded tower;<br /></span> +<span>My watchful warders all to cheat<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May be beyond my power."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>At midnight's dark and silent hour<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The tall and gallant knight<br /></span> +<span>Sought on the cliff the northern tower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And saw the promised light.<br /></span> +<span>With toil he climbed the cragged cliff,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And there the ladder found;<br /></span> +<span>And o'er the yawning gulf he clomb<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The ladder round by round.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And as he climbed the ladder bent<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Above the yawning deep,<br /></span> +<span>But bravely to the port he went<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And entered at a leap<br /></span> +<span>Full twenty warders thronged the hall<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Each with his blade in hand;<br /></span> +<span>They caught the brave knight like a thrall<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bound him foot and hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>They tied him fast to an iron ring,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At Maria's stern command,<br /></span> +<span>And then they jeered—"God save the king<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all his knightly band!"<br /></span> +<span>They bound a bandage o'er his eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then the haughty princess said:<br /></span> +<span>"Audacious knight, I hold a prize,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My castle or your head!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Now, mark!—desert the king's command,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And join your sword with mine,<br /></span> +<span>And thine shall be my heart and hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This castle shall be thine.<br /></span> +<span>I grant one hour for thee to choose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My bold and gallant lord;<br /></span> +<span>And if my offer you refuse<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You perish by the sword!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>He spoke not a word, but his face was pale<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he prayed a silent prayer;<br /></span> +<span>But his heart was oak and it could not quail,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a secret oath he sware.<br /></span> +<span>And grim stood the warders armed all,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the torches' flicker and flare,<br /></span> +<span>As they watch for an hour in the gloomy hall<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The brave knight pinioned there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The short—the flying hour is past,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The warders have bared his breast;<br /></span> +<span>The bugler bugles a doleful blast;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will the pale knight stand the test?<br /></span> +<span>He has made his choice—he will do his part,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He has sworn and he cannot lie,<br /></span> +<span>And he cries with the sword at his beating heart,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"<i>Betray?—nay—better to die!</i>"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Suddenly fell from his blue eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The silken, blinding bands,<br /></span> +<span>And while he looked in sheer surprise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They freed his feet and hands.<br /></span> +<span>"I give thee my castle," Maria cried,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"And I give thee my heart and hand,<br /></span> +<span>And Maria will be the proudest bride<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In all this Magyar land.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Grant heaven that thou be true to me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As thou art to the king,<br /></span> +<span>And I'll bless the day I gave to thee<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My castle for a ring."<br /></span> +<span>The red blood flushed to the brave knight's face<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As he looked on the lady fair;<br /></span> +<span>He sprang to her arms in a fond embrace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he married her then and there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>So the little blind elf with his feathered shaft<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Did more than the sword could do,<br /></span> +<span>For he conquered and took with his magical craft<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her heart and her castle, too.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: WESSELENYI]</p> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<a name="ISABEL"></a><h3>ISABEL</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Fare-thee-well:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On my soul the toll of bell<br /></span> +<span>Trembles. Thou art calmly sleeping<br /></span> +<span>While my weary heart is weeping:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I cannot listen to thy knell:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fare-thee-well.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Sleep and rest:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sorrow shall not pain thy breast,<br /></span> +<span>Pangs and pains that pierce the mortal<br /></span> +<span>Cannot enter at the portal<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of the Mansion of the Blest:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sleep and rest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Slumber sweet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Heart that nevermore will beat<br /></span> +<span>At the footsteps of thy lover;<br /></span> +<span>All thy cares and fears are over.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In thy silent winding-sheet<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Slumber sweet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Fare-thee-well:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the garden and the dell<br /></span> +<span>Where thou lov'dst to stroll and meet me,<br /></span> +<span>Nevermore thy kiss shall greet me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nevermore, O Isabel!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fare-thee-well.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">We shall meet—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where the wings of angels beat:<br /></span> +<span>When my toils and cares are over,<br /></span> +<span>Thou shalt greet again thy lover—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Robed and crowned at Jesus' feet<br /></span> +<span class="i4">We shall meet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Watch and wait<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At the narrow, golden gate;<br /></span> +<span>Watch my coming,—wait my greeting,<br /></span> +<span>For my years are few and fleeting<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my love shall not abate:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Watch and wait.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">So farewell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O my darling Isabel;<br /></span> +<span>Till we meet in the supernal<br /></span> +<span>Mansion and with love eternal<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the golden city dwell,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fare-thee-well.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="BYRON_AND_THE_ANGEL" id="BYRON_AND_THE_ANGEL" />BYRON AND THE ANGEL</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Poet:</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Why this fever—why this sighing?—<br /></span> +<span>Why this restless longing—dying<br /></span> +<span>For—a something—dreamy something,<br /></span> +<span>Undefined, and yet defying<br /></span> +<span>All the pride and power of manhood?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"O these years of sin and sorrow!<br /></span> +<span>Smiling while the iron harrow<br /></span> +<span>Of a keen and biting longing<br /></span> +<span>Tears and quivers in the marrow<br /></span> +<span>Of my being every moment—<br /></span> +<span>Of my very inmost being.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"What to me the mad ambition<br /></span> +<span>For men's praise and proud position—<br /></span> +<span>Struggling, fighting to the summit<br /></span> +<span>Of its vain and earthly mission,<br /></span> +<span>To lie down on bed of ashes—<br /></span> +<span>Bed of barren, bitter ashes?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Cure this fever? I have tried it;<br /></span> +<span>Smothered, drenched it and defied it<br /></span> +<span>With a will of brass and iron;<br /></span> +<span>Every smile and look denied it;<br /></span> +<span>Yet it heeded not denying,<br /></span> +<span>And it mocks at my defying<br /></span> +<span>While my very soul is dying.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Is there balm in Gilead?—tell me!<br /></span> +<span>Nay—no balm to soothe and quell me?<br /></span> +<span>Must I tremble in this fever?<br /></span> +<span>Death, O lift thy hand and fell me;<br /></span> +<span>Let me sink to rest forever<br /></span> +<span>Where this burning cometh never.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Sometimes when this restless madness<br /></span> +<span>Softens down to mellow sadness,<br /></span> +<span>I look back on sun-lit valleys<br /></span> +<span>Where my boyish heart of gladness<br /></span> +<span>Nestled without pain or longing—<br /></span> +<span>Nestled softly in a vision<br /></span> +<span>Full of love and hope's fruition,<br /></span> +<span>Lulled by morning songs of spring-time.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Then I ponder, and I wonder<br /></span> +<span>Was some heart-chord snapped asunder<br /></span> +<span>When the threads were soft and silken?<br /></span> +<span>Did some fatal boyish blunder<br /></span> +<span>Plant a canker in my bosom<br /></span> +<span>That hath ever burned and rankled?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"O this thirsting, thirsting hanker!<br /></span> +<span>O this burning, burning canker'<br /></span> +<span>Driving Peace and Hope to shipwreck—<br /></span> +<span>Without rudder, without anchor,<br /></span> +<span>On the reef-rocks of Damnation!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Invisible Angel:</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Jesus—Son of Virgin Mary;<br /></span> +<span>Lift the burden from the weary:<br /></span> +<span>Pity, Jesus, and anoint him<br /></span> +<span>With the holy balm of Gilead."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Poet:</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Yea, Christ Jesus, pour thy blessings<br /></span> +<span>On these terrible heart-pressings:<br /></span> +<span>O I bless thee, unseen Angel;<br /></span> +<span>Lead me—teach me, holy Spirit."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Angel:</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">"There is balm in Gilead!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There is balm in Gilead!<br /></span> +<span>Peace awaits thee with caressings—<br /></span> +<span>Sitting at the feet of Jesus—<br /></span> +<span>At the right-hand of Jehovah—<br /></span> +<span>At the blessed feet of Jesus;—Alleluia!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="CHRISTMAS_EVE" id="CHRISTMAS_EVE" />CHRISTMAS EVE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>From church and chapel and dome and tower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Near—far and everywhere,<br /></span> +<span>The merry bells chime loud and clear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the frosty air.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>All down the marble avenues<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lamp-lit casements glow,<br /></span> +<span>And from an hundred palaces<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Glad carols float and flow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>A thousand lamps from street to street<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blaze on the dusky air,<br /></span> +<span>And light the way for happy feet<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To carol, praise and prayer.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>'Tis Christmas eve. In church and hall<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The laden fir-trees bend;<br /></span> +<span>Glad children throng the festival<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And grandsires too attend.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Fur-wrapped and gemmed with pearls and gold,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Proud ladies rich and fair<br /></span> +<span>As Egypt's splendid queen of old<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In all her pomp are there.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And many a costly, golden gift<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hangs on each Christmas-tree,<br /></span> +<span>While round and round the carols drift<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In waves of melody.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> + +<h4>II</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>In a dim and dingy attic,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Away from the pomp and glare,<br /></span> +<span>A widow sits by a flickering lamp,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bowed down by toil and care.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On her toil-worn hand her weary head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At her feet a shoe half-bound,<br /></span> +<span>On the bare, brown table a loaf of bread,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hunger and want around.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>By her side at the broken window,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With her rosy feet all bare,<br /></span> +<span>Her little one carols a Christmas tune<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the chimes on the frosty air.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And the mother dreams of the by-gone years<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And their merry Christmas-bells,<br /></span> +<span>Till her cheeks are wet with womanly tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a sob in her bosom swells.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: AND THE MOTHER DREAMS OF THE BY GONE YEARS, AND THEIR +MERRY CHRISTMAS BELLS]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>The child looked up; her innocent ears<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Had caught the smothered cry;<br /></span> +<span>She saw the pale face wet with tears<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She fain would pacify.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Don't cry, mama," she softly said—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Here's a Christmas gift for you,"<br /></span> +<span>And on the mother's cheek a kiss<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She printed warm and true.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"God bless my child!" the mother cried<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And caught her to her breast—<br /></span> +<span>"O Lord, whose Son was crucified,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy precious gift is best.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"If toil and trouble be my lot<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While on life's sea I drift,<br /></span> +<span>O Lord, my soul shall murmur not,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If Thou wilt spare Thy gift."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="OUT_OF_THE_DEPTHS" id="OUT_OF_THE_DEPTHS" />OUT OF THE DEPTHS</h3> + +<blockquote><p>And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in +adultery, and when they had set her in the midst, they said unto him +"Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses in +the law commanded us that such be stoned; but what sayest thou?"—[<i>St. +John</i>, Chap, viii; 3, 4, 5.</p></blockquote> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Reach thy hand to me, O Jesus;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Reach thy loving hand to me,<br /></span> +<span>Or I sink, alas, and perish<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In my sin and agony.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>From the depths I cry, O Jesus,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lifting up mine eyes to thee;<br /></span> +<span>Save me from my sin and sorrow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With thy loving charity.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Pity, Jesus—blessed Savior;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I am weak, but thou art strong;<br /></span> +<span>Fill my heart with prayer and praises,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fill my soul with holy song.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Lift me up, O sacred Jesus—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lift my bruised heart to thee;<br /></span> +<span>Teach me to be pure and holy<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As the holy angels be.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Scribes and Pharisees surround me:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou art writing in the sand:<br /></span> +<span>Must I perish, Son of Mary?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wilt thou give the stern command?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Am I saved?—for Jesus sayeth—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Let the sinless cast a stone."<br /></span> +<span>Lo the Scribes have all departed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the Pharisees are gone!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Woman, where are thine accusers?"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(They have vanished one by one.)<br /></span> +<span>"Hath no man condemned thee, woman?"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she meekly answered—"None."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then he spake His blessed answer—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Balm indeed for sinners sore—<br /></span> +<span>"Neither then will I condemn thee:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Go thy way and sin no more."<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="FAME" id="FAME" />FAME</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dust of the desert are thy walls<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And temple-towers, O Babylon!<br /></span> +<span>O'er crumbled halls the lizard crawls,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And serpents bask in blaze of sun.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>In vain kings piled the Pyramids;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their tombs were robbed by ruthless hands.<br /></span> +<span>Who now shall sing their fame and deeds,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or sift their ashes from the sands?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Deep in the drift of ages hoar<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lie nations lost and kings forgot;<br /></span> +<span>Above their graves the oceans roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or desert sands drift o'er the spot.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>A thousand years are but a day<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When reckoned on the wrinkled earth;<br /></span> +<span>And who among the wise shall say<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What cycle saw the primal birth<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Of man, who lords on sea and land,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And builds his monuments to-day,<br /></span> +<span>Like Syrian on the desert sand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To crumble and be blown away.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Proud chiefs of pageant armies led<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To fame and death their followers forth,<br /></span> +<span>Ere Helen sinned and Hector bled,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or Odin ruled the rugged North.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And poets sang immortal praise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To mortal heroes ere the fire<br /></span> +<span>Of Homer blazed in Ilion lays,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or Brage tuned the Northern lyre.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>For fame men piled the Pyramids;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their names have perished with their bones:<br /></span> +<span>For fame men wrote their boasted deeds<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On Babel bricks and Runic stones—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On Tyrian temples, gates of brass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On Roman arch and Damask blades,<br /></span> +<span>And perished like the desert grass<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That springs to-day—to-morrow—fades.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And still for fame men delve and die<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In Afric heat and Arctic cold;<br /></span> +<span>For fame on flood and field they vie,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or gather in the shining gold.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Time, like the ocean, onward rolls<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Relentless, burying men and deeds;<br /></span> +<span>The brightest names, the bravest souls,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Float but an hour like ocean weeds,<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then sink forever. In the slime—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forgotten, lost forevermore,<br /></span> +<span>Lies Fame from every age and clime;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet thousands clamor on the shore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Immortal Fame!—O dust and death!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The centuries as they pass proclaim<br /></span> +<span>That Fame is but a mortal breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That man must perish—name and fame.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The earth is but a grain of sand—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An atom in a shoreless sea;<br /></span> +<span>A million worlds lie in God's hand—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yea, myriad millions—what are we?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>O mortal man of bone and blood!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then is there nothing left but dust?<br /></span> +<span>God made us; He is wise and good,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we may humbly hope and trust.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="WINONA" id="WINONA" />WINONA.</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>When the meadow-lark trilled o'er the leas and the oriole piped in the maples,</i><br /></span> +<span><i>From my hammock, all under the trees, by the sweet-scented field of red clover,</i><br /></span> +<span><i>I harked to the hum of the bees, as they gathered the mead of the blossoms,</i><br /></span> +<span><i>And caught from their low melodies the air of the song of Winona</i>.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>(In pronouncing Dakota words give "a" the sound of "ah,"—"e" the sound +of "a,"—"i" the sound of "e" and "u" the sound of "oo." Sound "ee" as +in English. The numerals refer to Notes in appendix.)</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Two hundred white Winters and more have fled from the face of the Summer,<br /></span> +<span>Since here on the oak-shaded shore of the dark-winding, swift Mississippi,<br /></span> +<span>Where his foaming floods tumble and roar o'er the falls and the white-rolling rapids,<br /></span> +<span>In the fair, fabled center of Earth, sat the Indian town of <i>Ka-thá-ga</i>. <a name='FNanchor_86'></a><a href='#Footnote_86'><sup>[86]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Far rolling away to the north, and the south, lay the emerald prairies,<br /></span> +<span>All dotted with woodlands and lakes, and above them the blue bent of ether.<br /></span> +<span>And here where the dark river breaks into spray and the roar of the <i>Ha-Ha</i>, <a name='FNanchor_76'></a><a href='#Footnote_76'><sup>[76]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Where gathered the bison-skin <i>tees</i><a name='FNanchor_F'></a><a href='#Footnote_F'><sup>[F]</sup></a> of the chief tawny tribe of Dakotas;<br /></span> +<span>For here, in the blast and the breeze, flew the flag of the chief of <i>Isantees</i>, <a name='FNanchor_86'></a><a href='#Footnote_86'><sup>[86]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Up-raised on the stem of a lance—the feathery flag of the eagle.<br /></span> +<span>And here to the feast and the dance, from the prairies remote and the forests,<br /></span> +<span>Oft gathered the out-lying bands, and honored the gods of the nation.<br /></span> +<span>On the islands and murmuring strands they danced to the god of the waters,<br /></span> +<span><i>Unktéhee</i>, <a name='FNanchor_69'></a><a href='#Footnote_69'><sup>[69]</sup></a> who dwelt in the caves, deep under the flood of the <i>Ha-Ha</i>; <a name='FNanchor_76'></a><a href='#Footnote_76'><sup>[76]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And high o'er the eddies and waves hung their offerings of furs and tobacco,<a name='FNanchor_G'></a><a href='#Footnote_G'><sup>[G]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And here to the Master of life—<i>Anpé-tu-wee</i>, <a name='FNanchor_70'></a><a href='#Footnote_70'><sup>[70]</sup></a> god of the heavens,<br /></span> +<span>Chief, warrior, and maiden, and wife, burned the sacred green sprigs of the cedar. <a name='FNanchor_50'></a><a href='#Footnote_50'><sup>[50]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And here to the Searcher-of-hearts—fierce <i>Tá-ku Skan-skán</i>, <a name='FNanchor_51'></a><a href='#Footnote_51'><sup>[51]</sup></a> the avenger,<br /></span> +<span>Who dwells in the uppermost parts of the earth, and the blue, starry ether,<br /></span> +<span>Ever watching, with all-seeing eyes, the deeds of the wives and the warriors,<br /></span> +<span>As an osprey afar in the skies, sees the fish as they swim in the waters,<br /></span> +<span>Oft spread they the bison-tongue feast, and singing preferred their petitions,<br /></span> +<span>Till the Day-Spirit<a name='FNanchor_70'></a><a href='#Footnote_70'><sup>[70]</sup></a> rose in the East—in the red, rosy robes of the morning,<br /></span> +<span>To sail o'er the sea of the skies, to his lodge in the land of the shadows,<br /></span> +<span>Where the black-winged tornadoes<a name='FNanchor_H'></a><a href='#Footnote_H'><sup>[H]</sup></a> arise, rushing loud from the mouths of their caverns.<br /></span> +<span>And here with a shudder they heard, flying far from his <i>tee</i> in the mountains,<br /></span> +<span><i>Wa-kín-yan</i>,<a name='FNanchor_32'></a><a href='#Footnote_32'><sup>[32]</sup></a> the huge Thunder-Bird, with the arrows of fire in his talons.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: FALLS OF ST. ANTHONY. +FACSIMILE OF THE CUT IN CARVER'S TRAVELS, PUBLISHED AT LONDON, IN 1778, +FROM A SURVEY AND SKETCH MADE BY CAPT. J. CARVER, NOV. 17, 1766. +PERPENDICULAR FALL, 30 FEET; BREADTH NEAR 600 FEET.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Two hundred white Winters and more have fled from the face of the Summer<br /></span> +<span>Since here by the cataract's roar, in the moon of the red-blooming lilies,<a name='FNanchor_71'></a><a href='#Footnote_71'><sup>[71]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>In the <i>tee</i> of Ta-té-psin<a name='FNanchor_I'></a><a href='#Footnote_I'><sup>[I]</sup></a> was born Winona—wild-rose of the prairies.<br /></span> +<span>Like the summer sun peeping, at morn, o'er the hills was the face of Winona.<br /></span> +<span>And here she grew up like a queen—a romping and lily-lipped laughter,<br /></span> +<span>And danced on the undulant green, and played in the frolicsome waters,<br /></span> +<span>Where the foaming tide tumbles and whirls o'er the murmuring rocks in the rapids;<br /></span> +<span>And whiter than foam were the pearls that gleamed in the midst of her laughter.<br /></span> +<span>Long and dark was her flowing hair flung like the robe of the night to the breezes;<br /></span> +<span>And gay as the robin she sung, or the gold-breasted lark of the meadows.<br /></span> +<span>Like the wings of the wind were her feet, and as sure as the feet of <i>Ta-tó-ka</i><a name='FNanchor_J'></a><a href='#Footnote_J'><sup>[J]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And oft like an antelope fleet o'er the hills and the prairies she bounded,<br /></span> +<span>Lightly laughing in sport as she ran, and looking back over her shoulder<br /></span> +<span>At the fleet-footed maiden or man that vainly her flying feet followed.<br /></span> +<span>The belle of the village was she, and the pride of the aged Ta-té-psin,<br /></span> +<span>Like a sunbeam she lighted his <i>tee</i>, and gladdened the heart of her father.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the golden-hued <i>Wázu-pe-weé</i>—the moon when the wild-rice is gathered;<br /></span> +<span>When the leaves on the tall sugar-tree are as red as the breast of the robin,<br /></span> +<span>And the red-oaks that border the lea are aflame with the fire of the sunset,<br /></span> +<span>From the wide, waving fields of wild-rice—from the meadows of <i>Psin-ta-wak-pá-dan</i>,<a name='FNanchor_K'></a><a href='#Footnote_K'><sup>[K]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Where the geese and the mallards rejoice, and grow fat on the bountiful harvest,<br /></span> +<span>Came the hunters with saddles of moose and the flesh of the bear and the bison,<br /></span> +<span>And the women in birch-bark canoes well laden with rice from the meadows.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>With the tall, dusky hunters, behold, came a marvelous man or a spirit,<br /></span> +<span>White-faced and so wrinkled and old, and clad in the robe of the raven.<br /></span> +<span>Unsteady his steps were and slow, and he walked with a staff in his right hand,<br /></span> +<span>And white as the first-falling snow were the thin locks that lay on his shoulders.<br /></span> +<span>Like rime-covered moss hung his beard, flowing down from his face to his girdle;<br /></span> +<span>And wan was his aspect and weird, and often he chanted and mumbled<br /></span> +<span>In a strange and mysterious tongue, as he bent o'er his book in devotion,<br /></span> +<span>Or lifted his dim eyes and sung, in a low voice, the solemn "<i>Te Deum</i>,"<br /></span> +<span>Or Latin, or Hebrew, or Greek—all the same were his words to the warriors,—<br /></span> +<span>All the same to the maids and the meek, wide-wondering-eyed, hazel-brown children.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Father René Menard <a name='FNanchor_L'></a><a href='#Footnote_L'><sup>[L]</sup></a>—it was he, long lost to his Jesuit brothers,<br /></span> +<span>Sent forth by an holy decree to carry the Cross to the heathen.<br /></span> +<span>In his old age abandoned to die, in the swamps, by his timid companions,<br /></span> +<span>He prayed to the Virgin on high, and she led him forth from the forest;<br /></span> +<span>For angels she sent him as men—in the forms of the tawny Dakotas,<br /></span> +<span>And they led his feet from the fen, from the slough of despond and the desert,<br /></span> +<span>Half dead in a dismal morass, as they followed the red-deer they found him,<br /></span> +<span>In the midst of the mire and the grass, and mumbling "<i>Te Deum laudamus.</i>"<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Unktómee<a name='FNanchor_72'></a><a href='#Footnote_72'><sup>[72]</sup></a>—Ho!</i>" muttered the braves, for they deemed him the black Spider-Spirit<br /></span> +<span>That dwells in the drearisome caves, and walks on the marshes at midnight,<br /></span> +<span>With a flickering torch in his hand, to decoy to his den the unwary.<br /></span> +<span>His tongue could they not understand, but his torn hands all shriveled with famine<br /></span> +<span>He stretched to the hunters and said: "He feedeth his chosen with manna;<br /></span> +<span>And ye are the angels of God sent to save me from death in the desert."<br /></span> +<span>His famished and woe-begone face, and his tones touched the hearts of the hunters;<br /></span> +<span>They fed the poor father apace, and they led him away to <i>Ka-thá-ga.</i><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>There little by little he learned the tongue of the tawny Dakotas;<br /></span> +<span>And the heart of the good father yearned to lead them away from their idols—<br /></span> +<span>Their giants<a name='FNanchor_16'></a><a href='#Footnote_16'><sup>[16]</sup></a> and dread Thunder-birds—their worship of stones<a name='FNanchor_73'></a><a href='#Footnote_73'><sup>[73]</sup></a> and the devil.<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Wakán-de!</i>"<a name='FNanchor_M'></a><a href='#Footnote_M'><sup>[M]</sup></a> they answered his words, for he read from his book in the Latin,<br /></span> +<span>Lest the Nazarene's holy commands by his tongue should be marred in translation;<br /></span> +<span>And oft with his beads in his hands, or the cross and the crucified Jesus,<br /></span> +<span>He knelt by himself on the sands, and his dim eyes uplifted to heaven.<br /></span> +<span>But the braves bade him look to the East—to the silvery lodge of <i>Han-nán-na</i>;<a name='FNanchor_N'></a><a href='#Footnote_N'><sup>[N]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And to dance with the chiefs at the feast—at the feast of the Giant <i>Heyó-ka.</i><a name='FNanchor_16'></a><a href='#Footnote_16'><sup>[16]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>They frowned when the good father spurned the flesh of the dog in the kettle,<br /></span> +<span>And laughed when his fingers were burned in the hot, boiling pot of the giant.<br /></span> +<span>"The Black-robe" they called the poor priest, from the hue of his robe and his girdle;<br /></span> +<span>And never a game or a feast but the father must grace with his presence.<br /></span> +<span>His prayer-book the hunters revered,—they deemed it a marvelous spirit;<br /></span> +<span>It spoke and the white father heard,—it interpreted visions and omens.<br /></span> +<span>And often they bade him to pray this marvelous spirit to answer,<br /></span> +<span>And tell where the sly Chippewa might be ambushed and slain in his forest.<br /></span> +<span>For Menard was the first in the land, proclaiming, like John in the desert,<br /></span> +<span>"The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand; repent ye, and turn from your idols."<br /></span> +<span>The first of the brave brotherhood that, threading the fens and the forest,<br /></span> +<span>Stood afar by the turbulent flood at the falls of the Father of Waters.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: FATHER RENE MENARD]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the lodge of the Stranger<a name='FNanchor_O'></a><a href='#Footnote_O'><sup>[O]</sup></a> he sat, awaiting the crown of a martyr;<br /></span> +<span>His sad face compassion begat in the heart of the dark-eyed Winona.<br /></span> +<span>Oft she came to the <i>teepee</i> and spoke; she brought him the tongue of the bison,<br /></span> +<span>Sweet nuts from the hazel and oak, and flesh of the fawn and the mallard.<br /></span> +<span>Soft <i>hánpa</i><a name='FNanchor_P'></a><a href='#Footnote_P'><sup>[P]</sup></a> she made for his feet and leggins of velvety fawn-skin,<br /></span> +<span>A blanket of beaver complete, and a hood of the hide of the otter.<br /></span> +<span>And oft at his feet on the mat, deftly braiding the flags and the rushes,<br /></span> +<span>Till the sun sought his <i>teepee</i> she sat, enchanted with what he related<br /></span> +<span>Of the white-wingèd ships on the sea and the <i>teepees</i> far over the ocean,<br /></span> +<span>Of the love and the sweet charity of the Christ and the beautiful Virgin.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>She listened like one in a trance when he spoke of the brave, bearded Frenchmen,<br /></span> +<span>From the green, sun-lit valleys of France to the wild <i>Hochelága</i><a name='FNanchor_Q'></a><a href='#Footnote_Q'><sup>[Q]</sup></a> transplanted,<br /></span> +<span>Oft trailing the deserts of snow in the heart of the dense Huron forests,<br /></span> +<span>Or steering the dauntless canoe through the waves of the fresh-water ocean.<br /></span> +<span>"Yea, stronger and braver are they," said the aged Menard to Winona,<br /></span> +<span>"Than the head-chief, tall Wazi-kuté,<a name='FNanchor_74'></a><a href='#Footnote_74'><sup>[74]</sup></a> but their words are as soft as a maiden's,<br /></span> +<span>Their eyes are the eyes of the swan, but their hearts are the hearts of the eagles;<br /></span> +<span>And the terrible <i>Mása Wakán</i><a name='FNanchor_R'></a><a href='#Footnote_R'><sup>[R]</sup></a> ever walks by their side like a spirit;<br /></span> +<span>Like a Thunder-bird, roaring in wrath, flinging fire from his terrible talons,<br /></span> +<span>He sends to their enemies death in the flash of the fatal <i>Wakándee</i>."<a name='FNanchor_S'></a><a href='#Footnote_S'><sup>[S]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>The Autumn was past and the snow lay drifted and deep on the prairies;<br /></span> +<span>From his <i>teepee</i> of ice came the foe—came the storm-breathing god of the winter.<br /></span> +<span>Then roared in the groves, on the plains, on the ice-covered lakes and the river,<br /></span> +<span>The blasts of the fierce hurricanes blown abroad from the breast of <i>Wazíya</i>. <a name='FNanchor_3'></a><a href='#Footnote_3'><sup>[3]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>The bear cuddled down in his den, and the elk fled away to the forest;<br /></span> +<span>The pheasant and gray prairie-hen made their beds in the heart of the snow-drift;<br /></span> +<span>The bison herds huddled and stood in the hollows and under the hill-sides,<br /></span> +<span>Or rooted the snow for their food in the lee of the bluffs and the timber;<br /></span> +<span>And the mad winds that howled from the north, from the ice-covered seas of <i>Wazíya</i>,<br /></span> +<span>Chased the gray wolf and silver-fox forth to their dens in the hills of the forest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Poor Father Menard—he was ill; in his breast burned the fire of a fever;<br /></span> +<span>All in vain was the magical skill of <i>Wicásta Wakán</i> <a name='FNanchor_61'></a><a href='#Footnote_61'><sup>[61]</sup></a> with his rattle;<br /></span> +<span>Into soft, child-like slumber he fell, and awoke in the land of the blessèd—<br /></span> +<span>To the holy applause of "Well-done!" and the harps in the hands of the angels.<br /></span> +<span>Long he carried the cross and he won the coveted crown of a martyr.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the land of the heathen he died, meekly following the voice of his Master,<br /></span> +<span>One mourner alone by his side—Ta-té-psin's compassionate daughter.<br /></span> +<span>She wailed the dead father with tears, and his bones by her kindred she buried.<br /></span> +<span>Then winter followed winter. The years sprinkled frost on the head of her father;<br /></span> +<span>And three weary winters she dreamed of the fearless and fair, bearded Frenchmen;<br /></span> +<span>At midnight their swift paddles gleamed on the breast of the broad Mississippi,<br /></span> +<span>And the eyes of the brave strangers beamed on the maid in the midst of her slumber.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>She lacked not admirers; the light of the lover oft burned in her <i>teepee</i>—<br /></span> +<span>At her couch in the midst of the night,—but she never extinguished the flambeau.<br /></span> +<span>The son of Chief Wazi-kuté—a fearless and eagle-plumed warrior—<br /></span> +<span>Long sighed for Winona, and he was the pride of the band of <i>Isántees</i>.<br /></span> +<span>Three times, in the night at her bed, had the brave held the torch of the lover, <a name='FNanchor_75'></a><a href='#Footnote_75'><sup>[75]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And thrice had she covered her head and rejected the handsome Tamdóka. <a name='FNanchor_T'></a><a href='#Footnote_T'><sup>[T]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>'Twas Summer. The merry-voiced birds trilled and warbled in woodland and meadow;<br /></span> +<span>And abroad on the prairies the herds cropped the grass in the land of the lilies,—<br /></span> +<span>And sweet was the odor of rose wide-wafted from hillside and heather;<br /></span> +<span>In the leaf-shaded lap of repose lay the bright, blue-eyed babes of the summer;<br /></span> +<span>And low was the murmur of brooks, and low was the laugh of the <i>Ha-Ha</i>; <a name='FNanchor_76'></a><a href='#Footnote_76'><sup>[76]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And asleep in the eddies and nooks lay the broods of <i>magá</i> <a name='FNanchor_60'></a><a href='#Footnote_60'><sup>[60]</sup></a>and the mallard.<br /></span> +<span>'Twas the moon of <i>Wasúnpa</i>. <a name='FNanchor_71'></a><a href='#Footnote_71'><sup>[71]</sup></a> The band lay at rest in the tees at <i>Ka-thá-ga</i>,<br /></span> +<span>And abroad o'er the beautiful land walked the spirits of Peace and of Plenty—<br /></span> +<span>Twin sisters, with bountiful hand wide scattering wild-rice and the lilies.<br /></span> +<span><i>An-pé-tu-wee</i><a name='FNanchor_70'></a><a href='#Footnote_70'><sup>[70]</sup></a> walked in the west—to his lodge in the far-away mountains,<br /></span> +<span>And the war-eagle flew to her nest in the oak on the Isle of the Spirit.<a name='FNanchor_U'></a><a href='#Footnote_U'><sup>[U]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And now at the end of the day, by the shore of the Beautiful Island,<a name='FNanchor_V'></a><a href='#Footnote_V'><sup>[V]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>A score of fair maidens and gay made joy in the midst of the waters.<br /></span> +<span>Half-robed in their dark, flowing hair, and limbed like the fair Aphroditè,<br /></span> +<span>They played in the waters, and there they dived and they swam like the beavers,<br /></span> +<span>Loud-laughing like loons on the lake when the moon is a round shield of silver,<br /></span> +<span>And the songs of the whippowils wake on the shore in the midst of the maples.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But hark!—on the river a song,—strange voices commingled in chorus;<br /></span> +<span>On the current a boat swept along with DuLuth and his hardy companions;<br /></span> +<span>To the stroke of their paddles they sung, and this the refrain that they chanted:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Dans mon chemin j'ai rencontré<br /></span> +<span>Deux cavaliers bien montés.<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Lon, lon, laridon daine,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Lon, lon, laridon da."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Deux cavaliers bien montés;<br /></span> +<span>L'un à cheval, et l'autre à pied.<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Lon, lon, laridon daine,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Lon, lon, laridon da."<a name='FNanchor_W'></a><a href='#Footnote_W'><sup>[W]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: ARRIVAL OF DULUTH AT KATHAGA]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Like the red, dappled deer in the glade alarmed by the footsteps of hunters,<br /></span> +<span>Discovered, disordered, dismayed, the nude nymphs fled forth from the waters,<br /></span> +<span>And scampered away to the shade, and peered from the screen of the lindens.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>A bold and adventuresome man was DuLuth, and a dauntless in danger,<br /></span> +<span>And straight to <i>Kathága</i> he ran, and boldly advanced to the warriors,<br /></span> +<span>Now gathering, a cloud on the strand, and gazing amazed on the strangers;<br /></span> +<span>And straightway he offered his hand unto Wázi-kuté, the <i>Itáncan</i>.<a name='FNanchor_X'></a><a href='#Footnote_X'><sup>[X]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>To the Lodge of the Stranger were led DuLuth and his hardy companions;<br /></span> +<span>Robes of beaver and bison were spread, and the Peace-pipe<a name='FNanchor_23'></a><a href='#Footnote_23'><sup>[23]</sup></a> was smoked with the Frenchman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>There was dancing and feasting at night, and joy at the presents he lavished.<br /></span> +<span>All the maidens were wild with delight with the flaming red robes and the ribbons,<br /></span> +<span>With the beads and the trinkets untold, and the fair, bearded face of the giver;<br /></span> +<span>And glad were they all to behold the friends from the Land of the Sunrise.<br /></span> +<span>But one stood apart from the rest—the queenly and silent Winona,<br /></span> +<span>Intently regarding the guest—hardly heeding the robes and the ribbons,<br /></span> +<span>Whom the White Chief beholding admired, and straightway he spread on her shoulders<br /></span> +<span>A lily-red robe and attired with necklet and ribbons the maiden.<br /></span> +<span>The red lilies bloomed in her face, and her glad eyes gave thanks to the giver,<br /></span> +<span>And forth from her <i>teepee</i> apace she brought him the robe and the missal<br /></span> +<span>Of the father—poor René Menard; and related the tale of the "Black Robe."<br /></span> +<span>She spoke of the sacred regard he inspired in the hearts of Dakotas;<br /></span> +<span>That she buried his bones with her kin, in the mound by the Cave of the Council;<br /></span> +<span>That she treasured and wrapt in the skin of the red-deer his robe and his prayer book—<br /></span> +<span>"Till his brothers should come from the East—from the land of the far <i>Hochelága</i>,<br /></span> +<span>To smoke with the braves at the feast, on the shores of the Loud-laughing Waters. <a name='FNanchor_16'></a><a href='#Footnote_16'><sup>[16]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>For the 'Black Robe' spake much of his youth and his friends in the Land of the Sunrise;<br /></span> +<span>It was then as a dream; now in truth I behold them, and not in a vision."<br /></span> +<span>But more spake her blushes, I ween, and her eyes full of language unspoken,<br /></span> +<span>As she turned with the grace of a queen and carried her gifts to the <i>teepee</i>.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Far away from his beautiful France—from his home in the city of Lyons,<br /></span> +<span>A noble youth full of romance, with a Norman heart big with adventure,<br /></span> +<span>In the new world a wanderer, by chance DuLuth sought the wild Huron forests.<br /></span> +<span>But afar by the vale of the Rhone, the winding and musical river,<br /></span> +<span>And the vine-covered hills of the Saône, the heart of the wanderer lingered,—<br /></span> +<span>'Mid the vineyards and mulberry trees, and the fair fields of corn and of clover<br /></span> +<span>That rippled and waved in the breeze, while the honey-bees hummed in the blossoms.<br /></span> +<span>For there, where th' impetuous Rhone, leaping down from the Switzerland mountains,<br /></span> +<span>And the silver-lipped, soft-flowing Saône, meeting, kiss and commingle together,<br /></span> +<span>Down winding by vineyards and leas, by the orchards of fig-trees and olives,<br /></span> +<span>To the island-gemmed, sapphire-blue seas of the glorious Greeks and the Romans;<br /></span> +<span>Aye, there, on the vine-covered shore,'mid the mulberry-trees and the olives,<br /></span> +<span>Dwelt his blue-eyed and beautiful Flore, with her hair like a wheat-field at harvest,<br /></span> +<span>All rippled and tossed by the breeze, and her cheeks like the glow of the morning,<br /></span> +<span>Far away o'er the emerald seas, as the sun lifts his brow from the billows,<br /></span> +<span>Or the red-clover fields when the bees, singing sip the sweet cups of the blossoms.<br /></span> +<span>Wherever he wandered—alone in the heart of the wild Huron forests,<br /></span> +<span>Or cruising the rivers unknown to the land of the Crees or Dakotas—<br /></span> +<span>His heart lingered still on the Rhone,'mid the mulberry trees and the vineyards,<br /></span> +<span>Fast-fettered and bound by the zone that girdled the robes of his darling.<br /></span> +<span>Till the red Harvest Moon<a name='FNanchor_71'></a><a href='#Footnote_71'><sup>[71]</sup></a> he remained in the vale of the swift Mississippi.<br /></span> +<span>The esteem of the warriors he gained, and the love of the dark-eyed Winona.<br /></span> +<span>He joined in the sports and the chase; with the hunters he followed the bison,<br /></span> +<span>And swift were his feet in the race when the red elk they ran on the prairies.<br /></span> +<span>At the Game of the Plum-stones<a name='FNanchor_77'></a><a href='#Footnote_77'><sup>[77]</sup></a> he played, and he won from the skillfulest players;<br /></span> +<span>A feast to <i>Wa'tánka</i><a name='FNanchor_78'></a><a href='#Footnote_78'><sup>[78]</sup></a> he made, and he danced at the feast of <i>Heyôka</i>.<a name='FNanchor_16'></a><a href='#Footnote_16'><sup>[16]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>With the flash and the roar of his gun he astonished the fearless Dakotas;<br /></span> +<span>They called it the "<i>Máza Wakán</i>"—the mighty, mysterious metal.<br /></span> +<span>"'Tis a brother," they said, "of the fire in the talons of dreadful Wakinyan,'<a name='FNanchor_32'></a><a href='#Footnote_32'><sup>[32]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>When he flaps his huge wings in his ire, and shoots his red shafts at <i>Unktéhee</i>."<a name='FNanchor_69'></a><a href='#Footnote_69'><sup>[69]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The <i>Itáncan</i>,<a name='FNanchor_74'></a><a href='#Footnote_74'><sup>[74]</sup></a> tall Wází-kuté, appointed a day for the races.<br /></span> +<span>From the red stake that stood by his <i>tee</i>, on the southerly side of the <i>Ha-ha</i>,<br /></span> +<span>O'er the crest of the hills and the dunes and the billowy breadth of the prairie,<br /></span> +<span>To a stake at the Lake of the Loons<a name='FNanchor_79'></a><a href='#Footnote_79'><sup>[79]</sup></a>—a league and return—was the distance.<br /></span> +<span>They gathered from near and afar, to the races and dancing and feasting;<br /></span> +<span>Five hundred tall warriors were there from <i>Kapóza</i><a name='FNanchor_6'></a><a href='#Footnote_6'><sup>[6]</sup></a> and far-off <i>Keóza</i>;<a name='FNanchor_8'></a><a href='#Footnote_8'><sup>[8]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span><i>Remnica</i><a name='FNanchor_Y'></a><a href='#Footnote_Y'><sup>[Y]</sup></a> too, furnished a share of the legions that thronged to the races,<br /></span> +<span>And a bountiful feast was prepared by the diligent hands of the women,<br /></span> +<span>And gaily the multitudes fared in the generous <i>tees</i> of <i>Kathága</i>.<br /></span> +<span>The chief of the mystical clan appointed a feast to <i>Unktéhee</i>—<br /></span> +<span>The mystic "<i>Wacípee Wakán</i>"<a name='FNanchor_Z'></a><a href='#Footnote_Z'><sup>[Z]</sup></a>—at the end of the day and the races.<br /></span> +<span>A band of sworn brothers are they, and the secrets of each one are sacred,<br /></span> +<span>And death to the lips that betray is the doom of the swarthy avengers,<br /></span> +<span>And the son of tall <i>Wází-kuté</i> was the chief of the mystical order.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h4>THE FOOT RACES.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>On an arm of an oak hangs the prize for the swiftest and strongest of runners—<br /></span> +<span>A blanket as red as the skies, when the flames sweep the plains in October.<br /></span> +<span>And beside it a strong, polished bow, and a quiver of iron-tipped arrows,<br /></span> +<span>Which <i>Kapóza's</i> tall chief will bestow on the fleet-footed second that follows.<br /></span> +<span>A score of swift runners are there from the several bands of the nation,<br /></span> +<span>And now for the race they prepare, and among them fleet-footed Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>With the oil of the buck and the bear their sinewy limbs are annointed,<br /></span> +<span>For fleet are the feet of the deer and strong are the limbs of the bruin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hark!—the shouts and the braying of drums, and the Babel of tongues and confusion!<br /></span> +<span>From his <i>teepee</i> the tall chieftain comes, and DuLuth brings a prize for the runners—<br /></span> +<span>A keen hunting-knife from the Seine, horn-handled and mounted with silver.<br /></span> +<span>The runners are ranged on the plain, and the Chief waves a flag as a signal,<br /></span> +<span>And away like the gray wolves they fly—like the wolves on the trail of the red-deer;<br /></span> +<span>O'er the hills and the prairie they vie, and strain their strong limbs to the utmost,<br /></span> +<span>While high on the hills hangs a cloud of warriors and maidens and mothers,<br /></span> +<span>To see the swift-runners, and loud are the cheers and the shouts of the warriors.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now swift from the lake they return o'er the emerald hills of the prairies;<br /></span> +<span>Like grey-hounds they pant and they yearn, and the leader of all is Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>At his heels flies <i>Hu-pá-hu,</i><a name='FNanchor_AA'></a><a href='#Footnote_AA'><sup>[AA]</sup></a> the fleet—the pride of the band of <i>Kaóza</i>,—<br /></span> +<span>A warrior with eagle-winged feet, but his prize is the bow and the quiver.<br /></span> +<span>Tamdóka first reaches the post, and his are the knife and the blanket,<br /></span> +<span>By the mighty acclaim of the host and award of the chief and the judges.<br /></span> +<span>Then proud was the tall warrior's stride, and haughty his look and demeanor;<br /></span> +<span>He boasted aloud in his pride, and he scoffed at the rest of the runners.<br /></span> +<span>"Behold me, for I am a man!<a name='FNanchor_AB'></a><a href='#Footnote_AB'><sup>[AB]</sup></a> my feet are as swift as the West-wind.<br /></span> +<span>With the coons and the beavers I ran; but where is the elk or the <i>cabri?</i>80<br /></span> +<span>Come!—where is the hunter will dare match his feet with the feet of Tamdóka?<br /></span> +<span>Let him think of <i>Taté</i><a name='FNanchor_AC'></a><a href='#Footnote_AC'><sup>[AC]</sup></a> and beware, ere he stake his last robe on the trial."<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Ohó! Ho! Hó-héca!</i>"<a name='FNanchor_AD'></a><a href='#Footnote_AD'><sup>[AD]</sup></a> they jeered, for they liked not the boast of the boaster;<br /></span> +<span>But to match him no warrior appeared, for his feet wore the wings of the west-wind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then forth from the side of the chief stepped DuLuth and he looked on the boaster;<br /></span> +<span>"The words of a warrior are brief,—I will run with the brave," said the Frenchman;<br /></span> +<span>"But the feet of Tamdóka are tired; abide till the cool of the sunset."<br /></span> +<span>All the hunters and maidens admired, for strong were the limbs of the stranger.<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Hiwó Ho!</i>"<a name='FNanchor_AE'></a><a href='#Footnote_AE'><sup>[AE]</sup></a> they shouted and loud rose the cheers of the multitude mingled;<br /></span> +<span>And there in the midst of the crowd stood the glad-eyed and blushing Winona.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now afar o'er the plains of the west walked the sun at the end of his journey,<br /></span> +<span>And forth came the brave and the guest, at the tap of the drum, for the trial.<br /></span> +<span>Like a forest of larches the hordes were gathered to witness the contest;<br /></span> +<span>As loud as the drums were their words and they roared like the roar of the <i>Ha-ha.</i><br /></span> +<span>For some for Tamdóka contend, and some for the fair, bearded stranger,<br /></span> +<span>And the betting runs high to the end, with the skins of the bison and beaver.<br /></span> +<span>A wife of tall <i>Wází-kuté</i>—the mother of boastful Tamdóka—<br /></span> +<span>Brought her handsomest robe from the <i>tee</i> with a vaunting and loud proclamation:<br /></span> +<span>She would stake her last robe on her son who, she boasted, was fleet as the <i>cabri</i>,<br /></span> +<span>And the tall, tawny chieftain looked on, approving the boast of the mother.<br /></span> +<span>Then fleet as the feet of a fawn to her lodge ran the dark-eyed Winona,<br /></span> +<span>She brought and she spread on the lawn, by the side of the robe of the boaster,<br /></span> +<span>The lily-red mantel DuLuth, with his own hands, had laid on her shoulders.<br /></span> +<span>"Tamdóka is swift, but forsooth, the tongue of his mother is swifter,"<br /></span> +<span>She said, and her face was aflame with the red of the rose and the lily,<br /></span> +<span>And loud was the roar of acclaim; but dark was the face of Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>They strip for the race and prepare,—DuLuth in his breeches and leggins;<br /></span> +<span>And the brown, curling locks of his hair down droop to his bare, brawny shoulders,<br /></span> +<span>And his face wears a smile debonair, as he tightens his red sash around him;<br /></span> +<span>But stripped to the moccasins bare, save the belt and the breech-clout of buckskin,<br /></span> +<span>Stands the haughty Tamdóka aware that the eyes of the warriors admire him;<br /></span> +<span>For his arms are the arms of a bear and his legs are the legs of a panther.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The drum beats,—the chief waves the flag, and away on the course speed the runners,<br /></span> +<span>And away leads the brave like a stag,—like a bound on his track flies the Frenchman;<br /></span> +<span>And away haste the hunters once more to the hills, for a view to the lakeside,<br /></span> +<span>And the dark-swarming hill-tops, they roar with the storm of loud voices commingled.<br /></span> +<span>Far away o'er the prairie they fly, and still in the lead is Tamdóka,<br /></span> +<span>But the feet of his rival are nigh, and slowly he gains on the hunter.<br /></span> +<span>Now they turn on the post at the lake,—now they run full abreast on the home-stretch:<br /></span> +<span>Side by side they contend for the stake for a long mile or more on the prairie<br /></span> +<span>They strain like a stag and a hound, when the swift river gleams through the thicket,<br /></span> +<span>And the horns of the riders resound, winding shrill through the depths of the forest.<br /></span> +<span>But behold!—at full length on the ground falls the fleet-footed Frenchman abruptly,<br /></span> +<span>And away with a whoop and a bound springs the eager, exulting Tamdóka<br /></span> +<span>Long and loud on the hills is the shout of his swarthy admirers and backers,<br /></span> +<span>"But the race is not won till it's out," said DuLuth, to himself as he gathered,<br /></span> +<span>With a frown on his face, for the foot of the wily Tamdóka had tripped him.<br /></span> +<span>Far ahead ran the brave on the route, and turning he boasted exultant.<br /></span> +<span>Like spurs to the steed to DuLuth were the jeers and the taunts of the boaster;<br /></span> +<span>Indignant was he and red wroth at the trick of the runner dishonest;<br /></span> +<span>And away like a whirlwind he speeds—like a hurricane mad from the mountains;<br /></span> +<span>He gains on Tamdóka,—he leads!—and behold, with the spring of a panther,<br /></span> +<span>He leaps to the goal and succeeds, 'mid the roar of the mad acclamation.<br /></span> +<span>Then glad as the robin in May was the voice of Winona exulting;<br /></span> +<span>Tamdóka turned sullen away, and sulking he walked by the river;<br /></span> +<span>He glowered as he went and the fire of revenge in his bosom was kindled:<br /></span> +<span>Dark was his visage with ire and his eyes were the eyes of a panther.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h4>THE WAKAN-WACEPEE, OR SACRED DANCE. <a name='FNanchor_81'></a><a href='#Footnote_81'><sup>[81]</sup></a></h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Lo the lights in the <i>"Teepee-Wákan!"</i> 'tis the night of the <i>Wákan Wacépee</i>.<br /></span> +<span>Round and round walks the chief of the clan, as he rattles the sacred <i>Ta-shá-kay</i>; <a name='FNanchor_81'></a><a href='#Footnote_81'><sup>[81]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Long and loud on the <i>Chán-che-ga</i> <a name='FNanchor_81'></a><a href='#Footnote_81'><sup>[81]</sup></a> beat the drummers with magical drumsticks,<br /></span> +<span>And the notes of the <i>Chô-tánka</i> <a name='FNanchor_81'></a><a href='#Footnote_81'><sup>[81]</sup></a> greet like the murmur of winds on the waters.<br /></span> +<span>By the friction of white-cedar wood for the feast was a Virgin-fire <a name='FNanchor_20'></a><a href='#Footnote_20'><sup>[20]</sup></a> kindled.<br /></span> +<span>They that enter the firm brotherhood first must fast and be cleansed by <i>E-neé-pee</i>;<a name='FNanchor_81'></a><a href='#Footnote_81'><sup>[81]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And from foot-sole to crown of the head must they paint with the favorite colors;<br /></span> +<span>For <i>Unktéhee</i> likes bands of blood-red, with the stripings of blue intermingled.<br /></span> +<span>In the hollow earth, dark and profound, <i>Unktéhee</i> and fiery <i>Wakínyan</i><br /></span> +<span>Long fought, and the terrible sound of the battle was louder than thunder;<br /></span> +<span>The mountains were heaved and around were scattered the hills and the boulders,<br /></span> +<span>And the vast solid plains of the ground rose and fell like the waves of the ocean.<br /></span> +<span>But the god of the waters prevailed. <i>Wakín-yan</i> escaped from the cavern,<br /></span> +<span>And long on the mountains he wailed, and his hatred endureth forever.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>When <i>Unktéhee</i> had finished the earth, and the beasts and the birds and the fishes,<br /></span> +<span>And men at his bidding came forth from the heart of the huge hollow mountains,<a name='FNanchor_69'></a><a href='#Footnote_69'><sup>[69]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>A band chose the god from the hordes, and he said: "Ye are the sons of <i>Unktéhee</i>:<br /></span> +<span>Ye are lords of the beasts and the birds, and the fishes that swim in the waters.<br /></span> +<span>But hearken ye now to my words,—let them sound in your bosoms forever:<br /></span> +<span>Ye shall honor <i>Unktéhee</i> and hate <i>Wakinyan</i>, the Spirit of Thunder,<br /></span> +<span>For the power of <i>Unktéhee</i> is great, and he laughs at the darts of <i>Wakinyan</i>.<br /></span> +<span>Ye shall honor the Earth and the Sun,—for they are your father and mother; <a name='FNanchor_70'></a><a href='#Footnote_70'><sup>[70]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Let your prayer to the Sun be:—<i>Wakán Até; on-si-md-da oheé-neé</i>."<a name='FNanchor_AF'></a><a href='#Footnote_AF'><sup>[AF]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And remember the <i>Táku Wakán</i><a name='FNanchor_73'></a><a href='#Footnote_73'><sup>[73]</sup></a> all-pervading in earth and in ether—<br /></span> +<span>Invisible ever to man, but He dwells in the midst of all matter;<br /></span> +<span>Yea, he dwells in the heart of the stone—in the hard granite heart of the boulder;<br /></span> +<span>Ye shall call him forever <i>Tunkán</i>—grandfather of all the Dakotas.<br /></span> +<span>Ye are men that I choose for my own; ye shall be as a strong band of brothers,<br /></span> +<span>Now I give you the magical bone and the magical pouch of the spirits,<a name='FNanchor_AG'></a><a href='#Footnote_AG'><sup>[AG]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And these are the laws ye shall heed: Ye shall honor the pouch and the giver.<br /></span> +<span>Ye shall walk as twin-brothers; in need, one shall forfeit his life for another.<br /></span> +<span>Listen not to the voice of the crow.<a name='FNanchor_AH'></a><a href='#Footnote_AH'><sup>[AH]</sup></a> Hold as sacred the wife of a brother.<br /></span> +<span>Strike, and fear not the shaft of the foe, for the soul of the brave is immortal.<br /></span> +<span>Slay the warrior in battle, but spare the innocent babe and the mother.<br /></span> +<span>Remember a promise,—beware,—let the word of a warrior be sacred<br /></span> +<span>When a stranger arrives at the <i>tee</i>—be he friend of the band or a foeman,<br /></span> +<span>Give him food; let your bounty be free; lay a robe for the guest by the lodge-fire;<br /></span> +<span>Let him go to his kindred in peace, if the peace-pipe he smoke in the <i>teepee</i>;<br /></span> +<span>And so shall your children increase, and your lodges shall laugh with abundance.<br /></span> +<span>And long shall ye live in the land, and the spirits of earth and the waters<br /></span> +<span>Shall come to your aid, at command, with the power of invisible magic.<br /></span> +<span>And at last, when you journey afar—o'er the shining "<i>Wanágee Ta-chán-ku</i>,"<a name='FNanchor_68'></a><a href='#Footnote_68'><sup>[68]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>You shall walk as a red, shining star<a name='FNanchor_8'></a><a href='#Footnote_8'><sup>[8]</sup></a> in the land of perpetual summer."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>All the night in the <i>teepee</i> they sang, and they danced to the mighty <i>Unktéhee</i>,<br /></span> +<span>While the loud-braying <i>Chán-che-ga</i> rang and the shrill-piping flute and the rattle,<br /></span> +<span>Till <i>Anpétuwee</i> <a name='FNanchor_70'></a><a href='#Footnote_70'><sup>[70]</sup></a> rose in the east—from the couch of the blushing <i>Han-nân-na</i>,<br /></span> +<span>And thus at the dance and the feast sang the sons of <i>Unktéhee</i> in chorus:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">"Wa-dú-ta o-hná mi-ká-ge!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wa-dú-ta o-hná mi-ká-ge!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mini-yâta ité wakândè makú,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Atè wakán—Tunkánsidân.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Tunkânsidân pejihúta wakán<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Micâgè—he Wicâgè!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Miniyáta ité wakándè makú.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Taukánsidan ité, nápè dú-win-ta woo,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wahutôpa wan yúha, nápè dú-win-ta woo."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>TRANSLATION.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">In red swan-down he made it for me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In red swan-down he made it for me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He of the water—he of the mysterious face—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Gave it to me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sacred Father—Grandfather!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Grandfather made me magical medicine.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That is true!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Being of mystery,—grown in the water—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He gave it to me!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the face of our Grandfather stretch out your hand;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Holding a quadruped, stretch out your hand!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Till high o'er the hills of the east <i>Anpétuwee</i> walked on his journey,<br /></span> +<span>In secret they danced at the feast, and communed with the mighty <i>Unktéhee</i>.<br /></span> +<span>Then opened the door of the <i>tee</i> to the eyes of the wondering Dakotas,<br /></span> +<span>And the sons of <i>Unktéhee</i> to be, were endowed with the sacred <i>Ozúha</i><a name='FNanchor_82'></a><a href='#Footnote_82'><sup>[82]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>By the son of tall Wazí-kuté, Tamdóka, the chief of the Magi.<br /></span> +<span>And thus since the birth-day of man—since he sprang from the heart of the mountains,<a name='FNanchor_69'></a><a href='#Footnote_69'><sup>[69]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Has the sacred "<i>Wacépee Wakán</i>" by the warlike Dakotas been honored,<br /></span> +<span>And the god-favored sons of the clan work their will with the help of the spirits.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h4>WINONA'S WARNING.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>'Twas sunrise; the spirits of mist trailed their white robes on dewy savannas,<br /></span> +<span>And the flowers raised their heads to be kissed by the first golden beams of the morning.<br /></span> +<span>The breeze was abroad with the breath of the rose of the Isles of the Summer,<br /></span> +<span>And the humming-bird hummed on the heath from his home in the land of the rainbow.<a name='FNanchor_AI'></a><a href='#Footnote_AI'><sup>[AI]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>'Twas the morn of departure. DuLuth stood alone by the roar of the <i>Ha-ha</i>;<br /></span> +<span>Tall and fair in the strength of his youth stood the blue-eyed and fair-bearded Frenchman.<br /></span> +<span>A rustle of robes on the grass broke his dream as he mused by the waters,<br /></span> +<span>And, turning, he looked on the face of Winona, wild-rose of the prairies,<br /></span> +<span>Half hid in her dark, flowing hair, like the round, golden moon in the pine-tops.<br /></span> +<span>Admiring he gazed—she was fair as his own blooming Flore in her orchards,<br /></span> +<span>With her golden locks loose on the air, like the gleam of the sun through the olives,<br /></span> +<span>Far away on the vine-covered shore, in the sun-favored land of his fathers.<br /></span> +<span>"Lists the chief to the cataract's roar for the mournful lament of the Spirit?"<a name='FNanchor_AJ'></a><a href='#Footnote_AJ'><sup>[AJ]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Said Winona,—"The wail of the sprite for her babe and its father unfaithful,<br /></span> +<span>Is heard in the midst of the night, when the moon wanders dim in the heavens."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Wild-Rose of the Prairies," he said, "DuLuth listens not to the <i>Ha-ha</i>,<br /></span> +<span>For the wail of the ghost of the dead for her babe and its father unfaithful;<br /></span> +<span>But he lists to a voice in his heart that is heard by the ear of no other,<br /></span> +<span>And to-day will the White Chief depart; he returns to the land of the sunrise."<br /></span> +<span>"Let Winona depart with the chief,—she will kindle the fire in his <i>teepee</i>;<br /></span> +<span>For long are the days of her grief, if she stay in the <i>tee</i> of Ta-té-psin,"<br /></span> +<span>She replied, and her cheeks were aflame with the bloom of the wild prairie lilies.<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Tanke</i><a name='FNanchor_AK'></a><a href='#Footnote_AK'><sup>[AK]</sup></a>, is the White Chief to blame?" said DuLuth to the blushing Winona.<br /></span> +<span>"The White Chief is blameless," she said, "but the heart of Winona will follow<br /></span> +<span>Wherever thy footsteps may lead, O blue-eyed, brave Chief of the white men.<br /></span> +<span>For her mother sleeps long in the mound, and a step-mother rules in the <i>teepee</i>,<br /></span> +<span>And her father, once strong and renowned, is bent with the weight of his winters.<br /></span> +<span>No longer he handles the spear,—no longer his swift, humming arrows<br /></span> +<span>Overtake the fleet feet of the deer, or the bear of the woods, or the bison;<br /></span> +<span>But he bends as he walks, and the wind shakes his white hair and hinders his footsteps;<br /></span> +<span>And soon will he leave me behind, without brother or sister or kindred.<br /></span> +<span>The doe scents the wolf in the wind, and a wolf walks the path of Winona.<br /></span> +<span>Three times have the gifts for the bride<a name='FNanchor_55'></a><a href='#Footnote_55'><sup>[55]</sup></a> to the lodge of Ta-té-psin been carried,<br /></span> +<span>But the voice of Winona replied that she liked not the haughty Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>And thrice were the gifts sent away, but the tongue of the mother protested,<br /></span> +<span>And the were-wolf<a name='FNanchor_52'></a><a href='#Footnote_52'><sup>[52]</sup></a> still follows his prey, and abides but the death of my father."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I pity Winona," he said, "but my path is a pathway of danger,<br /></span> +<span>And long is the trail for the maid to the far-away land of the sunrise;<br /></span> +<span>And few are the braves of my band, and the braves of Tamdóka are many;<br /></span> +<span>But soon I return to the land, and a cloud of my hunters will follow.<br /></span> +<span>When the cold winds of winter return and toss the white robes of the prairies,<br /></span> +<span>The fire of the White Chief will burn in his lodge at the Meeting-of-Waters;<a name='FNanchor_AL'></a><a href='#Footnote_AL'><sup>[AL]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And when from the Sunrise again comes the chief of the sons of the Morning,<br /></span> +<span>Many moons will his hunters remain in the land of the friendly Dakotas.<br /></span> +<span>The son of Chief Wází-Kuté guides the White Chief afar on his journey;<br /></span> +<span>Nor long on the <i>Tânka Medé</i><a name='FNanchor_AM'></a><a href='#Footnote_AM'><sup>[AM]</sup></a>—on the breast of the blue, bounding billows—<br /></span> +<span>Shall the bark of the Frenchman delay, but his pathway shall kindle behind him."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>She was pale, and her hurried voice swelled with alarm as she questioned replying—<br /></span> +<span>"Tamdóka thy guide?—I beheld thy death in his face at the races.<br /></span> +<span>He covers his heart with a smile, but revenge never sleeps in his bosom;<br /></span> +<span>His tongue—it is soft to beguile; but beware of the pur of the panther!<br /></span> +<span>For death, like a shadow, will walk by thy side in the midst of the forest,<br /></span> +<span>Or follow thy path like a hawk on the trail of a wounded <i>Mastínca</i>.<a name='FNanchor_AN'></a><a href='#Footnote_AN'><sup>[AN]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>A son of <i>Unktéhee</i> is he,—the Chief of the crafty magicians;<br /></span> +<span>They have plotted thy death; I can see thy trail—it is red in the forest;<br /></span> +<span>Beware of Tamdóka,—beware. Slumber not like the grouse of the woodlands,<br /></span> +<span>With head under wing, for the glare of the eyes that sleep not are upon thee."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Winona, fear not," said DuLuth, "for I carry the fire of <i>Wakínyan</i><a name='FNanchor_AO'></a><a href='#Footnote_AO'><sup>[AO]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And strong is the arm of my youth, and stout are the hearts of my warriors;<br /></span> +<span>But Winona has spoken the truth, and the heart of the White Chief is thankful.<br /></span> +<span>Hide this in thy bosom, dear maid,—'tis the crucified Christ of the white men.<a name='FNanchor_AP'></a><a href='#Footnote_AP'><sup>[AP]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Lift thy voice to his spirit in need, and his spirit will hear thee and answer;<br /></span> +<span>For often he comes to my aid; he is stronger than all the Dakotas;<br /></span> +<span>And the Spirits of evil, afraid, hide away when he looks from the heavens."<br /></span> +<span>In her swelling, brown bosom she hid the crucified Jesus in silver;<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Niwástè</i>,"<a name='FNanchor_AQ'></a><a href='#Footnote_AQ'><sup>[AQ]</sup></a> she sadly replied; in her low voice the rising tears trembled;<br /></span> +<span>Her dewy eyes turned she aside, and she slowly returned to the <i>teepees</i>.<br /></span> +<span>But still on the swift river's strand, admiring the graceful Winona,<br /></span> +<span>As she gathered, with brown, dimpled hand, her hair from the wind, stood the Frenchman.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h4>DULUTH'S DEPARTURE</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>To bid the brave White Chief adieu, on the shady shore gathered the warriors;<br /></span> +<span>His glad boatmen manned the canoe, and the oars in their hands were impatient.<br /></span> +<span>Spake the Chief of <i>Isántees</i>: "A feast will await the return of my brother.<br /></span> +<span>In peace rose the sun in the East, in peace in the West he descended.<br /></span> +<span>May the feet of my brother be swift till they bring him again to our <i>teepees</i>,<br /></span> +<span>The red pipe he takes as a gift, may he smoke that red pipe many winters.<br /></span> +<span>At my lodge-fire his pipe shall be lit, when the White Chief returns to <i>Kathága</i>;<br /></span> +<span>On the robes of my <i>tee</i> shall he sit; he shall smoke with the chiefs of my people.<br /></span> +<span>The brave love the brave, and his son sends the Chief as a guide for his brother,<br /></span> +<span>By the way of the <i>Wákpa Wakán</i><a name='FNanchor_AR'></a><a href='#Footnote_AR'><sup>[AR]</sup></a> to the Chief at the Lake of the Spirits.<br /></span> +<span>As light as the foot-steps of dawn are the feet of the stealthy Tamdóka;<br /></span> +<span>He fears not the <i>Máza Wakán</i>;<a name='FNanchor_AS'></a><a href='#Footnote_AS'><sup>[AS]</sup></a> he is sly as the fox of the forest.<br /></span> +<span>When he dances the dance of red war howl the wolves by the broad <i>Mini-ya-ta</i>,<a name='FNanchor_AT'></a><a href='#Footnote_AT'><sup>[AT]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>For they scent on the south-wind afar their feast on the bones of Ojibways."<br /></span> +<span>Thrice the Chief puffed the red pipe of peace, ere it passed to the lips of the Frenchman.<br /></span> +<span>Spake DuLuth: "May the Great Spirit bless with abundance the Chief and his people;<br /></span> +<span>May their sons and their daughters increase, and the fire ever burn in their <i>teepees</i>."<br /></span> +<span>Then he waved with a flag his adieu to the Chief and the warriors assembled;<br /></span> +<span>And away shot Tamdóka's canoe to the strokes of ten sinewy hunters;<br /></span> +<span>And a white path he clove up the blue, bubbling stream of the swift Mississippi;<br /></span> +<span>And away on his foaming trail flew, like a sea-gull, the bark of the Frenchman.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration:TWO HUNDRED WHITE WINTERS AND MORE HAVE FLED FROM THE +FACE OF THE SUMMER ...<br /> +<br /> + * * * * *<br /> +<br /> +AH, LITTLE HE DREAMED THEN, FORSOOTH, THAT A CITY WOULD STAND ON THAT +HILL SIDE]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then merrily rose the blithe song of the <i>voyageurs</i> homeward returning,<br /></span> +<span>And thus, as they glided along, sang the bugle-voiced boatmen in chorus:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>SONG.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Home again! home again! bend to the oar!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Merry is the life of the gay <i>voyageur.</i><br /></span> +<span class="i2">He rides on the river with his paddle in his hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And his boat is his shelter on the water and the land.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The clam has his shell and the water-turtle too,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But the brave boatman's shell is his birch-bark canoe.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Merry is the life of the gay <i>voyageur.</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Home again! home again! bend to the oar!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Merry is the life of the gay <i>voyageur</i>,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His couch is as downy as a couch can be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For he sleeps on the feathers of the green fir-tree.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He dines on the fat of the pemmican-sack,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And his <i>eau de vie</i> is the <i>eau de lac</i>.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Merry is the life of the gay <i>voyageur</i>.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Home again! home again! bend to the oar!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Merry is the life of the gay <i>voyageur</i>.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The brave, jolly boatman,—he never is afraid<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When he meets at the portage a red, forest maid,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A Huron, or a Cree, or a blooming Chippeway;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he marks his trail with the <i>bois brulés</i><a name='FNanchor_AU'></a><a href='#Footnote_AU'><sup>[AU]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span class="i2">So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Merry is the life of the gay <i>voyageur</i>.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Home again! home again! bend to the oar!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Merry is the life of the gay <i>voyageur</i>.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the reeds of the meadow the stag lifts his branchy head stately and listens,<br /></span> +<span>And the bobolink, perched on the flag, her ear sidelong bends to the chorus.<br /></span> +<span>From the brow of the Beautiful Isle,<a name='FNanchor_AV'></a><a href='#Footnote_AV'><sup>[AV]</sup></a> half hid in the midst of the maples,<br /></span> +<span>The sad-faced Winona, the while, watched the boat growing less in the distance,<br /></span> +<span>Till away in the bend of the stream, where it turned and was lost in the lindens,<br /></span> +<span>She saw the last dip and the gleam of the oars ere they vanished forever.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Still afar on the waters the song, like bridal bells distantly chiming,<br /></span> +<span>The stout, jolly boatmen prolong, beating time with the stroke of their paddles;<br /></span> +<span>And Winona's ear, turned to the breeze, lists the air falling fainter and fainter,<br /></span> +<span>Till it dies like the murmur of bees when the sun is aslant on the meadows.<br /></span> +<span>Blow, breezes,—blow softly and sing in the dark, flowing hair of the maiden;<br /></span> +<span>But never again shall you bring the voice that she loves to Winona.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h4>THE CANOE RACE.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now a light rustling wind from the South shakes his wings o'er the wide, wimpling waters:<br /></span> +<span>Up the dark-winding river DuLuth follows fast in the wake of Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>On the slopes of the emerald shores leafy woodlands and prairies alternate;<br /></span> +<span>On the vine-tangled islands the flowers peep timidly out at the white men;<br /></span> +<span>In the dark-winding eddy the loon sits warily watching and voiceless,<br /></span> +<span>And the wild-goose, in reedy lagoon, stills the prattle and play of her children.<br /></span> +<span>The does and their sleek, dappled fawns prick their ears and peer out from the thickets,<br /></span> +<span>And the bison-calves play on the lawns, and gambol like colts in the clover.<br /></span> +<span>Up the still-flowing <i>Wákpa Wakán's</i> winding path through the groves and the meadows,<br /></span> +<span>Now DuLuth's brawny boatmen pursue the swift-gliding bark of Tamdóka;<br /></span> +<span>And hardly the red braves out-do the stout, steady oars of the white men.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now they bend to their oars in the race—the ten tawny braves of Tamdóka;<br /></span> +<span>And hard on their heels in the chase ply the six stalwart oars of the Frenchmen.<br /></span> +<span>In the stern of his boat sits DuLuth; in the stern of his boat sits Tamdóka,<br /></span> +<span>And warily, cheerily, both urge the oars of their men to the utmost.<br /></span> +<span>Far-stretching away to the eyes, winding blue in the midst of the meadows,<br /></span> +<span>As a necklet of sapphires that lies unclaspt in the lap of a virgin,<br /></span> +<span>Here asleep in the lap of the plain lies the reed-bordered, beautiful river.<br /></span> +<span>Like two flying coursers that strain, on the track, neck and neck on the home-stretch,<br /></span> +<span>With nostrils distended and mane froth-flecked, and the neck and the shoulders,<br /></span> +<span>Each urged to his best by the cry and the whip and the rein of his rider,<br /></span> +<span>Now they skim o'er the waters and fly, side by side, neck and neck, through the meadows,<br /></span> +<span>The blue heron flaps from the reeds, and away wings her course up the river:<br /></span> +<span>Straight and swift is her flight o'er the meads, but she hardly outstrips the canoemen.<br /></span> +<span>See! the <i>voyageurs</i> bend to their oars till the blue veins swell out on their foreheads;<br /></span> +<span>And the sweat from their brawny breasts pours; but in vain their Herculean labor;<br /></span> +<span>For the oars of Tamdóka are ten, and but six are the oars of the Frenchman,<br /></span> +<span>And the red warriors' burden of men is matched by the <i>voyageurs'</i> luggage.<br /></span> +<span>Side by side, neck and neck, for a mile, still they strain their strong arms to the utmost,<br /></span> +<span>Till rounding a willowy isle, now ahead creeps the boat of Tamdóka,<br /></span> +<span>And the neighboring forests profound, and the far-stretching plain of the meadows<br /></span> +<span>To the whoop of the victors resound, while the panting French rest on their paddles.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h4>IN CAMP.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>With sable wings wide o'er the land night sprinkles the dew of the heavens;<br /></span> +<span>And hard by the dark river's strand, in the midst of a tall, somber forest,<br /></span> +<span>Two camp fires are lighted and beam on the trunks and the arms of the pine trees.<br /></span> +<span>In the fitful light darkle and gleam the swarthy-hued faces around them.<br /></span> +<span>And one is the camp of DuLuth, and the other the camp of Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>But few are the jests and uncouth of the voyageurs over their supper,<br /></span> +<span>While moody and silent the braves round their fire in a circle sit crouching;<br /></span> +<span>And low is the whisper of leaves and the sough of the wind in the branches;<br /></span> +<span>And low is the long-winding howl of the lone wolf afar in the forest;<br /></span> +<span>But shrill is the hoot of the owl, like a bugle-blast blown in the pine-tops,<br /></span> +<span>And the half-startled <i>voyageurs</i> scowl at the sudden and saucy intruder.<br /></span> +<span>Like the eyes of the wolves are the eyes of the watchful and silent Dakotas;<br /></span> +<span>Like the face of the moon in the skies, when the clouds chase each other across it,<br /></span> +<span>Is Tamdóka's dark face in the light of the flickering flames of the camp-fire.<br /></span> +<span>They have plotted red murder by night, and securely contemplate their victims.<br /></span> +<span>But wary and armed to the teeth are the resolute Frenchmen, and ready,<br /></span> +<span>If need be, to grapple with death, and to die hand to hand in the forest.<br /></span> +<span>Yet skilled in the arts and the wiles of the cunning and crafty <i>Algonkins</i><a name='FNanchor_AW'></a><a href='#Footnote_AW'><sup>[AW]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>They cover their hearts with their smiles, and hide their suspicions of evil.<br /></span> +<span>Round their low, smouldering fire, feigning sleep, lie the watchful and wily Dakotas;<br /></span> +<span>But DuLuth and his <i>voyageurs</i> heap their fire that shall blaze till the morning,<br /></span> +<span>Ere they lay themselves snugly to rest, with their guns by their sides on the blankets,<br /></span> +<span>As if there were none to molest but the gray, skulking wolves of the forest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>'Tis midnight. The rising moon gleams, weird and still, o'er the dusky horizon;<br /></span> +<span>Through the hushed, somber forest she beams, and fitfully gloams on the meadows;<br /></span> +<span>And a dim, glimmering pathway she paves, at times, on the dark stretch of river.<br /></span> +<span>The winds are asleep in the caves—in the heart of the far-away mountains;<br /></span> +<span>And here on the meadows and there, the lazy mists gather and hover;<br /></span> +<span>And the lights of the Fen-Spirits<a name='FNanchor_72'></a><a href='#Footnote_72'><sup>[72]</sup></a> flare and dance on the low-lying marshes,<br /></span> +<span>As still as the footsteps of death by the bed of the babe and its mother;<br /></span> +<span>And hushed are the pines, and beneath lie the weary-limbed boatmen in slumber.<br /></span> +<span>Walk softly,—walk softly, O Moon, through the gray, broken clouds in thy pathway,<br /></span> +<span>For the earth lies asleep and the boon of repose is bestowed on the weary.<br /></span> +<span>Toiling hands have forgotten their care; e'en the brooks have forgotten to murmur;<br /></span> +<span>But hark!—there's a sound on the air!—'tis the light-rustling robes of the Spirits,<br /></span> +<span>Like the breath of the night in the leaves, or the murmur of reeds on the river,<br /></span> +<span>In the cool of the mid-summer eyes, when the blaze of the day has descended.<br /></span> +<span>Low-crouching and shadowy forms, as still as the gray morning's footsteps,<br /></span> +<span>Creep sly as the serpent that charms, on her nest in the meadow, the plover;<br /></span> +<span>In the shadows of pine-trunks they creep, but their panther-eyes gleam in the fire-light,<br /></span> +<span>As they peer on the white-men asleep, in the glow of the fire, on their blankets.<br /></span> +<span>Lo in each swarthy right-hand a knife; in the left-hand, the bow and the arrows!<br /></span> +<span>Brave Frenchmen, awake to the strife!—or you sleep in the forest forever.<br /></span> +<span>Nay, nearer and nearer they glide, like ghosts on the field of their battles,<br /></span> +<span>Till close on the sleepers, they bide but the signal of death from Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>Still the sleepers sleep on. Not a breath stirs the leaves of the awe-stricken forest;<br /></span> +<span>The hushed air is heavy with death; like the footsteps of death are the moments.<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Arise!</i>"—At the word, with a bound, to their feet spring the vigilant Frenchmen;<br /></span> +<span>And the depths of the forest resound to the crack and the roar of their rifles;<br /></span> +<span>And seven writhing forms on the ground clutch the earth. From the pine-tops the screech-owl<br /></span> +<span>Screams and flaps his wide wings in affright, and plunges away through the shadows;<br /></span> +<span>And swift on the wings of the night flee the dim, phantom-forms through the darkness.<br /></span> +<span>Like <i>cabris</i><a name='FNanchor_80'></a><a href='#Footnote_80'><sup>[80]</sup></a> when white wolves pursue, fled the four yet remaining Dakotas;<br /></span> +<span>Through forest and fen-land they flew, and wild terror howled on their footsteps.<br /></span> +<span>And one was Tamdóka. DuLuth through the night sent his voice like a trumpet:<br /></span> +<span>"Ye are <i>Sons of Unktéhee</i>, forsooth! Return to your mothers, ye cowards!"<br /></span> +<span>His shrill voice they heard as they fled, but only the echoes made answer.<br /></span> +<span>At the feet of the brave Frenchmen, dead, lay seven swarthy <i>Sons of whitehead</i>;<br /></span> +<span>And there, in the midst of the slain, they found, as it gleamed in the fire-light,<br /></span> +<span>The horn-handled knife from the Seine, where it fell from the hand of Tamdóka.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration:NEARER AND NEARER THEY GLIDE LIKE GHOSTS ON THE FIELDS OF +THEIR BATTLES. TILL CLOSE ON THE SLEEPERS, THEY BIDE FOR THE SIGNAL OF +DEATH FROM TAMDOKA]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the gray of the morn, ere the sun peeped over the dewy horizon,<br /></span> +<span>Their journey again was begun, and they toiled up the swift, winding river;<br /></span> +<span>And many a shallow they passed on their way to the Lake of the Spirits;<a name='FNanchor_AX'></a><a href='#Footnote_AX'><sup>[AX]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>But dauntless they reached it at last, and found Akee-pá-kee-tin's<a name='FNanchor_AY'></a><a href='#Footnote_AY'><sup>[AY]</sup></a> village,<br /></span> +<span>On an isle in the midst of the lake; and a day in his teepees they tarried.<br /></span> +<span>Of the deed in the wilderness spake, to the brave Chief, the frank-hearted Frenchman.<br /></span> +<span>A generous man was the Chief, and a friend of the fearless explorer;<br /></span> +<span>And dark was his visage with grief at the treacherous act of the warriors.<br /></span> +<span>"Brave Wází-kuté is a man, and his heart is as clear as the sunlight;<br /></span> +<span>But the head of a treacherous clan and a snake-in-the-grass, is Tamdóka,"<br /></span> +<span>Said the chief; and he promised DuLuth, on the word of a friend and a warrior,<br /></span> +<span>To carry the pipe and the truth to his cousin, the chief at Kathága;<br /></span> +<span>For thrice at the <i>Tânka Medé</i> he smoked in the lodge of the Frenchman;<br /></span> +<span>And thrice had he carried away the bountiful gifts of the trader.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>When the chief could no longer prevail on the white men to rest in his <i>teepees</i>,<br /></span> +<span>He guided their feet on the trail to the lakes of the winding Rice-River.<a name='FNanchor_AZ'></a><a href='#Footnote_AZ'><sup>[AZ]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Now on speeds the light bark canoe, through the lakes to the broad <i>Gitchee Seebee</i>;<a name='FNanchor_BA'></a><a href='#Footnote_BA'><sup>[BA]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And up the great river they row,—up the Big Sandy Lake and Savanna;<br /></span> +<span>And down through the meadows they go to the river of blue <i>Gitchee-Gumee</i>.<a name='FNanchor_BB'></a><a href='#Footnote_BB'><sup>[BB]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Still onward they speed to the Dalles—to the roar of the white-rolling rapids,<br /></span> +<span>Where the dark river tumbles and falls down the ragged ravine of the mountains.<br /></span> +<span>And singing his wild jubilee to the low-moaning pines and the cedars,<br /></span> +<span>Rushes on to the unsalted sea o'er the ledges upheaved by volcanoes.<br /></span> +<span>Their luggage the <i>voyageurs</i> bore down the long, winding path of the portage,<a name='FNanchor_BC'></a><a href='#Footnote_BC'><sup>[BC]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>While they mingled their song with the roar of the turbid and turbulent waters.<br /></span> +<span>Down-wimpling and murmuring there 'twixt two dewy hills winds a streamlet,<br /></span> +<span>Like a long, flaxen ringlet of hair on the breast of a maid in her slumber.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>All safe at the foot of the trail, where they left it, they found their felucca,<br /></span> +<span>And soon to the wind spread the sail, and glided at ease through the waters,—<br /></span> +<span>Through the meadows and lakelets and forth, round the point stretching south like a finger,<br /></span> +<span>From the pine-plumed hills on the north, sloping down to the bay and the lake-side<br /></span> +<span>And behold, at the foot of the hill, a cluster of Chippewa wigwams,<br /></span> +<span>And the busy wives plying with skill their nets in the emerald waters.<br /></span> +<span>Two hundred white winters and more have fled from the face of the Summer<br /></span> +<span>Since DuLuth on that wild, somber shore, in the unbroken forest primeval,<br /></span> +<span>From the midst of the spruce and the pines, saw the smoke of the wigwams up-curling,<br /></span> +<span>Like the fumes from the temples and shrines of the Druids of old in their forests.<br /></span> +<span>Ah, little he dreamed then, forsooth, that a city would stand on that hill-side,<br /></span> +<span>And bear the proud name of DuLuth, the untiring and dauntless explorer,—<br /></span> +<span>A refuge for ships from the storms, and for men from the bee-hives of Europe,<br /></span> +<span>Out-stretching her long, iron arms o'er an empire of Saxons and Normans.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>The swift west-wind sang in the sails, and on flew the boat like a sea-gull,<br /></span> +<span>By the green, templed hills and the dales, and the dark, rugged rocks of the North Shore;<br /></span> +<span>For the course of the brave Frenchman lay to his fort at the <i>Gáh-mah-na-ték-wáhk,</i><a name='FNanchor_83'></a><a href='#Footnote_83'><sup>[83]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>By the shore of the grand Thunder Bay, where the gray rocks loom up into mountains;<br /></span> +<span>Where the Stone Giant sleeps on the Cape, and the god of the storms makes the thunder,<a name='FNanchor_83'></a><a href='#Footnote_83'><sup>[83]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And the <i>Makinak</i><a name='FNanchor_83'></a><a href='#Footnote_83'><sup>[83]</sup></a> lifts his huge shape from the breast of the blue-rolling waters.<br /></span> +<span>And thence to the south-westward led his course to the Holy Ghost Mission,<a name='FNanchor_84'></a><a href='#Footnote_84'><sup>[84]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Where the Black Robes, the brave shepherds, fed their wild sheep on the isle <i>Wauga-bá-mè</i>,<a name='FNanchor_84'></a><a href='#Footnote_84'><sup>[84]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>In the enchanting <i>Cha-quám-e-gon</i> Bay defended by all the Apostles,<a name='FNanchor_BD'></a><a href='#Footnote_BD'><sup>[BD]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And thence, by the Ké-we-naw, lay his course to the Mission Sainte Marie,<a name='FNanchor_BE'></a><a href='#Footnote_BE'><sup>[BE]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Now the waves clap their myriad hands, and streams the white hair of the surges;<br /></span> +<span>DuLuth at the steady helm stands, and he hums as he bounds o'er the billows:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">O sweet is the carol of bird,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And sweet is the murmur of streams,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But sweeter the voice that I heard—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In the night—in the midst of my dreams.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h4>WINONA AND TA-TE-PSIN.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>'Tis the moon of the sere, falling leaves. From the heads of the maples the west-wind<br /></span> +<span>Plucks the red-and-gold plumage and grieves on the meads for the rose and the lily;<br /></span> +<span>Their brown leaves the moaning oaks strew, and the breezes that roam on the prairies,<br /></span> +<span>Low-whistling and wanton pursue the down of the silk-weed and thistle.<br /></span> +<span>All sere are the prairies and brown in the glimmer and haze of the Autumn;<br /></span> +<span>From the far northern marshes flock down, by thousands, the geese and the mallards.<br /></span> +<span>From the meadows and wide-prairied plains, for their long southward journey preparing.<br /></span> +<span>In croaking flocks gather the cranes, and choose with loud clamor their leaders.<br /></span> +<span>The breath of the evening is cold, and lurid along the horizon<br /></span> +<span>The flames of the prairies are rolled, on the somber skies flashing their torches.<br /></span> +<span>At noontide a shimmer of gold through the haze pours the sun from his pathway.<br /></span> +<span>The wild-rice is gathered and ripe, on the moors, lie the scarlet <i>po-pan-ka</i>,<a name='FNanchor_BF'></a><a href='#Footnote_BF'><sup>[BF]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span><i>Michábo</i><a name='FNanchor_85'></a><a href='#Footnote_85'><sup>[85]</sup></a> is smoking his pipe,—'tis the soft, dreamy Indian Summer,<br /></span> +<span>When the god of the South<a name='FNanchor_3'></a><a href='#Footnote_3'><sup>[3]</sup></a> as he flies from <i>Wazíya</i>, the god of the Winter,<br /></span> +<span>For a time turns his beautiful eyes, and backward looks over his shoulder.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>It is noon. From his path in the skies the red sun looks down on <i>Kathága</i>.<br /></span> +<span>Asleep in the valley it lies, for the swift hunters follow the bison.<br /></span> +<span>Ta-té-psin, the aged brave, bends as he walks by the side of Winona;<br /></span> +<span>Her arm to his left hand she lends, and he feels with his staff for the pathway;<br /></span> +<span>On his slow, feeble footsteps attends his gray dog, the watchful Wicháka; <a name='FNanchor_BG'></a><a href='#Footnote_BG'><sup>[BG]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>For blind in his years is the chief of a fever that followed the Summer,<br /></span> +<span>And the days of Ta-té-psin are brief. Once more by the dark-rolling river<br /></span> +<span>Sits the Chief in the warm, dreamy haze of the beautiful Summer in Autumn;<br /></span> +<span>And the faithful dog lovingly lays his head at the feet of his master.<br /></span> +<span>On a dead, withered branch sits a crow, down-peering askance at the old man;<br /></span> +<span>On the marge of the river below romp the nut-brown and merry-voiced children,<br /></span> +<span>And the dark waters silently flow, broad and deep, to the plunge of the Ha-ha.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>By his side sat Winona. He laid his thin, shriveled hand on her tresses,<br /></span> +<span>"Winona my daughter," he said, "no longer thy father beholds thee;<br /></span> +<span>But he feels the long locks of thy hair, and the days that are gone are remembered,<br /></span> +<span>When Sisóka <a name='FNanchor_BH'></a><a href='#Footnote_BH'><sup>[BH]</sup></a> sat faithful and fair in the lodge of swift footed Ta-té-psin.<br /></span> +<span>The white years have broken my spear; from my bow they have taken the bow-string;<br /></span> +<span>But once on the trail of the deer, like a gray wolf from sunrise till sunset,<br /></span> +<span>By woodland and meadow and mere, ran the feet of Ta-té-psin untiring.<br /></span> +<span>But dim are the days that are gone, and darkly around me they wander,<br /></span> +<span>Like the pale, misty face of the moon when she walks through the storm of the winter;<br /></span> +<span>And sadly they speak in my ear. I have looked on the graves of my kindred.<br /></span> +<span>The Land of the Spirits is near. Death walks by my side like a shadow.<br /></span> +<span>Now open thine ear to my voice, and thy heart to the wish of thy father,<br /></span> +<span>And long will Winona rejoice that she heeded the words of Ta-té-psin.<br /></span> +<span>The cold, cruel winter is near, and famine will sit in the teepee.<br /></span> +<span>What hunter will bring me the deer, or the flesh of the bear or the bison?<br /></span> +<span>For my kinsmen before me have gone; they hunt in the land of the shadows.<br /></span> +<span>In my old age forsaken, alone, must I die in my teepee of hunger?<br /></span> +<span>Winona, Tamdóka can make my empty lodge laugh with abundance;<br /></span> +<span>For thine aged and blind father's sake, to the son of the Chief speak the promise.<br /></span> +<span>For gladly again to my tee will the bridal gifts come for my daughter.<br /></span> +<span>A fleet-footed hunter is he, and the good spirits feather his arrows;<br /></span> +<span>And the cold, cruel winter will be a feast-time instead of a famine."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"My father," she said, and her voice was filial and full of compassion,<br /></span> +<span>"Would the heart of Ta-té-psin rejoice at the death of Winona, his daughter?<br /></span> +<span>The crafty Tamdóka I hate. Must I die in his <i>teepee</i> of sorrow?<br /></span> +<span>For I love the White Chief and I wait his return to the land of Dakotas.<br /></span> +<span>When the cold winds of winter return, and toss the white robes of the prairies,<br /></span> +<span>The fire of the White Chief will burn in his lodge at the Meeting-of-Waters.<br /></span> +<span>Winona's heart followed his feet far away to the land of the Morning,<br /></span> +<span>And she hears in her slumber his sweet, kindly voice call the name of thy daughter.<br /></span> +<span>My father, abide, I entreat, the return of the brave to <i>Katáhga</i>.<br /></span> +<span>The wild-rice is gathered, the meat of the bison is stored in the <i>teepee</i>;<br /></span> +<span>Till the Coon-Moon<a name='FNanchor_71'></a><a href='#Footnote_71'><sup>[71]</sup></a> enough and to spare; and if then the white warrior return not,<br /></span> +<span>Winona will follow the bear and the coon to their dens in the forest.<br /></span> +<span>She is strong; she can handle the spear; she can bend the stout bow of the hunter;<br /></span> +<span>And swift on the trail of the deer will she run o'er the snow on her snow-shoes.<br /></span> +<span>Let the step-mother sit in the tee, and kindle the fire for my father;<br /></span> +<span>And the cold, cruel winter shall be a feast-time instead of a famine."<br /></span> +<span>"The White Chief will never return," half angrily muttered Ta-té-psin;<br /></span> +<span>"His camp-fire will nevermore burn in the land of the warriors he slaughtered.<br /></span> +<span>I grieve, for my daughter has said that she loves the false friend of her kindred;<br /></span> +<span>For the hands of the White Chief are red with the blood of the trustful Dakotas."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then warmly Winona replied, "Tamdóka himself is the traitor,<br /></span> +<span>And the brave-hearted stranger had died by his treacherous hand in the forest,<br /></span> +<span>But thy daughter's voice bade him beware of the sly death that followed his footsteps.<br /></span> +<span>The words of Tamdóka are fair, but his heart is the den of the serpents.<br /></span> +<span>When the braves told their tale like a bird sang the heart of Winona rejoicing,<br /></span> +<span>But gladlier still had she heard of the death of the crafty Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>The Chief will return; he is bold, and he carries the fire of Wakínyan:<br /></span> +<span>To our people the truth will be told, and Tamdóka will hide like a coward."<br /></span> +<span>His thin locks the aged brave shook; to himself half inaudibly muttered;<br /></span> +<span>To Winona no answer he spoke,—only moaned he "<i>Micúnksee! Micúnksee</i>!<a name='FNanchor_BI'></a><a href='#Footnote_BI'><sup>[BI]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>In my old age forsaken and blind! <i>Yun-hé-hé! Micúnksee! Micúnksee</i>!"<a name='FNanchor_BJ'></a><a href='#Footnote_BJ'><sup>[BJ]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>And Wicháka, the pitying dog, whined as he looked on the face of his master.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h4>FAMINE.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Wazíya</i> came down from the North—from the land of perpetual winter.<br /></span> +<span>From his frost-covered beard issued forth the sharp-biting, shrill-whistling North-wind;<br /></span> +<span>At the touch of his breath the wide earth turned to stone, and the lakes and the rivers:<br /></span> +<span>From his nostrils the white vapors rose, and they covered the sky like a blanket.<br /></span> +<span>Like the down of <i>Magá</i><a name='FNanchor_BK'></a><a href='#Footnote_BK'><sup>[BK]</sup></a> fell the snows, tossed and whirled into heaps by the North-wind.<br /></span> +<span>Then the blinding storms roared on the plains, like the simoons on sandy Sahara;<br /></span> +<span>From the fangs of the fierce hurricanes fled the elk and the deer and the bison.<br /></span> +<span>Ever colder and colder it grew, till the frozen ground cracked and split open;<br /></span> +<span>And harder and harder it blew, till the hillocks were bare as the boulders.<br /></span> +<span>To the southward the buffalos fled, and the white rabbits hid in their burrows;<br /></span> +<span>On the bare sacred mounds of the dead howled the gaunt, hungry wolves in the night-time,<br /></span> +<span>The strong hunters crouched in their <i>tees</i>; by the lodge-fires the little ones shivered;<br /></span> +<span>And the Magic-Men<a name='FNanchor_BL'></a><a href='#Footnote_BL'><sup>[BL]</sup></a> danced to appease, in their <i>teepee</i>, the wrath of <i>Wazíya</i>;<br /></span> +<span>But famine and fatal disease, like phantoms, crept into the village.<br /></span> +<span>The Hard Moon<a name='FNanchor_BM'></a><a href='#Footnote_BM'><sup>[BM]</sup></a> was past, but the moon when the coons make their trails in the forest<a name='FNanchor_BN'></a><a href='#Footnote_BN'><sup>[BN]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Grew colder and colder. The coon, or the bear, ventured not from his cover;<br /></span> +<span>For the cold, cruel Arctic simoon swept the earth like the breath of a furnace.<br /></span> +<span>In the <i>tee</i> of Ta-té-psin the store of wild-rice and dried meat was exhausted;<br /></span> +<span>And Famine crept in at the door, and sat crouching and gaunt by the lodge-fire.<br /></span> +<span>But now with the saddle of deer and the gifts came the crafty Tamdóka;<br /></span> +<span>And he said, "Lo I bring you good cheer, for I love the blind Chief and his daughter.<br /></span> +<span>Take the gifts of Tamdóka, for dear to his heart is the dark-eyed Winona."<br /></span> +<span>The aged Chief opened his ears; in his heart he already consented:<br /></span> +<span>But the moans of his child and her tears touched the age-softened heart of the father,<br /></span> +<span>And he said, "I am burdened with years,—I am bent by the snows of my winters;<br /></span> +<span>Ta-té-psin will die in his <i>tee</i>; let him pass to the Land of the Spirits;<br /></span> +<span>But Winona is young; she is free and her own heart shall choose her a husband."<br /></span> +<span>The dark warrior strode from the <i>tee</i>; low-muttering and grim he departed;<br /></span> +<span>"Let him die in his lodge," muttered he, "but Winona shall kindle my lodge-fire."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then forth went Winona. The bow of Ta-té-psin she took and his arrows,<br /></span> +<span>And afar o'er the deep, drifted snow through the forest she sped on her snow shoes.<br /></span> +<span>Over meadow and ice-covered mere, through the thickets of red-oak and hazel,<br /></span> +<span>She followed the tracks of the deer, but like phantoms they fled from her vision.<br /></span> +<span>From sunrise to sunset she sped; half famished she camped in the thicket;<br /></span> +<span>In the cold snow she made her lone bed; on the buds of the birch<a name='FNanchor_BO'></a><a href='#Footnote_BO'><sup>[BO]</sup></a> made her supper.<br /></span> +<span>To the dim moon the gray owl preferred, from the tree-top, his shrill lamentation,<br /></span> +<span>And around her at midnight she heard the dread famine-cries of the gray wolves.<br /></span> +<span>In the gloam of the morning again on the trail of the red-deer she followed—<br /></span> +<span>All day long through the thickets in vain, for the gray wolves were chasing the roebucks;<br /></span> +<span>And the cold, hungry winds from the plain chased the wolves and the deer and Winona.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the twilight of sundown she sat in the forest, all weak and despairing;<br /></span> +<span>Ta-té-psin's bow lay at her feet, and his otter-skin quiver of arrows<br /></span> +<span>"He promised,—he promised," she said,—half-dreamily uttered and mournful,—<br /></span> +<span>"And why comes he not? Is he dead? Was he slain by the crafty Tamdóka?<br /></span> +<span>Must Winona, alas, make her choice—make her choice between death and Tamdóka?<br /></span> +<span>She will die, but her soul will rejoice in the far Summer-land of the spirits.<br /></span> +<span>Hark! I hear his low, musical voice! he is coming! My White Chief is coming!<br /></span> +<span>Ah, no, I am half in a dream!—'twas the memory of days long departed;<br /></span> +<span>But the birds of the green Summer seem to be singing above in the branches."<br /></span> +<span>Then forth from her bosom she drew the crucified Jesus in silver.<br /></span> +<span>In her dark hair the cold north-wind blew, as meekly she bent o'er the image.<br /></span> +<span>"O Christ of the Whiteman," she prayed, "lead the feet of my brave to Kathága;<br /></span> +<span>Send a good spirit down to my aid, or the friend of the White Chief will perish."<br /></span> +<span>Then a smile on her wan features played, and she lifted her pale face and chanted<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">"E-ye-he-ktá! E-ye-he-ktá!<br /></span> +<span class="i5">Hé-kta-cè; é-ye-ce-quón.<br /></span> +<span class="i5">Mí-Wamdee-ská, he-he-ktá,<br /></span> +<span class="i5">He-kta-cè, é-ye-ce-quón,<br /></span> +<span class="i7">Mí-Wamdee-ská."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i9">[TRANSLATON]<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i5">He will come; he will come;<br /></span> +<span class="i5">He will come, for he promised.<br /></span> +<span class="i5">My White Eagle, he will come;<br /></span> +<span class="i5">He will come, for he promised——<br /></span> +<span class="i7">My White Eagle.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Thus sadly she chanted, and lo—allured by her sorrowful accents—<br /></span> +<span>From the dark covert crept a red roe and wonderingly gazed on Winona.<br /></span> +<span>Then swift caught the huntress her bow; from her trembling hand hummed the keen arrow.<br /></span> +<span>Up-leaped the red roebuck and fled, but the white snow was sprinkled with scarlet,<br /></span> +<span>And he fell in the oak thicket dead. On the trail ran the eager Winona.<br /></span> +<span>Half-famished the raw flesh she ate. To the hungry maid sweet was her supper<br /></span> +<span>Then swift through the night ran her feet, and she trailed the sleek roebuck behind her;<br /></span> +<span>And the guide of her steps was a star—the cold-glinting star of <i>Wazíya</i><a name='FNanchor_BP'></a><a href='#Footnote_BP'><sup>[BP]</sup></a>—<br /></span> +<span>Over meadow and hilltop afar, on the way to the lodge of her father.<br /></span> +<span>But hark! on the keen frosty air wind the shrill hunger-howls of the gray-wolves!<br /></span> +<span>And nearer,—still nearer!—the blood of the deer have they scented and follow;<br /></span> +<span>Through the thicket, the meadow, the wood, dash the pack on the trail of Winona.<br /></span> +<span>Swift she speeds with her burden, but swift on her track fly the minions of famine;<br /></span> +<span>Now they yell on the view from the drift, in the reeds at the marge of the meadow;<br /></span> +<span>Red gleam their wild, ravenous eyes, for they see on the hill-side their supper;<br /></span> +<span>The dark forest echoes their cries, but her heart is the heart of a warrior.<br /></span> +<span>From its sheath snatched Winona her knife, and a leg from the roebuck she severed;<br /></span> +<span>With the carcass she ran for her life,—to a low-branching oak ran the maiden;<br /></span> +<span>Round the deer's neck her head-strap<a name='FNanchor_BQ'></a><a href='#Footnote_BQ'><sup>[BQ]</sup></a> was tied; swiftly she sprang to the arms of the oak-tree;<br /></span> +<span>Quick her burden she drew to her side, and higher she clomb on the branches,<br /></span> +<span>While the maddened wolves battled and bled, dealing death o'er the leg to each other;<br /></span> +<span>Their keen fangs devouring the dead,—yea, devouring the flesh of the living,<br /></span> +<span>They raved and they gnashed and they growled, like the fiends in the regions infernal;<br /></span> +<span>The wide night re-echoing howled, and the hoarse North-wind laughed o'er the slaughter.<br /></span> +<span>But their ravenous maws unappeased by the blood and the flesh of their fellows,<br /></span> +<span>To the cold wind their muzzles they raised, and the trail to the oak-tree they followed.<br /></span> +<span>Round and round it they howled for the prey, madly leaping and snarling and snapping;<br /></span> +<span>But the brave maiden's keen arrows slay, till the dead number more than the living.<br /></span> +<span>All the long, dreary night-time, at bay, in the oak sat the shivering Winona;<br /></span> +<span>But the sun gleamed at last, and away skulked the gray cowards<a name='FNanchor_BR'></a><a href='#Footnote_BR'><sup>[BR]</sup></a> down through the forest.<br /></span> +<span>Then down dropped the deer and the maid. Ere the sun reached the midst of his journey,<br /></span> +<span>Her red, welcome burden she laid at the feet of her famishing father.<br /></span> +<span><i>Wazíya's</i> wild wrath was appeased, and homeward he turned to his <i>teepee</i>,<a name='FNanchor_3'></a><a href='#Footnote_3'><sup>[3]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>O'er the plains and the forest-land breezed from the Islands of Summer the South-wind.<br /></span> +<span>From their dens came the coon and the bear; o'er the snow through the woodlands they wandered;<br /></span> +<span>On her snow-shoes with stout bow and spear on their trails ran the huntress Winona.<br /></span> +<span>The coon to his den in the tree, and the bear to his burrow she followed;<br /></span> +<span>A brave, skillful hunter was she, and Ta-té-psin's lodge laughed with abundance.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration]</p> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h4>DEATH OF TA-TE-PSIN.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>The long winter wanes. On the wings of the spring come the geese and the mallards;<br /></span> +<span>On the bare oak the red-robin sings, and the crocus peeps up on the prairies,<br /></span> +<span>And the bobolink pipes, but he brings of the blue-eyed, brave White Chief no tidings.<br /></span> +<span>With the waning of winter, alas, waned the life of the aged Ta-té-psin;<br /></span> +<span>Ere the wild pansies peeped from the grass, to the Land of the Spirits he journeyed;<br /></span> +<span>Like a babe in its slumber he passed, or the snow from the hill-tops of April;<br /></span> +<span>And the dark-eyed Winona, at last, stood alone by the graves of her kindred.<br /></span> +<span>When their myriad mouths opened the trees to the sweet dew of heaven and the raindrops,<br /></span> +<span>And the April showers fell on the leas, on his mound fell the tears of Winona.<br /></span> +<span>Round her drooping form gathered the years and the spirits unseen of her kindred,<br /></span> +<span>As low, in the midst of her tears, at the grave of her father she chanted<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ma-kàh kin háy-chay-dan táy-han wan-kày.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tú-way ne ktáy snee e-yáy-chen e-wáh chày.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">E-yó-tan-han e-yáy-wah-ké-yày!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ma-kàh kin háy-chay-dan táy-han wan-kày.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>[TRANSLATION].<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Sore is my sorrow!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sore is my sorrow!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sore is my sorrow!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The earth alone lasts.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I speak as one dying;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sore is my sorrow!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sore is my sorrow!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The earth alone lasts.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Still hope, like a star in the night gleaming oft through the broken clouds somber,<br /></span> +<span>Cheered the heart of Winona, and bright on her dreams beamed the face of the Frenchman.<br /></span> +<span>As the thought of a loved one and lost, sad and sweet were her thoughts of the White Chief;<br /></span> +<span>In the moon's mellow light, like a ghost, walked Winona alone by the <i>Ha-Ha</i>,<br /></span> +<span>Ever wrapped in a dream. Far away—to the land of the sunrise—she wandered;<br /></span> +<span>On the blue-rolling <i>Tánka-Medé</i><a name='FNanchor_BS'></a><a href='#Footnote_BS'><sup>[BS]</sup></a> in the midst of her dreams, she beheld him—<br /></span> +<span>In his white-winged canoe, like a bird, to the land of Dakotas returning,<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>And often in fancy she heard the dip of his oars on the river.<br /></span> +<span>On the dark waters glimmered the moon, but she saw not the boat of the Frenchman.<br /></span> +<span>On the somber night bugled the loon, but she heard not the song of the boatmen.<br /></span> +<span>The moon waxed and waned, but the star of her hope never waned to the setting;<br /></span> +<span>Through her tears she beheld it afar, like a torch on the eastern horizon.<br /></span> +<span>"He will come,—he is coming," she said; "he will come, for my White Eagle promised,"<br /></span> +<span>And low to the bare earth the maid bent her ear for the sound of his footsteps,<br /></span> +<span>"He is gone, but his voice in my ear still remains like the voice of the robin;<br /></span> +<span>He is far, but his footsteps I hear; he is coming; my White Chief is coming!"<br /></span> +<span>But the moon waxed and waned. Nevermore will the eyes of Winona behold him.<br /></span> +<span>Far away on the dark, rugged shore of the blue <i>Gitchee Gúmee</i> he lingers.<br /></span> +<span>No tidings the rising sun brings; no tidings the star of the evening;<br /></span> +<span>But morning and evening she sings, like a turtle-dove widowed and waiting:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Aké u, aké u, aké u;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ma cántè maséeca.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aké u, aké u, aké u;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ma cántè maséca.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">Come again, come again, come again;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For my heart is sad.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Come again, come again, come again;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For my heart is sad.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h4>DEATH OF WINONA.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Down the broad <i>Ha-Ha Wák-pa</i><a name='FNanchor_BT'></a><a href='#Footnote_BT'><sup>[BT]</sup></a> the band took their way to the Games at <i>Keóza</i><a name='FNanchor_8'></a><a href='#Footnote_8'><sup>[8]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>While the swift-footed hunters by land ran the shores for the elk and the bison.<br /></span> +<span>Like <i>magás</i><a name='FNanchor_BU'></a><a href='#Footnote_BU'><sup>[BU]</sup></a> ride the birchen canoes on the breast of the dark, winding river,<br /></span> +<span>By the willow-fringed island they cruise, by the grassy hills green to their summits;<br /></span> +<span>By the lofty bluffs hooded with oaks that darken the deep with their shadows;<br /></span> +<span>And bright in the sun gleam the strokes of the oars in the hands of the women.<br /></span> +<span>With the band went Winona. The oar plied the maid with the skill of a hunter.<br /></span> +<span>They tarried a time on the shore of <i>Remníca</i>—the Lake of the Mountains.<a name='FNanchor_BV'></a><a href='#Footnote_BV'><sup>[BV]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>There the fleet hunters followed the deer, and the thorny pahin<a name='FNanchor_BW'></a><a href='#Footnote_BW'><sup>[BW]</sup></a> for the women<br /></span> +<span>From the tees rose the smoke of good cheer, curling blue through the tops of the maples,<br /></span> +<span>Near the foot of a cliff that arose, like the battle-scarred walls of a castle,<br /></span> +<span>Up-towering, in rugged repose, to a dizzy height over the waters.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>But the man-wolf still followed his prey, and the step-mother ruled in the teepee;<br /></span> +<span>Her will must Winona obey, by the custom and law of Dakotas.<br /></span> +<span>The gifts to the teepee were brought—the blankets and beads of the White men,<br /></span> +<span>And Winona, the orphaned, was bought by the crafty, relentless Tamdóka.<br /></span> +<span>In the Spring-time of life, in the flush of the gladsome mid-May days of Summer,<br /></span> +<span>When the bobolink sang and the thrush, and the red robin chirped in the branches,<br /></span> +<span>To the tent of the brave must she go; she must kindle the fire in his <i>teepee</i>;<br /></span> +<span>She must sit in the lodge of her foe, as a slave at the feet of her master.<br /></span> +<span>Alas for her waiting! the wings of the East-wind have brought her no tidings;<br /></span> +<span>On the meadow the meadow-lark sings, but sad is her song to Winona,<br /></span> +<span>For the glad warbler's melody brings but the memory of voices departed.<br /></span> +<span>The Day-Spirit walked in the west to his lodge in the land of the shadows;<br /></span> +<span>His shining face gleamed on the crest of the oak-hooded hills and the mountains,<br /></span> +<span>And the meadow-lark hied to her nest, and the mottled owl peeped from her cover.<br /></span> +<span>But hark! from the <i>teepees</i> a cry! Hear the shouts of the hurrying warriors!<br /></span> +<span>Are the feet of the enemy nigh,—of the crafty and cruel Ojibways?<br /></span> +<span>Nay; look!—on the dizzy cliff high—on the brink of the cliff stands Winona!<br /></span> +<span>Her sad face up-turned to the sky. Hark! I hear the wild wail of her death-song:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"My Father's Spirit, look down, look down—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">From your hunting grounds in the shining skies;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Behold, for the light of my heart is gone;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The light is gone and Winona dies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">I looked to the East, but I saw no star;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The face of my White Chief was turned away.<br /></span> +<span class="i1">I harked for his footsteps in vain; afar<br /></span> +<span class="i1">His bark sailed over the Sunrise-sea.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">Long have I watched till my heart is cold;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">In my breast it is heavy and cold as a stone.<br /></span> +<span class="i1">No more shall Winona his face behold,<br /></span> +<span class="i1">And the robin that sang in her heart is gone.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">Shall I sit at the feet of the treacherous brave?<br /></span> +<span class="i1">On his hateful couch shall Winona lie?<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Shall she kindle his fire like a coward slave?<br /></span> +<span class="i1">No!—a warrior's daughter can bravely die.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i1">My Father's Spirit, look down, look down—<br /></span> +<span class="i1">From your hunting-grounds in the shining skies;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">Behold, for the light in my heart is gone;<br /></span> +<span class="i1">The light is gone and Winona dies."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: DOWN WHIRLING AND FLUTTERING SHE FELL, AND HEADLONG PLUNGED INTO THE WATERS.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Swift the strong hunters climbed as she sang, and the foremost of all was Tamdóka;<br /></span> +<span>From crag to crag upward he sprang; like a panther he leaped to the summit.<br /></span> +<span>Too late!—on the brave as he crept turned the maid in her scorn and defiance;<br /></span> +<span>Then swift from the dizzy height leaped. Like a brant arrow-pierced in mid-heaven.<br /></span> +<span>Down whirling and fluttering she fell, and headlong plunged into the waters.<br /></span> +<span>Forever she sank mid the wail, and the wild lamentation of women.<br /></span> +<span>Her lone spirit evermore dwells in the depths of the Lake of the Mountains,<br /></span> +<span>And the lofty cliff evermore tells to the years as they pass her sad story.<a name='FNanchor_BX'></a><a href='#Footnote_BX'><sup>[BX]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>In the silence of sorrow the night o'er the earth spread her wide, sable pinions;<br /></span> +<span>And the stars<a name='FNanchor_18'></a><a href='#Footnote_18'><sup>[18]</sup></a> hid their faces; and light on the lake fell the tears of the spirits.<br /></span> +<span>As her sad sisters watched on the shore for her spirit to rise from the waters,<br /></span> +<span>They heard the swift dip of an oar, and a boat they beheld like a shadow,<br /></span> +<span>Gliding down through the night in the gray, gloaming mists on the face of the waters.<br /></span> +<span>'Twas the bark of DuLuth on his way from the Falls to the Games at <i>Keóza</i>.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_F'></a><a href='#FNanchor_F'>[F]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Tee—teepee</i>, the Dakota name for tent or wigwam</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_G'></a><a href='#FNanchor_G'>[G]</a><div class='note'><p> See <i>Hennepin's Description of Louisiana</i>, by Shea, pp. 243 and 256. +<i>Parkman's Discovery</i>, p. 246—and <i>Carver's Travels</i>, p. 67.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_H'></a><a href='#FNanchor_H'>[H]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas, like the ancient Romans and Greeks, think the home of +the winds is in the caverns of the mountains, and their great +Thunder-bird resembles in many respects the Jupiter of the Romans and +the Zeus of the Greeks. The resemblance of the Dakota mythology to that +of the older Greeks and Romans is striking.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_I'></a><a href='#FNanchor_I'>[I]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Tate</i>—wind,—<i>psin</i>—wild-rice—wild-rice wind.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_J'></a><a href='#FNanchor_J'>[J]</a><div class='note'><p> mountain antelope.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_K'></a><a href='#FNanchor_K'>[K]</a><div class='note'><p> Little Rice River. It bears the name of Rice Creek to-day and +empties into the Mississippi from the east, a few miles above +Minneapolis.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_L'></a><a href='#FNanchor_L'>[L]</a><div class='note'><p> See the account of Father Menard, his mission and disappearance in +the wilderness. <i>Neill's Hist. Minnesota</i>, pp 104-107, inc.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_M'></a><a href='#FNanchor_M'>[M]</a><div class='note'><p> It is wonderful!</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_N'></a><a href='#FNanchor_N'>[N]</a><div class='note'><p> The morning.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_O'></a><a href='#FNanchor_O'>[O]</a><div class='note'><p> A lodge set apart for guests of the village.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_P'></a><a href='#FNanchor_P'>[P]</a><div class='note'><p> Moccasins.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_Q'></a><a href='#FNanchor_Q'>[Q]</a><div class='note'><p> The Ottawa name for the region of the St. Lawrence River.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_R'></a><a href='#FNanchor_R'>[R]</a><div class='note'><p> "Mysterious metal"—or metal having a spirit in it. This is the +common name applied by the Dakotas to all firearms.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S'>[S]</a><div class='note'><p> Lightning.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_T'></a><a href='#FNanchor_T'>[T]</a><div class='note'><p> Tah-mdo-kah, literally, the buck-deer.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_U'></a><a href='#FNanchor_U'>[U]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas say that for many years in olden times war-eagles made +their nests in oak trees on Spirit-island—<i>Wanagi-wita</i>, just below the +Falls till frightened away by the advent of white men.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_V'></a><a href='#FNanchor_V'>[V]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas called Nicollet Island <i>Wi-ta Waste</i>—the Beautiful +Island.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_W'></a><a href='#FNanchor_W'>[W]</a><div class='note'><p> A part of one of the favorite songs of the French <i>voyageurs</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_X'></a><a href='#FNanchor_X'>[X]</a><div class='note'><p> Head-chief</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_Y'></a><a href='#FNanchor_Y'>[Y]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced Ray-mne-chah—The village of the Mountains, situate where +Red Wing now stands.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_Z'></a><a href='#FNanchor_Z'>[Z]</a><div class='note'><p> Sacred Dance—The Medicine-dance—See description <i>infra.</i></p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AA'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AA'>[AA]</a><div class='note'><p> The wings.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AB'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AB'>[AB]</a><div class='note'><p> A favorite boast of the Dakota braves.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AC'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AC'>[AC]</a><div class='note'><p> The wind.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AD'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AD'>[AD]</a><div class='note'><p> About equivalent to Oho!—Aha!—fudge!</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AE'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AE'>[AE]</a><div class='note'><p> Hurra there!</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AF'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AF'>[AF]</a><div class='note'><p> "Sacred Spirit! Father! have pity on me always."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AG'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AG'>[AG]</a><div class='note'><p> Riggs' Takoo Wakan, p. 90.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AH'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AH'>[AH]</a><div class='note'><p> Slander.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AI'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AI'>[AI]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas say the humming-bird comes from the "Land of the +rain-bow."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AJ'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AJ'>[AJ]</a><div class='note'><p> See Legend of the Falls, or Note 28—Appendix.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AK'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AK'>[AK]</a><div class='note'><p> My Sister.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AL'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AL'>[AL]</a><div class='note'><p> Mendota—properly Mdo-te—meaning the out-let of a lake or river +into another, commonly applied to the region about Fort Snelling.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AM'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AM'>[AM]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Tanka-Mede</i>—Great Lake, i.e. Lake Superior. The Dakotas seem to +have had no other name for it. They generally referred to it as +<i>Mini-ya-ta—There at the water</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AN'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AN'>[AN]</a><div class='note'><p> The rabbit. The Dakotas called the Crees "Mastincapi"—Rabbits.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AO'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AO'>[AO]</a><div class='note'><p> i.e. fire-arms which the Dakotas compare to the roar of the wings +of the Thunder-bird and the fierey arrows he shoots.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AP'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AP'>[AP]</a><div class='note'><p> DuLuth was a devout Catholic.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AQ'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AQ'>[AQ]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Nee-wah-shtay</i>—Thou art good.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AR'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AR'>[AR]</a><div class='note'><p> Spirit-River, now called Rum River.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AS'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AS'>[AS]</a><div class='note'><p> Fire-arm—spirit-metal.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AT'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AT'>[AT]</a><div class='note'><p> Lake Superior—at that time the home of the Ojibways (Chippewas).</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AU'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AU'>[AU]</a><div class='note'><p> "Burnt woods"—half-breeds.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AV'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AV'>[AV]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Wita Waste</i>—"Beautiful Island"; the Dakota name for Nicollet +Island.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AW'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AW'>[AW]</a><div class='note'><p> Ojibways.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AX'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AX'>[AX]</a><div class='note'><p> Mille Lacs</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AY'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AY'>[AY]</a><div class='note'><p> See Hennepin's account of "Aqui-pa-que-tin," and his village. +Shea's Hennepin, 225.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_AZ'></a><a href='#FNanchor_AZ'>[AZ]</a><div class='note'><p> Now called "Mud River"—it empties into the Mississippi at Aitkin.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BA'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BA'>[BA]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Gitchee See-bee</i>—Big River—is the Ojibway name for the +Mississippi, which is a corruption of Gitchee Seebee—as Michigan is a +corruption of <i>Gitchee Gumee</i>—Great Lake, the Ojibway name of Lake +Superior.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BB'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BB'>[BB]</a><div class='note'><p> The Ojibways called the St. Louis River <i>Gitchee-Gumee +See-bee</i>—<i>Great-lake River</i>, i.e. the river of the Great Lake (Lake +Superior).</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BC'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BC'>[BC]</a><div class='note'><p> The route of DuLuth above described—from the mouth of the +Wild-Rice (Mud) River, to Lake Superior—was for centuries, and still +is, the Indians' canoe-route. I have walked over the old portage from +the foot of the Dalles to the St. Louis above—trod by the feet of +half-breeds and <i>voyageurs</i> for more than two centuries, and by the +Indians for perhaps a thousand years.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BD'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BD'>[BD]</a><div class='note'><p> The Apostle Islands.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BE'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BE'>[BE]</a><div class='note'><p> At the Sault Ste. Marie.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BF'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BF'>[BF]</a><div class='note'><p> Cranberries.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BG'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BG'>[BG]</a><div class='note'><p> Wee-chah kah—literally "Faithful".</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BH'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BH'>[BH]</a><div class='note'><p> The Robin—the name of Winona's Mother.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BI'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BI'>[BI]</a><div class='note'><p> My Daughter; My Daughter.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BJ'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BJ'>[BJ]</a><div class='note'><p> Alas, O My Daughter,—My Daughter!</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BK'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BK'>[BK]</a><div class='note'><p> Wild-goose</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BL'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BL'>[BL]</a><div class='note'><p> Medicine-men.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BM'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BM'>[BM]</a><div class='note'><p> January.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BN'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BN'>[BN]</a><div class='note'><p> February.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BO'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BO'>[BO]</a><div class='note'><p> The pheasant feeds on birch-buds in winter. Indians eat them when +very hungry.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BP'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BP'>[BP]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Wazíya's</i> Star is the North-star.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BQ'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BQ'>[BQ]</a><div class='note'><p> A strap used in carrying burdens.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BR'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BR'>[BR]</a><div class='note'><p> Wolves sometimes attack people at night, but rarely, if ever, in +the day time. If they have followed a hunter all night, and "treed" him, +they will skulk away as soon as the sun rises.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BS'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BS'>[BS]</a><div class='note'><p> Lake Superior,—The Gitchee Gumee of the Chippewas.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BT'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BT'>[BT]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakota name for the Mississippi, see note 76 in Appendix.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BU'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BU'>[BU]</a><div class='note'><p> Wild Geese.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BV'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BV'>[BV]</a><div class='note'><p> Lake Pepin, by Hennepin called Lake of Tears—Called by the Dakotas +<i>Remnee-chah-Mday</i>—Lake of the Mountains.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BW'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BW'>[BW]</a><div class='note'><p> Pah-hin—the porcupine—the quills of which are greatly prized for +ornamental work.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_BX'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BX'>[BX]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas say that the spirit of Winona forever haunts the lake. +They say that it was many, many winters ago when Winona leaped from the +rock,—that the rock was then perpendicular to the water's edge and she +leaped into the lake, but now the rock has partly crumbled down and the +waters have also receded, so that they do not now reach, the foot of the +perpendicular rock as of old.</p></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<a name="SPRING"></a><h3>SPRING</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Et nunc omnis ager, mine omms parturit arbos;</i><br /></span> +<span><i>Nunc frondent sylvæ, nunc formostssimus annus.</i><br /></span> +<span><i>—Virgil.</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Delightful harbinger of joys to come,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of summer's verdure and a fruitful year,<br /></span> +<span>Who bids thee o'er our northern snow-fields roam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And make all gladness in thy bright career?<br /></span> +<span>Lo from the Indian Isle thou dost appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And dost a thousand pleasures with thee bring:<br /></span> +<span>But why to us art thou so ever dear?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bearest thou the hope—upon thy radiant wing—<br /></span> +<span>Of Immortality, O soft, celestial Spring?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Yea, buds and flowers that fade not, they are thine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And youth-renewing balms; the sear and old<br /></span> +<span>Are young and gladsome at thy touch divine.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou breath'st upon the frozen earth—behold,<br /></span> +<span>Meadows and vales of grass and floral gold,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Green-covered hills and leafy mountains grand:<br /></span> +<span>Young life leaps up where all was dumb and cold,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As smoldering embers into flame are fanned,<br /></span> +<span>Or the dead came back to life at the touch of the Savior's hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The snow-clouds fly the canopy of heaven;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rivulets ripple with the merry tone<br /></span> +<span>Of wanton waters, and the breezes given<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To fan the budding hills are all thine own.<br /></span> +<span>Returning songsters from the tropic zone<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their vernal love-songs in the tree tops sing,<br /></span> +<span>And talk and twitter in a tongue unknown<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of joys that journey on thy golden wing,<br /></span> +<span>And God who sends thee forth to wake the world, O Spring!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[ILLUSTRATION: SPRING ADA MARY HUNTLY WILLIE]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Emblem of youth—enchanting goddess, Spring;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lo now the happy rustic wends his way<br /></span> +<span>O'er meadows decked with violets from thy wing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And laboring to the rhythm of song all day,<br /></span> +<span>Performs the task the harvest shall repay<br /></span> +<span class="i2">An hundredfold into the reaper's hand.<br /></span> +<span>What recks the tiller of his toil in May?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What cares he if his cheeks are tinged and tanned<br /></span> +<span>By thy warm sunshine-kiss and by thy breezes bland?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hark to the tinkling bells of grazing kine!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lambkins bleating on the mountain-side!<br /></span> +<span>The red squirrel chippering in the proud old pine!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The pigeon-cock cooing to his vernal bride!<br /></span> +<span>O'er all the land and o'er the peaceful tide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Singing and praising every living thing,<br /></span> +<span>Till one sweet anthem, echoed far and wide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Makes all the broad blue bent of ether ring<br /></span> +<span>With welcomings to thee, God-given, supernal Spring.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="TO_MOLLIE" id="TO_MOLLIE" />TO MOLLIE</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>O Mollie, I would I possessed such a heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It enchants me—so gentle and true;<br /></span> +<span>I would I possessed all its magical art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then, Mollie, I would enchant you.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Those dear, rosy lips—tho' I never caressed them(?)—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are as sweet as the wild honey-dew;<br /></span> +<span>Your cheeks—all the angels in Heaven have blessed them,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But not one is as lovely as you.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then give me that heart,—O that innocent heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For mine own is cold and <i>perdu</i>;<br /></span> +<span>It enchants me, but give me its magical art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then, Mollie, I will enchant you.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">1855.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<h3><a name="TO_SYLVA" id="TO_SYLVA" />TO SYLVA</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>I know thou art true, and I know thou art fair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As the rose-bud that blooms in thy beautiful hair;<br /></span> +<span>Thou art far, but I feel the warm throb of thy heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou art far, but I love thee wherever thou art.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Wherever at noontide my spirit may be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At evening it silently wanders to thee;<br /></span> +<span>It seeks thee, my dear one, for comfort and rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As the weary-winged dove seeks at night-fall her nest.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Through the battle of life—through its sorrow and care—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till the mortal sink down with its load of despair,—<br /></span> +<span>Till we meet at the feet of the Father and Son,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I'll love thee and cherish thee, beautiful one.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>1859.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="THANKSGIVING" id="THANKSGIVING" />THANKSGIVING.</h3> + +<h4>[Nov. 26, 1857, during the great financial depression.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Father, our thanks are due to thee<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For many a blessing given,<br /></span> +<span>By thy paternal love and care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From the bounty-horn of heaven.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>We know that still that horn is filled<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With blessings for our race,<br /></span> +<span>And we calmly look thro' winter's storm<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To thy benignant face.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Father, we raise our thanks to Thee,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who seldom thanked before;<br /></span> +<span>And seldom bent the stubborn knee<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy goodness to adore:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But Father, thou hast blessings poured<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On all our wayward days<br /></span> +<span>And now thy mercies manifold<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Have filled our hearts with praise<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The winter-storm may rack and roar;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We do not fear its blast;<br /></span> +<span>And we'll bear with faith and fortitude<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lot that thou hast cast.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But Father,—Father,—O look down<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the poor and homeless head<br /></span> +<span>And feed the hungry thousands<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That cry to thee for bread.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Thou givest us our daily bread;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We would not ask for more;<br /></span> +<span>But, Father, give their daily bread<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the multitudes of poor.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>In all the cities of the land<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The naked and hungry are;<br /></span> +<span>O feed them with thy manna, Lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And clothe them with thy care.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Thou dost not give a serpent, Lord,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We will not give a stone;<br /></span> +<span>For the bread and meat thou givest us<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are not for us alone.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And while a loaf is given to us<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From thy all-bounteous horn<br /></span> +<span>We'll cheerfully divide that loaf<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With the hungry and forlorn.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="CHARITY1" id="CHARITY1" />CHARITY</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Frail are the best of us, brothers—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">God's charity cover us all—<br /></span> +<span>Yet we ask for perfection in others,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And scoff when they stumble and fall.<br /></span> +<span>Shall we give him a fish—or a serpent—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who stretches his hand in his need?<br /></span> +<span>Let the proud give a stone, but the manly<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will give him a hand full of bread.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Let us search our own hearts and behavior<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ere we cast at a brother a stone,<br /></span> +<span>And remember the words of the Savior<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the frail and unfortunate one;<br /></span> +<span>Remember when others displease us<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The Nazarene's holy command,<br /></span> +<span>For the only word written by Jesus<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was charity—writ in the sand.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + + +<h3>CHARITY</h3> + +<h4>[Written in a friend's book of autographs, 1876.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Bear and forbear, I counsel thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forgive and be forgiven,<br /></span> +<span>For Charity is the golden key<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That opens the gate of heaven.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="SAILOR_BOYS_SONG" id="SAILOR_BOYS_SONG" />SAILOR-BOY'S SONG</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Away, away, o'er the bounding sea<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My spirit flies like a gull;<br /></span> +<span>For I know my Mary is watching for me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the moon is bright and full.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>She sits on the rock by the sounding shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gazes over the sea;<br /></span> +<span>And she sighs, "Will my sailor-boy come no more?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will he never come back to me?"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The moonbeams play in her raven hair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the soft breeze kisses her brow;<br /></span> +<span>But if your sailor-boy, love, were there,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He would kiss your sweet lips I trow.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And mother—she sits in the cottage-door;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But her heart is out on the sea;<br /></span> +<span>And she sighs, "Will my sailor-boy come no more?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will he never come back to me?"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Ye winds that over the billows roam<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With a low and sullen moan,<br /></span> +<span>O swiftly come to waft me home;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O bear me back to my own.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>For long have I been on the billowy deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the boundless waste of sea;<br /></span> +<span>And while I sleep there are two who weep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And watch and pray for me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>When the mad storm roars till the stoutest fear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the thunders roll over the sea,<br /></span> +<span>I think of you, Mary and mother dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For I know you are thinking of me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then blow, ye winds, for my swift return;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let the tempest roar o'er the main;<br /></span> +<span>Let the billows yearn and the lightning burn;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They will hasten me home again.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="MY_DEAD" id="MY_DEAD" />MY DEAD</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Last night in my feverish dreams I heard<br /></span> +<span>A voice like the moan of an autumn sea,<br /></span> +<span>Or the low, sad wail of a widowed bird,<br /></span> +<span>And it said—"My darling, come home to me."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then a hand was laid on my throbbing head—<br /></span> +<span>As cold as clay, but it soothed my pain:<br /></span> +<span>I wakened and knew from among the dead<br /></span> +<span>My darling stood by my coach again.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="DUST_TO_DUST" id="DUST_TO_DUST" />DUST TO DUST</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust:<br /></span> +<span>Fall and perish love and lust:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Life is one brief autumn day;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sin and sorrow haunt the way<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the narrow house of clay,<br /></span> +<span>Clutching at the good and just:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust:<br /></span> +<span>Still we strive and toil and trust,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From the cradle to the grave:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Vainly crying, "Jesus, save!"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fall the coward and the brave,<br /></span> +<span>Fall the felon and the just:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust:<br /></span> +<span>Hark, I hear the wintry gust;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet the roses bloom to-day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blushing to the kiss of May,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While the north winds sigh and say:<br /></span> +<span>"Lo we bring the cruel frost—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust:<br /></span> +<span>Yet we live and love and trust,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lifting burning brow and eye<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the mountain peaks on high:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From the peaks the ages cry,<br /></span> +<span>Strewing ashes, rime and rust:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">"Dust to dust!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust:<br /></span> +<span>What is gained when all is lost?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gaily for a day we tread—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Proudly with averted head<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O'er the ashes of the dead—<br /></span> +<span>Blind with pride and mad with lust:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Dust to dust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Hope and trust:<br /></span> +<span>All life springs from out the dust:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ah, we measure God by man,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Looking forward but a span<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On His wondrous, boundless plan;<br /></span> +<span>All His ways are wise and just;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hope and trust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Hope and trust:<br /></span> +<span>Hope will blossom from the dust;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Love is queen: God's throne is hers;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His great heart with loving force<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Throbs throughout the universe;<br /></span> +<span>We are His and He is just;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Hope and trust.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<h3><a name="O_LET_ME_DREAM_THE_DREAMS_OF_LONG_AGO" id="O_LET_ME_DREAM_THE_DREAMS_OF_LONG_AGO" />O LET ME DREAM THE DREAMS OF LONG AGO</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Call me not back, O cold and crafty world:<br /></span> +<span>I scorn your thankless thanks and hollow praise.<br /></span> +<span>Wiser than seer or scientist—content<br /></span> +<span>To tread no paths beyond these bleating hills,<br /></span> +<span>Here let me lie beneath this dear old elm,<br /></span> +<span>Among the blossoms of the clover-fields,<br /></span> +<span>And listen to the humming of the bees.<br /></span> +<span>Here in those far-off, happy, boyhood years,<br /></span> +<span>When all my world was bounded by these hills,<br /></span> +<span>I dreamed my first dreams underneath this elm.<br /></span> +<span>Dreamed? Aye, and builded castles in the clouds;<br /></span> +<span>Dreamed, and made glad a fond, proud mother's heart,<br /></span> +<span>Now moldering into clay on yonder hill;<br /></span> +<span>Dreamed till my day-dreams paved the world with gold;<br /></span> +<span>Dreamed till my mad dreams made one desolate;<br /></span> +<span>Dreamed—O my soul, and was it all a dream?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>As I lay dreaming under this old elm,<br /></span> +<span>Building my castles in the sunny clouds,<br /></span> +<span>Her soft eyes peeping from the copse of pine,<br /></span> +<span>Looked tenderly on me and my glad heart leaped<br /></span> +<span>Following her footsteps. O the dream—the dream!<br /></span> +<span>O fawn-eyed, lotus-lipped, white-bosomed Flore!<br /></span> +<span>I hide my bronzed face in your golden hair:<br /></span> +<span>Thou wilt not heed the dew-drops on my beard;<br /></span> +<span>Thou wilt not heed the wrinkles on my brow;<br /></span> +<span>Thou wilt not chide me for my long delay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Here we stood heart to heart and eye to eye,<br /></span> +<span>And I looked down into her inmost soul,<br /></span> +<span>The while she drank my promise like sweet wine<br /></span> +<span>O let me dream the dreams of long ago!<br /></span> +<span>Soft are the tender eyes of maiden love;<br /></span> +<span>Sweet are the dew-drops of a dear girl's lips<br /></span> +<span>When love's red roses blush in sudden bloom:<br /></span> +<span>O let me dream the dreams of long ago!<br /></span> +<span>Hum soft and low, O bee-bent clover-fields;<br /></span> +<span>Blink, blue-eyed violets, from the dewy grass;<br /></span> +<span>Break into bloom, my golden dandelions;<br /></span> +<span>Break into bloom, my dear old apple-trees.<br /></span> +<span>I hear the robins cherup on the hedge,<br /></span> +<span>I hear the warbling of the meadow-larks;<br /></span> +<span>I hear the silver-fluted whippowil;<br /></span> +<span>I hear the harps that moan among the pines<br /></span> +<span>Touched by the ghostly fingers of the dead.<br /></span> +<span>Hush!—let me dream the dreams of long ago.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And wherefore left I these fair, flowery fields,<br /></span> +<span>Where her fond eyes and ever gladsome voice<br /></span> +<span>Made all the year one joyous, warbling June,<br /></span> +<span>To chase my castles in the passing clouds—<br /></span> +<span>False as the mirage of some Indian isle<br /></span> +<span>To shipwrecked sailors famished on the brine?<br /></span> +<span>Wherefore?—Look out upon the babbling world—<br /></span> +<span>Fools clamoring at the heels of clamorous fools!<br /></span> +<span>I hungered for the sapless husks of fame.<br /></span> +<span>Dreaming I saw, beyond my native hills,<br /></span> +<span>The sunshine shimmer on the laurel trees.<br /></span> +<span>Ah tenderly plead her fond eyes brimmed with tears;<br /></span> +<span>But lightly laughing at her fears I turned,<br /></span> +<span>Eager to clutch my crown of laurel leaves,<br /></span> +<span>Strong-souled and bold to front all winds of heaven—<br /></span> +<span>A lamb and lion molded into one—<br /></span> +<span>And burst away to tread the hollow world.<br /></span> +<span>Ah nut-brown boys that tend the lowing kine,<br /></span> +<span>Ah blithesome plowmen whistling on the glebe,<br /></span> +<span>Ah merry mowers singing in the swaths,<br /></span> +<span>Sweet, simple souls, contented not to know,<br /></span> +<span>Wiser are ye and ye may teach the wise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Years trode upon the heels of flying years,<br /></span> +<span>And still my <i>Ignis Fatuus</i> flew before;<br /></span> +<span>On thorny paths my eager feet pursued,<br /></span> +<span>Till she whose fond heart doted on my dreams<br /></span> +<span>Passed painless to the pure eternal peace.<br /></span> +<span>Years trode upon the heels of flying years<br /></span> +<span>And touched my brown beard with their silver wands,<br /></span> +<span>And still my <i>Ignis Fatuus</i> flew before;<br /></span> +<span>Through thorns and mire my torn feet followed still,<br /></span> +<span>Till she, my darling, unforgotten Flore,<br /></span> +<span>Nursing her one hope all those weary years<br /></span> +<span>Waiting my tardy coming, drooped and died.<br /></span> +<span>I hear her low, sweet voice among the pines:<br /></span> +<span>O let me dream the dreams of long ago:<br /></span> +<span>I see her fond eyes peeping from the pines:<br /></span> +<span>O let me dream the dreams of long ago<br /></span> +<span>And hide my bronzed face in her golden hair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Is this the Indian summer of my days—<br /></span> +<span>Wealth without care and love without desire?<br /></span> +<span>O misty, cheerless moon of falling leaves!<br /></span> +<span>Is this the fruitage promised by the spring?<br /></span> +<span>O blighted clusters withering on the vine!<br /></span> +<span>O promised lips of love to one who dreams<br /></span> +<span>And wakens holding but the hollow air!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Let me dream on lest, dead unto my dead,<br /></span> +<span>False to the true and true unto the false,<br /></span> +<span>Maddened by thoughts of that which might have been,<br /></span> +<span>And weary of the chains of that which is,<br /></span> +<span>I slake my heart-thirst at forbidden springs.<br /></span> +<span>I hear the voices of the moaning pines;<br /></span> +<span>I hear the low, hushed whispers of the dead,<br /></span> +<span>And one wan face looks in upon my dreams<br /></span> +<span>And wounds me with her sad, imploring eyes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The dead sun sinks beyond the misty hills;<br /></span> +<span>The chill winds whistle in the leafless elms;<br /></span> +<span>The cold rain patters on the fallen leaves.<br /></span> +<span>Where pipes the silver-fluted whippowil?<br /></span> +<span>I hear no hum of bees among the bloom;<br /></span> +<span>I hear no robin cherup on the hedge:<br /></span> +<span>One dumb, lone lark sits shivering in the rain.<br /></span> +<span>I hear the voices of the Autumn wind;<br /></span> +<span>I hear the cold rain dripping on the leaves;<br /></span> +<span>I hear the moaning of the mournful pines;<br /></span> +<span>I hear the hollow voices of the dead.<br /></span> +<span>O let me dream the dreams of long ago<br /></span> +<span>And dreaming pass into the dreamless sleep—<br /></span> +<span>Beyond the voices of the autumn winds,<br /></span> +<span>Beyond the patter of the dreary rain,<br /></span> +<span>Beyond compassion and all vain regret<br /></span> +<span>Beyond all waking and all weariness:<br /></span> +<span>O let me dream the dreams of long ago.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="THE_PIONEER" id="THE_PIONEER" />THE PIONEER</h3> + +<h4>[MINNESOTA—1860-1875]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>When Mollie and I were married from the dear old cottage-home,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the vale between the hills of fir and pine,<br /></span> +<span>I parted with a sigh in a stranger-land to roam,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And to seek a western home for me and mine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>By a grove-encircled lake in the wild and prairied West,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As the sun was sinking down one summer day,<br /></span> +<span>I laid my knapsack down and my weary limbs to rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And resolved to build a cottage-home and stay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I staked and marked my "corners," and I "filed" upon my claim,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I built a cottage-home of "logs and shakes;"<br /></span> +<span>And then I wrote a letter, and Mollie and baby came<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Out to bless me and to bake my johnny-cakes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>When Mollie saw my "cottage" and the way that I had "bached",<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She smiled, but I could see that she was "blue;"<br /></span> +<span>Then she found my "Sunday-clothes" all soiled and torn and patched,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she hid her face and shed a tear or two.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But she went to work in earnest and the cabin fairly shone,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And her dinners were so savory and so nice<br /></span> +<span>That I felt it was "not good that the man should be alone"—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Even in this lovely land of Paradise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Well, the neighbors they were few and were many miles apart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And you couldn't hear the locomotive scream;<br /></span> +<span>But I was young and hardy, and my Mollie gave me heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my "steers" they made a fast and fancy team.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And the way I broke the sod was a marvel, you can bet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For I fed my "steers" before the dawn of day;<br /></span> +<span>And when the sun went under I was plowing prairie yet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till my Mollie blew the old tin horn for tea.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And the lazy, lousy "Injuns" came a-loafing round the lake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a-begging for a bone or bit of bread;<br /></span> +<span>And the sneaking thieves would steal whatever they could take—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From the very house where they were kindly fed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>O the eastern preachers preach, and the long-haired poets sing<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of the "noble braves" and "dusky maidens fair;"<br /></span> +<span>But if they had pioneered 'twould have been another thing<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When the "Injuns" got a-hankering for their "hair."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Often when we lay in bed in the middle of the night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How the prairie-wolves would howl their jubilee!<br /></span> +<span>Then Mollie she would waken in a shiver and a fright,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Clasp our baby-pet and snuggle up to me.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>There were hardships you may guess, and enough of weary toil<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For the first few years, but then it was so grand<br /></span> +<span>To see the corn and wheat waving o'er the virgin soil,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And two stout and loving hearts went hand in hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But Mollie took the fever when our second babe was born,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she lay upon the bed as white as snow;<br /></span> +<span>And my idle cultivator lay a rusting in the corn;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the doctor said poor Mollie she must go.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now I never prayed before, but I fell upon my knees,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I prayed as never any preacher prayed;<br /></span> +<span>And Mollie always said that it broke the fell disease;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I truly think the Lord He sent us aid:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>For the fever it was broken, and she took a bit of food,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And O then I went upon my knees again;<br /></span> +<span>And I never cried before,—and I never thought I could,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But my tears they fell upon her hand like rain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And I think the Lord has blessed us ever since I prayed the prayer,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For my crops have never wanted rain or dew:<br /></span> +<span>And Mollie often said in the days of debt and care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Don't you worry, John, the Lord will help us through."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>For the "pesky," painted Sioux, in the fall of 'sixty-two,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Came a-whooping on their ponies o'er the plain,<br /></span> +<span>And they killed my pigs and cattle, and I tell you it looked "blue,"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When they danced around my blazing stacks of grain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And the settlers mostly fled, but I didn't have a chance,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So I caught my hunting-rifle long and true,<br /></span> +<span>And Mollie poured the powder while I made the devils dance,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To a tune that made 'em jump and tumble, too.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And they fired upon the cabin; 'twas as good as any fort,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But the "beauties" wouldn't give us any rest;<br /></span> +<span>For they skulked and blazed away, and I didn't call it sport,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For I had to do my very "level best."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Now they don't call <i>me</i> a coward, but my Mollie she's a "brick;"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For she chucked the children down the cellar-way,<br /></span> +<span>And she never flinched a hair tho' the bullets pattered thick,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we held the "painted beauties" well at bay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But once when I was aiming, a bullet grazed my head,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And it cut the scalp and made the air look blue;<br /></span> +<span>Then Mollie straightened up like a soldier and she said:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Never mind it, John, the Lord will help us through."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And you bet it raised my "grit," and I never flinched a bit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my nerves they got as strong as steel or brass;<br /></span> +<span>And when I fired again I was sure that I had hit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For I saw the skulking devil "claw the grass."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Well, the fight was long and hot, and I got a charge of shot<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the shoulder, but it never broke a bone;<br /></span> +<span>And I never stopped to think whether I was hit or not<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till we found our ammunition almost gone.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But the "Rangers" came at last—just as we were out of lead,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I thanked the Lord, and Mollie thanked Him, too;<br /></span> +<span>Then she put her arms around my neck and sobbed and cried and said:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Bless the Lord!—I knew that He would help us through."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And yonder on the hooks hangs that same old trusty gun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And above it—I am sorry they're so few—<br /></span> +<span>Hang the black and braided trophies<a name='FNanchor_BY'></a><a href='#Footnote_BY'><sup>[BY]</sup></a> yet that I and Mollie won<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In that same old bloody battle with the Sioux.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Fifteen years have rolled away since I laid my knapsack down,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my prairie claim is now one field of grain;<br /></span> +<span>And yonder down the lake loom the steeples of a town,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my flocks are feeding out upon the plain.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The old log-house is standing filled with bins of corn and wheat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the cars they whistle past our cottage-home;<br /></span> +<span>But my span of spanking trotters they are "just about" as fleet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I wouldn't give my farm to rule in Rome.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>For Mollie and I are young yet, and monarchs, too, are we—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of a "section" just as good as lies out-doors;<br /></span> +<span>And the children are so happy (and Mollie and I have three)<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And we think that we can "lie upon our oars."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: THE PIONEER]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>So this summer we went back to the old home by the hill:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O the hills they were so rugged and so tall!<br /></span> +<span>And the lofty pines were gone but the rocks were all there still,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the valleys looked so crowded and so small;<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And the dear familiar faces that I longed so much to see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Looked so strangely unfamiliar and so old,<br /></span> +<span>That the land of hills and valleys was no more a home to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the river seemed a rivulet as it rolled.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>So I gladly hastened back to the prairies of the West—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To the boundless fields of waving grass and corn;<br /></span> +<span>And I love the lake-gemmed land where the wild-goose builds her nest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Far better than the land where I was born.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And I mean to lay my bones over yonder by the lake—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By and by when I have nothing else to do—<br /></span> +<span>And I'll give the "chicks" the farm, and I know for Mollie's sake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That the good and gracious Lord will help 'em through.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_BY'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BY'>[BY]</a><div class='note'><p> Scalp-locks.</p></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="NIGHT_THOUGHTS" id="NIGHT_THOUGHTS" />NIGHT THOUGHTS</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"<i>Le notte e madre dipensien</i>."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I tumble and toss on my pillow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As a ship without rudder or spars<br /></span> +<span>Is tumbled and tossed on the billow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">'Neath the glint and the glory of stars.<br /></span> +<span>'Tis midnight and moonlight, and slumber<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has hushed every heart but my own;<br /></span> +<span>O why are these thoughts without number<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sent to me by the man in the moon?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Thoughts of the Here and Hereafter,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thoughts all unbidden to come,—<br /></span> +<span>Thoughts that are echoes of laughter—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thoughts that are ghosts from the tomb,—<br /></span> +<span>Thoughts that are sweet as wild honey,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thoughts that are bitter as gall,—<br /></span> +<span>Thoughts to be coined into money,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thoughts of no value at all.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dreams that are tangled like wild-wood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A hint creeping in like a hare;<br /></span> +<span>Visions of innocent childhood,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Glimpses of pleasure and care;<br /></span> +<span>Brave thoughts that flash like a saber,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cowards that crouch as they come,—<br /></span> +<span>Thoughts of sweet love and sweet labor<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the fields at the old cottage-home.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Visions of maize and of meadow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Songs of the birds and the brooks,<br /></span> +<span>Glimpses of sunshine and shadow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of hills and the vine-covered nooks;<br /></span> +<span>Dreams that were dreams of a lover,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A face like the blushing of morn,—<br /></span> +<span>Hum of bees and the sweet scent of clover<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And a bare-headed girl in the corn.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hopes that went down in the battle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Apples that crumbled to dust,—<br /></span> +<span>Manna for rogues, and the rattle<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of hail-storms that fall on the just.<br /></span> +<span>The "shoddy" that lolls in her chariot,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Maud Muller at work in the grass:<br /></span> +<span>Here a silver-bribed Judas Iscariot,—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There—Leonidas dead in the pass.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Commingled the good and the evil;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sown together the wheat and the tares;<br /></span> +<span>In the heart of the wheat is the weevil;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There is joy in the midst of our cares.<br /></span> +<span>The past,—shall we stop to regret it?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What is,—shall we falter and fall?<br /></span> +<span>If the envious wrong thee, forget it;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let thy charity cover them all.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The cock hails the morn, and the rumble<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of wheels is abroad in the streets,<br /></span> +<span>Still I tumble and mumble and grumble<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At the fleas in my ears and—the sheets;<br /></span> +<span>Mumble and grumble and tumble<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till the buzz of the bees is no more;<br /></span> +<span>In a jumble I mumble and drumble<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And tumble off—into a snore.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="DANIEL" id="DANIEL" />DANIEL</h3> + +<h4>[Written at the grave of an old friend.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,—down into the darkness at last;<br /></span> +<span>Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,—sleeping the dreamless sleep,—<br /></span> +<span>Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn—the pure and the perfect rest:<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Joy was there in the spring-time and hope like a blossoming rose,<br /></span> +<span>When the wine-blood of youth ran tingling and throbbing in every vein;<br /></span> +<span>Chirrup of robin and blue-bird in the white-blossomed apple and pear;<br /></span> +<span>Carpets of green on the meadows spangled with dandelions;<br /></span> +<span>Lowing of kine in the valleys, bleating of lambs on the hills;<br /></span> +<span>Babble of brooks and the prattle of fountains that flashed in the sun;<br /></span> +<span>Glad, merry voices, ripples of laughter, snatches of music and song,<br /></span> +<span>And blue-eyed girls in the gardens that blushed like the roses they wore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And life was a pleasure unvexed, unmingled with sorrow and pain?<br /></span> +<span>A round of delight from the blink of morn till the moon rose laughing at night?<br /></span> +<span>Nay, there were cares and cankers—envy and hunger and hate;<br /></span> +<span>Death and disease in the pith of the limbs, in the root and the bud and the branch;<br /></span> +<span>Dry-rot, alas, at the heart, and a canker-worm gnawing therein.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The summer of life came on with its heat and its struggle and toil,<br /></span> +<span>Sweat of the brow and the soul, throbbing of muscle and brain,<br /></span> +<span>Toil and moil and grapple with Fortune clutched as she flew—<br /></span> +<span>Only a shred of her robe, and a brave heart baffled and bowed!<br /></span> +<span>Stern-visaged Fate with a hand of iron uplifted to fell;<br /></span> +<span>The secret stab of a friend that stung like the sting of an asp,<br /></span> +<span>Wringing red drops from the soul and a stifled moan of despair;<br /></span> +<span>The loose lips of gossip and then—a storm of slander and lies,<br /></span> +<span>Till Justice was blind as a bat and deaf to the cries of the just,<br /></span> +<span>And Mercy, wrapped up in her robe, stood by like a statue in stone.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Sear autumn followed the summer with frost and the falling of leaves<br /></span> +<span>And red-ripe apples that blushed on the hills in the orchard of peace:<br /></span> +<span>Red-ripe apples, alas, with worms writhing down to the core,<br /></span> +<span>Apples of ashes and fungus that fell into rot at a touch;<br /></span> +<span>Clusters of grapes in the garden blighted and sour on the vines;<br /></span> +<span>Wheat-fields that waved in the valley and promised a harvest of gold,<br /></span> +<span>Thrashing but chaff and weevil or cockle and shriveled cheat.<br /></span> +<span>Fair was the promise of spring-time; the harvest a harvest of lies:<br /></span> +<span>Fair was the promise of summer with Fortune clutched by the robe;<br /></span> +<span>Fair was the promise of autumn—a hollow harlot in red,<br /></span> +<span>A withered rose at her girdle and the thorns of the rose in her hand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,—down into the darkness at last;<br /></span> +<span>Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel, sleeping the dreamless sleep—<br /></span> +<span>Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn—the pure and the perfect rest:<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew?<br /></span> +<span>Dead Ashes, what do you care if it storm, if it shine, if it shower?<br /></span> +<span>Hail-storm, tornado or tempest, or the blinding blizzard of snow,<br /></span> +<span>Or the mid-May showers on the blossoms with the glad sun blinking between,<br /></span> +<span>Dead Ashes, what do you care?—they break not the sleep of the dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Proud stands the ship to the sea, fair breezes belly her sails;<br /></span> +<span>Strong masted, stanch in her shrouds, stanch in her beams and her bones;<br /></span> +<span>Bound for Hesperian isles—for the isles of the plantain and palm,<br /></span> +<span>Hope walks her deck with a smile and Confidence stands at the helm;<br /></span> +<span>Proudly she turns to the sea and walks like a queen on the waves.<br /></span> +<span>Caught in the grasp of the tempest, lashed by the fiends of the storm,<br /></span> +<span>Torn into shreds are her sails, tumbled her masts to the main;<br /></span> +<span>Rudderless, rolling she drives and groans in the grasp of the sea;<br /></span> +<span>Harbor or hope there is none; she goes to her grave in the brine:<br /></span> +<span>Dead in the fathomless slime lie the bones of the ship and her crew.<br /></span> +<span>Such was the promise of life; so is the promise fulfilled.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,—down into the darkness at last;<br /></span> +<span>Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,—sleeping the dreamless sleep,—<br /></span> +<span>Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn—the pure and the perfect rest:<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew?<br /></span> +<span>Over your grave the tempest may roar or the zephyr sigh;<br /></span> +<span>Over your grave the blue-bells may blink or the snow-drifts whirl,—<br /></span> +<span>Dead Ashes, what do you care?—they break not the sleep of the dead.<br /></span> +<span>They that were friends may mourn, they that were friends may praise;<br /></span> +<span>They that knew you and yet—knew you never—may cavil and blame;<br /></span> +<span>They that were foes in disguise may strike at you down in the grave;<br /></span> +<span>Slander, the scavenger-buzzard—may vomit her lies on you there;<br /></span> +<span>Dead Ashes, what do you care?—they break not the sleep of the dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The hoarse, low voice of the years croaks on forever-and-aye:<br /></span> +<span><i>Change! Change! Change</i>! and the winters wax and wane.<br /></span> +<span>The old oak dies in the forest; the acorn sprouts at its feet;<br /></span> +<span>The sea gnaws on at the land; the continent crowds on the sea.<br /></span> +<span>Bound to the Ixion wheel with brazen fetters of fate<br /></span> +<span>Man rises up from the dust and falls to the dust again.<br /></span> +<span>God washes our eyes with tears, and still they are blinded with dust:<br /></span> +<span>We grope in the dark and marvel, and pray to the Power unknown—<br /></span> +<span>Crying for help to the desert: not even an echo replies.<br /></span> +<span>Doomed unto death like the moon, like the midget that men call man,<br /></span> +<span>Wrinkled with age and agony the old Earth rolls her rounds;<br /></span> +<span>Shrinking and shuddering she rolls—an atom in God's great sea—<br /></span> +<span>Only an atom of dust in the infinite ocean of space.<br /></span> +<span>What to him are the years who sleeps in her bosom there?<br /></span> +<span>What to him is the cry wrung out of the souls of men?<br /></span> +<span><i>Change, Change, Change</i>, and the sea gnaws on at the land:<br /></span> +<span>Dead Ashes, what do you care?—it breaks not the sleep of the dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,—down into the darkness at last;<br /></span> +<span>Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,—sleeping the dreamless sleep,—<br /></span> +<span>Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn—the pure and the perfect rest:<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better if only the dead soul knew?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Up—out of the darkness at last, Daniel,—out of the darkness at last;<br /></span> +<span>Into the light of the life eternal—into the sunlight of God,<br /></span> +<span>Singing the song of the soul immortal freed from the fetters of flesh:<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, and is it not better than sleeping the dreamless sleep?<br /></span> +<span>Hark! from the reel of the spheres eternal the freed soul answereth "<i>Aye</i>."<br /></span> +<span>Aye—Aye—Aye—it is better, brothers, if it be but the dream of the famished soul.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="MINNETONKA" id="MINNETONKA" />MINNETONKA<a name='FNanchor_BZ'></a><a href='#Footnote_BZ'><sup>[BZ]</sup></a></h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>I sit once more on breezy shore, at sunset in this glorious June,<br /></span> +<span>I hear the dip of gleaming oar, I list the singers' merry tune.<br /></span> +<span>Beneath my feet the waters beat, and ripple on the polished stones,<br /></span> +<span>The squirrel chatters from his seat; the bag-pipe beetle hums and drones.<br /></span> +<span>The pink and gold in blooming wold,—the green hills mirrored in the lake!<br /></span> +<span>The deep, blue waters, zephyr-rolled, along the murmuring pebbles break.<br /></span> +<span>The maples screen the ferns, and lean the leafy lindens o'er the deep;<br /></span> +<span>The sapphire, set in emerald green, lies like an Orient gem asleep.<br /></span> +<span>The crimson west glows like the breast of <i>Rhuddin</i><a name='FNanchor_CB'></a><a href='#Footnote_CB'><sup>[CB]</sup></a> when he pipes in May,<br /></span> +<span>As downward droops the sun to rest, and shadows gather on the bay.<br /></span> +<span>In amber sky the swallows fly and sail and circle o'er the deep;<br /></span> +<span>The light-winged night-hawks whir and cry; the silver pike and salmon leap.<br /></span> +<span>The rising moon, o'er isle and dune, looks laughing down on lake and lea;<br /></span> +<span>Weird o'er the waters shrills the loon; the high stars twinkle in the sea.<br /></span> +<span>From bank and hill the whippowil sends piping forth his flute-like notes,<br /></span> +<span>And clear and shrill the answers trill from leafy isles and silver throats.<br /></span> +<span>The twinkling light on cape and height; the hum of voices on the shores;<br /></span> +<span>The merry laughter on the night; the dip and plash of frolic oars,—<br /></span> +<span>These tell the tale. On hill and dale the cities pour their gay and fair;<br /></span> +<span>Along the sapphire lake they sail, and quaff like wine the balmy air.<br /></span> +<span>'Tis well. Of yore from isle and shore the smoke of Indian <i>teepees</i><a name='FNanchor_CC'></a><a href='#Footnote_CC'><sup>[CC]</sup></a> rose;<br /></span> +<span>The hunter plied the silent oar; the forest lay in still repose.<br /></span> +<span>The moon-faced maid, in leafy glade, her warrior waited from the chase;<br /></span> +<span>The nut-brown, naked children played, and chased the gopher on the grass.<br /></span> +<span>The dappled fawn on wooded lawn, peeped out upon the birch canoe,<br /></span> +<span>Swift-gliding in the gray of dawn along the silent waters blue.<br /></span> +<span>In yonder tree the great Wanm-dee<a name='FNanchor_CD'></a><a href='#Footnote_CD'><sup>[CD]</sup></a> securely built her spacious nest;<br /></span> +<span>The blast that swept the landlocked sea<a name='FNanchor_CE'></a><a href='#Footnote_CE'><sup>[CE]</sup></a> but rocked her clamorous babes to rest.<br /></span> +<span>By grassy mere the elk and deer gazed on the hunter as he came;<br /></span> +<span>Nor fled with fear from bow or spear;—"so wild were they that they were tame."<br /></span> +<span>Ah, birch canoe, and hunter, too, have long forsaken lake and shore;<br /></span> +<span>He bade his fathers' bones adieu and turned away forevermore.<br /></span> +<span>But still, methinks, on dusky brinks the spirit of the warrior moves;<br /></span> +<span>At crystal springs the hunter drinks, and nightly haunts the spot he loves.<br /></span> +<span>For oft at night I see the light of lodge-fires on the shadowy shores,<br /></span> +<span>And hear the wail some maiden's sprite above her slaughtered warrior pours.<br /></span> +<span>I hear the sob, on Spirit Knob,<a name='FNanchor_CA'></a><a href='#Footnote_CA'><sup>[CA]</sup></a> of Indian mother o'er her child;<br /></span> +<span>And on the midnight waters throb her low <i>yun-he-he's</i><a name='FNanchor_CF'></a><a href='#Footnote_CF'><sup>[CF]</sup></a> weird and wild:<br /></span> +<span>And sometimes, too, the light canoe glides like a shadow o'er the deep<br /></span> +<span>At midnight when the moon is low, and all the shores are hushed in sleep.<br /></span> +<span>Alas,—Alas!—for all things pass; and we shall vanish too, as they;<br /></span> +<span>We build our monuments of brass, and granite, but they waste away.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: CRYSTAL BAY LAKE MINNETONKA]</p> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_BZ'></a><a href='#FNanchor_BZ'>[BZ]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakota name for this beautiful lake is <i>We-ne-a-tan-ka</i>—Broad +Water. By dropping the "a" before "tanka" we have changed the name to +<i>Big Water</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CA'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CA'>[CA]</a><div class='note'><p> Spirit-Knob was a small hill upon a point in the lake in full view +from Wayzata. It is now washed away by the waves. The spirit of a Dakota +mother, whose only child was drowned in the lake during a storm many +years ago, often wailed at midnight (so the Dakotas said), on this hill. +So they called it <i>Wa-na-gee Pa-zo-dan</i>—Spirit-Knob. (Literally—little +hill of the spirit.)</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CB'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CB'>[CB]</a><div class='note'><p> The Welsh name for the robin.</p></div> + + +<a name='Footnote_CC'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CC'>[CC]</a><div class='note'><p> Lodges.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CD'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CD'>[CD]</a><div class='note'><p> Wanm-dee—the war-eagle of the Dakotas.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CE'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CE'>[CE]</a><div class='note'><p> Lake Superior.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CF'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CF'>[CF]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced <i>Yoon-hay-hay</i>—the exclamation used by Dakota women in +their lament for the dead, and equivalent to "woe-is-me."</p></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="BEYOND" id="BEYOND" />BEYOND</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>White-haired and hoary-bearded, who art thou<br /></span> +<span>That speedest on, albeit bent with age,<br /></span> +<span>Even as a youth that followeth after dreams?<br /></span> +<span>Whence are thy feet, and whither trends thy way?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Stayed not his hurried steps, but as he passed<br /></span> +<span>His low, hoarse answer fell upon the wind:<br /></span> +<span>"Go thou and question yonder mountain-peaks;<br /></span> +<span>Go thou and ask the hoary-heaving main;—<br /></span> +<span>Nay, if thou wilt, the great, globed, silent stars<br /></span> +<span>That sail innumerable the shoreless sea,<br /></span> +<span>And let the eldest answer if he may.<br /></span> +<span>Lo the unnumbered myriad, myriad worlds<br /></span> +<span>Rolling around innumerable suns,<br /></span> +<span>Through all the boundless, bottomless abyss,<br /></span> +<span>Are but as grains of sand upwhirled and flung<br /></span> +<span>By roaring winds and scattered on the sea.<br /></span> +<span>I have beheld them and my hand hath sown.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Far-twinkling faint through dim, immeasured depths,<br /></span> +<span>Behold Alcyone—a grander sun.<br /></span> +<span>Round him thy solar orb with all his brood<br /></span> +<span>Glimmering revolves. Lo from yon mightier sphere<br /></span> +<span>Light, flying faster than the thoughts of men,<br /></span> +<span>Swift as the lightnings cleave the glowering storm,<br /></span> +<span>Shot on and on through dim, ethereal space,<br /></span> +<span>Ere yet it touched thy little orb of Earth,<br /></span> +<span>Five hundred cycles of thy world and more.<br /></span> +<span>Round him thy Sun, obedient to his power,<br /></span> +<span>Thrice tenfold swifter than the swiftest wing,<br /></span> +<span>His æon-orbit, million-yeared and vast,<br /></span> +<span>Wheels through the void. Him flaming I beheld<br /></span> +<span>When first he flashed from out his central fire—<br /></span> +<span>A mightier orb beyond thine utmost ken.<br /></span> +<span>Round upon round innumerable hath swung<br /></span> +<span>Thy sun upon his circuit; grander still<br /></span> +<span>His vaster orbit far Alcyone<br /></span> +<span>Wheels and obeys the mightier orb unseen.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Seest thou yon star-paved pathway like an arch<br /></span> +<span>Athwart thy welkin?—wondrous zone of stars,<br /></span> +<span>Dim in the distance circling one huge sun,<br /></span> +<span>To whom thy sun is but a spark of fire—<br /></span> +<span>To whom thine Earth is but a grain of dust:<br /></span> +<span>Glimmering around him myriad suns revolve<br /></span> +<span>And worlds innumerable as sea-beach sands.<br /></span> +<span>Ere on yon <i>Via Lactea</i> rolled one star<br /></span> +<span>Lo I was there and trode the mighty round;<br /></span> +<span>Yea, ere the central orb was fired and hung<br /></span> +<span>A lamp to light the chaos. Star on star,<br /></span> +<span>System on system, myriad worlds on worlds,<br /></span> +<span>Beyond the utmost reach of mortal ken,<br /></span> +<span>Beyond the utmost flight of mortal dream,<br /></span> +<span>Yet have mine eyes beheld the birth of all.<br /></span> +<span>But whence I am I know not. We are three—<br /></span> +<span>Known, yet unknown—unfathomable to man,<br /></span> +<span>Time, Space, and Matter pregnant with all life,<br /></span> +<span>Immortals older than the oldest orb.<br /></span> +<span>We were and are forever: out of us<br /></span> +<span>Are all things—suns and satellites, midge and man.<br /></span> +<span>Worlds wax and wane, suns flame and glow and die;<br /></span> +<span>Through shoreless space their scattered ashes float,<br /></span> +<span>Unite, cohere, and wax to worlds again,<br /></span> +<span>Changing, yet changless—new, but ever old—<br /></span> +<span>No atom lost and not one atom gained,<br /></span> +<span>Though fire to vapor melt the adamant,<br /></span> +<span>Or feldspar fall in drops of summer rain.<br /></span> +<span>And in the atoms sleep the germs of life,<br /></span> +<span>Myriad and multiform and marvelous,<br /></span> +<span>Throughout all vast, immeasurable space,<br /></span> +<span>In every grain of dust, in every drop<br /></span> +<span>Of water, waiting but the thermal touch.<br /></span> +<span>Yea, in the womb of nature slumber still<br /></span> +<span>Wonders undreamed and forms beyond compare,<br /></span> +<span>Minds that will cleave the chaos and unwind<br /></span> +<span>The web of fate, and from the atom trace<br /></span> +<span>The worlds, the suns, the universal law:<br /></span> +<span>And from the law, the Master; yea, and read<br /></span> +<span>On yon grand starry scroll the Master's will."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Yea, but what Master? Lift the veil, O Time!<br /></span> +<span>Where lie the bounds of Space and whither dwells<br /></span> +<span>The Power unseen—the infinite Unknown?<br /></span> +<span>Faint from afar the solemn answer fell:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Æon on æon, cycles myriad-yeared,<br /></span> +<span>Swifter than light out-flashing from the suns,<br /></span> +<span>My flying feet have sought the bounds of space<br /></span> +<span>And found not, nor the infinite Unknown.<br /></span> +<span>I see the Master only in his work:<br /></span> +<span>I see the Ruler only in his law:<br /></span> +<span>Time hath not touched the great All-father's throne,<br /></span> +<span>Whose voice unheard the Universe obeys,<br /></span> +<span>Who breathes upon the deep and worlds are born.<br /></span> +<span>Worlds wax and wane, suns crumble into dust,<br /></span> +<span>But matter pregnant with immortal life,<br /></span> +<span>Since erst the white-haired centuries wheeled the vast,<br /></span> +<span>Hath lost nor gained. Who made it, and who made<br /></span> +<span>The Maker? Out of nothing, nothing. Lo<br /></span> +<span>The worm that crawls from out the sun-touched sand,<br /></span> +<span>What knows he of the huge, round, rolling Earth?<br /></span> +<span>Yet more than thou of all the vast Beyond,<br /></span> +<span>Or ever wilt. Content thee; let it be:<br /></span> +<span>Know only this—there is a Power unknown—<br /></span> +<span>Master of life and Maker of the worlds."<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="LINES" id="LINES" />LINES</h3> + +<h4>On the death of Captain Hiram A. Coats, my old schoolmate and friend.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dead? or is it a dream—<br /></span> +<span>Only the voice of a dream?<br /></span> +<span>Dead in the prime of his years,<br /></span> +<span>And laid in the lap of the dust;<br /></span> +<span>Only a handful of ashes<br /></span> +<span>Moldering down into dust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Strong and manly was he,<br /></span> +<span>Strong and tender and true;<br /></span> +<span>Proud in the prime of his years;<br /></span> +<span>Strong in the strength of the just:<br /></span> +<span>A heart that was half a lion's,<br /></span> +<span>And half the heart of a girl;<br /></span> +<span>Tender to all that was tender,<br /></span> +<span>And true to all that was true;<br /></span> +<span>Bold in the battle of life,<br /></span> +<span>And bold on the bloody field;<br /></span> +<span>First at the call of his country,<br /></span> +<span>First in the front of the foe.<br /></span> +<span>Hope of the years was his—<br /></span> +<span>The golden and garnered sheaves;<br /></span> +<span>Fair on the hills of autumn<br /></span> +<span>Reddened the apples of peace.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dead? or is it a dream?<br /></span> +<span>Dead in the prime of his years,<br /></span> +<span>And laid in the lap of the dust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Aye, it <i>is</i> but a dream;<br /></span> +<span>For the life of man is a dream:<br /></span> +<span>Dead in the prime of his years<br /></span> +<span>And laid in the lap of the dust;<br /></span> +<span>Only a handful of ashes<br /></span> +<span>Moldering down into dust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Only a handful of ashes<br /></span> +<span>Moldering down into dust?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, but what of the breath<br /></span> +<span>Blown out of the bosom of God?<br /></span> +<span>What of the spirit that breathed<br /></span> +<span>And burned in the temple of clay?<br /></span> +<span>Dust unto dust returns;<br /></span> +<span>The dew-drop returns to the sea;<br /></span> +<span>The flash from the flint and the steel<br /></span> +<span>Returns to its source in the sun.<br /></span> +<span>Change cometh forever-and-aye,<br /></span> +<span>But forever nothing is lost—<br /></span> +<span>The dew-drop that sinks in the sand,<br /></span> +<span>Nor the sunbeam that falls in the sea.<br /></span> +<span>Ah, life is only a link<br /></span> +<span>In the endless chain of change.<br /></span> +<span>Death giveth the dust to the dust<br /></span> +<span>And the soul to the infinite soul:<br /></span> +<span>For aye since the morning of man—<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Since the human rose up from the brute—<br /></span> +<span>Hath Hope, like a beacon of light,<br /></span> +<span>Like a star in the rift of the storm,<br /></span> +<span>Been writ by the finger of God<br /></span> +<span>On the longing hearts of men.<br /></span> +<span>O follow no goblin fear;<br /></span> +<span>O cringe to no cruel creed;<br /></span> +<span>Nor chase the shadow of doubt<br /></span> +<span>Till the brain runs mad with despair.<br /></span> +<span>Stretch forth thy hand, O man,<br /></span> +<span>To the winds and the quaking earth—<br /></span> +<span>To the heaving and falling sea—<br /></span> +<span>To the ultimate stars and feel<br /></span> +<span>The throb of the spirit of God—<br /></span> +<span>The pulse of the Universe.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<h3><a name="MAULEY" id="MAULEY" />MAULEY</h3> + +<h4>THE BRAVE FERRY-MAN</h4> + +<blockquote><p>[NOTE.—The great Sioux massacre in Minnesota commenced at the Agency village, on the Minnesota +River, early in the morning of the 16th day of August, 1862, precipitated, doubtless, by the +murders at Acton on the day previous. The massacre and the Indian war that followed developed +many brave men, but no truer hero than Mauley, an obscure Frenchman, the ferry-man at the +Agency. Continually under fire, he resolutely ran his ferry-boat back and forth across the river, +affording the terror-stricken people the only chance for escape. He was shot down on his boat just +as he had landed on the opposite shore the last of those who fled from the burning village to the +ferry-landing. The Indians disemboweled his dead body, cut off the head, hands and feet and +thrust them into the cavity. See <i>Heard's Hist. Sioux War</i>, p 67.]</p></blockquote> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Crouching in the early morning,<br /></span> +<span>Came the swarth and naked "Sioux;"<a name='FNanchor_CG'></a><a href='#Footnote_CG'><sup>[CG]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>On the village, without warning,<br /></span> +<span>Fell the sudden, savage blow.<br /></span> +<span>Horrid yell and crack of rifle<br /></span> +<span>Mingle as the flames arise;—<br /></span> +<span>With the tomahawk they stifle<br /></span> +<span>Mothers' wails and children's cries.<br /></span> +<span>Men and women to the ferry<br /></span> +<span>Fly from many a blazing cot;—<br /></span> +<span>Brave and ready—grim and steady,<br /></span> +<span>Mauley mans the ferry-boat.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Can they cross the ambushed river?<br /></span> +<span>'Tis for life the only chance;<br /></span> +<span>Only this may some deliver<br /></span> +<span>From the scalping-knife and lance.<br /></span> +<span>Through the throng of wailing women<br /></span> +<span>Frantic men in terror burst;—<br /></span> +<span>"Back, ye cowards!" thundered Mauley,—<br /></span> +<span>"I will take the women first!"<br /></span> +<span>Then with brawny arms and lever<br /></span> +<span>Back the craven men he smote.<br /></span> +<span>Brave and ready—grim and steady,<br /></span> +<span>Mauley mans the ferry-boat.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>To and fro across the river<br /></span> +<span>Plies the little mercy-craft,<br /></span> +<span>While from ambushed gun and quiver<br /></span> +<span>On it falls the fatal shaft.<br /></span> +<span>Trembling from the burning village,<br /></span> +<span>Still the terror-stricken fly,<br /></span> +<span>For the Indians' love of pillage<br /></span> +<span>Stays the bloody tragedy.<br /></span> +<span>At the windlass-bar bare-headed—<br /></span> +<span>Bare his brawny arms and throat—<br /></span> +<span>Brave and ready—grim and steady,<br /></span> +<span>Mauley mans the ferry-boat.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hark!—a sudden burst of war-whoops!<br /></span> +<span>They are bent on murder now;<br /></span> +<span>Down the ferry-road they rally,<br /></span> +<span>Led by furious Little Crow.<br /></span> +<span>Frantic mothers clasp their children,<br /></span> +<span>And the help of God implore;<br /></span> +<span>Frantic men leap in the river<br /></span> +<span>Ere the boat can reach the shore.<br /></span> +<span>Mauley helps the weak and wounded<br /></span> +<span>Till the last soul is afloat;—<br /></span> +<span>Brave and ready—grim and steady,<br /></span> +<span>Mauley mans the ferry-boat.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Speed the craft!—The fierce Dakotas<br /></span> +<span>Whoop and hasten to the shore,<br /></span> +<span>And a shower of shot and arrows<br /></span> +<span>On the crowded boat they pour.<br /></span> +<span>Fast it floats across the river,<br /></span> +<span>Managed by the master hand,<br /></span> +<span>Laden with a freight so precious,—<br /></span> +<span>God be thanked!—it reaches land.<br /></span> +<span>Where is Mauley—grim and steady,<br /></span> +<span>Shall his brave deed be forgot?<br /></span> +<span>Grasping still the windlass-lever,<br /></span> +<span>Dead he lies upon the boat.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: MAULEY THE BRAVE FERRY-MAN]</p> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_CG'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CG'>[CG]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced Soo; a name given to the Dakotas in early days by the +French traders.</p></div> + + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<a name="MEN"></a><h3>MEN</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Man is a creature of a thousand whims;<br /></span> +<span>The slave of hope and fear and circumstance.<br /></span> +<span>Through toil and martyrdom a million years<br /></span> +<span>Struggling and groping upward from the brute,<br /></span> +<span>And ever dragging still the brutish chains,<br /></span> +<span>And ever slipping backward to the brute.<br /></span> +<span>Shall he not break the galling, brazen bonds<br /></span> +<span>That bind him writhing on the wheel of fate?<br /></span> +<span>Long ages groveling with his brother brutes,<br /></span> +<span>He plucked the tree of knowledge and uprose<br /></span> +<span>And walked erect—a god; but died the death:<br /></span> +<span>For knowledge brings but sadness and unrest<br /></span> +<span>Forever, insatiate longing and regret.<br /></span> +<span>Behold the brute's unerring instinct guides<br /></span> +<span>True as the pole-star, while man's reason leads<br /></span> +<span>How oft to quicksands and the hidden reefs!<br /></span> +<span>Contented brute, his daily wants how few!<br /></span> +<span>And these by Nature's mother-hand supplied.<br /></span> +<span>Man's wants unnumbered and unsatisfied,<br /></span> +<span>And multiplied at every onward step—<br /></span> +<span>Insatiate as the cavernous maw of time.<br /></span> +<span>His real wants how simple and how few!<br /></span> +<span>Behold the kine in yonder pasture-field<br /></span> +<span>Cropping the clover, or in rest reclined,<br /></span> +<span>Chewing meek-eyed the cud of sweet content.<br /></span> +<span>Ambition plagues them not, nor hope, nor fear;<br /></span> +<span>No demons fright them and no cruel creeds;<br /></span> +<span>No pangs of disappointment or remorse.<br /></span> +<span>See man the picture of perpetual want,<br /></span> +<span>The prototype of all disquietude;<br /></span> +<span>Full of trouble, yet ever seeking more;<br /></span> +<span>Between the upper and the nether stone<br /></span> +<span>Ground and forever in the mill of fate.<br /></span> +<span>Nature and art combine to clothe his form,<br /></span> +<span>To feed his fancy and to fill his maw;<br /></span> +<span>And yet the more they give the more he craves.<br /></span> +<span>Give him the gold of Ophir, still he delves;<br /></span> +<span>Give him the land, and he demands the sea;<br /></span> +<span>Give him the earth—he reaches for the stars.<br /></span> +<span>Doomed by his fate to scorn the good he has<br /></span> +<span>And grasp at fancied good beyond his reach,<br /></span> +<span>He seeks for silver in the distant hills<br /></span> +<span>While in the sand gold glitters at his feet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>O man, thy wisdom is but folly still;<br /></span> +<span>Wiser the brute and full of sweet content.<br /></span> +<span>The wit and wisdom of five thousand years—What<br /></span> +<span>are they but the husks we feed upon,<br /></span> +<span>While beast and bird devour the golden grain?<br /></span> +<span>Lo for the brutes dame Nature sows and tills;<br /></span> +<span>For them the Tuba-tree of Paradise<br /></span> +<span>Bends with its bounties free and manifold;<br /></span> +<span>For them the fabled fountain Salsabil,<br /></span> +<span>Gushes pure wine that sparkles as it runs,<br /></span> +<span>And fair Al Cawthar flows with creamy milk.<br /></span> +<span>But man, forever doomed to toil and sweat,<br /></span> +<span>Digs the hard earth and casts his seeds therein,<br /></span> +<span>And hopes the harvest;—how oft he hopes in vain!<br /></span> +<span>Weeds choke, winds blast, and myriad pests devour,<br /></span> +<span>The hot sun withers and the floods destroy.<br /></span> +<span>Unceasing labor, vigilance and care<br /></span> +<span>Reward him here and there with bounteous store.<br /></span> +<span>Had man the blessed wisdom of content,<br /></span> +<span>Happy were he—as wise Horatius sung—<br /></span> +<span>To whom God gives enough with sparing hand.<br /></span> +<span>Of all the crops by sighing mortals sown,<br /></span> +<span>And watered with man's sweat and woman's tears,<br /></span> +<span>There is but only one that never fails<br /></span> +<span>In drouth or flood, on fat or flinty soil,<br /></span> +<span>On Nilus' banks or Scandia's stony hills—<br /></span> +<span>The plenteous, never-stinted crop of fools.<br /></span> +<span>So hath it been since erst aspiring man<br /></span> +<span>Broke from the brute and plucked the fatal tree,<br /></span> +<span>And will be till eternity grows gray.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Princes and parasites comprise mankind:<br /></span> +<span>To one wise prince a million parasites;<br /></span> +<span>The most uncommon thing is common-sense;<br /></span> +<span>A truly wise man is a freak of nature.<br /></span> +<span>The herd are parasites of parasites<br /></span> +<span>That blindly follow priest or demagogue,<br /></span> +<span>Himself blind leader of the blind. The wise<br /></span> +<span>Weigh words, but by the yard fools measure them.<br /></span> +<span>The wise beginneth at the end; the fool<br /></span> +<span>Ends at the beginning, or begins anew:<br /></span> +<span>Aye, every ditch is full of after-wit.<br /></span> +<span>Folly sows broad cast; Wisdom gathers in,<br /></span> +<span>And so the wise man fattens on the fool,<br /></span> +<span>And from the follies of the foolish learns<br /></span> +<span>Wisdom to guide himself and bridle them.<br /></span> +<span>"To-morrow I made my fortune," cries the fool,<br /></span> +<span>"To-day I'll spend it." Thus will Folly eat<br /></span> +<span>His chicken ere the hen hath laid the egg.<br /></span> +<span>So Folly blossoms with promises all the year—<br /></span> +<span>Promises that bud and blossom but to blast.<br /></span> +<span>"All men are fools," said Socrates, the wise,<br /></span> +<span>And in the broader sense I grant it true,<br /></span> +<span>For even Socrates had his Xanthipp'.<br /></span> +<span>Whose head is wise oft hath a foolish heart;<br /></span> +<span>The wisest has more follies than he needs;<br /></span> +<span>Wisdom and madness, too, are near akin.<br /></span> +<span>The marrow-maddening canker-worm of love<br /></span> +<span>Feeds on the brains of wise men as on fools'.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The wise man gathers wisdom from all men<br /></span> +<span>As bees their honey hive from plant and weed.<br /></span> +<span>Yea, from the varied history of the world,<br /></span> +<span>From the experience of all times, all men,<br /></span> +<span>The wise man learneth wisdom. Folly learns<br /></span> +<span>From his own bruises if he learns at all.<br /></span> +<span>The fool—born wise—what need hath he to learn?<br /></span> +<span>He needs but gabble wisdom to the world:<br /></span> +<span>Grill him on a gridiron and he gabbles still.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Wise men there are—wise in the eyes of men—<br /></span> +<span>Who cram their hollow heads with ancient wit<br /></span> +<span>Cackled in Carthage, babbled in Babylon,<br /></span> +<span>Gabbled in Greece and riddled in old Rome,<br /></span> +<span>And never coin a farthing of their own.<br /></span> +<span>Wise men there are—for owls are counted wise—<br /></span> +<span>Who love to leave the lamp-lit paths behind,<br /></span> +<span>And chase the shapeless shadow of a doubt.<br /></span> +<span>Too wise to learn, too wise to see the truth,<br /></span> +<span>E'en though it glow and sparkle like a gem<br /></span> +<span>On God's outstretched forefinger for all time.<br /></span> +<span>These have one argument, and only one,<br /></span> +<span>For good or evil, earth or jeweled heaven—<br /></span> +<span>The olden, owlish argument of doubt.<br /></span> +<span>Ah, he alone is wise who ever stands<br /></span> +<span>Armed <i>cap-a-pié</i> with God's eternal truth.<br /></span> +<span>Where <i>Grex</i> is <i>Rex</i> God help the hapless land.<br /></span> +<span>The yelping curs that bay the rising moon<br /></span> +<span>Are not more clamorous, and the fitful winds<br /></span> +<span>Not more inconstant. List the croaking frogs<br /></span> +<span>That raise their heads in fen or stagnant pool,<br /></span> +<span>Shouting at eve their wisdom from the mud.<br /></span> +<span>Beside the braying, bleating, bellowing mob,<br /></span> +<span>Their jarring discords are sweet harmony.<br /></span> +<span>The headless herd are but a noise of wind;<br /></span> +<span>Sometimes, alas, the wild tornado's roar.<br /></span> +<span>As full of freaks as curs are full of fleas,<br /></span> +<span>Like gnats they swarm, like flies they buzz and breed.<br /></span> +<span>Thought works in silence: Wisdom stops to think.<br /></span> +<span>No ass so obstinate as ignorance.<br /></span> +<span>Oft as they seize the ship of state, behold—<br /></span> +<span>Overboard goes all ballast and they crowd<br /></span> +<span>To blast or breeze or hurricane full sail,<br /></span> +<span>Each dunce a pilot and a captain too.<br /></span> +<span>How often cross-eyed Justice hits amiss!<br /></span> +<span>Doomed by Athenian mobs to banishment,<br /></span> +<span>See Aristides leave the land he saved:<br /></span> +<span>Wisdom his fault and justice his offense.<br /></span> +<span>See Caesar crowned a god and Tully slain;<br /></span> +<span>See Paris red with riot and noble blood,<br /></span> +<span>A king beheaded and a monster throned,—<br /></span> +<span>King Drone, flat fool that weather-cocked all winds,<br /></span> +<span>Gulped gall and vinegar and smacked it wine,<br /></span> +<span>Wig-wagged his way from gilded <i>Oeil de Boeuf</i><br /></span> +<span>Through mob and maelstrom to the guillotine.<br /></span> +<span>Chateaus up-blazing torch the doom of France,<br /></span> +<span>While human wolves howl ruin round their walls.<br /></span> +<span>Contention hisses from a million mouths,<br /></span> +<span>And from ten thousand muttering craters smokes<br /></span> +<span>The smell of sulphur. Gaul becomes a ghoul;<br /></span> +<span>While <i>Parlez-Tous</i> in hot palaver holds<br /></span> +<span>Hubbub <i>ad</i> Bedlam—Pandemonium thriced.<br /></span> +<span>There, voices drowning voice with frantic cries,<br /></span> +<span>Discord demented flaps her ruffled wings<br /></span> +<span>And shrieks delirium to her screeching brood.<br /></span> +<span>Sneer-lipped, hawk-eyed, wolf-tongued oraculars—<br /></span> +<span>Wise-wigs, Girondins, frothing Jacobins—<br /></span> +<span>Reason to madness run, tongues venom-tanged—<br /></span> +<span>Howl chaos all with one united throat.<br /></span> +<span>Maelstrom of madness, lazar-howled, hag-shrilled!<br /></span> +<span>Quack quackles quack; all doctors disagree,<br /></span> +<span>While Doctor Guillotine's huge scalpel heads<br /></span> +<span>Hell-dogs beheading helpless innocents.<br /></span> +<span>The very babes bark rabies. Journalism,<br /></span> +<span>Moon-mad, green-eyed, hound-scented, <i>lupus</i>-tongued<br /></span> +<span>On howls the pack and smells her bread in blood.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>O Tempus ferax insanorum, Heu!</i><br /></span> +<span>Physicked with metaphysics, pamphleteered<br /></span> +<span>Into paroxysms, bruited into brutes.<br /></span> +<span>And metamorphosed into murder, lo<br /></span> +<span>Men lapse to savagery and turn to beasts.<br /></span> +<span>Hell-broth hag-boiled: a mad Theroigne is queen—<br /></span> +<span>Mounts to the brazen throne of Harlotdom,<br /></span> +<span>Queen of the cursed, and flares her cannon-torch.<br /></span> +<span>Watch-wolves, lean-jawed, fore-smelling feast of blood,<br /></span> +<span>In packs on Paris howl from farthest France.<br /></span> +<span>Discord demented bursts the bounds of <i>Dis</i>;<br /></span> +<span>Mad Murder raves and Horror holds her hell.<br /></span> +<span>Hades up-heaves her whelps. In human forms<br /></span> +<span>Up-flare the Furies, serpent-haired and grin<br /></span> +<span>Horrid with bloody jaws. Scaled reptiles crawl<br /></span> +<span>From slum and sewer, slimy, coil on coil—<br /></span> +<span>Danton, dark beast, that builded for himself<br /></span> +<span>A monument of quicksand limed with blood;<br /></span> +<span>Horse-leech Marat, blear-eyed, vile vulture born;<br /></span> +<span>Fair Charlotte's dagger robbed the guillotine!<br /></span> +<span>Black-biled, green-visaged, traitorous Robespierre,<br /></span> +<span>That buzzard-beaked, hawk-taloned octopus<br /></span> +<span>Who played with pale poltroonery of men,<br /></span> +<span>And drank the cup of flattery till he reeled;<br /></span> +<span>Hell's pope uncrowned, immortal for a day.<br /></span> +<span>Tinville, relentless dog of murder-plot—<br /></span> +<span>Doom-judge whose trembling victims were foredoomed;<br /></span> +<span>Maillard who sucked his milk from Murder's dugs,<br /></span> +<span>Twin-whelp to Theroigne, captain of the hags;<br /></span> +<span>Jourdan, red-grizzled mule-son blotched with blood,<br /></span> +<span>Headsman forever "famous-infamous;"<br /></span> +<span>Keen, hag-whelped journalist Camille Desmoulins,<br /></span> +<span>Who with a hundred other of his ilk<br /></span> +<span>Hissed on the hounds and smeared his bread with blood;<br /></span> +<span>Lebon, man-fiend, that vampire-ghoul who drank<br /></span> +<span>Hot blood of headless victims, and compelled<br /></span> +<span>Mothers to view the murder of their babes;<br /></span> +<span>At whose red guillotine, in Arras raised,<br /></span> +<span>The pipe and fiddle played at every fall<br /></span> +<span>Of ghastly head the ribald "<i>Ca Ira</i>;"<br /></span> +<span>And fiends unnamed and nameless brutes untaled.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Petticoat-patriots <i>sans bas</i>, and <i>Sans-culottes</i>,<br /></span> +<span>Rampant in rags and hunger-toothed uproar<br /></span> +<span>Paris the proud. With Jacobin clubs they club<br /></span> +<span>The head of France till all her brains are out.<br /></span> +<span>Hired murder hunts in packs. Men murder-mad<br /></span> +<span>Slay for the love of murder. Gloomy night,<br /></span> +<span>Hiding her stars lest they in pity fall,<br /></span> +<span>Beholds a thousand guiltless, trembling souls—<br /></span> +<span>Men, women, children—forth from prisons flung<br /></span> +<span>In flare of torch and glare of demon eyes,<br /></span> +<span>Among the howling wolves and lazar-hags,<br /></span> +<span>Crying for mercy where no mercy is,<br /></span> +<span>Hewed down in heaps by bloody ax and pike.<br /></span> +<span>From their grim battlements the imps of hell<br /></span> +<span>Indignant hissed and damped their fires with tears;<br /></span> +<span>And Manhood from the watch-towers of the world<br /></span> +<span>Cried in the name of Human Nature—"Hold!"<br /></span> +<span>As well the drifting snail might strive to still<br /></span> +<span>The volcan-heaved, storm-struck, moon-maddened sea.<br /></span> +<span>Blood-frenzied beasts demand their feast of blood.<br /></span> +<span><i>"Liberty—Equality—Fraternity!"</i>—the cry<br /></span> +<span>Of blood-hounds baying on the track of babes.<br /></span> +<span>Queen innocent beheaded—mother-queen!<br /></span> +<span>And queenly Roland—Nature's queenly queen!<br /></span> +<span>Aye, at the foot of bloody guillotine<br /></span> +<span>She stood a heroine: before her loomed<br /></span> +<span>The Goddess of Liberty—in statue-stone.<br /></span> +<span>Queen Roland saw, and spake the words that ring<br /></span> +<span>Along the centuries—<i>"O Liberty!</i><br /></span> +<span><i>What crimes are committed in thy name!"</i>—and died.<br /></span> +<span>And when the headsman raised her severed head<br /></span> +<span>To hell-dogs shouting <i>"Vive la Liberté,"</i><br /></span> +<span>Godlike disdain still sparkled in her eyes.<br /></span> +<span>Grim Hell herself in pity stood aghast,<br /></span> +<span>Clanged shut her doors and stopped her ears with pitch.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>See the wise ruler—father of Brazil,<br /></span> +<span>Who struck the shackles from a million slaves,<br /></span> +<span>Whose reign was peace and love and gentleness,<br /></span> +<span>Despoiled and driven from the land he loves.<br /></span> +<span>See jealous Labor strike the hand that feeds,<br /></span> +<span>And burn the mills that grind his daily bread;<br /></span> +<span>Yea, in blind rage denounce the very laws<br /></span> +<span>That shield his home from Europe's pauperdom.<br /></span> +<span>See the grieved farmer raise his horny hand<br /></span> +<span>And splutter garlic. Hear the demagogues<br /></span> +<span>Fist-maul the wind and weather-cock the crowd,<br /></span> +<span>With brazen foreheads full of empty noise<br /></span> +<span>Out-bellowing the bulls of Bashan; and behold<br /></span> +<span>Shrill, wrinkled Amazons in high harangue<br /></span> +<span>Stamp their flat feet and gnash their toothless gums,<br /></span> +<span>And flaunt their petticoat-flag of "Liberty."<br /></span> +<span>Hear the old bandogs of the Daily Press,<br /></span> +<span>Chained to their party posts, or fetter-free<br /></span> +<span>And running amuck against old party creeds,<br /></span> +<span>On-howl their packs and glory in the fight.<br /></span> +<span>See mangy curs, whose editorial ears<br /></span> +<span>Prick to all winds to catch the popular breeze,<br /></span> +<span>Slang-whanging yelp, and froth and snap and snarl,<br /></span> +<span>And sniff the gutters for their daily food.<br /></span> +<span>And these—are they our prophets and our priests?<br /></span> +<span>Hurra!—Hurra!—Hurra!—for "Liberty!"<br /></span> +<span>Flaunt the red flag and flutter the petticoat;<br /></span> +<span>Ran-tan the drums and let the bugles bray,<br /></span> +<span>The eagle scream and sixty million throats<br /></span> +<span>Sing Yankee-doodle—Yankee-doodle-doo.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The state is sick and every fool a quack<br /></span> +<span>Running with pills and plasters and sure-cures,<br /></span> +<span>And every pill and package labelled <i>Ism</i>.<br /></span> +<span>See Liberty run mad, and Anarchy,<br /></span> +<span>Bearing the torch, the dagger and the bomb<br /></span> +<span>Red-mouthed run riot in her sacred name<br /></span> +<span>Hear mobs of idlers cry—<i>"Equality!</i><br /></span> +<span><i>Let all men share alike: divide, divide!"</i><br /></span> +<span>Butting their heads against the granite rocks<br /></span> +<span>Of Nature and the eternal laws of God.<br /></span> +<span>Pull down the toiler, lift the idler up!<br /></span> +<span>Despoil the frugal, crown the negligent!<br /></span> +<span>Offer rewards to idleness and crime!<br /></span> +<span>And pay a premium for improvidence!<br /></span> +<span>Fools, can your wolfish cries repeal the laws<br /></span> +<span>Of God engraven on the granite hills,<br /></span> +<span>Written in every Wrinkle of the earth,<br /></span> +<span>On every plain, on every mountain-top,—<br /></span> +<span>Nay, blazened o'er all the boundless Universe<br /></span> +<span>On every jewel that sparkles on God's throne?<br /></span> +<span>And can ye rectify God's mighty plan?<br /></span> +<span>O pygmies, can ye measure God himself?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, would ye measure God's almighty power,<br /></span> +<span>Go—crack Earth's bones and heave the granite hills;<br /></span> +<span>Measure the ocean in a drinking-cup;<br /></span> +<span>Measure Eternity by the town-clock;<br /></span> +<span>Nay, with a yard-stick measure the Universe:<br /></span> +<span>Measure for measure. Measure God by man!<br /></span> +<span>"Fools to the midmost marrow of your bones!"<br /></span> +<span>O buzzing flies and gnats! Ye cannot strike<br /></span> +<span>One little atom from God's Universe,<br /></span> +<span>Or warp the laws of Nature by a hair!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>His loving eye sees through all evil good.<br /></span> +<span>Man's life is but a breath; but lo with Him<br /></span> +<span>To-day, to-morrow, yesterday, are one<br /></span> +<span>One in the cycle of eternal time<br /></span> +<span>That hath beginning none, nor any end.<br /></span> +<span>The Earth revolving round her sire, the Sun,<br /></span> +<span>Measures the flying year of mortal man,<br /></span> +<span>But who shall measure God's eternal year?<br /></span> +<span>The unbegotten, everlasting God;<br /></span> +<span>Unmade, eternal, all-pervading power;<br /></span> +<span>Center and source of all things, high and low,<br /></span> +<span>Maker and master of the Universe—<br /></span> +<span>Ah, nay, the mighty Universe itself!<br /></span> +<span>All things in nature bear God's signature<br /></span> +<span>So plainly writ that he who runs may read.<br /></span> +<span>We know not what life is; how may we know<br /></span> +<span>Death—what it is, or what may lie beyond?<br /></span> +<span>Whoso forgets his God forgets himself.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Let me not blindly judge my brother man:<br /></span> +<span>There is but one just judge; there is but one<br /></span> +<span>Who knows the hearts of men. Him let us praise—<br /></span> +<span>Not with blind prayer, or idle, sounding psalms—<br /></span> +<span>But let us daily in our daily works,<br /></span> +<span>Praise God by righteous deeds and brother-love.<br /></span> +<span>Go forth into the forest and observe—<br /></span> +<span>For men believe their eyes and doubt their ears—<br /></span> +<span>The creeping vine, the shrub, the lowly bush,<br /></span> +<span>The dwarfed and stunted trees, the bent and bowed,<br /></span> +<span>And here and there a lordly oak or elm,<br /></span> +<span>And o'er them all a tall and princely pine.<br /></span> +<span>All struggle upward, but the many fail;<br /></span> +<span>The low dwarfed by the shadows of the great,<br /></span> +<span>The stronger basking in the genial sun.<br /></span> +<span>Observe the myriad fishes of the seas—<br /></span> +<span>The mammoths and the minnows of the deep.<br /></span> +<span>Behold the eagle and the little wren,<br /></span> +<span>The condor on his cliff, the pigeon-hawk,<br /></span> +<span>The teal, the coot, the broad-winged albatross.<br /></span> +<span>Turn to the beasts in forest and in field—<br /></span> +<span>The lion, the lynx, the mammoth and the mouse,<br /></span> +<span>The sheep, the goat, the bullock and the horse,<br /></span> +<span>The fierce gorillas and the chattering apes—<br /></span> +<span>Progenitors and prototypes of man.<br /></span> +<span>Not only differences in genera find,<br /></span> +<span>But grades in every kind and every class.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I would not doom to serfdom or to toil<br /></span> +<span>One race, one caste, one class, or any man:<br /></span> +<span>Give every honest man an honest chance;<br /></span> +<span>Protect alike the rich man and the poor;<br /></span> +<span>Let not the toiler live upon a crust<br /></span> +<span>While Croesus' bread is buttered on both sides.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>O people's king and shepherd, thronèd Law,<br /></span> +<span>Strike down the monsters of Monopoly.<br /></span> +<span>Lift up thy club, O mighty Hercules!<br /></span> +<span>Behold thy "Labors" yet unfinished are:<br /></span> +<span>Tear off thy Nessus shirt and bare thine arms.<br /></span> +<span>The Numean lion fattens on our flocks;<br /></span> +<span>The Lernean Hydra coils around our farms,<br /></span> +<span>Our towns, our mills, our mines, our factories;<br /></span> +<span>The triple monster Geryon lives again,<br /></span> +<span>Grown quadruple, and over all our plains<br /></span> +<span>And thousand hills his fattening oxen feed.<br /></span> +<span>Stymphalean buzzards ravage round our fields;<br /></span> +<span>The Augean stables reeking stench the land;<br /></span> +<span>The hundred-headed monster Cerberus,<br /></span> +<span>That throttled Greece and ravaged hapless France,<br /></span> +<span>Hath broke from hell and howls for human blood.<br /></span> +<span>Lift up thy knotted club, O Hercules!<br /></span> +<span>Strike swift and sure: crush down the Hydra's heads;<br /></span> +<span>Throttle the Numean lion: strike! nor spare<br /></span> +<span>The monster Geryon or the buzzard-beaks.<br /></span> +<span>Clean the Augean stables if thou can'st;<br /></span> +<span>But hurl the hundred-headed monster down<br /></span> +<span>Headlong to Hades: chain him; make thee sure<br /></span> +<span>He shall not burst the bonds of hell again.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>To you, O chosen makers of the laws,<br /></span> +<span>The nation looks—and shall it look in vain?<br /></span> +<span>Will ye sit idle, or in idle wind<br /></span> +<span>Blow out your zeal, and crack your party whips,<br /></span> +<span>Or drivel dotage, while the crisis cries—<br /></span> +<span>While all around the dark horizon loom<br /></span> +<span>Clouds thunder-capped that bode a hurricane?<br /></span> +<span>Sleep ye as slept the "Notables" of France,<br /></span> +<span>While under them an hundred Ætnas hissed<br /></span> +<span>And spluttered sulphur, gathering for the shock?<br /></span> +<span>Be ye our Hercules—and Lynceus-eyed:<br /></span> +<span>Still ye the storm or ere the storm begin—<br /></span> +<span>Ere "Liberty" take Justice by the throat,<br /></span> +<span>And run moon-mad a Malay murder-muck,<br /></span> +<span>Throttle the "Trusts", and crush the coils combined<br /></span> +<span>That crack our bones and fatten on our fields.<br /></span> +<span>Strike down the hissing heads of Anarchy:<br /></span> +<span>Strike swift and hard, nor parley with the fiend<br /></span> +<span>Mothered of hell and father of all fiends—<br /></span> +<span>Fell monster with an hundred bloody mouths,<br /></span> +<span>And every mouth an hundred hissing tongues,<br /></span> +<span>And every tongue drips venom from his fangs.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Protect the toiling millions by just laws;<br /></span> +<span>Let honest labor find its sure reward;<br /></span> +<span>Let willing hands find work and honest bread.<br /></span> +<span>So frame the laws that every honest man<br /></span> +<span>May find his home protected and his craft.<br /></span> +<span>Let Liberty and Order walk hand in hand<br /></span> +<span>With Justice: happy Trio! let them rule.<br /></span> +<span>Put up the bars: bar out the pauper swarms<br /></span> +<span>Alike from Asia's huts and Europe's hives.<br /></span> +<span>Let charity begin at home. In vain<br /></span> +<span>Will we bar out the swarms from Europe's hives<br /></span> +<span>And Asia's countless lepers, if our ports<br /></span> +<span>Are free to all the products of their hands.<br /></span> +<span>Put up the bars: bar out the pauper hordes;<br /></span> +<span>Bar out their products that compete with ours:<br /></span> +<span>Give honest toil at home an honest chance:<br /></span> +<span>Build up our own and keep our coin at home.<br /></span> +<span>In vain our mines pour forth their wealth of gold<br /></span> +<span>And silver, if by every ship it sail<br /></span> +<span>For London, Paris, Birmingham or Berlin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>We have been prodigal. The days are past<br /></span> +<span>When virgin acres wanted willing hands,<br /></span> +<span>When fertile empires lay in wilderness<br /></span> +<span>Waiting the teeming millions of the world.<br /></span> +<span>Lo where the Indian and the bison roamed—Lords<br /></span> +<span>of the prairies boundless as the sea—But<br /></span> +<span>twenty years ago, behold the change!<br /></span> +<span>Homesteads and hamlets, flocks and lowing herds,<br /></span> +<span>Railways and cities, miles of rustling corn,<br /></span> +<span>And leagues on leagues of waving fields of gold.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Let wise men teach and honest men proclaim<br /></span> +<span>The mutual dependence of the rich and poor;<br /></span> +<span>For if the wealthy profit by the poor,<br /></span> +<span>The poor man profits ever by the rich.<br /></span> +<span>Wealth builds our churches and our colleges;<br /></span> +<span>Wealth builds the mills that grind the million's bread;<br /></span> +<span>Wealth builds the factories that clothe the poor;<br /></span> +<span>Wealth builds the railways and the million ride.<br /></span> +<span>God hath so willed the toiling millions reap<br /></span> +<span>The golden harvest that the rich have sown.<br /></span> +<span>Six feet of earth make all men even; lo<br /></span> +<span>The toilers are the rich man's heirs at last.<br /></span> +<span>But there be men would grumble at their lot,<br /></span> +<span>Even if it were a corner-lot on Broadway.<br /></span> +<span>We stand upon the shoulders of the past.<br /></span> +<span>Who knoweth not the past how may he know<br /></span> +<span>The folly or the wisdom of to-day?<br /></span> +<span>For by comparison we weigh the good,<br /></span> +<span>And by comparison all evil weigh.<br /></span> +<span>"What can we reason, but from what we know?"<br /></span> +<span>Let honest men look back an hundred years—<br /></span> +<span>Nay, fifty, and behold the wondrous change.<br /></span> +<span>Where wooden tubs like sluggards sailed the sea,<br /></span> +<span>Steam-ships of steel like greyhounds course the main;<br /></span> +<span>Where lumbering coach and wain and wagon toiled<br /></span> +<span>Through mud and mire and rut and rugged way,<br /></span> +<span>The cushioned train a mile a minute flies.<br /></span> +<span>Then by slow coach the message went and came,<br /></span> +<span>But now by lightning bridled to man's use<br /></span> +<span>We flash our silent thoughts from sea to sea;<br /></span> +<span>Nay, under ocean's depths from shore to shore;<br /></span> +<span>And talk by telephone to distant ears.<br /></span> +<span>The dreams of yesterday are deeds to-day.<br /></span> +<span>Our frugal mothers spun with tedious toil,<br /></span> +<span>And wove the homespun cloth for all their fold;<br /></span> +<span>Their needles plied by weary fingers sewed.<br /></span> +<span>Behold, the humming factory spins and weaves,<br /></span> +<span>The singing "Singer" sews with lightning speed.<br /></span> +<span>Our fathers sowed their little fields by hand,<br /></span> +<span>And reaped with bended sickles and bent backs;<br /></span> +<span>By hand they bound the sheaves of wheat and rye;<br /></span> +<span>With flails they threshed and winnowed in the wind.<br /></span> +<span>Now by machines we sow and reap and bind;<br /></span> +<span>By steam we thresh and sack the bounteous grain.<br /></span> +<span>These are but few of all the million ways<br /></span> +<span>Whereby man's toil is lightened and he hath gained<br /></span> +<span>Tenfold in comfort, luxury and ease.<br /></span> +<span>For these and more the millions that enjoy<br /></span> +<span>May thank the wise and wealthy few who gave.<br /></span> +<span>If the rich are richer the poor are richer too.<br /></span> +<span>A narrow demagogue I count the man<br /></span> +<span>Who cries to-day—<i>"Progress and Poverty"</i>;<br /></span> +<span>As if a thousand added comforts made<br /></span> +<span>The poor man poorer and his lot the worse.<br /></span> +<span>'Tis but a new toot on the same old horn<br /></span> +<span>That brayed in ancient Greece and Babylon,<br /></span> +<span>And now amid the ruined walls of Rome<br /></span> +<span>Lies buried fathoms deep in dead men's dust.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>"Progress and Poverty!"</i> Man, hast thou traced<br /></span> +<span>The blood that throbs commingled in thy veins?<br /></span> +<span>Over thy shoulder hast thou cast a glance<br /></span> +<span>On thine old Celtic-Saxon-Norman sires—<br /></span> +<span>Huddled in squalid huts on beds of straw?<br /></span> +<span>Barefooted churls swine-herding in the fens,<br /></span> +<span>Bare-legged cowherds in their cow-skin coats,<br /></span> +<span>Wearing the collars of their Thane or Eorl,<br /></span> +<span>His serfs, his slaves, even as thy dog is thine;<br /></span> +<span>Harried by hunger, pillaged, ravaged, slain,<br /></span> +<span>By Viking robbers and the warring Jarls;<br /></span> +<span>Oft glad like hunted swine to fill their maws<br /></span> +<span>With herbs and acorns. <i>"Progress and Poverty!"</i><br /></span> +<span>The humblest laborer in our mills or mines<br /></span> +<span>Is royal Thane beside those slavish churls;<br /></span> +<span>The frugal farmer in our land to-day<br /></span> +<span>Lives better than their kings—himself a king.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Lo every age refutes old errors still,<br /></span> +<span>And still begets new errors for the next;<br /></span> +<span>But all the creeds of politics or priests<br /></span> +<span>Can't make one error truth, one truth a lie.<br /></span> +<span>There is no religion higher than the truth;<br /></span> +<span>Men make the creeds, but God ordains the law.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Above all cant, all arguments of men,<br /></span> +<span>Above all superstitions, old or new,<br /></span> +<span>Above all creeds of every age and clime,<br /></span> +<span>Stands the eternal truth—the creed of creeds.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Sweet is the lute to him who hath not heard<br /></span> +<span>The prattle of his children at his knees:<br /></span> +<span>Ah, he is rich indeed whose humble home<br /></span> +<span>Contains a frugal wife and sweet content.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<h3><a name="HELOISE" id="HELOISE" />HELOISE</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>I saw a light on yester-night—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A low light on the misty lea;<br /></span> +<span>The stars were dim and silence grim<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sat brooding on the sullen sea.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>From out the silence came a voice—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A voice that thrilled me through and through,<br /></span> +<span>And said, "Alas, is this your choice?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For he is false and I was true."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And in my ears the passing years<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Will sadly whisper words of rue:<br /></span> +<span>Forget—and yet—can I forget<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That one was false and one was true?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="CHANGE" id="CHANGE" />CHANGE</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Change is the order of the universe.<br /></span> +<span>Worlds wax and wane; suns die and stars are born.<br /></span> +<span>Two atoms of cosmic dust unite, cohere—<br /></span> +<span>And lo the building of a world begun.<br /></span> +<span>On all things—high or low, or great or small—<br /></span> +<span>Earth, ocean, mountain, mammoth, midge and man,<br /></span> +<span>On mind and matter—lo perpetual change—<br /></span> +<span>God's fiat—stamped! The very bones of man<br /></span> +<span>Change as he grows from infancy to age.<br /></span> +<span>His loves, his hates, his tastes, his fancies, change.<br /></span> +<span>His blood and brawn demand a change of food;<br /></span> +<span>His mind as well: the sweetest harp of heaven<br /></span> +<span>Were hateful if it played the selfsame tune<br /></span> +<span>Forever, and the fairest flower that gems<br /></span> +<span>The garden, if it bloomed throughout the year,<br /></span> +<span>Would blush unsought. The most delicious fruits<br /></span> +<span>Pall on our palate if we taste too oft,<br /></span> +<span>And Hyblan honey turns to bitter gall.<br /></span> +<span>Perpetual winter is a reign of gloom;<br /></span> +<span>Perpetual summer hardly pleases more.<br /></span> +<span>Behold the Esquimau—the Hottentot:<br /></span> +<span>This doomed to regions of perpetual ice,<br /></span> +<span>And that to constant summer's heat and glow:<br /></span> +<span>Inferior both, both gloomy and unblessed.<br /></span> +<span>The home of happiness and plenty lies<br /></span> +<span>Where autumn follows summer and the breath<br /></span> +<span>Of spring melts into rills the winter's snows.<br /></span> +<span>How gladly, after summer's blazing suns,<br /></span> +<span>We hail the autumn frosts and autumn fruits:<br /></span> +<span>How blithesome seems the fall of feathery snow<br /></span> +<span>When winter comes with merry clang of bells:<br /></span> +<span>And after winter's reign of ice and storm<br /></span> +<span>How glad we hail the robins of the spring.<br /></span> +<span>For God hath planted in the hearts of men<br /></span> +<span>The love of change, and sown the seeds of change<br /></span> +<span>In earth and air and sea and shoreless space.<br /></span> +<span>Day follows night and night the dying day,<br /></span> +<span>And every day—and every hour—is change;<br /></span> +<span>From when on dewy hills the rising dawn<br /></span> +<span>Sprinkles her mists of silver in the east,<br /></span> +<span>Till in the west the golden dust up-wheels<br /></span> +<span>Behind the chariot of the setting sun;<br /></span> +<span>From when above the hills the evening star<br /></span> +<span>Sparkles a diamond 'mong the grains of gold,<br /></span> +<span>Until her last faint flicker on the sea.<br /></span> +<span>The voices of the hoar and hurrying years<br /></span> +<span>Cry from the silence—"Change!—perpetual Change!"<br /></span> +<span>Man's heart responding throbs—"Perpetual Change,"<br /></span> +<span>And grinds like a mill-stone: wanting grists of change<br /></span> +<span>It grinds and grinds upon its troubled self.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Behold the flowers that spring and bloom and fade.<br /></span> +<span>Behold the blooming maid: the song of larks<br /></span> +<span>Is in her warbling throat; the blue of heaven<br /></span> +<span>Is in her eyes; her loosened tresses fall<br /></span> +<span>A shower of gold on shoulders tinged with rose;<br /></span> +<span>Her form a seraph's and her gladsome face<br /></span> +<span>A benediction. Lo beneath her feet<br /></span> +<span>The loving crocus bursts in sudden bloom.<br /></span> +<span>Fawn-eyed and full of gentleness she moves—<br /></span> +<span>A sunbeam on the lawn. The hearts of men<br /></span> +<span>Follow her footsteps. He whose sinewy arms<br /></span> +<span>Might burst through bars of steel like bands of straw,<br /></span> +<span>Caught in the net of her unloosened hair,<br /></span> +<span>A helpless prisoner lies and loves his chains.<br /></span> +<span>Blow, ye soft winds, from sandal-shaded isle,<br /></span> +<span>And bring the <i>mogra's</i> breath and orange-bloom.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Fly, fleet-winged doves, to Ponce de Leon's spring,<br /></span> +<span>And in your bills bring her the pearls of youth;<br /></span> +<span>For lo the fingers of relentless Time<br /></span> +<span>Weave threads of silver in among the gold,<br /></span> +<span>And seam her face with pain and carking care,<br /></span> +<span>Till, bent and bowed, the shriveled hands of Death<br /></span> +<span>Reach from the welcome grave and draw her in.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="FIDO" id="FIDO" />FIDO</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hark, the storm is raging high;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beat the breakers on the coast,<br /></span> +<span>And the wintry waters cry<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like the wailing of a ghost.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the rugged coast of Maine<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Stands the frugal farmer's cot:<br /></span> +<span>What if drive the sleet and rain?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">John and Hannah heed it not.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the hills the mad winds roar,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the tall pines toss and groan;<br /></span> +<span>Round the headland—down the shore—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Stormy spirits shriek and moan.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Inky darkness wraps the sky;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not a glimpse of moon or star;<br /></span> +<span>And the stormy-petrels cry<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Out along the harbor-bar.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Seated by their blazing hearth—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">John and Hannah—snug and warm—<br /></span> +<span>What if darkness wrap the earth?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Drive the sleet and howl the storm!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Let the stormy-petrels fly!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let the moaning breakers beat!<br /></span> +<span>Hark! I hear an infant cry<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the patter of baby-feet:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And Hannah listened as she spoke,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But only heard the driving rain,<br /></span> +<span>As on the cottage-roof it broke<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And pattered on the window-pane.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And she sat knitting by the fire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">While pussy frolicked at her feet;<br /></span> +<span>And ever roared the tempest higher,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ever harder the hailstones beat.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Hark! the cry—it comes again!"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Nay, it is the winds that wail,<br /></span> +<span>And the patter on the pane<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of the driving sleet and hail"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Replied the farmer as he piled<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The crackling hemlock on the coals,<br /></span> +<span>And lit his corn-cob pipe and smiled<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The smile of sweet contented souls.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Aye, let the storm rave o'er the earth;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their kine are snug in barn and byre;<br /></span> +<span>The apples sputter on the hearth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The cider simmers on the fire.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>But once again at midnight high,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She heard in dreams, through wind and sleet,<br /></span> +<span>An infant moan, an infant cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the patter of baby-feet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Half-waking from her dreams she turned<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And heard the driving wind and rain;<br /></span> +<span>Still on the hearth the fagots burned,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hail beat on the window-pane.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>John rose as wont, at dawn of day;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The earth was white with frozen sleet;<br /></span> +<span>And lo his faithful Fido lay<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dead on the door-stone at his feet.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<h3><a name="THE_REIGN_OF_REASON" id="THE_REIGN_OF_REASON" />THE REIGN OF REASON</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>The day of truth is dawning. I behold<br /></span> +<span>O'er darksome hills the trailing robes of gold<br /></span> +<span>And silent footsteps of the gladsome dawn.<br /></span> +<span>The morning breaks by sages long foretold;<br /></span> +<span>Truth comes to set upon the world her throne.<br /></span> +<span>Men lift their foreheads to the rising sun,<br /></span> +<span>And lo the reign of Reason is begun.<br /></span> +<span>Fantastic phantasms fly before the light—<br /></span> +<span>Pale, gibbering ghosts and ghouls and goblin fears:<br /></span> +<span>Man who hath walked in sleep—what thousands years?<br /></span> +<span>Groping among the shadows of the night,<br /></span> +<span>Moon-struck and in a weird somnambulism,<br /></span> +<span>Mumbling some cunning cant or catechism,<br /></span> +<span>Thrilled by the electric magic of the skies—<br /></span> +<span>Sun-touched by Truth—awakes and rubs his eyes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Old Superstition, mother of cruel creeds,<br /></span> +<span>O'er all the earth hath sown her dragon-teeth.<br /></span> +<span>Lo centuries on centuries the seeds<br /></span> +<span>Grew rank, and from them all the haggard breeds<br /></span> +<span>Of Hate and Fear and Hell and cruel Death.<br /></span> +<span>And still her sunken eyes glare on mankind;<br /></span> +<span>Her livid lips grin horrible; her hands,<br /></span> +<span>Shriveled to bone and sinew, clutch all lands<br /></span> +<span>And with blind fear lead on or drive the blind.<br /></span> +<span>Ah ignorance and fear go hand in hand,<br /></span> +<span>Twin-born, and broadcast scatter hate and thorns,<br /></span> +<span>They people earth with ghosts and hell with horns,<br /></span> +<span>And sear the eyes of truth with burning brand.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Behold, the serried ranks of Truth advance,<br /></span> +<span>And stubborn Science shakes her shining lance<br /></span> +<span>Full in the face of stolid Ignorance.<br /></span> +<span>But Superstition is a monster still—<br /></span> +<span>An Hydra we may scotch but hardly kill;<br /></span> +<span>For if with sword of Truth we lop a head,<br /></span> +<span>How soon another groweth in its stead!<br /></span> +<span>All men are slaves. Yea, some are slave to wine<br /></span> +<span>And some to women, some to shining gold,<br /></span> +<span>But all to habit and to customs old.<br /></span> +<span>Around our stunted souls old tenets twine<br /></span> +<span>And it is hard to straighten in the oak<br /></span> +<span>The crook that in the sapling had its start:<br /></span> +<span>The callous neck is glad to wear the yoke;<br /></span> +<span>Nor reason rules the head, but aye the heart:<br /></span> +<span>The head is weak, the throbbing heart is strong;<br /></span> +<span>But where the heart is right the head is not far wrong.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Men have been learning error age on age,<br /></span> +<span>And superstition is their heritage<br /></span> +<span>Bequeathed from age to age and sire to son<br /></span> +<span>Since the dim history of the world begun.<br /></span> +<span>Trust paves the way for treachery to tread;<br /></span> +<span>Under the cloak of virtue vices creep;<br /></span> +<span>Fools chew the chaff while cunning eats the bread,<br /></span> +<span>And wolves become the shepherds of the sheep.<br /></span> +<span>The mindless herd are but the cunning's tools;<br /></span> +<span>For ages have the learned of the schools<br /></span> +<span>Furnished pack-saddles for the backs of fools.<br /></span> +<span>Pale Superstition loves the gloom of night;<br /></span> +<span>Truth, like a diamond, ever loves the light.<br /></span> +<span>But still 'twere wrong to speak but in abuse,<br /></span> +<span>For priests and popes have had, and have, their use.<br /></span> +<span>Yea, Superstition since the world began<br /></span> +<span>Hath been an instrument to govern man:<br /></span> +<span>For men were brutes, and brutal fear was given<br /></span> +<span>To chain the brute till Reason came from heaven.<br /></span> +<span>Aye, men were beasts for lo how many ages!<br /></span> +<span>And only fear held them in chains and cages.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Wise men were priests, and gladly I accord<br /></span> +<span>They were the priests and prophets of the Lord;<br /></span> +<span>For love was lust and o'er all earth's arena<br /></span> +<span>Hell-fire alone could tame the wild hyena.<br /></span> +<span>All history is the register, we find,<br /></span> +<span>Of the crimes and lusts and sufferings of mankind;<br /></span> +<span>And there are still dark lands where it is well<br /></span> +<span>That Superstition wear the horns of hell,<br /></span> +<span>And hold her torches o'er the brutal head,<br /></span> +<span>And fright the beast with fire and goblin dread<br /></span> +<span>Till Reason come the darkness to dispel.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>How hard it is for mortals to unlearn<br /></span> +<span>Beliefs bred in the marrow of their bones!<br /></span> +<span>How hard it is for mortals to discern<br /></span> +<span>The truth that preaches from the silent stones,<br /></span> +<span>The silent hills, the silent universe,<br /></span> +<span>While Error cries in sanctimonious tones<br /></span> +<span>That all the light of life and God is hers!<br /></span> +<span>Lo in the midst we stand: we cannot see<br /></span> +<span>Either the dark beginning or the end,<br /></span> +<span>Or where our tottering footsteps turn or trend<br /></span> +<span>In the vast orbit of Eternity.<br /></span> +<span>Let Reason be our light—the only light<br /></span> +<span>That God hath given unto benighted man,<br /></span> +<span>Wherewith to see a glimpse of his vast plan<br /></span> +<span>And stars of hope that glimmer on our night.<br /></span> +<span>Lo all-pervading Unity is His;<br /></span> +<span>Lo all-pervading Unity is He:<br /></span> +<span>One mighty heart throbs in the earth and sea,<br /></span> +<span>In every star through heaven's immensity,<br /></span> +<span>And God in all things breathes, in all things is.<br /></span> +<span>God's perfect order rules the vast expanse,<br /></span> +<span>And Love is queen and all the realms are hers;<br /></span> +<span>But strike one planet from the Universe<br /></span> +<span>And all is chaos and unbridled chance.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And is there life beyond this life below?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, is death death?—or but a happy change<br /></span> +<span>From night to light—on angel wings to range,<br /></span> +<span>And sing the songs of seraphs as we go?<br /></span> +<span>Alas, the more we know the less we know we know.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>God hath laid down the limits we cannot pass;<br /></span> +<span>And it is well he giveth us no glass<br /></span> +<span>Wherewith to see beyond the present glance,<br /></span> +<span>Else we might die a thousand deaths perchance<br /></span> +<span>Before we lay our bones beneath the grass.<br /></span> +<span>What is the soul, and whither will it fly?<br /></span> +<span>We only know that matter cannot die,<br /></span> +<span>But lives and lived through all eternity,<br /></span> +<span>And ever turns from hoary age to youth.<br /></span> +<span>And is the soul not worthier than the dust?<br /></span> +<span>So in His providence we put our trust;<br /></span> +<span>And so we humbly hope, for God is just—<br /></span> +<span>Father all-wise, unmoved by wrath or ruth:<br /></span> +<span>What then is certain—what eternal? Truth,<br /></span> +<span>Almighty God, Time, Space and Cosmic Dust.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="LOVE_WILL_FIND" id="LOVE_WILL_FIND" />LOVE WILL FIND</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Seek ye the fairest lily of the field,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fairest lotus that in lakelet lies,<br /></span> +<span>The fairest rose that ever morn revealed,<br /></span> +<span>And Love will find—from other eyes concealed—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A fairer flower in some fair woman's eyes.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>List ye the lark that warbles to the morn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sweetest note that linnet ever sung,<br /></span> +<span>Or trembling lute in tune with silver horn,<br /></span> +<span>And Love will list—and laugh your lute to scorn—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A sweeter lute in some fair woman's tongue.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Seek ye the dewy perfume seaward blown<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From flowering orange-groves to passing ships;<br /></span> +<span>Nay, sip the nectared dew of Helicon,<br /></span> +<span>And Love will find—and claim it all his own—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A sweeter dew on some fair woman's lips.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Seek ye a couch of softest eider-down,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The silken floss that baby birdling warms,<br /></span> +<span>Or shaded moss with blushing roses strown,<br /></span> +<span>And Love will find—when they are all alone—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A softer couch in some fair woman's arms.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="AN_OLD_ENGLISH_OAK" id="AN_OLD_ENGLISH_OAK" />AN OLD ENGLISH OAK</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Silence is the voice of mighty things.<br /></span> +<span>In silence dropped the acorn in the rain;<br /></span> +<span>In silence slept till sun-touched. Wondrous life<br /></span> +<span>Peeped from the mold and oped its eyes on morn.<br /></span> +<span>Up-grew in silence through a thousand years<br /></span> +<span>The Titan-armed, gnarl-jointed, rugged oak,<br /></span> +<span>Rock-rooted. Through his beard and shaggy locks<br /></span> +<span>Soft breezes sung and tempests roared: the rain<br /></span> +<span>A thousand summers trickled down his beard;<br /></span> +<span>A thousand winters whitened on his head;<br /></span> +<span>Yet spake he not. He, from his coigne of hills,<br /></span> +<span>Beheld the rise and fall of empire, saw<br /></span> +<span>The pageantry and perjury of kings,<br /></span> +<span>The feudal barons and the slavish churls,<br /></span> +<span>The peace of peasants; heard the merry song<br /></span> +<span>Of mowers singing to the swing of scythes,<br /></span> +<span>The solemn-voiced, low-wailing funeral dirge<br /></span> +<span>Winding slow-paced with death to humble graves;<br /></span> +<span>And heard the requiem sung for coffined kings.<br /></span> +<span>Saw castles rise and castles crumble down,<br /></span> +<span>Abbeys up-loom and clang their solemn bells,<br /></span> +<span>And heard the owl hoot ruin on their walls:<br /></span> +<span>Beheld a score of battle fields corpse-strewn—<br /></span> +<span>Blood-fertiled with ten thousand flattered fools<br /></span> +<span>Who, but to please the vanity of one,<br /></span> +<span>Marched on hurrahing to the doom of death—<br /></span> +<span>And spake not, neither sighed nor made a moan.<br /></span> +<span>Saw from the blood of heroes roses spring,<br /></span> +<span>And where the clangor of steel-sinewed War<br /></span> +<span>Roared o'er embattled rage, heard gentle Peace<br /></span> +<span>To bleating hills and vales of rustling gold<br /></span> +<span>Flute her glad notes from morn till even-tide.<br /></span> +<span>Grim with the grime of a thousand years he stood—<br /></span> +<span>Grand in his silence, mighty in his years.<br /></span> +<span>Under his shade the maid and lover wooed;<br /></span> +<span>Under his arms their children's children played<br /></span> +<span>And lambkins gamboled; at his feet by night<br /></span> +<span>The heart-sick wanderer laid him down and died,<br /></span> +<span>And he looked on in silence.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i14">Silent hours<br /></span> +<span>In ghostly pantomime on tip-toe tripped<br /></span> +<span>The stately minuet of the passing years,<br /></span> +<span>Until the horologe of Time struck <i>One</i>.<br /></span> +<span>Black Thunder growled and from his throne of gloom<br /></span> +<span>Fire-flashed the night with hissing bolt, and lo,<br /></span> +<span>Heart-split, the giant of a thousand years<br /></span> +<span>Uttered one voice and like a Titan fell,<br /></span> +<span>Crashing one hammer-clang, and passed away.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="THE_LEGEND_OF_THE_FALLS" id="THE_LEGEND_OF_THE_FALLS" />THE LEGEND OF THE FALLS<a name='FNanchor_CH'></a><a href='#Footnote_CH'><sup>[CH]</sup></a></h3> + +<h4>[Read at the Celebration of the Old Settlers of Hennepin County, at the Academy of Music, Minneapolis, +July 4, 1879.]</h4> + +<p>[<i>The Numerals refer to Notes in Appendix.</i>]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>On the Spirit-Island <a name='FNanchor_CI'></a><a href='#Footnote_CI'><sup>[CI]</sup></a> sitting under midnight's misty moon,<br /></span> +<span>Lo I see the spirits flitting o'er the waters one by one!<br /></span> +<span>Slumber wraps the silent city, and the droning mills are dumb;<br /></span> +<span>One lone whippowil's shrill ditty calls her mate that ne'er will come.<br /></span> +<span>Sadly moans the mighty river, foaming down the fettered falls,<br /></span> +<span>Where of old he thundered ever o'er abrupt and lofty walls.<br /></span> +<span>Great <i>Unktéhee</i>—god of waters—lifts no more his mighty head;<br /></span> +<span>Fled he with the timid otters?—lies he in the cavern dead?<br /></span> +<span>Hark!—the waters hush their sighing and the whippowil her call,<br /></span> +<span>Through the moon-lit mists are flying dusky shadows silent all.<br /></span> +<span>Lo from out the waters foaming—from the cavern deep and dread—<br /></span> +<span>Through the glamour and the gloaming comes a spirit of the dead.<br /></span> +<span>Sad she seems; her tresses raven on her tawny shoulders rest;<br /></span> +<span>Sorrow on her brow is graven, in her arms a babe is pressed.<br /></span> +<span>Hark!—she chants the solemn story—sings the legend sad and old,<br /></span> +<span>And the river wrapt in glory listens while the tale is told.<br /></span> +<span>Would you hear the legend olden hearken while I tell the tale—<br /></span> +<span>Shorn, alas, of many a golden, weird Dakota chant and wail.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> +<h3>THE LEGEND</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Tall was young Wanâta, stronger than <i>Heyóka's</i> <a name='FNanchor_16'></a><a href='#Footnote_16'><sup>[16]</sup></a> giant form,—<br /></span> +<span>Laughed at flood and fire and hunger, faced the fiercest winter storm.<br /></span> +<span>When <i>Wakinyan</i> <a name='FNanchor_32'></a><a href='#Footnote_32'><sup>[32]</sup></a> flashed and thundered, when Unktéhee raved and roared,<br /></span> +<span>All but brave <i>Wanâta</i> wondered, and the gods with fear implored.<br /></span> +<span>When the war-whoop shrill resounded, calling friends to meet the foe,<br /></span> +<span>From the <i>teepee</i> swift he bounded, armed with polished lance and bow.<br /></span> +<span>In the battle's din and clangor fast his fatal arrows flew,<br /></span> +<span>Flashed his fiery eyes with anger,—many a stealthy foe he slew.<br /></span> +<span>Hunter swift was he and cunning, caught the beaver, slew the bear,<br /></span> +<span>Overtook the roebuck running, dragged the panther from his lair.<br /></span> +<span>Loved was he by many a maiden; many a dark eye glanced in vain;<br /></span> +<span>Many a heart with sighs was laden for the love it could not gain.<br /></span> +<span>So they called the brave "<i>Ska Câpa</i>;"<a name='FNanchor_CJ'></a><a href='#Footnote_CJ'><sup>[CJ]</sup></a> but the fairest of the band—<br /></span> +<span>Moon-faced, meek Anpétu-Sâpa—won the hunter's heart and hand.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>From the wars with triumph burning, from the chase of bison fleet,<br /></span> +<span>To his lodge the brave returning, spread his trophies at her feet.<br /></span> +<span>Love and joy sat in the <i>teepee</i>; him a black-eyed boy she bore;<br /></span> +<span>But alas, she lived to weep a love she lost forevermore.<br /></span> +<span>For the warriors chose Wanâta first <i>Itáncan</i><a name='FNanchor_CK'></a><a href='#Footnote_CK'><sup>[CK]</sup></a> of the band.<br /></span> +<span>At the council-fire he sat a leader brave, a chieftain grand.<br /></span> +<span>Proud was fair Anpétu-Sâpa, and her eyes were glad with joy;<br /></span> +<span>Proud was she and very happy with her warrior and her boy.<br /></span> +<span>But alas, the fatal honor that her brave Wanâta won,<br /></span> +<span>Brought a bitter woe upon her,—hid with clouds the summer sun.<br /></span> +<span>For among the brave Dakotas wives bring honor to the chief.<br /></span> +<span>On the vine-clad Minnesota's banks he met the Scarlet Leaf.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Young and fair was Apè-dúta<a name='FNanchor_CL'></a><a href='#Footnote_CL'><sup>[CL]</sup></a>—full of craft and very fair;<br /></span> +<span>Proud she walked a queen of beauty with her dark, abundant hair.<br /></span> +<span>In her net of hair she caught him—caught Wanâta with her wiles;<br /></span> +<span>All in vain his wife besought him—begged in vain his wonted smiles.<br /></span> +<span>Apè-dúta ruled the <i>teepee</i>—all Wanâta's smiles were hers;<br /></span> +<span>When the lodge was wrapped in sleep a star<a name='FNanchor_CM'></a><a href='#Footnote_CM'><sup>[CM]</sup></a> beheld the mother's tears.<br /></span> +<span>Long she strove to do her duty for the black-eyed babe she bore;<br /></span> +<span>But the proud, imperious beauty made her sad forevermore.<br /></span> +<span>Still she dressed the skins of beaver, bore the burdens, spread the fare;<br /></span> +<span>Patient ever, murmuring never, though her cheeks were creased with care.<br /></span> +<span>In the moon <i>Magâ-o kâda</i>, <a name='FNanchor_71'></a><a href='#Footnote_71'><sup>[71]</sup></a> twice an hundred years ago—<br /></span> +<span>Ere the "Black Robe's<a name='FNanchor_CN'></a><a href='#Footnote_CN'><sup>[CN]</sup></a>" sacred shadow stalked the prairies' pathless snow—<br /></span> +<span>Down the swollen, rushing river, in the sunset's golden hues,<br /></span> +<span>From the hunt of bear and beaver came the band in swift canoes.<br /></span> +<span>On the queen of fairy islands, on the <i>Wita Wâstè's</i> <a name='FNanchor_CO'></a><a href='#Footnote_CO'><sup>[CO]</sup></a> shore<br /></span> +<span>Camped Wanâta, on the highlands just above the cataract's roar.<br /></span> +<span>Many braves were with Wanâta; Apè-dúta, too, was there,<br /></span> +<span>And the sad Anpétu-sâpa spread the lodge with wonted care.<br /></span> +<span>Then above the leafless prairie leaped the fat-faced, laughing moon,<br /></span> +<span>And the stars—the spirits fairy—walked the welkin one by one.<br /></span> +<span>Swift and silent in the gloaming on the waste of waters blue,<br /></span> +<span>Speeding downward to the foaming, shot Wanâta's birch canoe.<br /></span> +<span>In it stood Anpétu-sâpa—in her arms her sleeping child;<br /></span> +<span>Like a wailing Norse-land <i>drapa</i> <a name='FNanchor_CP'></a><a href='#Footnote_CP'><sup>[CP]</sup></a> rose her death-song weird and wild:<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: Anpétu-sâpa]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Mihihna</i>,<a name='FNanchor_CQ'></a><a href='#Footnote_CQ'><sup>[CQ]</sup></a> <i>Mihihna</i>, my heart is stone;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The light is gone from my longing eyes;<br /></span> +<span>The wounded loon in the lake alone<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her death-song sings to the moon and dies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Mihihna, Mihihna</i>, the path is long,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The burden is heavy and hard to bear;<br /></span> +<span>I sink—I die, and my dying song<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is a song of joy to the false one's ear.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Mihihna, Mihihna</i>, my young heart flew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Far away with my brave to the bison-chase;<br /></span> +<span>To the battle it went with my warrior true,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And never returned till I saw his face.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Mihihna, Mihihna</i>, my brave was glad<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When he came from the chase of the roebuck fleet;<br /></span> +<span>Sweet were the words that my hunter said<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As his trophies he laid at Anpétu's feet.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Mihihna, Mihihna</i>, the boy I bore—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When the robin sang and my brave was true,<br /></span> +<span>I can bear to look on his face no more,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For he looks, <i>Mihihna</i>, so much like you.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Mihihna, Mihihna</i>, the Scarlet Leaf<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Has robbed my boy of his father's love;<br /></span> +<span>He sleeps in my arms—he will find no grief<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the star-lit lodge in the land above.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Mihihna, Mihihna</i>, my heart is stone;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The light is gone from my longing eyes;<br /></span> +<span>The wounded loon in the lake alone<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her death-song sings to the moon and dies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Swiftly down the turbid torrent, as she sung her song she flew;<br /></span> +<span>Like a swan upon the current, dancing rode the light canoe.<br /></span> +<span>Hunters hurry in the gloaming; all in vain Wanâta calls;<br /></span> +<span>Singing through the surges foaming, lo she plunges o'er the Falls.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Long they searched the sullen river—searched for leagues along the shore,<br /></span> +<span>Bark or babe or mother never saw the sad Dakotas more;<br /></span> +<span>But at night or misty morning oft the hunters heard her song,<br /></span> +<span>Oft the maidens heard her warning in their mellow mother-tongue.<br /></span> +<span>On the bluffs they sat enchanted till the blush of beamy dawn;<br /></span> +<span>Spirit Isle, they say, is haunted, and they call the spot Wakân<a name='FNanchor_CR'></a><a href='#Footnote_CR'><sup>[CR]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Many summers on the highland in the full moon's golden glow—<br /></span> +<span>In the woods on Fairy Island,<a name='FNanchor_CS'></a><a href='#Footnote_CS'><sup>[CS]</sup></a> walked a snow-white fawn and doe—<br /></span> +<span>Spirits of the babe and mother sadly seeking evermore<br /></span> +<span>For a father's love another turned away with evil power.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Sometimes still when moonbeams shimmer through the maples on the lawn,<br /></span> +<span>In the gloaming and the glimmer walk the silent doe and fawn;<br /></span> +<span>And on Spirit Isle or near it, under midnight's misty moon,<br /></span> +<span>Oft is seen the mother's spirit, oft is heard her mournful tune.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_CH'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CH'>[CH]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>An-pe-tu Sa-pa</i>—Clouded Day—was the name of the Dakota mother +who committed suicide, as related in this legend, by plunging over the +Falls of St. Anthony. Schoolcraft calls her "<i>Ampata Sapa</i>." <i>Ampata</i> is +not Dakota. There are several versions of this legend, all agreeing in +the main points.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CI'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CI'>[CI]</a><div class='note'><p> The small island of rock a few rods below the Falls, was called by +the Dakotas <i>Wanagee We-ta</i>—Spirit-Island. They say the spirit of +<i>Anpetu Sapa</i> sits upon that island at night and pours forth her sorrow +in song. They also say that from time out of mind, war-eagles nested on +that island, until the advent of white men frightened them away. This +seems to be true. See <i>Carver's Travels</i> (London, 1778), p. 71.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CJ'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CJ'>[CJ]</a><div class='note'><p> Or <i>Capa Ska</i>—White beaver. White beavers are very rare, very +cunning and hard to catch.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CK'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CK'>[CK]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>E-tan-can</i>—Chief.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CL'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CL'>[CL]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>A-pe</i>—leaf,—<i>duta</i>—Scarlet,—Scarlet leaf</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CM'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CM'>[CM]</a><div class='note'><p> Stars, the Dakotas say, are the faces of the departed watching over +their friends and relatives on earth.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CN'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CN'>[CN]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas called the Jesuit priests "Black Robes," from the color +of their vestments.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CO'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CO'>[CO]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Wee-tah Wah-stay</i>—Beautiful Island,—the Dakota name for Nicollet +Island, just above the Falls.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CP'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CP'>[CP]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Drapa</i>, a Norse funeral wail in which the virtues of the deceased +are recounted.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CQ'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CQ'>[CQ]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Mee-heen-yah</i>—My husband.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CR'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CR'>[CR]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced Walk-on,—Sacred, inhabited by a spirit.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CS'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CS'>[CS]</a><div class='note'><p> Fairy Island,—<i>Wita-Waste</i>—Nicollet Island.</p></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<a name="CHICKADEE"></a><h2>CHICKADEE</h2> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee!<br /></span> +<span>That was the song that he sang to me—<br /></span> +<span>Sang from his perch in the willow tree—<br /></span> +<span>Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">My little brown bird,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The song that I heard<br /></span> +<span>Was a happier song than the minstrels sing—<br /></span> +<span>A paean of joy and a carol of spring;<br /></span> +<span>And my heart leaped throbbing and sang with thee<br /></span> +<span>Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">My birdie looked wise<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With his little black eyes,<br /></span> +<span>As he peeked and peered from his perch at me<br /></span> +<span>With a throbbing throat and a flutter of glee,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">As if he would say—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Sing trouble away,<br /></span> +<span>Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Only one note<br /></span> +<span class="i4">From his silver throat;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Only one word<br /></span> +<span class="i4">From my wise little bird;<br /></span> +<span>But a sweeter note or a wiser word<br /></span> +<span>From the tongue of mortal I never have heard,<br /></span> +<span>Than my little philosopher sang to me<br /></span> +<span>From his bending perch in the willow tree—<br /></span> +<span>Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Come foul or fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Come trouble and care—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">No—never a sigh<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Or a thought of despair!<br /></span> +<span>For my little bird sings in my heart to me,<br /></span> +<span>As he sang from his perch in the willow tree—<br /></span> +<span>Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee dee:<br /></span> +<span>Chickadee-dee, chickadee-dee;<br /></span> +<span>Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="ANTHEM" id="ANTHEM" />ANTHEM</h3> + +<h4>[APRIL, 1861.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Spirit of Liberty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wake in the Land!<br /></span> +<span>Sons of our Forefathers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Raise the strong hand!<br /></span> +<span>Burn in each heart anew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Liberty's fires;<br /></span> +<span>Wave the old Flag again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Flag of our sires;<br /></span> +<span>Glow all thy stars again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Banner of Light!<br /></span> +<span>Wave o'er us forever,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Emblem of might;<br /></span> +<span>God for our Banner!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">God for the Right!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Minions of Tyranny,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tremble and kneel!<br /></span> +<span>The sons of the Pilgrims<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are sharpening their steel.<br /></span> +<span>Pledge for our Land again<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Honor and life;<br /></span> +<span>Wave the old Flag again;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On to the strife!<br /></span> +<span>Shades of our Forefathers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Witness our fright!<br /></span> +<span>Wave o'er us forever,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Emblem of might;<br /></span> +<span>God for our Banner!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">God for our Right!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="HURRAH_FOR_THE_VOLUNTEERS" id="HURRAH_FOR_THE_VOLUNTEERS" />HURRAH FOR THE VOLUNTEERS</h3> + +<h4>[May, 1861.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Come then, brave men, from the Land of Lakes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With steady steps and cheers;<br /></span> +<span>Our country calls, as the battle breaks,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On the Northwest Pioneers.<br /></span> +<span>Let the eagle scream, and the bayonet gleam!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hurrah for the Volunteers!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="CHARGE_OF_THE_BLACK_HORSEquot" id="CHARGE_OF_THE_BLACK_HORSEquot" />CHARGE OF "THE BLACK-HORSE"</h3> + +<h4>[First battle of Bull Run.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Our columns are broken, defeated, and fled;<br /></span> +<span>We are gathered, a few from the flying and dead,<br /></span> +<span>Where the green flag is up and our wounded remain<br /></span> +<span>Imploring for water and groaning in pain.<br /></span> +<span>Lo the blood-spattered bosom, the shot-shattered limb,<br /></span> +<span>The hand-clutch of fear as the vision grows dim,<br /></span> +<span>The half-uttered prayer and the blood-fettered breath,<br /></span> +<span>The cold marble brow and the calm face of death.<br /></span> +<span>O proud were these forms at the dawning of morn,<br /></span> +<span>When they sprang to the call of the shrill bugle-horn:<br /></span> +<span>There are mothers and wives that await them afar;<br /></span> +<span>God help them!—Is this then the glory of war?<br /></span> +<span>But hark!—hear the cries from the field of despair;<br /></span> +<span>"The Black-Horse" are charging the fugitives there;<br /></span> +<span>They gallop the field o'er the dying and dead,<br /></span> +<span>And their blades with the blood of their victims are red.<br /></span> +<span>The cries of the fallen and flying are vain;<br /></span> +<span>They saber the wounded and trample the slain;<br /></span> +<span>And the plumes of the riders wave red in the sun,<br /></span> +<span>As they stoop for the stroke and the murder goes on.<br /></span> +<span>They halt for a moment—they form and they stand;<br /></span> +<span>Then with sabers aloft they ride down on our band<br /></span> +<span>Like the samiel that sweeps o'er Arabia's sand.<br /></span> +<span>"Halt!—down with your sabers!—the dying are here!<br /></span> +<span>Let the foeman respect while the friend sheds a tear."<br /></span> +<span>Nay; the merciless butchers were thirsting for blood,<br /></span> +<span>And mad for the murder still onward they rode.<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Stand firm and be ready</i>!"—Our brave, gallant few<br /></span> +<span>Have faced to the foe, and our rifles are true;<br /></span> +<span>Fire!—a score of grim riders go down in a breath<br /></span> +<span>At the flash of our guns—in the tempest of death!<br /></span> +<span>They wheel, and they clutch in despair at the mane!<br /></span> +<span>They reel in their saddles and fall to the plain!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The riderless steeds, wild with wounds and with fear,<br /></span> +<span>Dash away o'er the field in unbridled career;<br /></span> +<span>Their stirrups swing loose and their manes are all gore<br /></span> +<span>From the mad cavaliers that shall ride them no more.<br /></span> +<span>Of the hundred so bold that rode down on us there<br /></span> +<span>But few rode away with the tale of despair;<br /></span> +<span>Their proud, plumèd comrades so reckless, alas,<br /></span> +<span>Slept their long, dreamless sleep on the blood-spattered grass.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="ONLY_A_PRIVATE_KILLED" id="ONLY_A_PRIVATE_KILLED" />ONLY A PRIVATE KILLED</h3> + +<p>[The soldier was Louis Mitchell, of Co. 1, 1st Minn. Vols., killed in a skirmish, near Ball's Bluff, October 22, 1861.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"We've had a brush," the Captain said,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"And Rebel blood we've spilled;<br /></span> +<span>We came off victors with the loss<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of only a <i>private</i> killed."<br /></span> +<span>"Ah," said the orderly—"it was hot,"—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then he breathed a heavy breath—<br /></span> +<span>"Poor fellow!—he was badly shot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then bayoneted to death."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And now was hushed the martial din;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The saucy foe had fled;<br /></span> +<span>They brought the private's body in;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I went to see the dead;<br /></span> +<span>For I could not think our Rebel foes—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So valiant in the van—<br /></span> +<span>So boastful of their chivalry—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Could kill a wounded man.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>A musket ball had pierced his thigh—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A frightful, crushing wound—<br /></span> +<span>And then with savage bayonets<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They pinned him to the ground.<br /></span> +<span>One deadly thrust drove through the heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Another through the head;<br /></span> +<span>Three times they stabbed his pulseless breast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When he lay cold and dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>His hair was matted with his gore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His hands were clinched with might,<br /></span> +<span>As if he still his musket bore<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So firmly in the fight.<br /></span> +<span>He had grasped the foemen's bayonets<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their murderous thrusts to fend:<br /></span> +<span>They raised the coat-cape from his face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lo—it was my friend!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Think what a shudder chilled my heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">'Twas but the day before<br /></span> +<span>We laughed together merrily,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As we talked of days of yore.<br /></span> +<span>"How happy we shall be," he said,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"When the war is o'er, and when<br /></span> +<span>With victory's song and victory's tread<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We all march home again."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Ah little he dreamed—that soldier brave<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So near his journey's goal—<br /></span> +<span>How soon a heavenly messenger<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Would claim his Christian soul.<br /></span> +<span>But he fell like a hero—fighting,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And hearts with grief are filled;<br /></span> +<span>And honor is his,—tho' the Captain says<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Only a <i>private</i> killed."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I knew him well,—he was my friend;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He loved our land and laws,<br /></span> +<span>And he fell a blessed martyr<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To our Country's holy cause;<br /></span> +<span>And I know a cottage in the West<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where eyes with tears are filled<br /></span> +<span>As they read the careless telegram—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Only a <i>private</i> killed."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Comrades, bury him under the oak,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wrapped in his army-blue;<br /></span> +<span>He is done with the battle's din and smoke,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With drill and the proud review.<br /></span> +<span>And the time will come ere long, perchance,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When our blood will thus be spilled,<br /></span> +<span>And what care we if the Captain say—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Only a <i>private</i> killed."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>For the glorious Old Flag beckons.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We have pledged her heart and hand,<br /></span> +<span>And we'll brave even death to rescue<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Our dear old Fatherland.<br /></span> +<span>We ask not praise—nor honors,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then—as each grave is filled—<br /></span> +<span>What care we if the Captain say—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Only a <i>private</i> killed."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="DO_THEY_THINK_OF_US" id="DO_THEY_THINK_OF_US" />DO THEY THINK OF US?</h3> + +<h4>[October, 1861, after the Battle of Ball's Bluff.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Do they think of us, say—in the far distant West—<br /></span> +<span>On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest?<br /></span> +<span>On the long dusty march when the suntide is hot,<br /></span> +<span>O say, are their sons and their brothers forgot?<br /></span> +<span>Are our names on their lips, is our comfort their care<br /></span> +<span>When they kneel to the God of our fathers in prayer?<br /></span> +<span>When at night on their warm, downy pillows they lie,<br /></span> +<span>Wrapped in comfort and ease, do they think of us, say?<br /></span> +<span>When the rain patters down on the roof overhead,<br /></span> +<span>Do they think of the camps without shelter or bed?<br /></span> +<span>Ah many a night on the cold ground we've lain—<br /></span> +<span>Chilled, chilled to the heart by the merciless rain,<br /></span> +<span>And yet there stole o'er us the peace of the blest,<br /></span> +<span>For our spirits went back to our homes in the West.<br /></span> +<span>O we think of them, and it sharpens our steel,<br /></span> +<span>When the battle-smoke rolls and the grim cannon peal,<br /></span> +<span>When forward we rush at the shrill bugle's call<br /></span> +<span>To the hail-storm of conflict where many must fall.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>When night settles down on the slaughter-piled plain,<br /></span> +<span>And the dead are at rest and the wounded in pain,<br /></span> +<span>Do they think of us, say, in the far distant West—<br /></span> +<span>On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest?<br /></span> +<span>Aye, comrades, we know that our darlings are there<br /></span> +<span>With their hearts full of hope and their souls full of prayer,<br /></span> +<span>And it steadies our rifles—it steels every breast—<br /></span> +<span>The thought of our loved ones at home in the West—<br /></span> +<span>On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="CHARGE_OF_FREMONTS_BODY_GUARD" id="CHARGE_OF_FREMONTS_BODY_GUARD" />CHARGE OF FREMONT'S BODY-GUARD</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>On they ride—on they ride—<br /></span> +<span>Only three hundred,—<br /></span> +<span>Ride the brave Body-Guard,<br /></span> +<span>From the "Prairie Scouts" sundered:<br /></span> +<span>Two thousand riflemen,<br /></span> +<span>Ambushed on either side,<br /></span> +<span>The signal of slaughter bide:<br /></span> +<span>Ho! has the farmer-guide<br /></span> +<span>Led them astray and lied?<br /></span> +<span>How can they pass the wood?<br /></span> +<span>On they ride—on they ride—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fearlessly, readily,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Silently, steadily<br /></span> +<span>Ride the brave Body-Guard<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Led by Zagonyi.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Up leap the Southrons there;<br /></span> +<span>Loud breaks the battle-blare;<br /></span> +<span>Now swings his hat in air;<br /></span> +<span>Flashes his saber bare:<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Draw sabers;—follow me</i>!"<br /></span> +<span>Shouts the brave Captain:<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Union and Liberty</i>!"<br /></span> +<span>Thunders the Captain.<br /></span> +<span>Three hundred sabers flash;<br /></span> +<span>Three hundred Guardsmen dash<br /></span> +<span>On to the fierce attack;<br /></span> +<span>Into the <i>cul-de-sac</i><br /></span> +<span class="i2">Plunge the Three Hundred.<br /></span> +<span>Yell the mad ambushed pack—<br /></span> +<span>Two thousand rifles crack<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At the Three Hundred.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dire is the death they deal,<br /></span> +<span>Gleams the steel—volleys peal—<br /></span> +<span>Horses plunge—riders reel;<br /></span> +<span>Sabers and bayonets clash;<br /></span> +<span>Guns in their faces flash;<br /></span> +<span>Blue coats are spattered red—<br /></span> +<span>Fifty brave Guards are dead—<br /></span> +<span>Zagonyi is still ahead,<br /></span> +<span>Swinging his hat in air,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Flashing his saber:<br /></span> +<span>"Steady men;—steady there;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forward—Battalion!"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>On they plunge—on they dash<br /></span> +<span>Thro' the dread gantlet;<br /></span> +<span>Death gurgles in the gash<br /></span> +<span>Of furious-dealt saber-slash;<br /></span> +<span>Over them the volleys crash<br /></span> +<span>Thro' the trees like a whirlwind.<br /></span> +<span>They pass through the fire of death;<br /></span> +<span>Pant riders and steeds for breath;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"<i>Halt!</i>" cried the Captain<br /></span> +<span>Then he looked up the hill;<br /></span> +<span>There on the summit still<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The "Third Company" paltered.<br /></span> +<span>Right through the fire of hell,<br /></span> +<span>Where fifty brave Guardsmen fell,<br /></span> +<span>Zagonyi had ridden well;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Foley had faltered.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Flashed like a flame of fire—<br /></span> +<span>Flashed with a menace dire—<br /></span> +<span>Flashed with a yell of ire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sword of the Captain.<br /></span> +<span>Kennedy saw the flash,<br /></span> +<span>And ordered the "Third" to dash<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gallantly forward:<br /></span> +<span>"Come on, Boys, for Liberty!<br /></span> +<span>Forward, and follow me!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Remember Kentucky!"<br /></span> +<span>Into the hell they broke—<br /></span> +<span>Into the fire and smoke—<br /></span> +<span>Dealing swift saber-stroke—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gallant Kentuckians.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Horses plunge,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Riders lunge<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Heavily forward;<br /></span> +<span>Over the fallen they ride<br /></span> +<span>Down to Zagonyi's side,<br /></span> +<span>Mowing a swath of death<br /></span> +<span>Either side,—right and left<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Piling the slaughtered!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Under the storm of lead,<br /></span> +<span>Still hissing overhead,<br /></span> +<span>They re-formed the battle-line;<br /></span> +<span>Then the brave Captain said:<br /></span> +<span>"Guardsmen: avenge our dead!<br /></span> +<span><i>Charge</i>!"—Up the hill they go,—<br /></span> +<span>Right into the swarming foe!<br /></span> +<span>Woe to the foemen—woe!<br /></span> +<span>See mad Zagonyi there;<br /></span> +<span>Streams on the wind his hair,<br /></span> +<span>Flashes his saber bare;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On they go—on they go;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Volleys flash,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sabers clash,<br /></span> +<span>On they plunge, on they dash,<br /></span> +<span>Following Zagonyi<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Into the hell again.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hand to hand fight and die<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Infantry, cavalry;<br /></span> +<span>Grappled and mixed they lie—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Infantry, cavalry:<br /></span> +<span>Hurra!—the Rebels fly!<br /></span> +<span>Bravo!—Three Hundred!<br /></span> +<span>"Forward and follow me!"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shouted the Captain;<br /></span> +<span>"Union and Liberty!"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All the Guards thundered.<br /></span> +<span>With mad hearts and sabers stout<br /></span> +<span>Into the Rebel-rout<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gallop the Guardsmen,<br /></span> +<span>Thundering their cry again,<br /></span> +<span>Cleaving their foes in twain,<br /></span> +<span>Piling the heaps of slain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sabered and sundered.<br /></span> +<span>Three hundred foes they slayed,<br /></span> +<span>Glorious the charge they made,<br /></span> +<span>Victorious the charge they made—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The gallant Three Hundred!<br /></span> +<span>Let the Crown-Poet paid<br /></span> +<span>Sing of the "Light Brigade"<br /></span> +<span>And "The wild charge they made"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When "Some one had blundered;"<br /></span> +<span>Following the British Bard,<br /></span> +<span>I sing of the Body-Guard—<br /></span> +<span>The Heroes that fought so hard—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where nobody blundered.<br /></span> +<span>Hail, brave Zagonyi—hail!<br /></span> +<span>All hail, the Body-Guard!—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The glorious—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The victorious—<br /></span> +<span>The invincible Three Hundred.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="A_MILLION_MORE" id="A_MILLION_MORE" />A MILLION MORE</h3> + +<h4>[AUGUST, 1862.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>The nation calls aloud again,<br /></span> +<span>For Freedom wounded writhes in pain.<br /></span> +<span>Gird on your armor, Northern men;<br /></span> +<span>Drop scythe and sickle, square and pen;<br /></span> +<span>A million bayonets gleam and flash;<br /></span> +<span>A thousand cannon peal and crash;<br /></span> +<span>Brothers and sons have gone before;<br /></span> +<span>A million more!—a million more!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Fire and sword!—aye, sword and fire!<br /></span> +<span>Let war be fierce and grim and dire;<br /></span> +<span>Your path be marked by flame and smoke,<br /></span> +<span>And tyrant's bones and fetters broke:<br /></span> +<span>Stay not for foe's uplifted hand;<br /></span> +<span>Sheathe not the sword; quench not the brand<br /></span> +<span>Till Freedom reign from shore to shore,<br /></span> +<span>Or might 'mid ashes smoke and gore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>If leader stay the vengeance-rod,<br /></span> +<span>Let him beware the wrath of God;<br /></span> +<span>The maddened millions long his trust<br /></span> +<span>Will crush his puny bones to dust,<br /></span> +<span>And all the law to guide their ire<br /></span> +<span>Will be the law of blood and fire.<br /></span> +<span>Come, then—the shattered ranks implore—<br /></span> +<span>A million more—a million more!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Form and file and file and form;<br /></span> +<span>This war is but God's thunder-storm<br /></span> +<span>To purify our cankered land<br /></span> +<span>And strike the fetter from the hand.<br /></span> +<span>Forced by grim fate our Chief at last<br /></span> +<span>Shall blow dear Freedom's bugle-blast;<br /></span> +<span>And then shall rise from shore to shore<br /></span> +<span>Four millions more—four millions more.<a name='FNanchor_CT'></a><a href='#Footnote_CT'><sup>[CT]</sup></a><br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_CT'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CT'>[CT]</a><div class='note'><p> There were four millions of slaves in the South when the war began.</p></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="ON_READING_PRESIDENT_LINCOLNS_LETTER" id="ON_READING_PRESIDENT_LINCOLNS_LETTER" />ON READING PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S LETTER</h3> + +<h4>To Horace Greeley, of date Aug. 22, 1862—"If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it," etc.</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Perish the power that, bowed to dust,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still wields a tyrant's rod—<br /></span> +<span>That dares not even then be just,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And leave the rest with God.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="THE_DYING_VETERAN" id="THE_DYING_VETERAN" />THE DYING VETERAN</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>All-day-long the crash of cannon<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shook the battle-covered plain;<br /></span> +<span>All-day-long the frenzied foemen<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dashed against our lines in vain;<br /></span> +<span>All the field was piled with slaughter;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now the lurid setting sun<br /></span> +<span>Saw our foes in wild disorder,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And the bloody day was won.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Foremost on our line of battle<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All-day-long a veteran stood—<br /></span> +<span>Stalwart, brawny, grim and steady,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Black with powder, smeared with blood;<br /></span> +<span>Never flinched and never faltered<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the deadliest storm of lead,<br /></span> +<span>And before his steady rifle<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lay a score of foemen dead.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Never flinched and never faltered<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till our shout of victory rose,<br /></span> +<span>Till he saw defeat, disaster,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Overwhelmed our flying foes;<br /></span> +<span>Then he trembled, then he tottered,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gasped for breath and dropped his gun,<br /></span> +<span>Staggered from the ranks and prostrate<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fell to the earth. His work was done.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Silent comrades gathered round him,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And his Captain sadly came,<br /></span> +<span>Bathed his quivering lips with water,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Took his hand and spoke his name;<br /></span> +<span>And his fellow soldiers softly<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On his knapsack laid his head;<br /></span> +<span>Then his eyes were lit with luster,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And he raised his hand and said:<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Good-bye, comrades; farewell, Captain!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I am glad the day is won;<br /></span> +<span>I am mustered out, I reckon—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never mind-my part is done.<br /></span> +<span>We have marched and fought together<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till you seem like brothers all,<br /></span> +<span>But I hope again to meet you<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At the final bugle-call.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Captain, write and tell my mother<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That she must not mourn and cry,<br /></span> +<span>For I never flinched in battle,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I do not fear to die.<br /></span> +<span>You may add a word for Mary;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tell her I was ever true.<br /></span> +<span>Mary took a miff one Sunday,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so I put on the "blue."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"And I know she has repented,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I never let her see<br /></span> +<span>How it cut—her crusty answer—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When she turned away from me.<br /></span> +<span>I was never good at coaxing,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So I didn't even try;<br /></span> +<span>But you tell her I forgive her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she must not mourn and cry,"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Then he closed his eyes in slumber,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And his spirit passed away,<br /></span> +<span>And his comrades spread a blanket<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O'er his cold and silent clay.<br /></span> +<span>At dawn of morn they buried him,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wrapped in his army-blue.<br /></span> +<span>On the bloody field of Fair Oaks<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sleeps the soldier tried and true.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="GRIERSONS_RAID" id="GRIERSONS_RAID" />GRIERSON'S RAID</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Mount to horse—mount to horse;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forward, Battalion!<br /></span> +<span>Gallop the gallant force;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Down with Rebellion!<br /></span> +<span>Over hill, creek and plain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Clatter the fearless—<br /></span> +<span>Dash away—splash away—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Led by the Peerless.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Carbines crack—foemen fly<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hither and thither;<br /></span> +<span>Under the death-fire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They falter and wither.<br /></span> +<span>Burn the bridge—tear the track—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Down with Rebellion!<br /></span> +<span>Cut the wires—cut the wires!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forward, Battalion!<br /></span> +<span>Day and night—night and day,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gallop the fearless—<br /></span> +<span>Swimming the rivers' floods—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Led by the Peerless;<br /></span> +<span>Depots and powder-trains<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blazing and thundering<br /></span> +<span>Masters and dusky slaves<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gazing and wondering.<br /></span> +<span>Eight hundred miles they ride—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dauntless Battalion—<br /></span> +<span>Down through the Southern Land<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mad with Rebellion.<br /></span> +<span>Into our lines they dash—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Brave Cavaliers—<br /></span> +<span>Greeting our flag with<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A thunder of cheers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<h3><a name="THE_OLD_FLAG" id="THE_OLD_FLAG" />THE OLD FLAG</h3> + +<h4>[Written July 4, 1863.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Have ye heard of Fort Donelson's desperate fight,<br /></span> +<span>Where the giant Northwest bared his arm for the right,<br /></span> +<span>Where thousands so bravely went down in the slaughter,<br /></span> +<span>And the blood of the West ran as freely as water;<br /></span> +<span>Where the Rebel Flag fell and our banner arose<br /></span> +<span>O'er an army of captured and suppliant foes?<br /></span> +<span>Lo—torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder,<br /></span> +<span>The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Heard ye of Shiloh, where fierce Beauregard<br /></span> +<span>O'erwhelmed us with numbers and pressed us so hard,<br /></span> +<span>Till our veteran supporters came up to our aid<br /></span> +<span>And the tide of defeat and disaster was staid—<br /></span> +<span>Where like grain-sheaves the slaughtered were piled on the plain<br /></span> +<span>And the brave rebel Johnston went down with the slain?<br /></span> +<span>Lo—torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder,<br /></span> +<span>The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Heard ye the cannon-roar down by Stone River?<br /></span> +<span>Saw ye the bleeding braves stagger and quiver?<br /></span> +<span>Heard ye the shout and the roar and the rattle?<br /></span> +<span>And saw ye the desperate surging of battle?<br /></span> +<span>Volley on volley and steel upon steel—<br /></span> +<span>Breast unto breast—how they lunge and they reel!<br /></span> +<span>Lo—torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder,<br /></span> +<span>The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Heard ye of Vicksburg—the Southern Gibraltar,<br /></span> +<span>Where the hands of our foemen built tyranny's altar,<br /></span> +<span>Where their hosts are walled in by a cordon of braves,<br /></span> +<span>And the pits they have dug for defense are their graves,<br /></span> +<span>Where the red bombs are bursting and hissing the shot,<br /></span> +<span>Where the nine thunders death and the charge follows hot?<br /></span> +<span>Lo—torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder,<br /></span> +<span>The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Heard ye from Gettysburg?—Glory to God!<br /></span> +<span>Bare your heads, O ye Freemen, and kneel on the sod!<br /></span> +<span>Praise the Lord!—praise the Lord!—it is done!—it is done!<br /></span> +<span>The battle is fought and the victory won!<br /></span> +<span>They first took the sword, and they fall by the sword;<br /></span> +<span>They are scattered and crushed by the hand of the Lord!<br /></span> +<span>Lo—torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder,<br /></span> +<span>The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="GETTYSBURG_CHARGE_OF_THE_FIRST_MINNESOTA" id="GETTYSBURG_CHARGE_OF_THE_FIRST_MINNESOTA" />GETTYSBURG: CHARGE OF THE FIRST MINNESOTA</h3> + +<p>[Written for and read at the Camp Fire of the G.A.R. Department of Minnesota, National Encampment of the Grand Army of the Republic, at Minneapolis, June 22, 1884.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Ready and ripe for the harvest lay the acres of golden grain<br /></span> +<span>Waving on hillock and hillside and bending along the plain.<br /></span> +<span>Ready and ripe for the harvest two veteran armies lay<br /></span> +<span>Waiting the signal of battle on the Gettysburg hills that day.<br /></span> +<span>Sharp rang the blast of the bugles calling the foe to the fray,<br /></span> +<span>And shrill from the enemy's cannon the demon shells shrieked as they flew;<br /></span> +<span>Crashed and rumbled and roared our batteries ranged on the hill,<br /></span> +<span>Rumbled and roared at the front the bellowing guns of the foe<br /></span> +<span>Swelling the chorus of hell ever louder and deadlier still,<br /></span> +<span>And shrill o'er the roar of the cannon rose the yell of the rebels below,<br /></span> +<span>As they charged on our Third Corps advanced and crushed in the lines at a blow.<br /></span> +<span>Leading his clamorous legions, flashing his saber in air,<br /></span> +<span>Forward rode furious Longstreet charging on Round Top there—<br /></span> +<span>Key to our left and center—key to the fate of the field—<br /></span> +<span>Leading his wild-mad Southrons on to the lions' lair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Red with the blood of our legions—red with the blood of our best,<br /></span> +<span>Waiting the fate of the battle the lurid sun stood in the west.<br /></span> +<span>Hid by the crest of the hills we lay at the right concealed,<br /></span> +<span>Prone on the earth that shuddered under us there as we lay.<br /></span> +<span>Thunder of cheers on the left!—dashing down on his stalwart bay,<br /></span> +<span>Spurring his gallant charger till his foaming flanks ran blood,<br /></span> +<span>Hancock, the star of our legions, rode down where our officers stood:<br /></span> +<span>"<i>By the left flank, double-quick, march!</i>"—We sprang to our feet and away,<br /></span> +<span>Like a fierce pack of hunger-mad wolves that pant for the blood of the prey.<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Halt!</i>"—on our battery's flank we stood like a hedge-row of steel—<br /></span> +<span>Bearing the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Down at the marge of the valley our broken ranks stagger and reel,<br /></span> +<span>Grimy with dust and with powder, wearied and panting for breath,<br /></span> +<span>Flinging their arms in panic, flying the hail-storm of death.<br /></span> +<span>Rumble of volley on volley of the enemy hard on the rear,<br /></span> +<span>Yelling their wild, mad triumph, thundering cheer upon cheer,<br /></span> +<span>Dotting the slope with slaughter and sweeping the field with fear.<br /></span> +<span>Drowned is the blare of the bugle, lost is the bray of the drum,<br /></span> +<span>Yelling, defiant, victorious, column on column they come.<br /></span> +<span>Only a handful are we, thrown into the gap of our lines,<br /></span> +<span>Holding the perilous breach where the fate of the battle inclines,<br /></span> +<span>Only a handful are we—column on column they come.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Roared like the voice of a lion brave Hancock fierce for the fray:<br /></span> +<span>"Hurry the reserve battalions; bring every banner and gun:<br /></span> +<span>Charge on the enemy, Colvill, stay the advance of his lines:<br /></span> +<span>Here—by the God of our Fathers!—here shall the battle be won,<br /></span> +<span>Or we'll die for the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills today."<br /></span> +<span>Shrill rang the voice of our Colonel, the bravest and best of the brave:<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Forward, the First Minnesota! Forward, and follow me, men!</i>"<br /></span> +<span>Gallantly forward he strode, the bravest and best of the brave.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Two hundred and fifty and two—all that were left of us then—<br /></span> +<span>Two hundred and fifty and two fearless, unfaltering men<br /></span> +<span>Dashed at a run for the enemy, sprang to the charge with a yell.<br /></span> +<span>On us their batteries thundered solid shot, grape shot and shell;<br /></span> +<span>Never a man of us faltered, but many a comrade fell.<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Forward, the First Minnesota!</i>"—like tigers we sprang at our foes;<br /></span> +<span>Grim gaps of death in our ranks, but ever the brave ranks close:<br /></span> +<span>Down went our sergeant and colors—defiant our colors arose!<br /></span> +<span>"<i>Fire</i>!" At the flash of our rifles—grim gaps in the ranks of our foes!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"<i>Forward, the First Minnesota!</i>" our brave Colonel cried as he fell<br /></span> +<span>Gashed and shattered and mangled—"<i>Forward</i>!" he cried as he fell.<br /></span> +<span>Over him mangled and bleeding frenzied we sprang to the fight,<br /></span> +<span>Over him mangled and bleeding we sprang to the jaws of hell.<br /></span> +<span>Flashed in our faces their rifles, roared on the left and the right,<br /></span> +<span>Swarming around us by thousands we fought them with desperate might.<br /></span> +<span>Five times our banner went down—five times our banner arose,<br /></span> +<span>Tattered and torn but defiant, and flapped in the face of our foes.<br /></span> +<span>Hold them? We held them at bay, as a bear holds the hounds on his track,<br /></span> +<span>Knee to knee, shoulder to shoulder, we met them and staggered them back.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Desperate, frenzied, bewildered, blindly they fired on their own;<br /></span> +<span>Like reeds in the whirl of the cyclone columns and colors went down.<br /></span> +<span>Banner of stars on the right! Hurrah! gallant Gibbon is come!<br /></span> +<span>Thunder of guns on the left! Hurrah! 'tis our cannon that boom!<br /></span> +<span>Solid-shot, grape-shot and canister crash like the cracking of doom.<br /></span> +<span>Baffled, bewildered and broken the ranks of the enemy yield;<br /></span> +<span>Panic-struck, routed and shattered they fly from the fate of the field.<br /></span> +<span>Hold them? We held them at bay, as a bear holds the hounds on his track;<br /></span> +<span>Knee to knee, shoulder to shoulder, we met them and staggered them back;<br /></span> +<span>Two hundred and fifty and two, we held their mad thousands at bay,<br /></span> +<span>Met them and baffled and broke them, turning the tide of the day;<br /></span> +<span>Two hundred and fifty and two when the sun hung low in heaven,<br /></span> +<span>But ah! when the stars rode over we numbered but forty-seven:<br /></span> +<span>Dead on the field or wounded the rest of our regiment lay;<br /></span> +<span>Never a man of us faltered or flinched in the fire of the fray,<br /></span> +<span>For we bore the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Tears for our fallen comrades—cover their graves with flowers,<br /></span> +<span>For they fought and fell like Spartans for this glorious land of ours.<br /></span> +<span>They fell, but they fell victorious, for the Rebel ranks were riven,<br /></span> +<span>And over our land united—one nation from sea to sea,<br /></span> +<span>Over the grave of Treason, over millions of men made free,<br /></span> +<span>Triumphant the flag of our fathers waves in the winds of heaven—<br /></span> +<span>Striped with the blood of her heroes she waves in the winds of heaven.<br /></span> +<span>Tears for our fallen comrades—cover their graves with flowers,<br /></span> +<span>For they fought and fell like Spartans for this glorious land of ours;<br /></span> +<span>And oft shall our children's children garland their graves and say:<br /></span> +<span>"They bore the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="ADDRESS_TO_THE_FLAG" id="ADDRESS_TO_THE_FLAG" />ADDRESS TO THE FLAG</h3> + +<h4>[After the Battle of Gettysburg.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Float in the winds of heaven, O tattered Flag!<br /></span> +<span>Emblem of hope to all the misruled world:<br /></span> +<span>Thy field of golden stars is rent and red—<br /></span> +<span>Dyed in the blood of brothers madly spilled<br /></span> +<span>By brother-hands upon the mother-soil.<br /></span> +<span>O fatal Upas of the savage Nile,<a name='FNanchor_CU'></a><a href='#Footnote_CU'><sup>[CU]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Transplanted hither—rooted—multiplied—<br /></span> +<span>Watered with bitter tears and sending forth<br /></span> +<span>Thy venom-vapors till the land is mad,<br /></span> +<span>Thy day is done. A million blades are swung<br /></span> +<span>To lay thy jungles open to the sun;<br /></span> +<span>A million torches fire thy blasted boles;<br /></span> +<span>A million hands shall drag thy fibers out<br /></span> +<span>And feed the fires till every root and branch<br /></span> +<span>Lie in dead ashes. From the blackened soil,<br /></span> +<span>Enriched and moistened with fraternal blood,<br /></span> +<span>Beside the palm shall spring the olive-tree,<br /></span> +<span>And every breeze shall waft the happy song<br /></span> +<span>Of Freedom crowned with olive-twigs and flowers.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Yea, Patriot-Flag of our old patriot-sires,<br /></span> +<span>Honored—victorious on an hundred fields<br /></span> +<span>Where side by side for Freedom's mother-land<br /></span> +<span>Her Southern sons and Northern fighting fell,<br /></span> +<span>And side by side in glorious graves repose,<br /></span> +</div></div> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>I see the dawn of glory grander still,<br /></span> +<span>When hand in hand upon this battle-field<br /></span> +<span>The blue-eyed maidens of the Merrimac<br /></span> +<span>With dewy roses from the Granite Hills,<br /></span> +<span>And dark-eyed daughters from the land of palms<br /></span> +<span>With orange-blossoms from the broad St. Johns,<br /></span> +<span>In solemn concert singing as they go,<br /></span> +<span>Shall strew the graves of these fraternal dead.<br /></span> +<span>The day of triumph comes, O blood-stained Flag!<br /></span> +<span>Washed clean and lustrous in the morning light<br /></span> +<span>Of a new era, thou shalt float again<br /></span> +<span>In more than pristine glory o'er the land<br /></span> +<span>Peace-blest and re-united. On the seas<br /></span> +<span>Thou shalt be honored to the farthest isle.<br /></span> +<span>The oppressed of foreign lands shall flock the shores<br /></span> +<span>To look upon and bless thee. Mothers shall lift<br /></span> +<span>Their infants to behold thee as a star<br /></span> +<span>New-born in heaven to light the darksome world.<br /></span> +<span>The children weeping round the desolate,<br /></span> +<span>Sore-stricken mother in the saddened home<br /></span> +<span>Whereto the father shall no more return,<br /></span> +<span>In future years will proudly boast the blood<br /></span> +<span>Of him who bravely fell defending thee.<br /></span> +<span>And these misguided brothers who would tear<br /></span> +<span>Thy starry field asunder and would trail<br /></span> +<span>Their own proud flag and history in the dust,<br /></span> +<span>Ere many years will bless thee, dear old Flag,<br /></span> +<span>That thou didst triumph even over them.<br /></span> +<span>Aye, even they with proudly swelling hearts<br /></span> +<span>Will see the glory thou shalt shortly wear,<br /></span> +<span>And new-born stars swing in upon thy field<br /></span> +<span>In lustrous clusters. Come, O glorious day<br /></span> +<span>Of Freedom crowned with Peace. God's will be done!<br /></span> +<span>God's will is peace on earth—good-will to men.<br /></span> +<span>The chains all broken and the bond all free,<br /></span> +<span>O may this nation learn to war no more;<br /></span> +<span>Yea, into plow-shares may these brothers beat<br /></span> +<span>Their swords and into pruning-hooks their spears,<br /></span> +<span>Clasp hands again, and plant these battle-fields<br /></span> +<span>With golden corn and purple-clustered vines,<br /></span> +<span>And side by side re-build the broken walls—<br /></span> +<span>Joined and cemented as one solid stone<br /></span> +<span>With patriot-love and Christ's sweet charity.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_CU'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CU'>[CU]</a><div class='note'><p> African slavery.</p></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="NEW_YEARS_ADDRESS_JANUARY_1_1866" id="NEW_YEARS_ADDRESS_JANUARY_1_1866" />NEW-YEARS ADDRESS—JANUARY 1, 1866</h3> + +<h4>[Written for the St. Paul Pioneer.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Good morning—good morning—a happy new year!<br /></span> +<span>We greet you, kind friends of the old <i>Pioneer</i>;<br /></span> +<span>Hope your coffee is good and your steak is well done,<br /></span> +<span>And you're happy as clams in the sand and the sun.<br /></span> +<span>The old year's a shadow—a shade of the past;<br /></span> +<span>It is gone with its toils and its triumphs so vast—<br /></span> +<span>With its joys and its tears—with its pleasure and pain—<br /></span> +<span>With its shouts of the brave and its heaps of the slain—<br /></span> +<span>Gone—and it cometh—no, never again.<br /></span> +<span>And as we look forth on the future so fair<br /></span> +<span>Let us brush from the picture the visage of care;<br /></span> +<span>The error, the folly, the frown and the tear—<br /></span> +<span>Drop them all at the grave of the silent old year.<br /></span> +<span>Has the heart been oppressed with a burden of woe?<br /></span> +<span>Has the spirit been cowed by a merciless blow?<br /></span> +<span>Has the tongue of the brave or the voice of the fair<br /></span> +<span>Prayed to God and received no response to its prayer?<br /></span> +<span>Look up!—'twas a shadow—the morning is here:<br /></span> +<span>A Happy New Year!—O, a Happy New Year!<br /></span> +<span>Yet stay for a moment. We cannot forget<br /></span> +<span>The fields where the true and the traitor have met;<br /></span> +<span>When the old year came in we were trembling with fear<br /></span> +<span>Lest Freedom should fall in her glorious career;<br /></span> +<span>And the roar of the conflict was loud o'er the land<br /></span> +<span>Where the traitor-flag waved in a rebel's red hand;<br /></span> +<span>But the God of the Just led the hosts of the Free,<br /></span> +<span>And Victory marched from the north to the sea.<br /></span> +<span>Behold—where the conflict was doubtful and dire—<br /></span> +<span>There—on house-top and hill-top, on fortress and spire—<br /></span> +<span>The Old Banner waves again higher and prouder,<br /></span> +<span>Though torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>God bless the brave soldiers that followed that flag<br /></span> +<span>Through river and swamp, over mountain and crag—<br /></span> +<span>On the wild charge triumphant—the sullen retreat—<br /></span> +<span>On fields spread with victory or piled with defeat;<br /></span> +<span>God bless their true hearts for they stood like a wall,<br /></span> +<span>And saved us our Country and saved us our all.<br /></span> +<span>But many a mother and many a daughter<br /></span> +<span>Weep, alas, o'er the brave that went down in the slaughter.<br /></span> +<span>Pile the monuments high—not on hill-top and plain—<br /></span> +<span>To the glorious sons 'neath the old banner slain—<br /></span> +<span>But over the land from the sea to the sea—<br /></span> +<span>Pile their monuments high in the hearts of the Free.<br /></span> +<span>Heaven bless the brave souls that are spared to return<br /></span> +<span>Where the "lamp in the window" ceased never to burn—<br /></span> +<span>Where the vacant chair stood at the desolate hearth<br /></span> +<span>Since the son shouldered arms or the father went forth.<br /></span> +<span>"Peace!—Peace!"—was the shout;—at the jubilant word<br /></span> +<span>Wives and mothers went down on their knees to the Lord!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Methinks I can see, through the vista of years—<br /></span> +<span>From the memories of old such a vision appears—<br /></span> +<span>A gray-haired old veteran in arm-chair at ease,<br /></span> +<span>With his grandchildren clustered intent at his knees,<br /></span> +<span>Recounting his deeds with an eloquent tongue,<br /></span> +<span>And a fire that enkindles the hearts of the young;<br /></span> +<span>How he followed the Flag from the first to the last—<br /></span> +<span>On the long, weary march, in the battle's hot blast;<br /></span> +<span>How he marched under Sherman from center to sea,<br /></span> +<span>Or fought under Grant in his battles with Lee;<br /></span> +<span>And the old fire comes back to his eye as of yore,<br /></span> +<span>And his iron hand clutches his musket once more,<br /></span> +<span>As of old on the battle-field ghastly and red,<br /></span> +<span>When he sprang to the charge o'er the dying and dead;<br /></span> +<span>And the eyes of his listeners are gleaming with fire,<br /></span> +<span>As he points to that Flag floating high on the spire.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: And the eyes of his listeners are gleaming with fire +As he points to that flag floating high on the spire.]</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Heaven bless the new year that is just ushered in;<br /></span> +<span>May the Rebels repent of their folly and sin,<br /></span> +<span>Depart from their idols, extend the right hand,<br /></span> +<span>And pledge that the Union forever shall stand.<br /></span> +<span>May they see that the rending of fetter and chain<br /></span> +<span>Is <i>their</i> triumph as well—their unspeakable gain;<br /></span> +<span>That the Union dissevered and weltering in blood<br /></span> +<span>Could yield them no profit and bode them no good.<br /></span> +<span>'Tis human to err and divine to forgive;<br /></span> +<span>Let us walk after Christ—bid the poor sinners live,<br /></span> +<span>And come back to the fold of the Union once more,<br /></span> +<span>And we'll do as the prodigal's father of yore—<br /></span> +<span>Kill the well-fatted calf—(but we'll not do it twice)<br /></span> +<span>And invite them to dinner—and give them a slice.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>There's old Johnny Bull—what a terrible groan<br /></span> +<span>Escapes when he thinks of his big "Rebel Loan"—<br /></span> +<span>How the money went out with a nod and a grin,<br /></span> +<span>But the cotton—the cotton—it didn't come in.<br /></span> +<span>Then he thinks of diplomacy—Mason-Slidell,<br /></span> +<span>And he wishes that both had been warming in hell,<br /></span> +<span>For he got such a rap from our little Bill Seward<br /></span> +<span>That the red nose he blows is right hard to be cured;<br /></span> +<span>And then the steam pirates he built and equipped,<br /></span> +<span>And boasted, you know, that they couldn't be whipped;<br /></span> +<span>But alas for his boast—Johnny Bull "caught a Tartar,"<br /></span> +<span>And now like a calf he is bawling for quarter.<br /></span> +<span>Yes, bluff Johnny Bull will be tame as a yearling,<br /></span> +<span>Beg pardon and humbly "come down" with his sterling.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>There's Monsieur <i>l'Escamoteur</i><a name='FNanchor_CV'></a><a href='#Footnote_CV'><sup>[CV]</sup></a> over in France;<br /></span> +<span>He has had a clear field and a gay country dance<br /></span> +<span>Down there in Mexico—playing his tricks<br /></span> +<span>While we had a family "discussion wid sticks";<br /></span> +<span>But the game is played out; don't you see it's so handy<br /></span> +<span>For Grant and his boys to march over the Grande.<br /></span> +<span>He twists his waxed moustache and looks very blue,<br /></span> +<span>And he says to himself, (what he wouldn't to you)<br /></span> +<span>"Py tam—dair's mon poor leetle chappie—Dutch Max!<br /></span> +<span><i>Cornes du Diable</i><a name='FNanchor_CW'></a><a href='#Footnote_CW'><sup>[CW]</sup></a>—'e'll 'ave to make tracks<br /></span> +<span>Or ve'll 'ave all dem tam Yankee poys on our packs."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Monsieur l'Empereur, if your Max can get out<br /></span> +<span>With the hair of his head on—he'd better, no doubt.<br /></span> +<span>If you'll not take it hard, here's a bit of advice—<br /></span> +<span>It is dangerous for big pigs to dance on the ice;<br /></span> +<span>They sometimes slip up and they sometimes fall in,<br /></span> +<span>And the ice you are on is exceedingly thin.<br /></span> +<span>You're <i>au fait</i>, I'll admit, at a sharp game of chance,<br /></span> +<span>But the Devil himself couldn't always beat France.<br /></span> +<span>Remember the fate of your uncle of yore,<br /></span> +<span>Tread lightly, and keep very close to the shore.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The Giant Republic—its future how vast!<br /></span> +<span>Now, freed from the follies and sins of the past,<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>It will tower to the zenith; the ice-covered sea<br /></span> +<span>And Darien shall bound-mark the Land of the Free.<br /></span> +<span>Behold how the landless, the poor and oppressed,<br /></span> +<span>Flock in on our shores from the East and the West!<br /></span> +<span>Let them come—bid them come—we have plenty of room;<br /></span> +<span>Our forests shall echo, our prairies shall bloom;<br /></span> +<span>The iron horse, puffing his cloud-breath of steam,<br /></span> +<span>Shall course every valley and leap every stream;<br /></span> +<span>New cities shall rise with a magic untold,<br /></span> +<span>While our mines yield their treasures of silver and gold,<br /></span> +<span>And prosperous, united and happy, we'll climb<br /></span> +<span>Up the mountain of Fame till the end of Old Time—<br /></span> +<span>Which, as I figure up, is a century hence:<br /></span> +<span>Then we'll all go abroad without any expense;<br /></span> +<span>We'll capture a comet—the smart Yankee race<br /></span> +<span>Will ride on his tail through the kingdom of Space,<br /></span> +<span>Tack their telegraph wires to Uranus and Mars;<br /></span> +<span>Yea, carry their arts to the ultimate stars,<br /></span> +<span>And flaunt the Old Flag at the suns as they pass,<br /></span> +<span>And astonish the Devil himself with—their brass.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And now, "Gentle Readers," I'll bid you farewell;<br /></span> +<span>I hope this fine poem will please you—and <i>sell</i>.<br /></span> +<span>You'll ne'er lack a friend if you ne'er lack a dime;<br /></span> +<span>May you never grow old till the end of Old Time;<br /></span> +<span>May you never be cursed with an itching for rhyme;<br /></span> +<span>For in spite of your physic, in spite of your plaster,<br /></span> +<span>The rash will break out till you go to disaster—<br /></span> +<span>Which you plainly can see is the case with my Muse,<br /></span> +<span>For she scratches away though she's said her adieus.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Dear Ladies, though last to receive my oblation,<br /></span> +<span>And last in the list of Mosaic creation,<br /></span> +<span>The last is the best, and the last shall be first.<br /></span> +<span>Through Eve, sayeth Moses, old Adam was cursed;<br /></span> +<span>But I cannot agree with you, Moses, that Adam<br /></span> +<span>Sinned and fell through the gentle persuasion of madam.<br /></span> +<span>The victim, no doubt, of Egyptian flirtation,<br /></span> +<span>You mistook your chagrin for divine inspiration,<br /></span> +<span>And condemned all the sex without proof or probation,<br /></span> +<span>As we rhymsters mistake the moonbeams that elate us<br /></span> +<span>For flashes of wit or the holy afflatus,<br /></span> +<span>And imagine we hear the applause of a nation,—<br /></span> +<span>But all honest men who are married and blest<br /></span> +<span>Will agree that the last work of God is the best.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And now to you all—whether married or single—<br /></span> +<span>Whether sheltered by slate, or by "shake," or by shingle—<br /></span> +<span>God bless you with peace and with bountiful cheer,<br /></span> +<span>Happy houses, happy hearts—and a happy New Year!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>P.S.—If you wish all these blessings, 'tis clear<br /></span> +<span>You should send in your "stamps" for the old <i>Pioneer</i>.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_CV'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CV'>[CV]</a><div class='note'><p> The Juggler.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_CW'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CW'>[CW]</a><div class='note'><p> Horns of the Devil!—equivalent to the exclamation—The Devil!</p></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="MY_FATHER_LAND" id="MY_FATHER_LAND" />MY FATHER-LAND</h3> + +<h4>[From the German of Theodor Korner.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Where is the minstrel's Father-land?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where the sparks of noble spirits flew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where flowery wreaths for beauty grew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where strong hearts glowed so glad and true<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For all things sacred, good and grand:<br /></span> +<span>There was my Father-land.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>How named the minstrel's Father-land?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O'er slaughtered son—'neath tyrants' yokes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She weepeth now—and foreign strokes;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They called her once the Land of Oaks—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Land of the Free—the German Land:<br /></span> +<span>Thus was called my Father-land.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Why weeps the minstrel's Father-land?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because while tyrant's tempest hailed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The people's chosen princes quailed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all their sacred pledges failed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because she could no ear command,<br /></span> +<span>Alas must weep my Father-land.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Whom calls the minstrel's Father-land?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She calls on heaven with wild alarm—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With desperation's thunder-storm—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On Liberty to bare her arm,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On Retribution's vengeful hand:<br /></span> +<span>On these she calls—my Father-land.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>What would the minstrel's Father-land?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She would strike the base slaves to the ground<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Chase from her soil the tyrant hound,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And free her sons in shackles bound,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or lay them free beneath her sand:<br /></span> +<span>That would my Father-land.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And hopes the minstrel's Father-land?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She hopes for holy Freedom's sake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hopes that her true sons will awake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hopes that just God will vengeance take,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And ne'er mistakes the Avenger's hand:<br /></span> +<span>Thereon relies my Father-land.<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="MY_HEARTS_ON_THE_RHINE" id="MY_HEARTS_ON_THE_RHINE" />MY HEART'S ON THE RHINE</h3> + +<h4>[From the German of Wolfgang Muller.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>My heart's on the Rhine—in the old Father-land;<br /></span> +<span>Where my cradle was rocked by a dear mother's hand,<br /></span> +<span>My youth and my friends—they are there yet, I know,<br /></span> +<span>And my love dreams of me with her cheeks all aglow;<br /></span> +<span>O there where I reveled in song and in wine!<br /></span> +<span>Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I hail thee, thou broad-breasted, golden-green stream;<br /></span> +<span>Ye cities and churches and castles that gleam;<br /></span> +<span>Ye grain-fields of gold in the valley so blue;<br /></span> +<span>Ye vineyards that glow in the sun-shimmered dew;<br /></span> +<span>Ye forests and caverns and cliffs that were mine!<br /></span> +<span>Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I hail thee, O life of the soul-stirring song,<br /></span> +<span>Of waltz and of wine, with a yearning so strong,<br /></span> +<span>Hail, ye stout race of heroes, so brave and so true.<br /></span> +<span>Ye blue-eyed, gay maidens, a greeting to you!<br /></span> +<span>Your life and your aims and your efforts be mine;<br /></span> +<span>Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>My heart's on the Rhine—in the old Father-land,<br /></span> +<span>Where my cradle was rocked by a dear mother's hand;<br /></span> +<span>My youth and my friends—they are there yet, I know,<br /></span> +<span>And my love dreams of me with her cheeks all aglow:<br /></span> +<span>Be thou ever the same to me, Land of the Vine!<br /></span> +<span>Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="THE_MINSTREL" id="THE_MINSTREL" />THE MINSTREL</h3> + +<h4>[From the German of Goethe]</h4> +<h4>[<i>Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, Book 2, Chap. 2.</i>]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>"What hear I at the gateway ringing?<br /></span> +<span>What bard upon the drawbridge singing?<br /></span> +<span>Go bid him to repeat his song<br /></span> +<span>Here, in the hall amid the throng,"<br /></span> +<span>The monarch cried;<br /></span> +<span>The little page hied;<br /></span> +<span>As back he sped,<br /></span> +<span>The monarch said—<br /></span> +<span>"Bring in the gray-haired minstrel."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I greet you, noble lords and peers;<br /></span> +<span>I greet you, lovely dames.<br /></span> +<span>O heaven begemmed with golden spheres!<br /></span> +<span>Who knows your noble names?<br /></span> +<span>In hall of splendor so sublime,<br /></span> +<span>Close ye, mine eyes—'tis not the time<br /></span> +<span>To gaze in idle wonder."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>The gray-haired minstrel closed his eyes;<br /></span> +<span>He struck his wildest air;<br /></span> +<span>Brave faces glowed like sunset skies;<br /></span> +<span>Cast down their eyes the fair.<br /></span> +<span>The king well pleased with the minstrel's song,<br /></span> +<span>Sent the little page through the wondering throng<br /></span> +<span>A chain of gold to bear him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"O give not me the chain of gold;<br /></span> +<span>Award it to thy braves,<br /></span> +<span>Before whose faces fierce and bold<br /></span> +<span>Quail foes when battle raves;<br /></span> +<span>Or give it thy chancellor of state,<br /></span> +<span>And let him wear its golden weight<br /></span> +<span>With his official burdens.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I sing, I sing as the wild birds sing<br /></span> +<span>That in the forest dwell;<br /></span> +<span>The songs that from my bosom spring<br /></span> +<span>Alone reward me well:<br /></span> +<span>But may I ask that page of thine<br /></span> +<span>To bring me one good cup of wine<br /></span> +<span>In golden goblet sparkling?"<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>He took the cup; he drank it all:<br /></span> +<span>"O soothing nectar thine!<br /></span> +<span>Thrice bless'd the highly favored hall<br /></span> +<span>Where flows such glorious wine:<br /></span> +<span>If thou farest well, then think of me,<br /></span> +<span>And thank thy God, as I thank thee<br /></span> +<span>For this inspiring goblet."<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="HOPE" id="HOPE" />HOPE</h3> + +<h4>[From the German of Schiller.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Men talk and dream of better days—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of a golden time to come;<br /></span> +<span>Toward a happy and shining goal<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They run with a ceaseless hum.<br /></span> +<span>The world grows old and grows young again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still hope of the better is bright to men.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hope leads us in at the gate of life;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She crowns the boyish head;<br /></span> +<span>Her bright lamp lures the stalwart youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor burns out with the gray-haired dead;<br /></span> +<span>For the grave closes over his trouble and care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But see—on the grave—Hope is planted there!<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>'Tis not an empty and flattering deceit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Begot in a foolish brain;<br /></span> +<span>For the heart speaks loud with its ceaseless throbs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"We are not born in vain";<br /></span> +<span>And the words that out of the heart-throbs roll,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They cannot deceive the hoping soul.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="MRS_MCNAIR" id="MRS_MCNAIR" />MRS. MCNAIR</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>Misce stultitiam consiliis brevem.—Horace.</i><br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Mrs. McNair<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Was tall and fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mrs. McNair was slim;<br /></span> +<span>She had flashing black eyes and raven hair;<br /></span> +<span>But a very remarkably modest air;<br /></span> +<span>And her only care was for Mr. McNair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She was exceedingly fond of him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">He sold "notions" and lace<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With wonderful grace,<br /></span> +<span>And kept everything neatly displayed in its place:<br /></span> +<span>The red, curly hair on his head and his face<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He always persisted<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Should be oiled and twisted;<br /></span> +<span>He was the sleekest young husband that ever existed.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Precisely at four<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He would leave his store;<br /></span> +<span>And Mr. McNair with his modest bride<br /></span> +<span>Seated snugly and lovingly by his side,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">On the rural Broadway,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Every pleasant day,<br /></span> +<span>In his spick-span carriage would rattle away.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Though it must be allowed<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lady was proud,<br /></span> +<span>She'd have no maid about her the dear lady vowed:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">So for Mr. McNair<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The wear and the fare<br /></span> +<span>She made it a care of her own to prepare.<br /></span> +<span>I think I may guess, being married myself,<br /></span> +<span>That the cause was not solely the saving of pelf.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">As for her, I'll declare,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Though raven her hair,<br /></span> +<span>Though her eyes were so dark and her body so slim,<br /></span> +<span>She hadn't a thought for a man but him.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">From three to nine,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Invited to dine,<br /></span> +<span>Oft met at the house of the pair divine:<br /></span> +<span>Her husband—and who, by the way, was well able—<br /></span> +<span>Did all the "agreeable" done at the table;<br /></span> +<span>While she—most remarkably loving bride—<br /></span> +<span>Sat snugly and modestly down by his side.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And when they went out<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It was whispered about,<br /></span> +<span>"She's the lovingest wife in the town beyond doubt;"<br /></span> +<span>And every one swore, from pastor to clown,<br /></span> +<span>They were the most affectionate couple in town.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Yes; Mrs McNair<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Was modest and fair;<br /></span> +<span>She never fell into a pout or a fret;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And Mr. McNair<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Was her only care<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And indeed her only pet.<br /></span> +<span>The few short hours he spent at his store<br /></span> +<span>She spent sewing or reading the romancers' lore;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And whoever came<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It was always the same<br /></span> +<span>With the modest lady that opened the door.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">But there came to town<br /></span> +<span class="i4">One Captain Brown<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To spend a month or more.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Now this same Captain Brown<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Was a man of renown,<br /></span> +<span>And a dashing blue coat he wore;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And a bright, brass star.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And a visible scar<br /></span> +<span>On his brow—that he said he had got in the war<br /></span> +<span class="i4">As he led the van:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">(He never ran!)<br /></span> +<span>In short, he was the "General's" right-hand man,<br /></span> +<span>And had written his name on the pages of fame.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He was smooth as an eel,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And rode so genteel<br /></span> +<span>That in less than a week every old maid and dame<br /></span> +<span>Was constantly lisping the bold Captain's name.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Now Mr. McNair,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">As well as the fair,<br /></span> +<span>Had a "bump of reverence" as big as a pear,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And whoever like Brown<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Had a little renown,<br /></span> +<span>And happened to visit that rural town,<br /></span> +<span>Was invited of course by McNair—to "go down."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">So merely by chance,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The son of the lance<br /></span> +<span>Became the bold hero of quite a romance:<br /></span> +<span>For Mrs. McNair thought him wonderful fair,<br /></span> +<span>And that none but her husband could with him compare.<br /></span> +<span>Half her timidity vanished in air<br /></span> +<span>The first time he dined with herself and McNair.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Now the Captain was arch<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In whiskers and starch<br /></span> +<span>And preferred, now and then, a gay waltz to a march.<br /></span> +<span>A man, too, he was of uncommon good taste;<br /></span> +<span>Always "at home" and never in haste,<br /></span> +<span>And his manners and speech were remarkably chaste.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To tell you in short<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His daily resort<br /></span> +<span>He made at the house of "his good friend McNair,"<br /></span> +<span>Who ('twas really too bad) was so frequently out<br /></span> +<span>When the Captain called in "just to see <i>him</i>" (no doubt)<br /></span> +<span>But Mrs. McNair was so lonely—too bad;<br /></span> +<span>So he chatted and chattered and made her look glad.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And many a view<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Of his coat of blue,<br /></span> +<span>All studded with buttons gilt, spangled and new,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The dear lady took<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Half askance from her book,<br /></span> +<span>As she modestly sat in the opposite nook.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Familiarly he<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And modestly she<br /></span> +<span>Talked nonsense and sense so strangely commingled,<br /></span> +<span>That the dear lady's heart was delighted and tingled.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A man of sobriety<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Renown and variety<br /></span> +<span>It could not be wrong to enjoy his society:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">O was it a sin<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For him to "drop in,"<br /></span> +<span>And sometimes to pat her in sport on the chin?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Dear Ladies, beware;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Dear Ladies, take care—<br /></span> +<span>How you play with a lion asleep in his lair:<br /></span> +<span>"Mere trifling flirtations"—these arts you employ?<br /></span> +<span>Flirtations once led to the siege of old Troy;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And a woman was in<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For the sorrow and sin<br /></span> +<span>And slaughter that fell when the Greeks tumbled in;<br /></span> +<span>Nor is there a doubt, my dears, under the sun,<br /></span> +<span>But they've led to the sack of more cities than one.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I would we were all<br /></span> +<span class="i4">As pure as Saint Paul<br /></span> +<span>That we touched not the goblet whose lees are but gall;<br /></span> +<span>But if so we must know where a flirtation leads;<br /></span> +<span>Beware of the fair and look out for our heads.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Remember the odious,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Frail woman, Herodias<br /></span> +<span>Sent old Baptist John to a place incommodious,<br /></span> +<span>And prevailed on her husband to cut off his head<br /></span> +<span>For an indiscreet thing the old Nazarite said.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Day in and day out<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The blue coat was about;<br /></span> +<span>And the dear little lady was glad when he came<br /></span> +<span>And began to be talkative, tender and tame.<br /></span> +<span>Then he gave her a ring, begged a curl of her hair,<br /></span> +<span>And smilingly whispered her—"don't tell McNair."<br /></span> +<span class="i4">She dropped her dark eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And with two little sighs<br /></span> +<span>Sent the bold Captain's heart fluttering up to the skies.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Then alas—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What a pass!<br /></span> +<span>He fell at the feet of the lady so sweet,<br /></span> +<span>And swore that he loved her beyond his control—<br /></span> +<span>With all his humanity—body and soul!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lady so frail<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Turned suddenly pale,<br /></span> +<span>Then—sighed that his love was of little avail;<br /></span> +<span>For alas, the dear Captain—he must have forgot—<br /></span> +<span>She was tied to McNair with a conjugal knot.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But indeed<br /></span> +<span class="i4">She agreed—<br /></span> +<span>Were she only a maid he alone could succeed;<br /></span> +<span>But she prayed him by all that is sacred and fair,<br /></span> +<span>Not to rouse the suspicion of Mr. McNair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">'Twas really too bad,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For the lady was sad:<br /></span> +<span>And a terrible night o't the poor lady had,<br /></span> +<span>While Mr. McNair wondered what was the matter,<br /></span> +<span>And endeavored to coax, to console and to flatter.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Many tears she shed<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That night while in bed<br /></span> +<span>For she had such a terrible pain in her head!<br /></span> +<span>"My dear little pet, where's the camphor?" he said;<br /></span> +<span>"I'll go for the doctor—you'll have to be bled;<br /></span> +<span>I declare, my dear wife, you are just about dead."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">"O no, my dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I pray you don't fear,<br /></span> +<span>Though the pain, I'll admit, is exceeding severe.<br /></span> +<span>I know what it is—I have had it before—<br /></span> +<span>It's only neuralgia: please go to the store<br /></span> +<span>And bring me a bottle of 'Davis's Pain-<br /></span> +<span>Killer,' and I shall be better again."<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He sprang out of bed<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And away he sped<br /></span> +<span>In his gown for the cordial to cure her head,<br /></span> +<span>Not dreaming that Cupid had played her a trick—<br /></span> +<span>The blind little rogue with a sharpened stick.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I confess on my knees<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I have had the disease;<br /></span> +<span>It is worse than the bites of a thousand fleas;<br /></span> +<span>And the only cure I have found for these ills<br /></span> +<span>Is a double dose of "Purgative Pills."<br /></span> +<span class="i4">He rubbed her head—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And eased it, she said;<br /></span> +<span>And he shrugged and shivered and got into bed.<br /></span> +<span>He slept and he snored, but the poor lady's pain,<br /></span> +<span>When her lord slept soundly, came on again.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">It wore away<br /></span> +<span class="i4">However by day<br /></span> +<span>And when Brown called again she was smiling and gay;<br /></span> +<span>But alas, he must say—to the lady's dismay—<br /></span> +<span>In the town of his heart he had staid out his stay,<br /></span> +<span>And must leave for his regiment with little delay.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Now Mrs. McNair<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Was tall and fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Mrs. McNair was slim,<br /></span> +<span>But the like of Brown was so wonderful rare<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That she could not part with him.<br /></span> +<span>Indeed you can see it was truly a pity,<br /></span> +<span>For her husband was just going down to the city,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And Captain Brown—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The man of renown—<br /></span> +<span>Could console her indeed were he only in town.<br /></span> +<span>So McNair to the city the next Monday hied,<br /></span> +<span>And left bold Captain Brown with his modest young bride.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">As the serpent did Eve<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Most sorely deceive—<br /></span> +<span>Causing old father Adam to sorrow and grieve,<br /></span> +<span>And us, his frail children, tho' punished and chidden,<br /></span> +<span>To hanker for things that are sweet but forbidden—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The Captain so fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With his genius so rare,<br /></span> +<span>Wound the web of enchantment round Mrs. McNair;<br /></span> +<span>And alas, fickle Helen, ere three days were over,<br /></span> +<span>She had sworn to elope with her brass-buttoned lover.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Like Helen, the Greek,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">She was modest and meek,<br /></span> +<span>And as fair as a rose, but a trifle too weak.<br /></span> +<span>When a maid she had suitors as proud as Ulysses,<br /></span> +<span>But she ne'er bent her neck to their arms or their kisses,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Till McNair he came in<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With a brush on his chin—<br /></span> +<span>It was love at first sight—but a trifle too thin;<br /></span> +<span>For, married, the dreams of her girlhood fell short all,<br /></span> +<span>And she found that her husband was only a mortal.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Dear ladies, betray us—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Fast and loose play us—<br /></span> +<span>We'll follow you still like bereaved Menelaus,<br /></span> +<span>Till the little blind god with his cruel shafts slay us.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Cold-blooded as I am,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If a son of old Priam<br /></span> +<span>Should break the Mosaic commands and defy 'em,<br /></span> +<span>And elope with my "pet," and moreover my riches,<br /></span> +<span>I would follow the rogue if I went upon crutches<br /></span> +<span>To the plains of old Troy without jacket or breeches.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But then I'm so funny<br /></span> +<span class="i4">If he'd give up the money,<br /></span> +<span>He might go to the dogs with himself and his "Honey."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">The lovers agreed<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That the hazardous deed<br /></span> +<span>Should be done in the dark and with very great speed,<br /></span> +<span>For Mr. McNair—when the fellow came back—<br /></span> +<span>Might go crazy and foolishly follow their track.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">So at midnight should wait<br /></span> +<span class="i4">At her garden-gate<br /></span> +<span>A carriage to carry the dear, precious freight<br /></span> +<span>Of Mrs. McNair who should meet Captain Brown<br /></span> +<span>At the Globe Hotel in a neighboring town.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A man should be hired<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To convey the admired.<br /></span> +<span>And keep mum as a mouse, and do what was desired.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Wearily, wearily half the night<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The lady watched away;<br /></span> +<span>At times in a spirit of sadness quite,<br /></span> +<span>But fully resolved on her amorous flight,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">She longed to be under way;<br /></span> +<span>Yet with sad heaving heart and a tear, I declare,<br /></span> +<span>As she sorrowfully thought of poor Mr. McNair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">"Poor fellow," she sighed,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">"I wish he had died<br /></span> +<span>Last spring when he had his complaint in the side<br /></span> +<span>For I know—I am sure—it will terribly grieve him<br /></span> +<span>To have me elope with the Captain and leave him.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But the Captain—dear me!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I hardly can see<br /></span> +<span>Why I love the brave Captain to such a degree:<br /></span> +<span>But see—there's the carriage, I vow, at the gate!<br /></span> +<span>I must go—'tis the law of inveterate fate."<br /></span> +<span class="i4">So a parting look<br /></span> +<span class="i4">At her home she took,<br /></span> +<span>While a terrible conflict her timid soul shook;<br /></span> +<span>Then turned to the carriage heart-stricken and sore,<br /></span> +<span>Stepped hastily in and closed up the door.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">"Crack!" went the whip;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">She bit her white lip,<br /></span> +<span>And away she flew on her desperate trip.<br /></span> +<span>She thought of dear Brown; and poor Mr. McNair—<br /></span> +<span>She knew he would hang himself straight in despair.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">She sighed<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And she cried<br /></span> +<span class="i4">All during the ride,<br /></span> +<span>And endeavored—alas, but she could not decide.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Three times she prayed;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Three times she essayed<br /></span> +<span>To call to the driver for pity and aid—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To drive her straight<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To her garden-gate,<br /></span> +<span>And break the spell of her terrible fate.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But her tongue was tied—<br /></span> +<span class="i4">She couldn't decide,<br /></span> +<span>And she only moaned at a wonderful rate.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">No mortal can tell<br /></span> +<span class="i4">"What might have befell,"<br /></span> +<span>Had it been a mile more to the Globe Hotel;<br /></span> +<span>But as they approached it she broke from her spell.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">A single hair<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For Mr. McNair<br /></span> +<span>She vowed to herself that she did not care;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But the Captain so true<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In his coat of blue—<br /></span> +<span>To his loving arms in her fancy she flew.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In a moment or more<br /></span> +<span class="i4">They drove up to the door,<br /></span> +<span>And she felt that her trials and troubles were o'er.<br /></span> +<span>The landlord came hastily out in his slippers,<br /></span> +<span>For late he had sat with some smokers and sippers.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">As the lady stepped down<br /></span> +<span class="i4">With a fret and a frown,<br /></span> +<span>She sighed half aloud, "Where is dear Captain Brown?"<br /></span> +<span>"This way, my dear madam," politely he said,<br /></span> +<span>And straightway to the parlor the lady he led.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Now the light was dim<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Where she followed him,<br /></span> +<span>And the dingy old parlor looked gloomy and grim.<br /></span> +<span>As she entered, behold, in contemplative mood,<br /></span> +<span>In the farther corner the bold Captain stood<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In his coat of blue:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To his arms she flew;<br /></span> +<span>She buried her face in his bosom so true:<br /></span> +<span>"Dear Captain!—my Darling!" sighed Mrs. McNair;<br /></span> +<span>Then she raised her dark eyes and—Good Heavens'<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I declare!—-<br /></span> +<span>Instead of the Captain 'twas—<i>Mr. McNair!</i><br /></span> +<span>She threw up her arms—she screamed—and she fainted;<br /></span> +<span>Such a scene!—Ah the like of it never was painted.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Of repentance and pardon I need not tell;<br /></span> +<span>Her vows I will not relate,<br /></span> +<span>For every man must guess them well<br /></span> +<span>Who knows much of the "married state."<br /></span> +<span>Of the sad mischance suffice it to say<br /></span> +<span>That McNair had suspected the Captain's "foul play;"<br /></span> +<span class="i4">So he laid a snare<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For the bold and the fair,<br /></span> +<span>But he captured, alas, only Mrs. McNair;<br /></span> +<span>And the brass-buttoned lover—bold Captain Brown—<br /></span> +<span>Was nevermore seen in that rural town.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i4">Mrs. McNair<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Is tall and fair;<br /></span> +<span>Mrs. McNair is slim;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And her husband again is her only care—<br /></span> +<span>She is wonderfully fond of him;<br /></span> +<span>For now he is all the dear lady can wish—he<br /></span> +<span>Is a captain himself—in the State militia.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>1859.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="THE_DRAFT" id="THE_DRAFT" />THE DRAFT</h3> + +<h4>[January, 1865.]</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Old Father Abe has issued his "Call"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For Three Hundred Thousand more!<br /></span> +<span>By Jupiter, boys, he is after you all—<br /></span> +<span>Lamed and maimed—tall and small—<br /></span> +<span>With his drag-net spread for a general haul<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of the "suckers" uncaught before.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>I am sorry to see such a woeful change<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In the health of the hardiest;<br /></span> +<span>It is wonderful odd—it is "passing strange"—<br /></span> +<span>As over the country you travel and range,<br /></span> +<span>To behold such a sudden, lamentable change<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All over the East and the West.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Blades" tough and hearty a week ago,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who tippled and danced and laughed,<br /></span> +<span>Are "suddenly taken," and some quite low<br /></span> +<span>With an epidemical illness, you know:<br /></span> +<span>"What!—Zounds!—the cholera?" you quiz;—no—no—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The doctors call it the "Draft."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>What a blessed thing it were to be old—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A little past "forty-five;"<br /></span> +<span>'Twere better indeed than a purse of gold<br /></span> +<span>At a premium yet unwritten, untold,<br /></span> +<span>For what poor devil that's now "enrolled"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Expects to get off alive?<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>There's a miracle wrought in the Democrats;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They swore it was murder and sin<br /></span> +<span>To put in the "Niggers," like Kilkenny cats,<br /></span> +<span>To clear the ship of the rebel rats,<br /></span> +<span>But now I notice they swing their hats<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And shout to the "Niggers"—"<i>Go in!</i>"<br /></span> +</div></div> +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> + +<h3><a name="THE_DEVIL_AND_THE_MONK" id="THE_DEVIL_AND_THE_MONK" />THE DEVIL AND THE MONK</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Once Satan and a monk went on a "drunk,"<br /></span> +<span>And Satan struck a bargain with the monk,<br /></span> +<span>Whereby the Devil's crew was much increased<br /></span> +<span>By penceless poor and now and then a priest<br /></span> +<span>Who, lacking cunning or good common sense,<br /></span> +<span>Got caught <i>in flagrante</i> and out of pence.<br /></span> +<span>Then in high glee the Devil filled a cup<br /></span> +<span>And drank a brimming bumper to the pope:<br /></span> +<span>Then—"Here's to you," he said, "sober or drunk,<br /></span> +<span>In cowl or corsets, every monk's a punk.<br /></span> +<span>Whate'er they preach unto the common breed,<br /></span> +<span>At heart the priests and I are well agreed.<br /></span> +<span>Justice is blind we see, and deaf and old,<br /></span> +<span>But in her scales can hear the clink of gold.<br /></span> +<span>The convent is a harem in disguise,<br /></span> +<span>And virtue is a fig-leaf for the wise<br /></span> +<span>To hide the naked truth of lust and lecheries.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"And still the toilers feed the pious breed,<br /></span> +<span>And pin their faith upon the bishop's sleeve;<br /></span> +<span>Hungry for hope they gulp a moldy creed<br /></span> +<span>And dine on faith. 'Tis easier to believe<br /></span> +<span>An old-time fiction than to wear a tooth<br /></span> +<span>In gnawing bones to reach the marrow truth.<br /></span> +<span>Priests murder Truth and with her gory ghost<br /></span> +<span>They frighten fools and give the rogues a roast<br /></span> +<span>Until without or pounds or pence or price—<br /></span> +<span>Free as the fabled wine of paradise—<br /></span> +<span>They furnish priestly plates with buttered toast.<br /></span> +<span>Your priests of superstition stalk the land<br /></span> +<span>With Jacob's winning voice and Esau's hand;<br /></span> +<span>Sinners to hell and saints to heaven they call,<br /></span> +<span>And eat the fattest fodder in the stall.<br /></span> +<span>They, versed in dead rituals in dead language deep,<br /></span> +<span>Talk Greek to th' <i>grex</i> and Latin to their sheep,<br /></span> +<span>And feed their flocks a flood of cant and college<br /></span> +<span>For every drop of sense or useful knowledge."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I beg your pardon," softly said the monk,<br /></span> +<span>"I fear your Majesty is raving drunk.<br /></span> +<span>I would be courteous."<br /></span> +<span class="i18">But the Devil laughed<br /></span> +<span>And slyly winked and sagely shook his head.<br /></span> +<span>"My fawning dog," the sage satanic said,<br /></span> +<span>"Wags not his tail for me but for my bread.<br /></span> +<span>Brains rule to day as they have ruled for aye,<br /></span> +<span>And craft grown craftier in this modern day<br /></span> +<span>Still rides the fools, but in a craftier way;<br /></span> +<span>And priestcraft lingers and survives its use;<br /></span> +<span>What was a blessing once is now abuse:<br /></span> +<span>Grown fat and arrogant on power and pelf,<br /></span> +<span>The old-time shepherd has become a wolf<br /></span> +<span>And only feeds his flocks to feast himself.<br /></span> +<span>To clink of coin the pious juggler jumps,<br /></span> +<span>For still he thinks, as in the days of old,<br /></span> +<span>The key to holy heaven is made of gold,<br /></span> +<span>That in the game of mortals money is trumps,<br /></span> +<span>That golden darts will pierce e'en Virtue's shield,<br /></span> +<span>And by the salve of gold all sins are healed.<br /></span> +<span>So old Saint Peter stands outside the fence<br /></span> +<span>With hand outstretched for toll of Peter-pence,<br /></span> +<span>And sinners' souls must groan in Purgatory<br /></span> +<span>Until they pay the admission-fee to glory.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"There was an honest poet once on earth<br /></span> +<span>Who beat all other bardies at a canter;<br /></span> +<span>Rob' Burns his mother called him at his birth.<br /></span> +<span>Though handicapped by rum and much a ranter,<br /></span> +<span>He won the madcap race in <i>Tam O'Shanter</i>.<br /></span> +<span>He drove a spanking span from Scottish heather,<br /></span> +<span>Strong-limbed, but light of foot as flea or feather—<br /></span> +<span>Rhyme and Reason, matched and yoked together,<br /></span> +<span>And reined them with light hand and limber leather.<br /></span> +<span>He wrote to me once on a time—I mind it—<br /></span> +<span>A bold epistle and the poet signed it.<br /></span> +<span>He thought to cheat "Auld Nickie" of his dues,<br /></span> +<span>But who outruns the Devil casts his shoes;<br /></span> +<span>And so at last from frolicking and drinkin',<br /></span> +<span>'Some luckless hour' sent him to Hell 'alinkin'!<a name='FNanchor_CX'></a><a href='#Footnote_CX'><sup>[CX]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>Times had been rather dull in my dominion,<br /></span> +<span>And all my imps like lubbers lay a snoring,<br /></span> +<span>But Burns began to rhyme us his opinion,<br /></span> +<span>And in ten minutes had all Hell aroaring.<br /></span> +<span>Then Robbie pulled his book of poems out<br /></span> +<span>And read us sundry satires from the book;<br /></span> +<span>'<i>Death and Doctor Hornbook</i>' raised a shout<br /></span> +<span>Till all the roof-tin on the rafters shook;<br /></span> +<span>And when his '<i>Unco Guid</i>' the bardie read<br /></span> +<span>The crew all clapped their hands and yelled like mad;<br /></span> +<span>But '<i>Holy Willie's Prayer</i>' 'brought down the house'.<br /></span> +<span>So I was glad to give the bard a pass<br /></span> +<span>And a few pence for toll at Peter's gate;<br /></span> +<span>For if the roof of Hell were made of brass<br /></span> +<span>Bob Burns would shake it off as sure as fate.<br /></span> +<span>I mind it well—that poem on a louse!<br /></span> +<span>'O wad some pow'r the giftie gie us,' Monk,<br /></span> +<span>'To see oursels as others see us'—drunk;<br /></span> +<span>'It wad frae monie a blunder free us'—list!—<br /></span> +<span>'And foolish notion.' Abbot, bishop, priest,<br /></span> +<span>'What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e' you all,<br /></span> +<span>'And ev'n devotion.' Cowls and robes would fall,<br /></span> +<span>And sometimes leave a bishop but a beast,<br /></span> +<span>And show a leper sore where erst they made a priest."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Not to be beat the jolly monk filled up<br /></span> +<span>His silver mug with rare old Burgundy;<br /></span> +<span>"Here's to your health," he said, "your Majesty"—<br /></span> +<span>And drained the brimming goblet at a gulp—<br /></span> +<span>"'For when the Devil was sick the Devil a monk would be;<br /></span> +<span>But when the Devil got well a devil a monk was he.'<br /></span> +<span><i>In vino veritas</i> is true, no doubt—<br /></span> +<span>When wine goes in teetotal truth comes out.<br /></span> +<span>To shake a little Shakespeare in the wine:<br /></span> +<span>'Some rise by sin and some by virtue fall';<br /></span> +<span>But in the realm of Fate, as I opine,<br /></span> +<span>A devil a virtue is or sin at all.<br /></span> +<span>'The Devil be damned' is what we preach, you know it—<br /></span> +<span>At mass and vespers, holy-bread and dinner:<br /></span> +<span>From priest to pope, from pedagogue to poet,<br /></span> +<span>We sanctify the sin and damn the sinner.<br /></span> +<span>This poet Shakespeare, whom I read with pleasure,<br /></span> +<span>Wrote once—I think, in taking his own 'Measure':—<br /></span> +<span>'They say best men are molded out of faults,<br /></span> +<span>And, for the most, become much more the better<br /></span> +<span>For being a little bad.' The reason halts:<br /></span> +<span>If read between the lines—not by the letter—<br /></span> +<span>'Tis plain enough that Shakespeare was atrimmin'<br /></span> +<span>His own unruly ship and furling sail<br /></span> +<span>To meet a British tempest or a gale,<br /></span> +<span>And keep cold water from his wine and women.<br /></span> +<span>Now I'll admit, when he's a little mellow,<br /></span> +<span>The Devil himself's a devilish clever fellow,<br /></span> +<span>And, though his cheeks and paunch are somewhat shrunk,<br /></span> +<span>He only lacks a cowl to make a monk.<br /></span> +<span>Time is the mother of twins <i>et hic et nunc;</i><br /></span> +<span>Come, hood your horns and fill the mug abrimmin',<br /></span> +<span>For we are cheek by jowl on wit and wine and women."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>And so the monk and Devil filled the mug,<br /></span> +<span>And quaffed and chaffed and laughed the night away;<br /></span> +<span>And when the "wee sma" hours of night had come,<br /></span> +<span>The monk slipped out and stole the abbot's rum;<br /></span> +<span>And when the abbot came at break of day,<br /></span> +<span>There cheek by jowl—horns, hoofs, and hood—they lay,<br /></span> +<span>With open missal and an empty jug,<br /></span> +<span>And broken beads and badly battered mug—<br /></span> +<span>In fond embrace—dead drunk upon the rug.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Think not, wise reader, that the bard hath drunk<br /></span> +<span>The wine that fumed these vagaries from the monk;<br /></span> +<span>Nor, in the devil ethics thou hast read,<br /></span> +<span>There spake the poet in the Devil's stead.<br /></span> +<span>Let Virtue be our helmet and our shield,<br /></span> +<span>And Truth our weapon—weapon sharp and strong<br /></span> +<span>And deadly to all error and all wrong.<br /></span> +<span>Yea, armed with Truth, though rogues and rascals throng<br /></span> +<span>The citadel of Virtue shall not yield,<br /></span> +<span>For God's right arm of Truth prevails in every field.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: THE DEVIL AND THE MONK]</p> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_CX'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CX'>[CX]</a><div class='note'><p> Tripping. See Burns' "<i>Address to the Deil</i>"</p></div> + + + + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<a name="THE_TARIFF_ON_TIN"></a><h3>THE TARIFF ON TIN</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Monarch of Hannah's rocking-chair,<br /></span> +<span>With unclipped beard and unkempt hair,<br /></span> +<span>Sitting at ease by the kitchen fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor heeding the wind and the driving sleet,<br /></span> +<span>Jo Lumpkin perused the <i>Daily Liar</i>—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A leading and stanch Democratic sheet,<br /></span> +<span>While Hannah, his wife, in her calico,<br /></span> +<span>Sat knitting a pair of mittens for Jo.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Hanner," he said, and he raised his eyes<br /></span> +<span>And looked exceedingly grave and wise,<br /></span> +<span>"The kentry's agoin, I guess, tu the dogs:<br /></span> +<span>Them durned Republikins, they air hogs:<br /></span> +<span>A dev'lish purty fix we air in;<br /></span> +<span>They've gone un riz the teriff on tin."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"How's thet?" said Hannah, and turned her eyes<br /></span> +<span>With a look of wonder and vague surprise.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Why them confoundered Congriss chaps<br /></span> +<span>Hez knocked the prices out uv our craps:<br /></span> +<span>We can't sell butter ner beans no more<br /></span> +<span>Tu enny furren ship er shore,<br /></span> +<span>Becuz them durned Republikins<br /></span> +<span>Hez gone un riz the teriff on tins."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>Hannah dropped her knitting-work on her knees,<br /></span> +<span>And looked very solemn and ill-at-ease:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She gazed profoundly into the fire,<br /></span> +<span>Then hitched her chair a little bit nigher,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And said as she glanced at the <i>Daily Liar</i><br /></span> +<span>With a sad, wan look in her buttermilk eyes:<br /></span> +<span>"I vum thet's a tax on punkin-pies,<br /></span> +<span>Fer they know we allers bakes 'em in<br /></span> +<span>Pans un platters un plates uv tin."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"I wouldn't agrumbled a bit," said Jo,<br /></span> +<span>"Et a tax on sugar un salt un sich;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I swow it's a morul political sin<br /></span> +<span>Tu drive the farmer intu the ditch<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With thet pesky teriff on tin.<br /></span> +<span>Ef they'd a put a teriff on irn un coal<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Un hides un taller un hemlock bark,<br /></span> +<span>Why thet might a helped us out uv a hole<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By buildin uv mills un givin uv work,<br /></span> +<span>Un gladd'nin many a farmer's soul<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By raisin the price of pertaters un pork:<br /></span> +<span>But durn their eyes, it's a morul sin—<br /></span> +<span>They've gone un riz the teriff on tin.<br /></span> +<span>I wouldn't wonder a bit ef Blaine<br /></span> +<span>Hed diskivered a tin mine over in Maine;<br /></span> +<span>Er else he hez foundered a combinashin<br /></span> +<span>Tu gobble the tin uv the hull creashin.<br /></span> +<span>I'll bet Jay Gould is intu the'trust,'<br /></span> +<span>Un they've gone in tergether tu make er bust;<br /></span> +<span>Un tu keep the British frum crowdin in<br /></span> +<span>They've gone un riz the teriff on tin.<br /></span> +<span>What'll we du fer pans un pails<br /></span> +<span>When the cow comes in un the old uns fails?<br /></span> +<span>Tu borrer a word frum Scripter, Hanner,<br /></span> +<span>Un du it, tu, in pious manner,<br /></span> +<span>You'll hev tu go down in yer sock fer a ducat,<br /></span> +<span>Er milk old Roan in a wooden bucket:<br /></span> +<span>Fer them Republikins—durn their skin—<br /></span> +<span>Hez riz sich a turrible teriff on tin.<br /></span> +<span>Tu cents a pound on British tin-plate!<br /></span> +<span>Why, Hanner, you see, at thet air rate,<br /></span> +<span>Accordin tu this ere newspaper-print—<br /></span> +<span>Un it mus be so er it wouldn't' be in't—<br /></span> +<span>It's a dollar un a half on one tin pan,<br /></span> +<span>Un about six shillin on a coffee-can,<br /></span> +<span>Un ten shillin, Hanner, on a dinner-pail!<br /></span> +<span>Gol! won't it make the workin men squeal—<br /></span> +<span>Thet durned Republikin tax un steal!<br /></span> +<span>They call it Protecshin, but blast my skin<br /></span> +<span>Ef it aint a morul political sin—<br /></span> +<span>Thet durned Republikin teriff on tin.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>"Un then they hev put a teriff on silk<br /></span> +<span>Un satin un velvit un thet air ilk,<br /></span> +<span>Un broadcloth un brandy un Havanny cigars,<br /></span> +<span>Un them slick silk hats thet our preacher wears;<br /></span> +<span>Un he'll hev tu wear humspun un drink skim milk.<br /></span> +<span>Un, Hanner, you see we'll hev tu be savin,<br /></span> +<span>Un whittle our store-bill down tu a shavin;<br /></span> +<span>You can't go tu meetin in silks; I vum<br /></span> +<span>You'll hev tu wear ging-um er stay tu hum."<br /></span> +<span>But Hannah said sharply—"I won't though, I swum!"<br /></span> +<span>And Hannah gazed wistfully on her Jo<br /></span> +<span>As he rocked himself mournfully to and fro,<br /></span> +<span>And then she looked thoughtfully into the fire,<br /></span> +<span>While the sleet fell faster and the wind blew higher,<br /></span> +<span>And Jo took a turn at the <i>Daily Liar</i>.<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span>1890.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>[Illustration: "THE KENTRY'S AGOIN', I GUESS, TO THE DOGS"]</p> + + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<a name="PAT_AND_THE_PIG"></a><h3>PAT AND THE PIG</h3> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Old Deutchland's the country for sauerkraut and beer,<br /></span> +<span>Old England's the land of roast beef and good cheer,<br /></span> +<span>Auld Scotland's the mother of gristle and grit,<br /></span> +<span>But Ireland, my boy, is the mother of wit.<br /></span> +<span>Once Pat was indicted for stealing a pig,<br /></span> +<span>And brought into court to the man in the wig.<br /></span> +<span>The indictment was long and so lumbered with Latin<br /></span> +<span>That Pat hardly knew what a pickle was Pat in;<br /></span> +<span>But at last it was read to the end, and the wig<br /></span> +<span>Said: "Pat, are you guilty of stealing the pig?"<br /></span> +<span>Pat looked very wise, though a trifle forlorn,<br /></span> +<span>And he asked of milord that the witness be sworn.<br /></span> +<span>"Bless yer sowl," stammered Pat, "an' the day ye was born!<br /></span> +<span>Faith how in the divil d'ye think Oi can tell<br /></span> +<span>Till Oi hear the ividince?"<br /></span> +<span class="i23">Pat reckoned well;<br /></span> +<span>For the witness was sworn and the facts he revealed—<br /></span> +<span>How Pat stole the piggy and how the pig squealed,<br /></span> +<span>Whose piggy the pig was and what he was worth,<br /></span> +<span>And the slits in his ears and his tail and—so forth;<br /></span> +<span>But he never once said, 'in the county of Meath,'<a name='FNanchor_CY'></a><a href='#Footnote_CY'><sup>[CY]</sup></a><br /></span> +<span>So Pat he escaped by the skin of his teeth.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<h4>FOOTNOTES</h4> + +<a name='Footnote_CY'></a><a href='#FNanchor_CY'>[CY]</a><div class='note'><p> In criminal cases it is necessary to prove that the crime was +committed in the county where the venue is laid.</p></div> + + + +<br /> +<hr style="width: 45%;" /><br /> +<a name="NOTES"></a><h3>NOTES</h3> + +<a name='Footnote_1'></a><a href='#FNanchor_1'>[1]</a><div class='note'><p> Called in the Dakota tongue "<i>Hok-sée-win-nâ-pee +Wo-hán-pee</i>"—Virgins' Dance (or Feast).</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_2'></a><a href='#FNanchor_2'>[2]</a><div class='note'><p> One of the favorite and most exciting games of the Dakotas is +ball-playing. A smooth place on the prairie, or in winter, on a frozen +lake or river, is chosen. Each player has a sort of bat, called +"<i>Tâ-kée-cha-psé-cha</i>," about thirty-two inches long, with a hoop at the +lower end four or five inches in diameter, interlaced with thongs of +deer-skin, forming a sort of pocket. With these bats they catch and +throw the ball. Stakes are set as bounds at a considerable distance from +the center on either side. Two parties are then formed and each chooses +a leader or chief. The ball (<i>Tâpa</i>) is then thrown up half way between +the bounds, and the game begins, the contestants contending with their +bats for the ball as it falls. When one succeeds in getting it fairly +into the pocket of his bat he swings it aloft and throws it as far as he +can toward the bound to which his party is working, taking care to send +it if possible where some of his own side will take it up. Thus the ball +is thrown and contended for till one party succeeds in casting it beyond +the bounds of the opposite party. A hundred players en a side are +sometimes engaged in this exciting game. Betting on the result often +runs high. Moccasins, pipes, knives, hatchets, blankets, robes and guns +are hung on the prize-pole. Not unfrequently horses are staked on the +issue and sometimes even women. Old men and mothers are among the +spectators, praising their swift-footed sons, and young wives and +maidens are there to stimulate their husbands and lovers. This game is +not confined to the warriors but is also a favorite amusement of the +Dakota maidens, who generally play for prizes offered by the chief or +warriors. (See <i>Neill's Hist. Minn.</i>, pp 74-5; <i>Riggs' Tâkoo Wakân</i>, pp +44-5, and <i>Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah</i>, p 55.)</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_3'></a><a href='#FNanchor_3'>[3]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced <i>Wah-zeé-yah</i>—the god of the North, or Winter. A fabled +spirit who dwells in the frozen North, in a great <i>teepee</i> of ice and +snow. From his mouth and nostrils he blows the cold blasts of winter. He +and <i>I-tó-ka-ga Wi câs-ta</i>—the spirit or god of the South (literally +the "South Man") are inveterate enemies, and always on the war-path +against each other. In winter <i>Wa-zi-ya</i> advances southward and drives +<i>I-tó-ka-ga Wi-câs-ta</i> before him to the Summer-Islands. But in spring +the god of the South having renewed his youth and strength in the "Happy +Hunting Grounds," is able to drive <i>Wa-zi-ya</i> back again to his icy +wigwam in the North. Some Dakotas say that the numerous granite +boulders scattered over the prairies of Minnesota and Dakota, were +hurled in battle by <i>Wa-zi-ya</i> from his home in the North at <i>I-tó-ka-ga +Wi-câs-ta</i>. The <i>Wa-zi-ya</i> of the Dakotas is substantially the same as +"<i>Ka be-bon-ik-ka</i>"—the "Winter-maker" of the Ojibways.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_4'></a><a href='#FNanchor_4'>[4]</a><div class='note'><p> Mendota—(meeting of the waters) at the confluence of the Mississippi +and Minnesota rivers. The true Dakota word is <i>Mdó-tè</i>—applied to the +mouth of a river flowing into another, also to the outlet of a lake.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_5'></a><a href='#FNanchor_5'>[5]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced <i>Wee-wâh-stay</i>; literally—a beautiful virgin or woman.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_6'></a><a href='#FNanchor_6'>[6]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Cetân-wa-ká-wa-mâni</i>—"He who shoots pigeon-hawks walking"—was the +full Dakota name of the grandfather of the celebrated "Little Crow" +(<i>Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta</i>—His Red People) who led his warriors in the +terrible outbreak in Minnesota in 1862-3. The Chippeways called the +grandfather <i>Ká-ká-gè</i>—crow or raven—from his war-badge, a crow-skin; +and hence the French traders and <i>courriers du bois</i> called him "<i>Petit +Corbeau</i>"—Little Crow. This sobriquet, of which he was proud, descended +to his son, <i>Wakinyan Tânka</i>—Big Thunder, who succeeded him as chief; +and from Big Thunder to his son <i>Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta</i>, who became chief on +the death of <i>Wakinyan Tânka</i>. These several "Little Crows" were +successively Chiefs of the Light-foot, or <i>Kapóza</i> band of Dakotas. +<i>Kapóza</i>, the principal village of this band, was originally located on +the east bank of the Mississippi near the site of the city of St. Paul. +<i>Col. Minn. Hist. Soc.</i>, 1864, p. 29. It was in later years moved to the +west bank. The grandfather whom I, for short, call <i>Wakâwa</i>, died the +death of a brave in battle against the Ojibways (commonly called +Chippeways)—the hereditary enemies of the Dakotas. <i>Wakinyan +Tânka</i>—Big Thunder, was killed by the accidental discharge of his own +gun. They were both buried with their kindred near the "<i>Wakan Teepee</i>," +the sacred Cave—(Carver's Cave). <i>Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta</i>, the last of the +Little Crows, was killed July 3, 1863, during the outbreak, near +Hutchinson, Minnesota, by the Lampsons—father and son, and his bones +were duly "done up" for the Historical Society of Minnesota. See +<i>Heard's Hist. Sioux War</i>, and <i>Neill's Hist. Minnesota</i>, Third Edition.</p> + +<p>[Illustration: LITTLE CROW. <i>From an original photograph in the author's +possession</i>]</p> + +<p>Little Crow's sixteen-year-old son, <i>Wa-wi-na-pe</i>—(One who appears +—like the spirit of his forefather) was with him at the time he was +killed; but escaped, and after much hardship and suffering, was at last +captured at <i>Mini Wakan</i> (Devil's Lake, in North Dakota). From him +personally I obtained much information in regard to Little Crow's +participation in the "Sioux War," and minutely the speech that Little +Crow made to his braves when he finally consented to lead them on the +war-path against the whites. A literal translation of that speech will +be found further on in this note.</p> + +<p>I knew <i>Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta</i>, and from his own lips, in 1859-60 and 61, +obtained much interesting information in regard to the history, +tradition, customs, superstitions and habits of the Dakotas, of whom he +was the recognized Head-Chief. He was a remarkable Indian—a philosopher +and a brave and generous man. "Untutored savage" that he was, he was a +prince among his own people, and the peer in natural ability of the +ablest white men in the Northwest in his time. He had largely adopted +the dress and habits of civilized man, and he urged his people to +abandon their savage ways, build houses, cultivate fields, and learn to +live like the white people. He clearly forsaw the ultimate extinction of +his people as a distinct race. He well knew and realized the numbers and +power of the whites then rapidly taking possession of the +hunting-grounds of the Dakotas, and the folly of armed opposition on the +part of his people. He said to me once: "No more Dakotas by and by; +Indians all white men. No more buffaloes by and by; all cows, all oxen." +But his braves were restless. They smarted under years of wrong and +robbery, to which, indeed, the most stinging insults were often added by +the traders and officials among them. If the true, unvarnished history +of the cause and inception of the "Sioux Outbreak" in Minnesota is ever +written and published, it will bring the blush of shame to the cheeks of +every honest man who reads it.</p> + +<p>Against his judgment and repeated protests, Little Crow was at last, +after the depredations had begun, forced into the war on the whites by +his hot-headed and uncontrollable "young men."</p> + +<p>Goaded to desperation, a party of Little Crow's young "bucks," in +August, 1862, began their depredations and spilled white blood at Acton. +Returning to their chief's camp near the agency, they told their fellow +braves what they had done. The hot-headed young warriors immediately +demanded of Little Crow that he put on the "war-paint" and lead them +against the white men. The chief severely rebuked the "young men" who +had committed the murders, blackened his face (a sign of mourning), +retired to his <i>teepee</i> and covered his head in sorrow.</p> + +<p>His braves surrounded his tent and cut it into strips with their knives. +They threatened to depose him from the chiefship unless he immediately +put on the "war-paint" and led them against the whites. They knew that +the Civil War was then in progress, that the white men were fighting +among themselves, and they declared that now was the time to regain +their lost hunting-grounds; that now was the time to avenge the thievery +and insults of the Agents who had for years systematically cheated them +out of the greater part of their promised annuities, for which they had +been induced to part with their lands; that now was the time to avenge +the debauchery of their wives and daughters by the dissolute hangers-on +who, as employees of the Indian Agents and licensed traders, had for +years hovered around them like buzzards around the carcasses of +slaughtered buffaloes.</p> + +<p>But Little Crow was unmoved by the appeals and threats of his warriors. +It is said that once for a moment he uncovered his head; that his face +was haggard and great beads of sweat stood out on his forehead. But at +last one of his enraged braves, bolder than the rest, cried out:</p> + +<p>"<i>Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta</i> is a coward!"</p> + +<p>Instantly Little Crow sprang from his <i>teepee</i>, snatched the +eagle-feathers from the head of his insulter and flung them on the +ground. Then, stretching himself to his full height, his eyes flashing +fire, and in a voice tremulous with rage, he exclaimed:</p> + +<p>"<i>Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta</i> is not a coward, and he is not a fool! When did he +run away from his enemies? When did he leave his braves behind him on +the war-path and turn back to his <i>teepees</i>? When he ran away from your +enemies, he walked behind on your trail with his face to the Ojibways +and covered your backs as a she-bear covers her cubs! Is +<i>Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta</i> without scalps? Look at his war-feathers! Behold the +scalp-locks of your enemies hanging there on his lodge-poles! Do they +call him a coward? <i>Ta-ó-ya-te-dú-ta</i> is not a coward, and he is not a +fool. Braves, you are like little children; you know not what you are +doing.</p> + +<p>"You are full of the white man's <i>devil-water</i>" (rum). "You are like +dogs in the Hot Moon when they run mad and snap at their own shadows. We +are only little herds of buffaloes left scattered; the great herds that +once covered the prairies are no more. See!—the white men are like the +locusts when they fly so thick that the whole sky is a snow-storm. You +may kill one—two—ten; yes, as many as the leaves in the forest +yonder, and their brothers will not miss them. Kill one—two—ten, and +ten times ten will come to kill you. Count your fingers all day long and +white men with guns in their hands will come faster than you can count.</p> + +<p>"Yes; they fight among themselves—away off. Do you hear the thunder of +their big guns? No; it would take you two moons to run down to where +they are fighting, and all the way your path would be among white +soldiers as thick as tamaracks in the swamps of the Ojibways. Yes; they +fight among themselves, but if you strike at them they will all turn on +you and devour you and your women and little children just as the +locusts in their time fall on the trees and devour all the leaves in one +day. You are fools. You cannot see the face of your chief; your eyes are +full of smoke. You cannot hear his voice; your ears are full of roaring +waters. Braves, you are little children—you are fools. You will die +like the rabbits when the hungry wolves hunt them in the Hard Moon +(January). <i>Ta-ó-ya-té dú-ta</i> is not a coward: he will die with you."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_7'></a><a href='#FNanchor_7'>[7]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Hârps-te-nâh</i>. The first-born daughter of a Dakota is called +<i>Winona</i>; the second, <i>Hârpen</i>; the third, <i>Hârpstinâ</i>; the fourth, +<i>Wâska</i>; the fifth, <i>Wehârka</i>. The first-born son is called <i>Chaskè</i>; +the second, <i>Hârpam</i>; the third, <i>Hapéda</i>; the fourth, <i>Châtun</i>; the +fifth, <i>Hârka</i>. They retain these names till others are given them on +account of some action, peculiarity, etc. The females often retain their +child-names through life.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_8'></a><a href='#FNanchor_8'>[8]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Wah-pah-sâh</i> was the hereditary name of a long and illustrious line +of Dakota chiefs. Wabashaw is a corrupt pronunciation. The name is a +contraction of <i>Wâ-pa-hâ-sa</i>, which is from <i>Wâ-ha-pa</i>, the standard or +pole used in the Dakota dances and upon which feathers of various colors +are tied, and not from <i>Wâ-pa</i>—leaf, as has been generally supposed. +Therefore <i>Wâpasa</i> means the Standard—and not the "Leaf-Shaker," as +many writers have it. The principal village of these hereditary chiefs +was <i>Ke-úk-sa</i>, or <i>Ke-ó-sa</i>,—where now stands the fair city of Winona. +<i>Ke-úk-sa</i> signifies—The village of law-breakers; so called because +this band broke the law or custom of the Dakotas against marrying blood +relatives of any degree. I get this information from Rev. Stephen R. +Riggs, author of the Dakota Grammar and Dictionary, "<i>Takoo Wakan</i>," +etc. <i>Wapasa</i>, grandfather of the last chief of that name, and a +contemporary of <i>Cetan-Wa-kâ-wa-mâni</i>, was a noted chief, and a friend +of the British in the war of the Revolution. <i>Neill's Hist. Minn.</i>, pp. +225-9.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_9'></a><a href='#FNanchor_9'>[9]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>E-hó, E-tó</i>—Exclamations of surprise and delight.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_10'></a><a href='#FNanchor_10'>[10]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Mah-gâh</i>—The wild-goose.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_11'></a><a href='#FNanchor_11'>[11]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Teé-peé</i>—A lodge or wigwam, often contracted to "<i>tee</i>."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_12'></a><a href='#FNanchor_12'>[12]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced <i>Mahr-peé-yah-doó-tah</i>—literally, Cloud Red.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_13'></a><a href='#FNanchor_13'>[13]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced <i>Wahnmdeé</i>—The War Eagle. Each feather worn by a warrior +represents an enemy slain or captured—man, woman or child; but the +Dakotas, before they became desperate under the cruel warfare of their +enemies, usually spared the lives of their captives, and never killed +women or infants, except in rare instances under the <i>lex talionis</i>. +<i>Neill's Hist. Minn.</i>, p. 112.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_14'></a><a href='#FNanchor_14'>[14]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Mah-tó</i>—The polar bear—<i>ursus maritimus</i>. The Dakotas say that in +olden times white bears were often found about Rainy Lake and the Lake +of the Woods in winter, and sometimes as far south as the mouth of the +Minnesota. They say one was once killed at White Bear Lake (but a few +miles from St. Paul and Minneapolis), and they therefore named the lake +Medé Mató—White Bear Lake, literally—Lake White Bear.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_15'></a><a href='#FNanchor_15'>[15]</a><div class='note'><p> The <i>Hó-hé</i> (Ho-hay) are the Assiniboins or "Stone-roasters." Their +home is the region of the Assiniboin River in Manitoba. They speak the +Dakota tongue, and originally were a band of that nation. Tradition says +a Dakota "Helen" was the cause of the separation and a bloody feud that +lasted for many years. The <i>Hóhés</i> are called "Stone-roasters," because, +until recently at least, they used <i>wa-ta-pe</i> kettles and vessels made +of birch bark in which they cooked their food. They boiled water in +these vessels by heating stones and putting them in the water. The +<i>wa-ta-pe</i> kettle is made of the fibrous roots of the white cedar +interlaced and tightly woven. When the vessel is soaked it becomes +water-tight. [<i>Snelling's</i>] <i>Tales of the North-west</i>, p 21, +<i>Mackenzie's Travels.</i></p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_16'></a><a href='#FNanchor_16'>[16]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Hey-ó-ka</i> is one of the principal Dakota deities. He is a giant, but +can change himself into a buffalo, a bear, a fish or a bird. He is +called the Anti-natural God or Spirit. In summer he shivers with cold, +in winter he suffers from heat; he cries when he laughs and he laughs +when he cries, etc. He is the reverse of nature in all things. <i>Heyóka</i> +is universally feared and reverenced by the Dakotas, but so severe is +the ordeal that the <i>Heyóka Wacipee</i> (the dance to <i>Heyóka</i>) is now +rarely celebrated. It is said that the "Medicine-men" use a secret +preparation which enables them to handle fire and dip their hands in +boiling water without injury and thereby gain great <i>eclat</i> from the +uninitiated. The chiefs and the leading warriors usually belong to the +secret order of "Medicine-men" or "Sons of <i>Unktéhee</i>"—the Spirit of +the Waters.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_17'></a><a href='#FNanchor_17'>[17]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakota name for the moon is <i>Han-yé-tu-wee</i>—literally, +Night-Sun. He is the twin brother of <i>An-pé-tu-wee</i>—the Day Sun. See +note 70.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_18'></a><a href='#FNanchor_18'>[18]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas believe that the stars are the spirits of their departed +friends.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_19'></a><a href='#FNanchor_19'>[19]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Tee</i>—Contracted from <i>teepee</i>, lodge or wigwam, and means the same.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_20'></a><a href='#FNanchor_20'>[20]</a><div class='note'><p> For all their sacred feasts the Dakotas kindle a new fire called "The +Virgin Fire." This is done with flint and steel, or by rubbing together +pieces of wood till friction produces fire. It must be done by a virgin, +nor must any woman, except a virgin, ever touch the "sacred armor" of a +Dakota warrior. White cedar is "<i>Wakân</i>"—sacred. See note 50. <i>Riggs' +Tahkoo Wakân</i>, p. 84.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_21'></a><a href='#FNanchor_21'>[21]</a><div class='note'><p> All Northern Indians consider the East a mysterious and sacred land +whence comes the sun. The Dakota name for the East is +<i>Wee-yo-heé-yan-pa</i>—the sunrise. The Ojibways call it <i>Waub-ó-nong</i> +—the white land or land of light, and they have many myths, legends and +traditions relating thereto. Barbarous peoples of all times have +regarded the East with superstitious reverence simply because the sun +rises in that quarter.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_22'></a><a href='#FNanchor_22'>[22]</a><div class='note'><p> See <i>Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah</i>, pp. 225-8, describing the feast to +<i>Heyóka</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_23'></a><a href='#FNanchor_23'>[23]</a><div class='note'><p> This stone from which the Dakotas have made their pipes for ages, is +esteemed <i>wakân</i>—sacred. They call it <i>I-yân-ska</i>, probably from <i>iya</i>, +to speak, and <i>ska</i>, white, truthful, peaceful,—hence, peace-pipe, +herald of peace, pledge of truth, etc. In the cabinet at Albany, N.Y., +there is a very ancient pipe of this material which the Iroquois +obtained from the Dakotas. Charlevoix speaks of this pipe-stone in his +<i>History of New France</i>. LeSueur refers to the Yanktons as the village +of the Dakotas at the Red-Stone Quarry. See <i>Neill's Hist. Minn.</i>, p. +514.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_24'></a><a href='#FNanchor_24'>[24]</a><div class='note'><p> "<i>Ho</i>" is an exclamation of approval—yea, yes, bravo.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_25'></a><a href='#FNanchor_25'>[25]</a><div class='note'><p> Buying is the honorable way of taking a wife among the Dakotas. The +proposed husband usually gives a horse or its value in other articles to +the father or natural guardian of the woman selected—sometimes against +her will. See note 75.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_26'></a><a href='#FNanchor_26'>[26]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas believe that the <i>Aurora Borealis</i> is an evil omen and +the threatening of an evil spirit (perhaps <i>Waziya</i>, the +Winter-god—some say a witch, or a very ugly old woman). When the lights +appear danger threatens, and the warriors shoot at, and often slay, the +evil spirit, but it rises from the dead again.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_27'></a><a href='#FNanchor_27'>[27]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Se-só-kah</i>—The Robin.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_28'></a><a href='#FNanchor_28'>[28]</a><div class='note'><p> The spirit of <i>Anpétu-sâpa</i> that haunts the Falls of St. Anthony with +her dead babe in her arms. See the Legend in <i>Neill's Hist. Minn.</i>, or +my <i>Legend of the Falls.</i></p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_29'></a><a href='#FNanchor_29'>[29]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Mee-coónk-shee</i>—My daughter.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_30'></a><a href='#FNanchor_30'>[30]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas call the meteor, "<i>Wakân-dénda</i>" (sacred fire) and +<i>Wakân-wóhlpa</i> (sacred gift). Meteors are messages from the Land of +Spirits warning of impending danger. It is a curious fact that the +"sacred stone" of the Mohammedans, in the Kaaba at Mecca, is a meteoric +stone, and obtains its sacred character from the fact that it fell from +heaven.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_31'></a><a href='#FNanchor_31'>[31]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Kah-nó-te-dahn</i>,—the little, mysterious dweller in the woods. This +spirit lives in the forest, in hollow trees. <i>Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah</i>, +Pre. Rem. xxxi. "The Dakota god of the woods—an unknown animal said to +resemble a man, which the Dakotas worship: perhaps, the +monkey."—<i>Riggs' Dakota Dic. Tit—Canotidan</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_32'></a><a href='#FNanchor_32'>[32]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas believe that thunder is produced by the flapping of the +wings of an immense bird which they call <i>Wakinyan</i>—the Thunder-bird. +Near the source of the Minnesota River is a place called +"Thunder-Tracks" where the foot-prints of a "Thunder-bird" are seen on +the rocks twenty-five miles apart. <i>Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah</i>, p. 71. +There are many Thunder-birds. The father of all the +Thunder-birds—"<i>Wakinyan Tanka</i>"—or "Big Thunder," has his <i>teepee</i> on +a lofty mountain in the far West. His <i>teepee</i> has four openings, at +each of which is a sentinel; at the east, a butterfly; at the west, a +bear; at the south, a red deer; at the north, a caribou. He has a bitter +enmity against <i>Unktéhee</i> (god of waters) and often shoots his fiery +arrows at him, and hits the earth, trees, rocks, and sometimes men. +<i>Wakinyan</i> created wild-rice, the bow and arrow, the tomahawk and the +spear. He is a great war-spirit, and <i>Wanmdée</i> (the war-eagle) is his +messenger. A Thunder-bird (say the Dakotas) was once killed near Kapóza +by the son of Cetan-Wakawa-mâni and he thereupon took the name of +"<i>Wakinyan Tanka</i>"—"Big Thunder."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_33'></a><a href='#FNanchor_33'>[33]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced <i>Tah-tâhn-kah</i>—Bison or Buffalo.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_34'></a><a href='#FNanchor_34'>[34]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Enâh</i>—An exclamation of wonder. <i>Ehó</i>—Behold! see there!</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_35'></a><a href='#FNanchor_35'>[35]</a><div class='note'><p> The Crees are the Knisteneaux of Alexander Mackenzie. See his account +of them, <i>Mackenzie's Travels</i>, (London, 1801) p. xci to cvii.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_36'></a><a href='#FNanchor_36'>[36]</a><div class='note'><p> Lake Superior. The only names the Dakotas have for Lake Superior are +<i>Medé Tânka</i> or <i>Tânka Medé</i>—Great Lake, and <i>Me-ne-yâ-ta</i>—literally, +<i>At-the-Water</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_37'></a><a href='#FNanchor_37'>[37]</a><div class='note'><p> April—Literally, the moon when the geese lay eggs. See note 71.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_38'></a><a href='#FNanchor_38'>[38]</a><div class='note'><p> Carver's Cave at St. Paul was called by the Dakotas <i>Wakân</i> +<i>Teepee</i>—sacred lodge. In the days that are no more they lighted their +council-fires in this cave and buried their dead near it. See <i>Neill's +Hist. Minn</i>., p. 207. Capt. Carver in his <i>Travels</i>, London, 1778, p. +63, et. seq., describes this cave as follows: "It is a remarkable cave +of an amazing depth. The Indians term it Wakonteebe, that is, the +Dwelling of the Great Spirit. The entrance into it is about ten feet +wide, the height of it five feet, the arch within is near fifteen feet +high and about thirty feet broad. The bottom of it consists of fine +clear sand. About twenty feet from the entrance begins a lake, the water +of which is transparent, and extends to an unsearchable distance; for +the darkness of the cave prevents all attempts to acquire a knowledge of +it. I threw a small pebble toward the interior parts of it with my +utmost strength. I could hear that it fell into the water, and +notwithstanding it was of so small a size it caused an astonishing and +horrible noise that reverberated through all those gloomy regions. I +found in this cave many Indian hieroglyphics which appeared very +ancient, for time had nearly covered them with moss so that it was with +difficulty I could trace them. They were cut in a rude manner upon the +inside of the walls, which were composed of a stone so extremely soft +that it might be easily penetrated with a knife: a stone everywhere to +be found near the Mississippi. This cave is only accessible by ascending +a narrow, steep passage that lies near the brink of the river. At a +little distance from this dreary cavern is the burying-place of several +bands of the Naudowessie (Dakota) Indians," Many years ago the roof fell +in but the cave has been partly restored and is now used as a beer +cellar.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_39'></a><a href='#FNanchor_39'>[39]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Wah-kâhn-dee</i>—The lightning.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_40'></a><a href='#FNanchor_40'>[40]</a><div class='note'><p> The Bloody River—the Red River was so called on account of the +numerous Indian battles that have been fought on its banks. The Ojibways +say that its waters were colored red by the blood of many warriors slain +on its banks in the fierce wars between themselves and the Dakotas.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_41'></a><a href='#FNanchor_41'>[41]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Tah</i>—The Moose. This is the root-word for all ruminating animals: +<i>Ta-tânka</i>, buffalo—Ta-tóka, mountain antelope—Ta-hinca, the red +deer—Ta-mdóka, the buck-deer—Ta-hinca-ská, white deer (sheep).</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_42'></a><a href='#FNanchor_42'>[42]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Hogâhn</i>—Fish. Red Hogan, the trout.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_43'></a><a href='#FNanchor_43'>[43]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Tipsânna</i> (often called <i>tipsinna</i>) is a wild prairie-turnip used +for food by the Dakotas. It grows on high, dry land, and increases from +year to year. It is eaten both cooked and raw.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_44'></a><a href='#FNanchor_44'>[44]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Rio Tajo</i> (or Tagus), a river of Spain and Portugal.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_45'></a><a href='#FNanchor_45'>[45]</a><div class='note'> +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>* * * * "Bees of Trebizond—<br /></span> +<span>Which from the sunniest flowers that glad<br /></span> +<span>With their pure smile the gardens round,<br /></span> +<span>Draw venom forth that drives men mad."<br /></span> +</div><div class="stanza"> +<span><i>—Thomas Moore</i>.<br /></span> +</div></div></div> + +<a name='Footnote_46'></a><a href='#FNanchor_46'>[46]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Skeé-skah</i>—The Wood-duck.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_47'></a><a href='#FNanchor_47'>[47]</a><div class='note'><p> The Crocus. I have seen the prairies in Minnesota spangled with these +beautiful flowers in various colors before the ground was free from +frost. The Dakotas call them "frost-flowers."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_48'></a><a href='#FNanchor_48'>[48]</a><div class='note'><p> The "Sacred Ring" around the Feast of the Virgins is formed by armed +warriors sitting, and none but a virgin must enter this ring. The +warrior who knows is bound on honor, and by old and sacred custom, to +expose and publicly denounce any tarnished maiden who dares to enter +this ring, and his word cannot be questioned—even by the chief. See +<i>Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah</i>, p. 64.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_49'></a><a href='#FNanchor_49'>[49]</a><div class='note'><p> Prairie's Pride.—This annual shrub, which abounds on many of the +sandy prairies in Minnesota, is sometimes called "tea-plant," +"sage-plant," and "red-root willow." I doubt if it has any botanic name. +Its long plumes of purple and gold are truly the "pride of the +prairies."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_50'></a><a href='#FNanchor_50'>[50]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas consider white cedar "<i>Wakân</i>," (sacred). They use +sprigs of it at their feasts, and often burn it to destroy the power of +evil spirits. <i>Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah</i>, p. 210.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_51'></a><a href='#FNanchor_51'>[51]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Tâhkoo-skahng-skahng</i>. This deity is supposed to be invisible, yet +everywhere present; he is an avenger and a searcher of hearts. (<i>Neill's +Hist. Minn</i>., p. 57). I suspect he was the chief spirit of the Dakotas +before the missionaries imported "<i>Wakân-Tánka</i>" (Great Spirit).</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_52'></a><a href='#FNanchor_52'>[52]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas believe in "were-wolves" as firmly as did our Saxon +ancestors, and for similar reasons—the howl of the wolf being often +imitated as a decoy or signal by their enemies the Ojibways.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_53'></a><a href='#FNanchor_53'>[53]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Shee-shó-kah</i>—The Robin.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_54'></a><a href='#FNanchor_54'>[54]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas call the Evening Star the "<i>Virgin Star</i>," and believe it +to be the spirit of the virgin wronged at the feast.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_55'></a><a href='#FNanchor_55'>[55]</a><div class='note'><p> Mille Lacs. This lake was discovered by Du Luth, and by him named Lac +Buade in honor of Governor Frontenac of Canada, whose family name was +Buade. The Dakota name for it is <i>Mdé Wakân</i>—Spirit Lake.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_56'></a><a href='#FNanchor_56'>[56]</a><div class='note'><p> The Ojibways imitate the hoot of the owl and the howl of the wolf to +perfection, and often use these cries as signals to each other in war +and the chase.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_57'></a><a href='#FNanchor_57'>[57]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas called the Ojibways the "Snakes of the Forest" on account +of their lying in ambush for their enemies.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_58'></a><a href='#FNanchor_58'>[58]</a><div class='note'><p> Strawberries.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_59'></a><a href='#FNanchor_59'>[59]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Seé-yo</i>—The prairie-hen.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_60'></a><a href='#FNanchor_60'>[60]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Mahgâh</i>—The wild-goose. <i>Fox-pups</i>. I could never see the propriety +of calling the young of foxes <i>kits</i> or <i>kittens</i>, which mean <i>little +cats</i>. The fox belongs to the <i>canis</i> or dog family, and not the <i>felis</i> +or cat family. If it is proper to call the young of dogs and wolves +<i>pups</i>, it is equally proper to so call the young of foxes.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_61'></a><a href='#FNanchor_61'>[61]</a><div class='note'><p> When a Dakota is sick he thinks the spirit of an enemy or some animal +has entered into his body, and the principal business of the +"medicine-man"—<i>Wicásta Wakân</i>—is to cast out the "unclean spirit," +with incantations and charms. See <i>Neill's Hist. Minn</i>., pp. 66-8. The +Jews entertained a similar belief in the days of Jesus of Nazareth.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_62'></a><a href='#FNanchor_62'>[62]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Wah-zeé-yah's</i> star—The North-star. See note 3.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_63'></a><a href='#FNanchor_63'>[63]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas, like our forefathers and all other barbarians, believe +in witches and witchcraft.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_64'></a><a href='#FNanchor_64'>[64]</a><div class='note'><p> The <i>Medó</i> is a wild potato; it resembles the sweet-potato in top and +taste. It grows in bottom-lands, and is much prized by the Dakotas for +food. The "<i>Dakota Friend</i>," for December, 1850. (Minn. Hist. Col.)</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_65'></a><a href='#FNanchor_65'>[65]</a><div class='note'><p> The meteor—<i>Wakân-denda</i>—Sacred fire.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_66'></a><a href='#FNanchor_66'>[66]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Me-tá-win</i>—My bride.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_68'></a><a href='#FNanchor_68'>[68]</a><div class='note'><p> The <i>Via Lactea</i> or Milky Way. The Dakotas call it <i>Wanágee +Tach-ánku</i>—The pathway of the spirits; and believe that over this path +the spirits of the dead pass to the Spirit-land. See <i>Riggs' Tah-koo +Wah-kan</i>, p. 101.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_69'></a><a href='#FNanchor_69'>[69]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Oonk-táy-he</i>. There are many <i>Unktéhees</i>, children of the <i>Great +Unktéhee</i>, who created the earth and man, and who formerly dwelt in a +vast cavern under the Falls of St. Anthony. The <i>Unktéhee</i> sometimes +reveals himself in the form of a huge buffalo-bull. From him proceed +invisible influences. The <i>Great Unktéhee</i> created the earth. +"Assembling in grand conclave all the aquatic tribes he ordered them to +bring up dirt from beneath the waters, and proclaimed death to the +disobedient. The beaver and otter forfeited their lives. At last the +muskrat went beneath the waters, and, after a long time, appeared at the +surface, nearly exhausted, with some dirt. From this <i>Unktéhee</i> +fashioned the earth into a large circular plain. The earth being +finished he took a deity, one of his own offspring, and, grinding him to +powder, sprinkled it upon the earth, and this produced many worms. The +worms were then collected and scattered again. They matured into infants +and these were then collected and scattered and became full-grown +Dakotas. The bones of the mastodon, the Dakotas think, are the bones of +<i>Unktéhees</i>, and they preserve them with the greatest care in the +medicine-bag." <i>Neill's Hist. Minn</i>., p. 55. The <i>Unktéhees</i> and the +Thunder-birds are perpetually at war. There are various accounts of the +creation of man. Some say that at the bidding of the <i>Great Unktéhee</i>, +men sprang full grown from the caverns of the earth. See <i>Riggs' "Tahkoo +Wahkan"</i>, and <i>Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah</i>. The <i>Great Unktéhee</i> and the +Great Thunder-bird had a terrible battle in the bowels of the earth to +determine which should be the ruler of the world. See description in +<i>Winona</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_70'></a><a href='#FNanchor_70'>[70]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced <i>Ahng-páy-too-wee</i>—The Sun; literally the Day-Sun, thus +distinguishing him from <i>Han-yé-tuwee</i> (Hahng-yay-too-wee) the Night Sun +(the moon). They are twin brothers, but <i>Anpétuwee</i> is the more +powerful. <i>Han-yé-tuwee</i> receives his power from his brother and obeys +him. He watches over the earth while the sun sleeps. The Dakotas believe +the sun is the father of life. Unlike the most of their other gods, he +is beneficent and kind; yet they worshiped him (in the sun-dance) in the +most dreadful manner. See <i>Riggs' Tahkoo Wakan</i>, pp. 81-2, and Catlin's +<i>Okeepa</i>. The moon is worshiped as the representative of the sun; and in +the great Sun-dance, which is usually held in the full of the moon, when +the moon rises the dancers turn their eyes on her (or him). <i>Anpétuwee</i> +issues every morning from the lodge of <i>Han-nán-na</i> (the Morning) and +begins his journey over the sky to his lodge in the land of shadows. +Sometimes he walks over on the Bridge (or path) of the Spirits—<i>Wanâge +Ta-chán-ku</i>,—and sometimes he sails over the sea of the skies in his +shining canoe; but <i>somehow</i>, and the Dakotas do not explain how, he +gets back again to the lodge of <i>Hannánna</i> in time to take a nap and eat +his breakfast before starting anew on his journey. The Dakotas swear by +the sun, "<i>As Anpétuwee hears me, this is true!</i>" They call him Father +and pray to him—"<i>Wakán! Até, on-she-má-da</i>"—"Sacred Spirit,—Father, +have mercy on me." As the Sun is the father, so they believe the Earth +is the mother, of life. Truly there is much philosophy in the Dakota +mythology. The Algonkins call the earth "<i>Me-suk-kum-mik-o-kwa</i>"—the +great-grandmother of all. <i>Narrative of John Tanner</i>, p. 193.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_71'></a><a href='#FNanchor_71'>[71]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas reckon their months by <i>moons</i>. They name their moons +from natural circumstances. They correspond very nearly with our months, +as follows:</p> + +<p>January—<i>Wee-té-rhee</i>—The Hard Moon; i.e.—the cold moon.</p> + +<p>February—<i>Wee-câ-ta-wee</i>—The Coon Moon—(the moon when the coons come +out of their hollow trees).</p> + +<p>March—<i>Istâ-wee-ca-ya-zang-wee</i>—the sore-eyes moon (from snow +blindness).</p> + +<p>April—Magâ-oka-da-wee—the moon when the geese lay eggs; also called +Wokâ da-wee—egg-moon; and sometimes Wató-papee-wee, the canoe-moon, or +moon when the streams become free from ice.</p> + +<p>May—Wó-zu-pee-wee—the planting moon.</p> + +<p>June—Wazú-ste-ca-sa-wee—the strawberry moon.</p> + +<p>July—Wa-sún-pa-wee—the moon when the geese shed their feathers, also +called Chang-pâ-sapa-wee—Choke-Cherry moon, and +sometimes—Mna-rchâ-rcha-wee—"The moon of the red-blooming lilies," +literally, the red-lily moon.</p> + +<p>August—Wasú-ton-wee—the ripe moon, i.e., Harvest Moon.</p> + +<p>September—Psin-na-ké-tu-wee—the ripe rice moon. (When the wild rice is +ripe.)</p> + +<p>October—Wâ-zu-pee-wee or Wee-wa-zu-pee—the moon when wild rice is +gathered and laid up for winter.</p> + +<p>November—Ta-kee-yu-hrâ-wee—the deer-rutting moon.</p> + +<p>December—Ta-hé-cha-psung-wee—the moon when deer shed their horns.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_72'></a><a href='#FNanchor_72'>[72]</a><div class='note'><p> Oonk-to-mee—is a bad spirit in the form of a monstrous black spider. +He inhabits fens and marshes and lies in wait for his prey. At night he +often lights a torch (evidently the ignis fatuus or Jack-o' lantern) and +swings it on the marshes to decoy the unwary into his toils.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_73'></a><a href='#FNanchor_73'>[73]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas have their stone-idol, or god, called Toon-kan—or Inyan. +This god dwells in stone or rocks and is, they say, the oldest god of +all—he is grandfather of all living things. I think, however, that the +stone is merely the symbol of the everlasting, all-pervading, invisible +Ta-ku Wa-kan—the essence of all life,—pervading all nature, animate +and inanimate. The Rev. S.R. Riggs, who for forty years has been a +student of Dakota customs, superstitions, etc., says, Tâhkoo Wahkan, p. +55, et seq.: "The religious faith of the Dakota is not in his gods as +such. It is in an intangible, mysterious something of which they are +only the embodiment, and that in such measure and degree as may accord +with the individual fancy of the worshiper. Each one will worship some +of these divinities, and neglect or despise others, but the great object +of all their worship, whatever its chosen medium, is the <i>Ta-koo +Wa-kan</i>, which is the supernatural and mysterious. No one term can +express the full meaning of the Dakota's <i>Wakan</i>. It comprehends all +mystery, secret power and divinity. Awe and reverence are its due, and +it is as unlimited in manifestation as it is in idea. All life is +<i>Wakan</i>; so also is everything which exhibits power, whether in action, +as the winds and drifting clouds; or in passive endurance, as the +boulder by the wayside. For even the commonest sticks and stones have a +spiritual essence which must be reverenced as a manifestation of the +all-pervading, mysterious power that fills the universe."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_74'></a><a href='#FNanchor_74'>[74]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Wazi-kuté</i>—Wah-ze-koo-tay; literally—Pine-shooter,—he that shoots +among the pines. When Father Hennepin was at Mille Lacs in 1679-80, +<i>Wazi-kuté</i> was the head chief (<i>Itâncan</i>) of the band of Isantees. +Hennepin writes the name Ouasicoude, and translates it—the "Pierced +Pine." See Shea's <i>Hennepin</i>, p. 234, <i>Minn. Hist. Coll</i>. vol. i, p. +316.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_75'></a><a href='#FNanchor_75'>[75]</a><div class='note'><p> When a Dakota brave wishes to "propose" to a "dusky maid," he visits +her <i>teepee</i> at night after she has retired, or rather, laid down in her +robe to sleep. He lights a splinter of wood and holds it to her face. If +she blows out the light, he is accepted; if she covers her head and +leaves it burning he is rejected. The rejection however is not +considered final till it has been thrice repeated. Even then the maiden +is often bought of her parents or guardian, and forced to become the +wife of the rejected suitor. If she accepts the proposal, still the +suitor must buy her of her parents with suitable gifts.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_76'></a><a href='#FNanchor_76'>[76]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas called the falls of St. Anthony the <i>Ha-Ha</i>—the <i>loud +laughing</i>, or <i>roaring</i>. The Mississippi River they called <i>Ha-Ha +Wâ-kpa</i> River of the Falls. The Ojibway name for the Falls of St. +Anthony is <i>Ka-kâ-bik-kúng</i>. Minnehaha is a combination of two Dakota +words—<i>Mini</i>—water and <i>Ha-Ha</i>, Falls; but it is not the name by which +the Dakotas designated that cataract. Some authorities say they called +it <i>I-hâ-ha</i>—pronounced E-rhah-rhah—lightly laughing. Rev. S.W. Pond, +whose long residence as a missionary among the Dakotas in this immediate +vicinity makes him an authority that can hardly be questioned, says they +called the Falls of Minnehaha "<i>Mini-i-hrpa-ya-dan</i>," and it had no +other name in Dakota. "It means Little Falls and nothing else." Letter +to the author.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_77'></a><a href='#FNanchor_77'>[77]</a><div class='note'><p> The game of the Plum-stones is one of the favorite games of the +Dakotas. Hennepin was the first to describe this game, in his +<i>Description de la Louisiane</i>, Paris, 1683, and he describes it very +accurately. See Shea's translation p. 301. The Dakotas call this game +<i>Kan-soo Koo-tay-pe</i>—shooting plum-stones. Each stone is painted black +on one side and red on the other; on one side they grave certain figures +which make the stones <i>Wakan</i>. They are placed in a dish and thrown up +like dice. Indeed, the game is virtually a game of dice. Hennepin says: +"There are some so given to this game that they will gamble away even +their great coat. Those who conduct the game cry at the top of their +voices when they rattle the platter, and they strike their shoulders so +hard as to leave them all black with the blows."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_78'></a><a href='#FNanchor_78'>[78]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Wa-tanka</i>—contraction of <i>Wa-kan Tanka</i>—Great Spirit. The Dakotas +had no <i>Wakan Tanka</i> or <i>Wakan-peta</i>—fire spirit—till white men +imported them. There being no name for the Supreme Being in the Dakota +tongue (except <i>Tâku Skán-skán</i>.—See note 51)—and all their gods and +spirits being <i>Wakan</i>—the missionaries named God in Dakota—"<i>Wakan +Tanka</i>"—which means <i>Big Spirit</i>, or <i>The Big Mysterious</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_79'></a><a href='#FNanchor_79'>[79]</a><div class='note'><p> The Dakotas called Lake Calhoun, at Minneapolis, +Minn.—<i>Mdé-mdó-za</i>—Loon Lake. They also called it <i>Re-ya-ta-mde</i>—the +lake back from the river. They called Lake Harriet—<i>Mdé-únma</i>—the +other lake—or (perhaps) <i>Mdé-uma</i>—Hazel-nut Lake. The lake nearest +Calhoun on the north—Lake of the Isles—they called <i>Wi-ta +Mdé</i>—Island-Lake. Lake Minnetonka they called <i>Me-ne-a-tân-ka</i>—<i>Broad +Water</i>.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_80'></a><a href='#FNanchor_80'>[80]</a><div class='note'><p> The animal called by the French <i>voyageurs</i> the <i>cabri</i> (the kid) is +found only on the prairies. It is of the goat kind, smaller than a deer +and so swift that neither horse nor dog can overtake it. (Snelling's +"<i>Tales of the Northwest</i>," p. 286, note 15.) It is the gazelle, or +prairie antelope, called by the Dakotas <i>Ta-tóka-dan</i>—little antelope. +It is the <i>Pish-tah-te-koosh</i> of the Algonkin tribes, "reckoned the +fleetest animal in the prairie country about the Assiniboin." <i>Captivity +and Adventures of John Tanner</i>, p. 301.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_81'></a><a href='#FNanchor_81'>[81]</a><div class='note'><p> The <i>Wicâstâpi Wakânpi</i> (literally, <i>men supernatural</i>) are the +"Medicine-men" or Magicians of the Dakotas. They call themselves the +sons or disciples of <i>Unktéhee</i>. In their rites, ceremonies, tricks and +pretensions they closely resemble the <i>Dactyli, Idæ</i>, and <i>Curetes</i> of +the ancient Greeks and Romans, the <i>Magi</i> of the Persians and the Druids +of Britain. Their pretended intercourse with spirits, their powers of +magic and divination, and their rites are substantially the same, and +point unmistakably to a common origin. The Dakota "Medicine-Man" can do +the "rope trick" of the Hindoo magician to perfection. The <i>teepee</i> used +for the <i>Wakan Wacipee</i>—or Sacred Dance—is called the <i>Wakan +Teepee</i>—the Sacred Teepee. Carvers Cave at St. Paul was also called +<i>Wakan Teepee</i> because the Medicine-men or magicians often held their +dances and feasts in it. For a full account of the rites, etc., see +Riggs' <i>Tahkoo Wahkan</i>, Chapter VI. The <i>Ta-sha-ke</i>—literally, +"Deer-hoofs"—is a rattle made by hanging the hard segments of +deer-hoofs to a wooden rod a foot long—about an inch in diameter at the +handle end, and tapering to a point at the other. The clashing of these +horny bits makes a sharp, shrill sound something like distant +sleigh-bells. In their incantations over the sick they sometimes use the +gourd shell rattle.</p> + +<p>The <i>Chân-che-ga</i>—is a drum or "Wooden Kettle." The hoop of the drum is +from a foot to eighteen inches in diameter, and from three to ten inches +deep. The skin covering is stretched over one end, making a drum with +one end only. The magical drum-sticks are ornamented with down, and +heads of birds or animals are carved on them. This makes them <i>Wakan</i>.</p> + +<p>The flute called <i>Cho-tanka</i> (big pith) is of two varieties—one made of +sumac, the pith of which is punched out. The second variety is made of +the long bone of the wing or thigh of the swan or crane. They call the +first the <i>bubbling chotanka</i> from the tremulous note it gives when +blown with all the holes stopped. Riggs' <i>Tâhkoo Wahkan</i>, p. 476, et +seq.</p> + +<p><i>E-né-pee</i>—vapor-bath, is used as a purification preparatory to the +sacred feasts. The vapor-bath is taken in this way: "A number of poles, +the size of hoop-poles or less, are taken, and their larger ends being +set in the ground in a circle, the flexible tops are bent over and tied +in the center. This frame-work is then covered with robes and blankets, +a small hole being left on one side for an entrance. Before the door a +fire is built, and round stones about the size of a man's head, are +heated in it. When hot they are rolled within, and the door being closed +steam is made by pouring water on them. The devotee, stripped to the +skin, sits within this steam-tight dome, sweating profusely at every +pore, until he is nearly suffocated. Sometimes a number engage in it +together and unite their prayers and songs." <i>Tâhkoo Wakan</i>, p. 83. +Father Hennepin was subjected to the vapor-bath at Mille Lacs by Chief +<i>Aqui-pa-que-tin</i>, two hundred years ago. After describing the method, +Hennepin says: "When he had made me sweat thus three times in a week, I +felt as strong as ever." Shea's Hennepin, p. 228. For a very full and +accurate account of the Medicine-men of the Dakotas, and their rites, +etc., see Chap. II, Neill's Hist. Minnesota.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_82'></a><a href='#FNanchor_82'>[82]</a><div class='note'><p> The sacred <i>O-zu-ha</i>—or Medicine sack must be made of the skin of +the otter, the coon, the weasel, the squirrel, the loon, a certain kind +of fish or the skins of serpents. It must contain four kinds of medicine +(or magic) representing birds, beasts, herbs and trees, viz.: The down +of the female swan colored red, the roots of certain grasses, bark from +the roots of cedar trees, and hair of the buffalo. "From this +combination proceeds a Wakân influence so powerful that no human being, +unassisted, can resist it." Wonderful indeed must be the magic power of +these Dakota Druids to lead such a man as the Rev. S.R. Riggs to say of +them: "By great shrewdness, untiring industry, and more or less of +<i>actual demoniacal possession</i>, they convince great numbers of their +fellows, and in the process are convinced themselves of their sacred +character and office." <i>Tâhkoo Wakân</i>, pp. 88-9.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_83'></a><a href='#FNanchor_83'>[83]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Gâh-ma-na-tek-wahk—the river of many falls</i>—is the Ojibway name of +the river commonly called Kaministiguia, near the mouth of which is +situated Fort William. The view on Thunder-Bay is one of the grandest in +America. Thunder-Cap, with its sleeping stone-giant, looms up into the +heavens. Here <i>Ka-be-bon-ikka</i>—the Ojibway's god of storms—flaps his +huge wings and makes the Thunder. From this mountain he sends forth the +rain, the snow, the hail, the lightning and the tempest. A vast giant, +turned to stone by his magic, lies asleep at his feet. The island called +by the Ojibways the <i>Mak-i-nak</i> (the turtle) from its tortoise-like +shape, lifts its huge form in the distance. Some "down-east Yankee" +called it "Pie-island," from its fancied resemblance to a pumpkin pie, +and the name, like all bad names, <i>sticks</i>. McKay's Mountain on the +mainland, a perpendicular rock more than a thousand feet high, upheaved +by the throes of some vast volcano, and numerous other bold and +precipitous headlands, and rock-built islands, around which roll the +sapphire-blue waters of the fathomless bay, present some of the most +magnificent views to be found on either continent.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_84'></a><a href='#FNanchor_84'>[84]</a><div class='note'><p> The Mission of the Holy Ghost—at La Pointe, on the isle +<i>Wauga-bâ-me</i>—(winding view) in the beautiful bay of Cha-quam-egon +—was founded by the Jesuits about the year 1660. Father René Menard was +probably the first priest at this point. After he was lost in the +wilderness, Father Glaude Allouëz permanently established the mission in +1665. The famous Father Marquette, who took Allouëz's place, Sept. 13, +1669, writing to his superior, thus describes the Dakotas: "The +Nadouessi are the Iroquois of this country, beyond La Pointe, <i>but less +faithless, and never attack till attacked.</i> Their language is entirely +different from the Huron and Algonquin. They have many villages but are +widely scattered. They have very extraordinary customs. They principally +use the calumet. They do not speak at great feasts, and when a stranger +arrives give him to eat of a wooden fork, as we would a child. All the +lake tribes make war on them, but with small success. They have false +oats (wild rice,) use little canoes, <i>and keep their word strictly</i>." +<i>Neill's Hist. Minn.</i>, p. III.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_85'></a><a href='#FNanchor_85'>[85]</a><div class='note'><p> <i>Michâbo</i> or <i>Manni-bozo</i>—the Good Spirit of the Algonkins. In +autumn, in the moon of the falling leaf, ere he composes himself to his +winter's sleep, he fills his great pipe and takes a god-like smoke. The +balmy clouds from his pipe float over the hills and woodland, filling +the air with the haze of "Indian Summer." <i>Brinton's Myths of the New +World</i>, p. 163.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_86'></a><a href='#FNanchor_86'>[86]</a><div class='note'><p> Pronounced <i>Kah-tháh-gah</i>—literally, <i>the place of waves and foam</i>. +This was the principal village of the <i>Isantee</i> band of Dakotas two +hundred years ago, and was located at the Falls of St. Anthony, which +the Dakotas called the <i>Ha-ha</i>,—pronounced <i>Rhah-rhah</i>,—the +<i>loud-laughing waters</i>. The Dakotas believed that the Falls were in the +center of the earth. Here dwelt the <i>Great Unktéhee</i>, the creator of the +earth and man: and from this place a path led to the Spirit-land. DuLuth +undoubtedly visited Kathâga in the year 1679. In his "Memoir" (Archives +of the Ministry of the Marine) addressed to Seignelay, 1685, he says: +"On the 2nd of July, 1679, I had the honor to plant his Majesty's arms +in the great village of the Nadouecioux called Izatys, where never had a +Frenchman been, etc." <i>Izatys</i> is here used not as the name of the +village, but as the name of the band—the <i>Isantees</i>. <i>Nadouecioux</i> was +a name given the Dakotas generally by the early French traders and the +Ojibways. See <i>Shea's Hennepin's Description of Louisiana</i>, pp. 203 and +375. The villages of the Dakotas were not permanent towns. They were +hardly more than camping grounds, occupied at intervals and for longer +or shorter periods, as suited the convenience of the hunters; yet there +were certain places, like Mille Lacs, the Falls of St. Anthony, <i>Kapoza</i> +(near St. Paul), <i>Remnica</i> (where the city of Red Wing now stands), and +<i>Keuxa</i> (or <i>Keoza</i>) on the site of the city of Winona, so frequently +occupied by several of the bands as to be considered their chief +villages respectively.</p> + +<p>Mr. Neill, usually very accurate and painstaking, has fallen into an +error in his prefatory notes to the last edition of his valuable +<i>History of Minnesota</i>. Speaking of DuLuth, he says:</p> + +<p>"He appears to have entered Minnesota by way of the Pigeon or St. Louis +River, and to have explored where no Frenchman had been, and on July 2, +1679, was at <i>Kathio</i> (<i>Kathâga</i>) perhaps on Red Lake or Lake of the +Woods, which was called 'the great village of the Wadouessioux,' one +hundred and twenty leagues from the <i>Songaskicons</i> and <i>Houetepons</i> who +were dwellers <i>in the Mille Lac region</i>."</p> + +<p>Now <i>Kathâga</i> (Mr. Neill's <i>Kathio</i>) was located at the Falls of St. +Anthony on the Mississippi as the whole current of Dakota traditions +clearly shows and DuLuth's dispatches clearly indicate. Besides, the +<i>Songaskicons</i> and <i>Houetepons</i> were <i>not</i> and never were "dwellers in +the Mille Lac region." The Songaskicons (Sissetons) were at that time +located on the Des Moines river (in Iowa), and the Houetabons +(Ouadebatons) at and around Big Stone Lake. The Isantees occupied the +region lying between the mouth of the Minnesota River and Spirit Lake +(Mille Lacs) with their principal village—<i>Kathága</i>—where the city of +Minneapolis now stands. These facts account for the "one hundred and +twenty leagues" as distances were roughly reckoned by the early French +explorers.</p> + +<p>September 1, 1678, Daniel Greysolon DuLuth, a native of Lyons, France, +left Quebec to explore the country of the Dakotas. "The next year (1679) +on the 2nd day of July, he caused the king's arms to be planted in the +great village of the Nadouessioux (Dakotas) called Kathio" (<i>Kathága</i>) +"where no Frenchman had ever been, also at the Songaskicons and +Houetabons, one hundred and twenty leagues distant from the former. * * +* * On this tour he visited Mille Lacs, which he called Lake Buade, the +family name of Frontenac, governor of Canada." <i>Neill''s History of +Minnesota</i>, p. 122. This is correct, except the name of the +village—<i>Kathio</i>, which is a misprint or perhaps an error of a copyist. +It should be <i>Kathága</i>. DuLuth was again at the Falls of St. Anthony in +1680 and returned to Lake Superior via the Mississippi, Rum River and +Mille Lacs, according to his own dispatches.</p> + +<p>Franquelin's "<i>Carte de la Louisiane</i>" printed at Paris A.D. 1684, from +information derived from DuLuth, who visited France in 1682-3, and +conferred with the minister of the Colonies and the minister of +Marine—shows the inaccuracy, as to points of compass at least, of the +early French explorers. According to this map, Lake Buade (Mille Lacs) +lies north-west of Lake Superior and Lake Pepin lies due west of it.</p> + +<p>DuLuth was afterward appointed to the command of Fort Frontenac near +Niagara Falls, and died there in 1710. The official dispatch from the +Governor of Canada to the French Government is, as regards the great +explorer, brief and expressive—"Captain DuLuth is dead. He was an +honest man."</p> + +<p>To Daniel Greysolon DuLuth, and not to Father Hennepin, whom he rescued +from his captors at Mille Lacs, belongs the credit of the first +exploration of Minnesota by white men.</p> + +<p>Father Hennepin was a self-conceited and self-convicted liar. Daniel +Greysolon DuLuth "was an honest man."</p></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>NOTES TO THE SEA-GULL</h2> +<br /> + +<a name='Footnote_S1'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S1'>[1]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Kay-óshk</i> is the Ojibway name for the sea-gull.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S2'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S2'>[2]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Gitchee</i>—great,—<i>Gumee</i>—sea or lake,—Lake Superior; also often +called <i>Ochipwè Gitchee Gúmee</i>, Great lake (or sea) of the Ojibways.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S3'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S3'>[3]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Né-mè-Shómis</i>—my grandfather. "In the days of my grandfather" is +the Ojibway's preface to all his traditions and legends.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S4'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S4'>[4]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Waub</i>—white—<i>O-jeeg</i>—fisher, (a furred animal). White Fisher was +the name of a noted Ojibway chief who lived on the south shore of Lake +Superior many years ago. Schoolcraft married one of his descendants.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S5'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S5'>[5]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Ma-kwa</i> or <i>mush-kwa</i>—the bear.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S6'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S6'>[6]</a><div class='note'><p>The <i>Te-ke-nâh-gun</i> is a board upon one side of which a sort of basket +is fastened or woven with thongs of skin or strips of cloth. In this the +babe is placed and the mother carries it on her back. In the wigwam the +<i>tekenagun</i> is often suspended by a cord to the lodge-poles and the +mother swings her babe in it.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S7'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S7'>[7]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Wabóse</i> (or <i>Wabos</i>)-the rabbit. <i>Penáy</i>, the pheasant. At certain +seasons the pheasant drums with his wings.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S8'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S8'>[8]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Kaug</i>, the porcupine. <i>Kenéw</i>, the war-eagle.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S9'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S9'>[9]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Ka-be-bon-ik-ka</i> is the god of storms, thunder, lightning, etc. His +home is on Thunder-Cap at Thunder-Bay, Lake Superior. By his magic the +giant that lies on the mountain was turned to stone. He always sends +warnings before he finally sends the severe cold of winter, in order to +give all creatures time to prepare for it.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S10'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S10'>[10]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Kewáydin</i> or <i>Kewáytin</i>, is the North wind or North-west wind.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S11'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S11'>[11]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Algónkin</i> is the general name applied to all tribes that speak the +Ojibway language or dialects of it.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S12'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S12'>[12]</a><div class='note'><p>This is the favorite "love-broth" of the Ojibway squaws. The warrior +who drinks it immediately falls desperately in love with the woman who +gives it to him. Various tricks are devised to conceal the nature of the +"medicine" and to induce the warrior to drink it; but when it is mixed +with a liberal quantity of "fire-water" it is considered irresistible.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S13'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S13'>[13]</a><div class='note'><p>Translation:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span>Woe-is-me! Woe-is-me!<br /></span> +<span>Great Spirit, behold me!<br /></span> +<span>Look, Father; have pity upon me!<br /></span> +<span>Woe-is-me! Woe-is-me!<br /></span> +</div></div></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S14'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S14'>[14]</a><div class='note'><p>Snow-storms from the North-west.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S15'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S15'>[15]</a><div class='note'><p>The Ojibways, like the Dakotas, call the <i>Via Lactea</i> (Milky Way) the +Pathway of the Spirits.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S16'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S16'>[16]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Shinge-bis</i>, the diver, is the only water-fowl that remains about +Lake Superior all winter.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S17'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S17'>[17]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Waub-èsé</i>—the white swan.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S18'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S18'>[18]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Pé-boân</i>, Winter, is represented as an old man with long white hair +and beard.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S19'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S19'>[S19]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Según</i> is Spring (or Summer). This beautiful allegory has been "done +into verse" by Longfellow in <i>Hiawatha</i>. Longfellow evidently took his +version from Schoolcraft. I took mine originally from the lips of +<i>Pah-go-nay-gie-shiek</i>—"Hole-in-the-day"—(the elder) in his day +head-chief of the Ojibways. I afterward submitted it to <i>Gitche +Shabásh-Konk</i>, head-chief of the <i>Misse-sah-ga-é-gun</i>—(Mille Lacs band +of Ojibways), who pronounced it correct.</p> +<p>"Hole-in-the-day," although sanctioned by years of unchallenged use, is +a bad translation of <i>Pah-go-nay-gie-shiek</i>, which means a <i>clear spot +in the sky</i>.</p><p>[Illustration: HOLE-IN-THE-DAY. <i>From an original photograph in the +author's possession.</i>]</p> + +<p>He was a very intelligent man; had been in Washington several times on +business connected with his people, and was always shrewd enough to +look out for himself in all his treaties and transactions with the +Government. He stood six feet two inches in his moccasins, was +well-proportioned, and had a remarkably fine face. He had a +nickname—<i>Que-we-zánc</i>—(Little Boy) by which he was familiarly called +by his people.</p> + +<p>The Pillagers—<i>Nah-kánd-tway-we-nin-ni-wak</i>—who live about Leech Lake +(<i>Kah-sah-gah-squah-g-me-cock</i>) were opposed to <i>Pa-go-nay-gie-shiek</i>, +but he compelled them through fear to recognize him as Head-Chief. At +the time of the "Sioux outbreak" in 1862 "Hole-in-the-day" for a time +apparently meditated an alliance with the <i>Po-áh-nuck</i> (Dakotas) and war +upon the whites. The Pillagers and some other bands urged him strongly +to this course, and his supremacy as head-chief was threatened unless he +complied. Messengers from the Dakotas were undoubtedly received by him, +and he, for a time at least, led the Dakotas to believe that their +hereditary enemies, the Ojibways, would bury the hatchet and join them +in a war of extermination against the whites. "Hole-in-the-day," with a +band of his warriors, appeared opposite Fort Ripley (situated on the +west bank of the Mississippi River between Little Falls and Crow Wing), +and assumed a threatening attitude toward the fort, then garrisoned by +volunteer troops. The soldiers were drawn up on the right bank and +"Hole-in-the-day" and his warriors on the left. A little speech-making +settled the matter for the time being and very soon thereafter a new +treaty was made with "Hole-in-the-day" and his head men, by which their +friendship and allegiance were secured to the whites. It was claimed by +the Pillagers that "Hole-in-the-day" seized the occasion to profit +personally in his negotiations with the agents of the Government.</p> + +<p>In 1867 "Hole-in-the-day" took "another wife." He married Helen McCarty, +a white woman, in Washington, D.C., and took her to his home at Gull +Lake (<i>Ka-ga-ya-skúnc-cock</i>) literally, <i>plenty of little gulls</i>.</p> + +<p>She bore him a son who is known as Joseph H. Woodbury, and now (1891) +resides in the city of Minneapolis. His marriage with a white woman +increased the hatred of the Pillagers, and they shot him from ambush and +killed him near <i>Ninge-tá-we-de-guá-yonk</i>—Crow Wing—on the 27th day of +June, 1868.</p> + +<p>At the time of his death, "Hole-in-the-day" was only thirty-seven years +old but had been recognized as Head-Chief for a long time. He could +speak some English, and was far above the average of white men in +native shrewdness and intelligence. He was thoroughly posted in the +traditions and legends of his people.</p> + +<p>The Ojibways have for many years been cursed by contact with the worst +elements of the whites, and seem to have adopted the vices rather than +the virtues of civilization. I once spoke of this to "Hole-in-the-day." +His reply was terse and truthful—"<i>Mádgè tche-mó-ko-mon, mádgè +a-nische-nábé: menógé tche-mó-ko-mon, menó a-nischè-nábè</i>.—Bad white +men, bad Indians: good white men, good Indians."</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S20'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S20'>[20]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Nah</i>—look, see. <i>Nashké</i>—behold.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S21'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S21'>[21]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Kee-zis</i>—the sun,—the father of life. <i>Waubúnong</i>—or +<i>Waub-ó-nong</i>—is the White Land or Land of Light,—the Sun-rise, the +East.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S22'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S22'>[22]</a><div class='note'><p>The Bridge of Stars spans the vast sea of the skies, and the sun and +moon walk over on it.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S23'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S23'>[23]</a><div class='note'><p>The <i>Miscodeed</i> is a small white flower with a pink border. It is the +earliest blooming wild flower on the shores of Lake Superior, and +belongs to the crocus family.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S24'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S24'>[24]</a><div class='note'><p>The <i>Ne-be-naw-baigs</i>, are Water-spirits; they dwell in caverns in +the depths of the lake, and in some respects resemble the <i>Unktéhee</i> of +the Dakotas.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S25'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S25'>[25]</a><div class='note'><p><i>Ogema</i>, Chief,—<i>Oge-má-kwá</i>—female Chief. Among the Algonkin +tribes women are sometimes made chiefs. <i>Net-nó-kwa</i>, who adopted Tanner +as her son, was <i>Oge-mâ-kwá</i> of a band of Ottawas. See <i>John Tanner's +Narrative</i>, p. 36.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S26'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S26'>[26]</a><div class='note'><p>The "Bridge of Souls" leads from the earth over dark and stormy +waters to the spirit-land. The "Dark River" seems to have been a part of +the superstitions of all nations.</p></div> + +<a name='Footnote_S27'></a><a href='#FNanchor_S27'>[27]</a><div class='note'><p>The <i>Jossakeeds</i> of the Ojibways are soothsayers who are able, by the +aid of spirits, to read the past as well as the future.</p></div> + + +<h3>FINIS</h3> + + + + + + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Feast of the Virgins and Other +Poems, by H. L. Gordon + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS *** + +***** This file should be named 15205-h.htm or 15205-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/5/2/0/15205/ + +Produced by Eric Eldred, Susan Skinner and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems + +Author: H. L. Gordon + +Release Date: February 28, 2005 [EBook #15205] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS *** + + + + +Produced by Eric Eldred, Susan Skinner and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. Produced from images generously made available +by the Canadiana.org. + + + + + + + +[Illustration: H. L. Gordon] + + +THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS + +AND OTHER POEMS + +BY + +H.L. GORDON + + + _I had rather write one word upon the rock + Of ages, than ten thousand in the sand._ + + +Entered according to act of Congress in the year 1891 by H.L. GORDON in +the office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D.C. + + + + +TABLE OF CONTENTS + +Address to the Flag +A Million More +An Old English Oak +Anthem +Betzko +Beyond +Byron and the Angel +Change +Charge of the "Black-Horse" +Charge of Fremont's Body-Guard +Charity +Chickadee +Christmas Eve [Illustrated] +Daniel +Do They Think of Us? +Dust to Dust +Fame +Fido +Gettysburg: Charge of the First Minnesota +Heloise +Hope +Hurrah for the Volunteers! +Isabel +Lines on the Death of Captain Coats +Love will Find +Mauley [Illustrated] +Men +Minnetonka [Illustrated] +Mrs. McNair +My Dead +My Father-Land +My Heart's on the Rhine +Night Thoughts +New Years Address, 1866 [Illustrated] +O Let Me Dream the Dreams of Long Ago +Only a Private Killed +On Reading President Lincoln's Letter +Out of the Depths +Pat and the Pig +Pauline [Illustrated] +Poetry +Prelude--The Mississippi +Sailor Boy's Song +Spring [Illustrated] +Thanksgiving +The Devil and the Monk [Illustrated] +The Draft +The Dying Veteran +The Feast of the Virgins [Illustrated] +The Legend of the Falls [Illustrated] +The Minstrel +The Old Flag +The Pioneer [Illustrated] +The Reign of Reason +The Sea-Gull [Illustrated] +The Tariff on Tin [Illustrated] +To Mollie +To Sylva +Twenty Years Ago [Illustrated] +Wesselenyi [Illustrated] +Winona [Illustrated] + + + + +PREFACE + +At odd hours during an active and busy life I have dallied with the +Muses. I found in them, in earlier years, rest from toil and drudgery +and, later, relief from physical suffering. + +Broken by over-work and compelled to abandon the practice of my +profession--the law, I wrote _Pauline_ after I had been given up to die +by my physicians. It proved to be a better 'medicine' for me than all +the quackeries of the quacks. It diverted my mind from myself and, +perhaps, saved my life. When published, its reception by the best +journals of this country and England was so flattering and, at the same +time, the criticisms of some were so just, that I have been induced to +carefully revise the poem and to publish my re-touched _Pauline_ in this +volume. I hope and believe I have greatly improved it. Several of the +minor poems have been published heretofore in journals and magazines; +others of equal or greater age flap their wings herein for the first +time; a few peeped from the shell but yesterday. + +I am aware that this volume contains several poems that a certain class +of critics will condemn, but they are my "chicks" and I will gather them +under my wings. + +"None but an author knows an author's cares, +Or Fancy's fondness for the child she bears."--_Cowper._ + +Much of my life has been spent in the Northwest--on the frontier of +civilization, and I became personally acquainted with many of the chiefs +and braves of the Dakota and Ojibway (Chippewa) Indians. I have written +of them largely from my own personal knowledge, and endeavored, above +all things, to be accurate, and to present them true to the life. + +For several years I devoted my leisure hours to the study of the +language, history, traditions, customs and superstitions of the Dakotas. +These Indians are now commonly called the "_Sioux_"--a name given them +by the early French traders and _voyageurs_. "Dakota" signifies +_alliance_ or _confederation_. Many separate bands, all having a common +origin and speaking a common tongue, were united under this name. See +"_Tah-Koo Wah-Kan,_" or "_The Gospel Among the Dakotas,_" by Stephen R. +Riggs, pp. 1 to 6 inc. + +They were but yesterday the occupants and owners of the fair forests and +fertile prairies of Minnesota--a brave, hospitable and generous +people--barbarians, indeed, but noble in their barbarism. They may be +fitly called the Iroquois of the West. In form and features, in language +and traditions, they are distinct from all other Indian tribes. When +first visited by white men, and for many years afterwards, the Falls of +St. Anthony (by them called the _Ha Ha_) was the center of their +country. They cultivated corn and tobacco, and hunted the elk, the +beaver and the bison. They were open-hearted, truthful and brave. In +their wars with other tribes they seldom slew women or children, and +rarely sacrificed the lives of their prisoners. + +For many years their chiefs and head men successfully resisted the +attempts to introduce spirituous liquors among them. More than a century +ago an English trader was killed at Mendota, near the present city of +St. Paul, because he persisted, after repeated warnings by the chiefs, +in dealing out _mini wakan_ (Devil-water) to the Dakota braves. + +With open arms and generous hospitality they welcomed the first white +men to their land, and were ever faithful in their friendship, till +years of wrong and robbery, and want and insult, drove them to +desperation and to war. They were barbarians, and their warfare was +barbarous, but not more barbarous than the warfare of our Saxon, Celtic +and Norman ancestors. They were ignorant and superstitious. Their +condition closely resembled the condition of our British forefathers at +the beginning of the Christian era. Macaulay says of Britain: "Her +inhabitants, when first they became known to the Tyrian mariners, were +little superior to the natives of the Sandwich Islands." And again: +"While the German princes who reigned at Paris, Toledo, Aries and +Ravenna listened with reverence to the instructions of bishops, adored +the relics of martyrs, and took part eagerly in disputes touching the +Nicene theology, the rulers of Wessex and Mercia were still performing +savage rites in the temples of Thor and Woden." + +The days of the Dakotas are done. The degenerate remnants of that once +powerful and warlike people still linger around the forts and agencies +of the Northwest, or chase the caribou and the elk on the banks of the +Saskatchewan, but the Dakotas of old are no more. The brilliant defeat +of Custer, by Sitting Bull and his braves, was their last grand rally +against the resistless march of the sons of the Saxons. The plow-shares +of a superior race are fast leveling the sacred mounds of their dead. +But yesterday, the shores of our lakes and our rivers were dotted with +their _teepees,_ their light canoes glided over our waters, and their +hunters chased the deer and the buffalo on the sites of our cities. +To-day, they are not. Let us do justice to their memory, for there was +much that was noble in their natures. + +In the Dakota Legends, I have endeavored to faithfully present many of +the customs and superstitions, and some of the traditions, of that +people. I have taken very little 'poetic license' with their traditions; +none, whatever, with their customs and superstitions. In my studies for +these Legends I was greatly aided by the Rev. S.R. Riggs, author of the +_"Grammar and Dictionary of the Dakota Language" "Tah-Koo Wah-Kan,"_ +&c., and for many years a missionary among the Dakotas. He patiently +answered my numerous inquiries and gave me valuable information. I am +also indebted to the late Gen. H.H. Sibley, one of the earliest +American traders among them, and to Rev. S.W. Pond, of Shakopee, one of +the first Protestant missionaries to these people, and himself the +author of poetical versions of some of their principal legends; to Mrs. +Eastman's _"Dacotah,"_ and last, but not least, to the Rev. E.D. Neill, +whose admirable _"History of Minnesota"_ so fully and faithfully +presents almost all that is known of the history, traditions, customs, +manners and superstitions of the Dakotas. + +In _Winona_ I have "tried my hand" on a new hexameter verse. With what +success, I leave to those who are better able to judge than I. If I have +failed, I have but added another failure to the numerous attempts to +naturalize hexameter verse in the English language. + +It will be observed that I have slightly changed the length and the +rhythm of the old hexameter line; but it is still hexameter, and, I +think, improved. + +I have not written for profit nor published for fame. Fame is a coy +goddess that rarely bestows her favors on him who seeks her--a phantom +that many pursue and but few overtake. + +She delights to hover for a time, like a ghost, over the graves of dead +men who know not and care not: to the living she is a veritable _Ignis +Fatuus_. But every man owes something to his fellowmen, and I owe much. + +If my friends find half the pleasure in reading these poems that I have +found in writing them, I shall have paid my debt and achieved success. + +H.L. GORDON. + +Minneapolis, November 1, 1891. + + + + + +PRELUDE + + +THE MISSISSIPPI + +The numerals refer to _Notes_ in appendix. + + +Onward rolls the Royal River, proudly sweeping to the sea, +Dark and deep and grand, forever wrapt in myth and mystery. +Lo he laughs along the highlands, leaping o'er the granite walls; +Lo he sleeps among the islands, where the loon her lover calls. +Still like some huge monster winding downward through the prairied plains, +Seeking rest but never finding, till the tropic gulf he gains. +In his mighty arms he claspeth now an empire broad and grand; +In his left hand lo he graspeth leagues of fen and forest land; +In his right the mighty mountains, hoary with eternal snow, +Where a thousand foaming fountains singing seek the plains below. +Fields of corn and feet of cities lo the mighty river laves, +Where the Saxon sings his ditties o'er the swarthy warriors' graves. + +Aye, before the birth of Moses--ere the Pyramids were piled-- +All his banks were red with roses from the sea to nor'lands wild, +And from forest, fen and meadows, in the deserts of the north, +Elk and bison stalked like shadows, and the tawny tribes came forth; +Deeds of death and deeds of daring on his leafy banks were done, +Women loved and men went warring, ere the siege of Troy begun. +Where his foaming waters thundered, roaring o'er the rocky walls, +Dusky hunters sat and wondered, listening to the spirits' calls. +"_Ha-ha!_"[76] cried the warrior greeting from afar the cataract's roar; +"_Ha-ha!_" rolled the answer beating down the rock-ribbed leagues of shore. +Now, alas, the bow and quiver and the dusky braves have fled, +And the sullen, shackled river drives the droning mills instead. + +Where the war-whoop rose, and after women wailed their warriors slain, +List the Saxon's silvery laughter, and his humming hives of gain. +Swiftly sped the tawny runner o'er the pathless prairies then, +Now the iron-reindeer sooner carries weal or woe to men. +On thy bosom, Royal River, silent sped the birch canoe +Bearing brave with bow and quiver on his way to war or woo; +Now with flaunting flags and streamers--mighty monsters of the deep-- +Lo the puffing, panting steamers through thy foaming waters sweep; +And behold the grain-fields golden, where the bison grazed of eld; +See the fanes of forests olden by the ruthless Saxon felled. +Plumed pines that spread their shadows ere Columbus spread his sails, +Firs that fringed the mossy meadows ere the Mayflower braved the gales, +Iron oaks that nourished bruin while the Vikings roamed the main, +Crashing fall in broken ruin for the greedy marts of gain. + +Still forever and forever rolls the restless river on, +Slumbering oft but ceasing never while the circling centuries run. +In his palm the lakelet lingers, in his hair the brooklets hide, +Grasped within his thousand fingers lies a continent fair and wide-- +Yea, a mighty empire swarming with its millions like the bees, +Delving, drudging, striving, storming, all their lives, for golden ease. + +Still, methinks, the dusky shadows of the days that are no more, +Stalk around the lakes and meadows, haunting oft the wonted shore: +Hunters from the land of spirits seek the bison and the deer +Where the Saxon now inherits golden field and silver mere; +And beside the mound where buried lies the dark-eyed maid he loves, +Some tall warrior, wan and wearied, in the misty moonlight moves. +See--he stands erect and lingers--stoic still, but loth to go-- +Clutching in his tawny fingers feathered shaft and polished bow. +Never wail or moan he utters and no tear is on his face, +But a warrior's curse he mutters on the crafty Saxon race. + +O thou dark, mysterious River, speak and tell thy tales to me; +Seal not up thy lips forever--veiled in mist and mystery. +I will sit and lowly listen at the phantom-haunted falls +Where thy waters foam and glisten o'er the rugged, rocky walls, +Till some spirit of the olden, mystic, weird, romantic days +Shall emerge and pour her golden tales and legends through my lays. + +Then again the elk and bison on thy grassy banks shall feed, +And along the low horizon shall the plumed hunter speed; +Then again on lake and river shall the silent birch canoe +Bear the brave with bow and quiver on his way to war or woo: +Then the beaver on the meadow shall rebuild his broken wall, +And the wolf shall chase his shadow and his mate the panther call. +From the prairies and the regions where the pine-plumed forest grows +Shall arise the tawny legions with their lances and their bows; +And again the cries of battle shall resound along the plain, +Bows shall twang and quivers rattle, women wail their warriors slain; +And by lodge-fire lowly burning shall the mother from afar +List her warrior's steps returning from the daring deeds of war. + + +[Illustration: THE GAME OF BALL] + + +THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS[1] + +A LEGEND OF THE DAKOTAS + + +In pronouncing Dakota words give "a" the sound of "ah",--"e" the sound +of "a",--"i" the sound of "e" and "u" the sound of "oo;" sound "ee" as +in English. The numerals refer to _Notes_ in appendix. + + +THE GAME OF BALL[2] + +Clear was the sky as a silver shield; +The bright sun blazed on the frozen field. +On ice-bound river and white-robed prairie +The diamonds gleamed in the flame of noon; +But cold and keen were the breezes airy +_Wa-zi-ya_[3] blew from his icy throne. + +On the solid ice of the silent river +The bounds are marked, and a splendid prize, +A robe of black-fox lined with beaver, +Is hung in view of the eager eyes; +And fifty merry Dakota maidens, +The fairest-molded of womankind +Are gathered in groups on the level ice. +They look on the robe and its beauty gladdens +And maddens their hearts for the splendid prize. +Lo the rounded ankles and raven hair +That floats at will on the wanton wind, +And the round, brown arms to the breezes bare, +And breasts like the mounds where the waters meet,[4] +And feet as fleet as the red deer's feet, +And faces that glow like the full, round moon +When she laughs in the luminous skies of June. + +The leaders are chosen and swiftly divide +The opposing parties on either side. +Wiwaste[5] is chief of a nimble band, +The star-eyed daughter of Little Crow;[6] +And the leader chosen to hold command +Of the band adverse is a haughty foe-- +The dusky, impetuous Harpstina,[7] +The queenly cousin of Wapasa.[8] + +_Kapoza's_ chief and his tawny hunters +Are gathered to witness the queenly game. +The ball is thrown and a net encounters, +And away it flies with a loud acclaim. +Swift are the maidens that follow after, +And swiftly it flies for the farther bound; +And long and loud are the peals of laughter, +As some fair runner is flung to ground; +While backward and forward, and to and fro, +The maidens contend on the trampled snow. +With loud "_Iho!--Ito!--Iho_!"[9] +And waving the beautiful prize anon, +The dusky warriors cheer them on. +And often the limits are almost passed, +As the swift ball flies and returns. At last +It leaps the line at a single bound +From the fair Wiwaste's sturdy arm +Like a fawn that flies from the baying hound. +The wild cheers broke like a thunder storm +On the beetling bluffs and the hills profound, +An echoing, jubilant sea of sound. +Wakawa, the chief, and the loud acclaim +Announced the end of the hard-won game, +And the fair Wiwaste was victor crowned. + +Dark was the visage of Harpstina +When the robe was laid at her rival's feet, +And merry maidens and warriors saw +Her flashing eyes and her look of hate, +As she turned to Wakawa, the chief, and said: +"The game was mine were it fairly played. +I was stunned by a blow on my bended head, +As I snatched the ball from slippery ground +Not half a fling from Wiwaste's bound. +The cheat--behold her! for there she stands +With the prize that is mine in her treacherous hands. +The fawn may fly, but the wolf is fleet; +The fox creeps sly on _Maga's_[10] retreat, +And a woman's revenge--it is swift and sweet." + +She turned to her lodge, but a roar of laughter +And merry mockery followed after. +Little they heeded the words she said, +Little they cared for her haughty tread, +For maidens and warriors and chieftain knew +That her lips were false and her charge untrue. + +Wiwaste, the fairest Dakota maiden, +The sweet-faced daughter of Little Crow, +To her _teepee_[11] turned with her trophy laden, +The black robe trailing the virgin snow. +Beloved was she by her princely father, +Beloved was she by the young and old, +By merry maidens and many a mother, +And many a warrior bronzed and bold. +For her face was as fair as a beautiful dream, +And her voice like the song of the mountain stream; +And her eyes like the stars when they glow and gleam +Through the somber pines of the nor'land wold, +When the winds of winter are keen and cold. + +Mah-pi-ya Du-ta[12], the tall Red Cloud, +A hunter swift and a warrior proud, +With many a scar and many a feather, +Was a suitor bold and a lover fond. +Long had he courted Wiwaste's father, +Long had he sued for the maiden's hand. +Aye, brave and proud was the tall Red Cloud, +A peerless son of a giant race, +And the eyes of the panther were set in his face: +He strode like a stag, and he stood like a pine; +Ten feathers he wore of the great _Wanmdee_;[13] +With crimsoned quills of the porcupine +His leggins were worked to his brawny knee. +The bow he bent was a giant's bow; +The swift, red elk could he overtake, +And the necklace that girdled his brawny neck +Was the polished claws of the great _Mato_[14] +He grappled and slew in the northern snow. +Wiwaste looked on the warrior tall; +She saw he was brawny and brave and great, +But the eyes of the panther she could but hate, +And a brave _Hohe_[15] loved she better than all. +Loved was Mahpiya by Harpstina +But the warrior she never could charm or draw; +And bitter indeed was her secret hate +For the maiden she reckoned so fortunate. + + +HEYOKA WACIPEE[16] + +THE GIANT'S DANCE. + +The night-sun[17] sails in his gold canoe, +The spirits[18] walk in the realms of air +With their glowing faces and flaming hair, +And the shrill, chill winds o'er the prairies blow. +In the _Tee[19] of the Council_ the Virgins light +The Virgin-fire[20] for the feast to-night; +For the _Sons of Heyoka_ will celebrate +The sacred dance to the giant great. +The kettle boils on the blazing fire, +And the flesh is done to the chief's desire. +With his stoic face to the sacred East,[21] +He takes his seat at the Giant's Feast. + +For the feast of _Heyoka_[22] the braves are dressed +With crowns from the bark of the white-birch trees, +And new skin leggins that reach the knees; +With robes of the bison and swarthy bear, +And eagle-plumes in their coal-black hair, +And marvelous rings in their tawny ears +That were pierced with the points of their shining spears. +To honor _Heyoka_ Wakawa lifts +His fuming pipe from the Red-stone Quarry.[23] +The warriors follow. The white cloud drifts +From the Council-lodge to the welkin starry, +Like a fog at morn on the fir-clad hill, +When the meadows are damp and the winds are still. + +They dance to the tune of their wild "_Ha-ha_" +A warrior's shout and a raven's caw-- +Circling the pot and the blazing fire +To the tom-tom's bray and the rude bassoon; +Round and round to their heart's desire, +And ever the same wild chant and tune-- +A warrior's shout and a raven's caw-- +"_Ha-ha,--ha-ha,--ha-ha,--ha!_" +They crouch, they leap, and their burning eyes +Flash fierce in the light of the flaming fire, +As fiercer and fiercer and higher and higher +The rude, wild notes of their chant arise. +They cease, they sit, and the curling smoke +Ascends again from their polished pipes, +And upward curls from their swarthy lips +To the god whose favor their hearts invoke. + +Then tall Wakawa arose and said: +"Brave warriors, listen, and give due heed. +Great is _Heyoka_, the magical god; +He can walk on the air; he can float on the flood. +He's a worker of magic and wonderful wise; +He cries when he laughs and he laughs when he cries; +He sweats when he's cold, and he shivers when hot, +And the water is cold in his boiling pot. +He hides in the earth and he walks in disguise, +But he loves the brave and their sacrifice. +We are sons of _Heyoka_. The Giant commands +In the boiling water to thrust our hands; +And the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire +_Heyoka_ will crown with his heart's desire." + +They thrust their hands in the boiling pot; +They swallow the bison-meat steaming hot; +Not a wince on their stoical faces bold, +For the meat and the water, they say, are cold: +And great is _Heyoka_ and wonderful wise; +He floats on the flood and he walks on the skies, +And ever appears in a strange disguise; +But he loves the brave and their sacrifice, +And the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire +Heyoka will crown with his heart's desire. + +Proud was the chief of his warriors proud, +The sinewy sons of the Giant's race; +But the bravest of all was the tall Red Cloud; +The eyes of the panther were set in his face; +He strode like a stag and he stood like a pine; +Ten feathers he wore of the great _Wanmdee_,[13] +With crimsoned quills of the porcupine +His leggins were worked to his brawny knee. +Blood-red were the stripes on his swarthy cheek, +And the necklace that girdled his brawny neck +Was the polished claws of the great Mato[14] +He grappled and slew in the northern snow. +Proud Red Cloud turned to the braves and said, +As he shook the plumes on his haughty head: +"Ho! the warrior that scorneth the foe and fire +_Heyoka_ will crown with his heart's desire!" +He snatched from the embers a red-hot brand, +And held it aloft in his naked hand. +He stood like a statue in bronze or stone-- +Not a muscle moved, and the braves looked on. +He turned to the chieftain--"I scorn the fire-- +Ten feathers I wear of the great _Wanmdee_; +Then grant me, Wakawa, my heart's desire; +Let the sunlight shine in my lonely tee.[19] +I laugh at red death and I laugh at red fire; +Brave Red Cloud is only afraid of fear; +But Wiwaste is fair to his heart and dear; +Then grant him, Wakawa, his heart's desire." +The warriors applauded with loud "_Ho! Ho!_"[24] +And he flung the brand to the drifting snow. +Three times Wakawa puffed forth the smoke +From his silent lips; then he slowly spoke: +"Mahpiya is strong as the stout-armed oak +That stands on the bluff by the windy plain, +And laughs at the roar of the hurricane. +He has slain the foe and the great _Mato_ +With his hissing arrow and deadly stroke +My heart is swift but my tongue is slow. +Let the warrior come to my lodge and smoke; +He may bring the gifts;[25] but the timid doe +May fly from the hunter and say him no." + +Wiwaste sat late in the lodge alone, +Her dark eyes bent on the glowing fire: +She heard not the wild winds shrill and moan; +She heard not the tall elms toss and groan; +Her face was lit like the harvest moon; +For her thoughts flew far to her heart's desire. +Far away in the land of the _Hohe_[15] dwelt +The warrior she held in her secret heart; +But little he dreamed of the pain she felt, +For she hid her love with a maiden's art. +Not a tear she shed, not a word she said, +When the brave young chief from the lodge departed; +But she sat on the mound when the day was dead, +And gazed at the full moon mellow-hearted. +Fair was the chief as the morning-star; +His eyes were mild and his words were low, +But his heart was stouter than lance or bow; +And her young heart flew to her love afar +O'er his trail long covered with drifted snow. +She heard a warrior's stealthy tread, +And the tall Wakawa appeared, and said: +"Is Wiwaste afraid of the spirit dread +That fires the sky in the fatal north?[26] +Behold the mysterious lights. Come forth: +Some evil threatens, some danger nears, +For the skies are pierced by the burning spears." + +The warriors rally beneath the moon; +They shoot their shafts at the evil spirit. +The spirit is slain and the flame is gone, +But his blood lies red on the snow-fields near it; +And again from the dead will the spirit rise, +And flash his spears in the northern skies. + +Then the chief and the queenly Wiwaste stood +Alone in the moon-lit solitude, +And she was silent and he was grave. +"And fears not my daughter the evil spirit? +The strongest warriors and bravest fear it. +The burning spears are an evil omen; +They threaten the wrath of a wicked woman, +Or a treacherous foe; but my warriors brave, +When danger nears, or the foe appears, +Are a cloud of arrows--a grove of spears." + +"My Father," she said, and her words were low, +"Why should I fear? for I soon will go +To the broad, blue lodge in the Spirit-land, +Where my fond-eyed mother went long ago, +And my dear twin-sisters walk hand in hand. +My Father, listen--my words are true," +And sad was her voice as the whippowil +When she mourns her mate by the moon-lit rill, +"Wiwaste lingers alone with you; +The rest are sleeping on yonder hill-- +Save one--and he an undutiful son-- +And you, my Father, will sit alone +When _Sisoka_[27] sings and the snow is gone. +I sat, when the maple leaves were red, +By the foaming falls of the haunted river; +The night-sun was walking above my head, +And the arrows shone in his burnished quiver; +And the winds were hushed and the hour was dread +With the walking ghosts of the silent dead. +I heard the voice of the Water-Fairy;[28] +I saw her form in the moon-lit mist, +As she sat on a stone with her burden weary, +By the foaming eddies of amethyst. +And robed in her mantle of mist the sprite +Her low wail poured on the silent night. +Then the spirit spake, and the floods were still-- +They hushed and listened to what she said, +And hushed was the plaint of the whippowil +In the silver-birches above her head: +'Wiwaste, the prairies are green and fair +When the robin sings and the whippowil; +But the land of the Spirits is fairer still, +For the winds of winter blow never there; +And forever the songs of the whippowils +And the robins are heard on the leafy hills. +Thy mother looks from her lodge above-- +Her fair face shines in the sky afar, +And the eyes of thy sisters are bright with love, +As they peep from the _tee_ of the mother-star. +To her happy lodge in the Spirit land +She beckons Wiwaste with shining hand.' + +"My Father--my Father, her words were true; +And the death of Wiwaste will rest on you. +You have pledged me as wife to the tall Red Cloud; +You will take the gifts of the warrior proud; +But I, Wakawa,--I answer--never! +I will stain your knife in my heart's red blood, +I will plunge and sink in the sullen river +Ere I will be wife to the dark Red Cloud!" + +"Wiwaste," he said, and his voice was low, +"Let it be as you will, for Wakawa's tongue +Has spoken no promise;--his lips are slow, +And the love of a father is deep and strong. +Be happy, Micunksee;[29] the flames are gone-- +They flash no more in the northern sky. +See the smile on the face of the watching moon; +No more will the fatal, red arrows fly; +For the singing shafts of my warriors sped +To the bad spirit's bosom and laid him dead, +And his blood on the snow of the North lies red. +Go--sleep in the robe that you won to-day, +And dream of your hunter--the brave Chaske." + +Light was her heart as she turned away; +It sang like the lark in the skies of May. +The round moon laughed, but a lone, red star,[30] +As she turned to the _teepee_ and entered in, +Fell flashing and swift in the sky afar, +Like the polished point of a javelin. +Nor chief nor daughter the shadow saw +Of the crouching listener, Harpstina. + +Wiwaste, wrapped in her robe and sleep, +Heard not the storm-sprites wail and weep, +As they rode on the winds in the frosty air; +But she heard the voice of her hunter fair; +For a fairy spirit with silent fingers +The curtains drew from the land of dreams; +And lo in her _teepee_ her lover lingers; +In his tender eyes all the love-light beams, +And his voice is the music of mountain streams. + +And then with her round, brown arms she pressed +His phantom form to her throbbing breast, +And whispered the name, in her happy sleep, +Of her _Hohe_ hunter so fair and far: +And then she saw in her dreams the deep +Where the spirit wailed, and a falling star; +Then stealthily crouching under the trees, +By the light of the moon, the _Kan-e-ti-dan_, [31] +The little, wizened, mysterious man, +With his long locks tossed by the moaning breeze. +Then a flap of wings, like a thunder-bird, [32] +And a wailing spirit the sleeper heard; +And lo, through the mists of the moon, she saw +The hateful visage of Harpstina. + +But waking she murmured--"And what are these---- +The flap of wings and the falling star, +The wailing spirit that's never at ease, +The little man crouching under the trees, +And the hateful visage of Harpstina? +My dreams are like feathers that float on the breeze, +And none can tell what the omens are---- +Save the beautiful dream of my love afar +In the happy land of the tall _Hohe_---- +My handsome hunter--my brave Chaske." + +[Illustration: BUFFALO CHASE] + +_"Ta-tanka! Ta-tanka!"_[33] the hunters cried, +With a joyous shout at the break of dawn +And darkly lined on the white hill-side, +A herd of bison went marching on +Through the drifted snow like a caravan. +Swift to their ponies the hunters sped, +And dashed away on the hurried chase. +The wild steeds scented the game ahead, +And sprang like hounds to the eager race. +But the brawny bulls in the swarthy van +Turned their polished horns on the charging foes +And reckless rider and fleet footman +Were held at bay in the drifted snows, +While the bellowing herd o'er the hilltops ran, +Like the frightened beasts of a caravan +On Sahara's sands when the simoon blows. +Sharp were the twangs of the hunters' bows, +And swift and humming the arrows sped, +Till ten huge bulls on the bloody snows +Lay pierced with arrows and dumb and dead. +But the chief with the flankers had gained the rear, +And flew on the trail of the flying herd. +The shouts of the riders rang loud and clear, +As their foaming steeds to the chase they spurred. +And now like the roar of an avalanche +Rolls the bellowing wrath of the maddened bulls +They charge on the riders and runners stanch, +And a dying steed in the snow drift rolls, +While the rider, flung to the frozen ground, +Escapes the horns by a panther's bound. +But the raging monsters are held at bay, +While the flankers dash on the swarthy rout: +With lance and arrow they slay and slay; +And the welkin rings to the gladsome shout---- +To the loud _Ina's_ and the wild _Iho's_, [34] +And dark and dead, on the bloody snows, +Lie the swarthy heaps of the buffaloes. +All snug in the _teepee_ Wiwaste lay, +All wrapped in her robe, at the dawn of day, +All snug and warm from the wind and snow, +While the hunters followed the buffalo. +Her dreams and her slumber their wild shouts broke; +The chase was afoot when the maid awoke; +She heard the twangs of the hunters' bows, +And the bellowing bulls and the loud _Iho_'s, +And she murmured--"My hunter is far away +In the happy land of the tall _Hohe_---- +My handsome hunter, my brave Chaske; +But the robins will come and my warrior too, +And Wiwaste will find her a way to woo." + +And long she lay in a reverie, +And dreamed, wide-awake, of the brave Chaske, +Till a trampling of feet on the crispy snow +She heard, and the murmur of voices low:---- +Then the warriors' greeting--_Iho! Iho!_ +And behold, in the blaze of the risen day, +With the hunters that followed the buffalo---- +Came her tall, young hunter--her brave Chaske. +Far south has he followed the bison-trail +With his band of warriors so brave and true. +Right glad is Wakawa his friend to hail, +And Wiwaste will find her a way to woo. + +Tall and straight as the larch-tree stood +The manly form of the brave young chief, +And fair as the larch in its vernal leaf, +When the red fawn bleats in the feathering wood. +Mild was his face as the morning skies, +And friendship shone in his laughing eyes; +But swift were his feet o'er the drifted snow +On the trail of the elk or the buffalo, +And his heart was stouter than lance or bow, +When he heard the whoop of his enemies. +Five feathers he wore of the great Wanmdee +And each for the scalp of a warrior slain, +When down on his camp from the northern plain, +With their murder-cries rode the bloody _Cree_.[35] +But never the stain of an infant slain, +Or the blood of a mother that plead in vain, +Soiled the honored plumes of the brave _Hohe_. +A mountain bear to his enemies, +To his friends like the red fawn's dappled form; +In peace, like the breeze from the summer seas---- +In war, like the roar of the mountain storm. +His fame in the voice of the winds went forth +From his hunting grounds in the happy North, +And far as the shores of the _Great Mede_ [36] +The nations spoke of the brave Chaske. + +Dark was the visage of grim Red Cloud, +Fierce were the eyes of the warrior proud, +When the chief to his lodge led the brave _Hohe_, +And Wiwaste smiled on the tall Chaske. +Away he strode with a sullen frown, +And alone in his _teepee_ he sat him down. +From the gladsome greeting of braves he stole, +And wrapped himself in his gloomy soul. +But the eagle eyes of the Harpstina +The clouded face of the warrior saw. +Softly she spoke to the sullen brave: +"Mah-pi-ya Duta--his face is sad; +And why is the warrior so glum and grave? +For the fair Wiwaste is gay and glad; +She will sit in the _teepee_ the live-long day, +And laugh with her lover--the brave _Hohe_ +Does the tall Red Cloud for the false one sigh? +There are fairer maidens than she, and proud +Were their hearts to be loved by the brave Red Cloud. +And trust not the chief with the smiling eyes; +His tongue is swift, but his words are lies; +And the proud Mah-pi-ya will surely find +That Wakawa's promise is hollow wind. +Last night I stood by his lodge, and lo +I heard the voice of the Little Crow; +But the fox is sly and his words were low. +But I heard her answer her father--'Never! +I will stain your knife in my heart's red blood, +I will plunge and sink in the sullen river, +Ere I will be wife to the dark Red Cloud!' +Then he spake again, and his voice was low, +But I heard the answer of Little Crow: +'Let it be as you will, for Wakawa's tongue +Has spoken no promise--his lips are slow, +And the love of a father is deep and strong.' + +"Mah-pi-ya Duta, they scorn your love, +But the false chief covets the warrior's gifts. +False to his promise the fox will prove, +And fickle as snow in _Wo-ka-da-wee_, [37] +That slips into brooks when the gray cloud lifts, +Or the red sun looks through the ragged rifts. +Mah-pi-ya Duta will listen to me. +There are fairer birds in the bush than she, +And the fairest would gladly be Red Cloud's wife. +Will the warrior sit like a girl bereft, +When fairer and truer than she are left, +That love Red Cloud as they love their life? +Mah-pi-ya Duta will listen to me. +I love him well--I have loved him long: +A woman is weak, but a warrior is strong, +And a love-lorn brave is a scorn to see. + +"Mah-pi-ya Duta, O listen to me! +Revenge is swift and revenge is strong, +And sweet as the hive in the hollow tree; +The proud Red Cloud will avenge his wrong. +Let the brave be patient, it is not long +Till the leaves be green on the maple tree, +And the Feast of the Virgins is then to be-- +The Feast of the Virgins is then to be!" + +Proudly she turned from the silent brave, +And went her way; but the warrior's eyes-- +They flashed with the flame of a sudden fire, +Like the lights that gleam in the Sacred Cave[38], +When the black night covers the autumn skies, +And the stars from their welkin watch retire. + +Three nights he tarried--the brave Chaske; +Winged were the hours and they flitted away; +On the wings of _Wakandee_[39] they silently flew, +For Wiwaste had found her a way to woo. +Ah little he cared for the bison-chase, +For the red lilies bloomed on the fair maid's face; +Ah little he cared for the winds that blew, +For Wiwaste had found her a way to woo. +Brown-bosomed she sat on her fox-robe dark, +Her ear to the tales of the brave inclined, +Or tripped from the _tee_ like the song of a lark, +And gathered her hair from the wanton wind. +Ah little he thought of the leagues of snow +He trod on the trail of the buffalo; +And little he recked of the hurricanes +That swept the snow from the frozen plains +And piled the banks of the Bloody River.[40] +His bow unstrung and forgotten hung +With his beaver hood and his otter quiver; +He sat spell-bound by the artless grace +Of her star-lit eyes and her moon-lit face. +Ah little he cared for the storms that blew, +For Wiwaste had found her a way to woo. +When he spoke with Wakawa her sidelong eyes +Sought the handsome chief in his hunter-guise. +Wakawa marked, and the lilies fair +On her round cheeks spread to her raven hair. +They feasted on rib of the bison fat, +On the tongue of the _Ta_[41] that the hunters prize, +On the savory flesh of the red _Hogan_,[42] +On sweet _tipsanna_[43] and pemmican +And the dun-brown cakes of the golden maize; +And hour after hour the young chief sat, +And feasted his soul on her love-lit eyes. + +The sweeter the moments the swifter they fly; +Love takes no account of the fleeting hours; +He walks in a dream 'mid the blooming of flowers, +And never awakes till the blossoms die. +Ah lovers are lovers the wide world over-- +In the hunter's lodge and the royal palace. +Sweet are the lips of his love to the lover-- +Sweet as new wine in a golden chalice +From the Tajo's[44] slope or the hills beyond; +And blindly he sips from his loved one's lips, +In lodge or palace the wide world over, +The maddening honey of Trebizond.[45] + +O what are leagues to the loving hunter, +Or the blinding drift of the hurricane, +When it raves and roars o'er the frozen plain! +He would face the storm--he would death encounter +The darling prize of his heart to gain. +But his hunters chafed at the long delay, +For the swarthy bison were far away, +And the brave young chief from the lodge departed. +He promised to come with the robins in May +With the bridal gifts for the bridal day; +And the fair Wiwaste was happy-hearted, +For Wakawa promised the brave Chaske. +Birds of a feather will flock together. +The robin sings to his ruddy mate, +And the chattering jays, in the winter weather, +To prate and gossip will congregate; +And the cawing crows on the autumn heather, +Like evil omens, will flock together, +In common council for high debate; +And the lass will slip from a doting mother +To hang with her lad on the garden gate. +Birds of a feather will flock together-- +'Tis an adage old--it is nature's law, +And sure as the pole will the needle draw, +The fierce Red Cloud with the flaunting feather, +Will follow the finger of Harpstina. + +The winter wanes and the south-wind blows +From the Summer Islands legendary; +The _skeskas_[46] fly and the melted snows +In lakelets lie on the dimpled prairie. +The frost-flowers[47] peep from their winter sleep +Under the snow-drifts cold and deep. +To the April sun and the April showers, +In field and forest, the baby flowers +Lift their blushing faces and dewy eyes; +And wet with the tears of the winter-fairies, +Soon bloom and blossom the emerald prairies, +Like the fabled Garden of Paradise. + +The plum-trees, white with their bloom in May, +Their sweet perfume on the vernal breeze +Wide strew like the isles of the tropic seas +Where the paroquet chatters the livelong day. +But the May-days pass and the brave Chaske [17] +O why does the lover so long delay? +Wiwaste waits in the lonely _tee_. +Has her fair face fled from his memory? +For the robin cherups his mate to please, +The blue-bird pipes in the poplar-trees, +The meadow lark warbles his jubilees, +Shrilling his song in the azure seas +Till the welkin throbs to his melodies, +And low is the hum of the humble-bees, +And the Feast of the Virgins is now to be. + + +THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS + +The sun sails high in his azure realms; +Beneath the arch of the breezy elms +The feast is spread by the murmuring river. +With his battle-spear and his bow and quiver, +And eagle-plumes in his ebon hair, +The chief Wakawa himself is there; +And round the feast, in the Sacred Ring,[48] +Sit his weaponed warriors witnessing. +Not a morsel of food have the Virgins tasted +For three long days ere the holy feast; +They sat in their _teepee_ alone and fasted, +Their faces turned to the Sacred East.[21] +In the polished bowls lies the golden maize, +And the flesh of fawn on the polished trays. +For the Virgins the bloom of the prairies wide-- +The blushing pink and the meek blue-bell, +The purple plumes of the prairie's pride,[49] +The wild, uncultured asphodel, +And the beautiful, blue-eyed violet +That the Virgins call "Let-me-not forget," +In gay festoons and garlands twine +With the cedar sprigs[50] and the wildwood vine. +So gaily the Virgins are decked and dressed, +And none but a virgin may enter there; +And clad is each in a scarlet vest, +And a fawn-skin frock to the brown calves bare. +Wild rose-buds peep from their flowing hair, +And a rose half blown on the budding breast; +And bright with the quills of the porcupine +The moccasined feet of the maidens shine. + +Hand in hand round the feast they dance, +And sing to the notes of a rude bassoon, +And never a pause or a dissonance +In the merry dance or the merry tune. +Brown-bosomed and fair as the rising moon, +When she peeps o'er the hills of the dewy east, +Wiwaste sings at the Virgins' Feast; +And bright is the light in her luminous eyes; +They glow like the stars in the winter skies; +And the lilies that bloom in her virgin heart +Their golden blush to her cheeks impart-- +Her cheeks half-hid in her midnight hair. +Fair is her form--as the red fawn's fair-- +And long is the flow of her raven hair; +It falls to her knees and it streams on the breeze +Like the path of a storm on the swelling seas. + +Proud of their rites are the Virgins fair, +For none but a virgin may enter there. +'Tis a custom of old and a sacred thing; +Nor rank nor beauty the warriors spare, +If a tarnished maiden should enter there. +And her that enters the Sacred Ring +With a blot that is known or a secret stain +The warrior who knows is bound to expose, +And lead her forth from the ring again. +And the word of a brave is the fiat of law; +For the Virgins' Feast is a sacred thing. +Aside with the mothers sat Harpstina; +She durst not enter the Virgins' ring. + +Round and round to the merry song +The maidens dance in their gay attire, +While the loud _Ho-Ho's_ of the tawny throng +Their flying feet and their song inspire. +They have finished the song and the sacred dance, +And hand in hand to the feast advance-- +To the polished bowls of the golden maize, +And the sweet fawn-meat in the polished trays. + +Then up from his seat in the silent crowd +Rose the frowning, fierce-eyed, tall Red Cloud; +Swift was his stride as the panther's spring, +When he leaps on the fawn from his cavern lair; +Wiwaste he caught by her flowing hair, +And dragged her forth from the Sacred Ring. +She turned on the warrior, her eyes flashed fire; +Her proud lips quivered with queenly ire; +And her sun-browned cheeks were aflame with red. +Her hand to the spirits she raised and said: +"I am pure!--I am pure as the falling snow! +Great _Taku-skan-skan_[51] will testify! +And dares the tall coward to say me no?" +But the sullen warrior made no reply. +She turned to the chief with her frantic cries: +"Wakawa,--my Father! he lies,--he lies! +Wiwaste is pure as the fawn unborn; +Lead me back to the feast or Wiwaste dies!" +But the warriors uttered a cry of scorn, +And he turned his face from her pleading eyes. + +Then the sullen warrior, the tall Red Cloud, +Looked up and spoke and his voice was loud; +But he held his wrath and he spoke with care: +"Wiwaste is young; she is proud and fair, +But she may not boast of the virgin snows. +The Virgins' Feast is a sacred thing; +How durst she enter the Virgins' ring? +The warrior would fain, but he dares not spare; +She is tarnished and only the Red Cloud knows." + +She clutched her hair in her clinched hand; +She stood like a statue bronzed and grand; +_Wakan-dee_[39] flashed in her fiery eyes; +Then swift as the meteor cleaves the skies-- +Nay, swift as the fiery _Wakinyan's_[32] dart, +She snatched the knife from the warrior's belt, +And plunged it clean to the polished hilt-- +With a deadly cry--in the villain's heart. +Staggering he clutched the air and fell; +His life-blood smoked on the trampled sand, +And dripped from the knife in the virgin's hand. + +Then rose his kinsmen's savage yell. +Swift as the doe's Wiwaste's feet +Fled away to the forest. The hunters fleet +In vain pursue, and in vain they prowl +And lurk in the forest till dawn of day. +They hear the hoot of the mottled owl; +They hear the were-wolf's[52] winding howl; +But the swift Wiwaste is far away. +They found no trace in the forest land; +They found no trail in the dew-damp grass; +They found no track in the river sand, +Where they thought Wiwaste would surely pass. + +The braves returned to the troubled chief; +In his lodge he sat in his silent grief. +"Surely," they said, "she has turned a spirit. +No trail she left with her flying feet; +No pathway leads to her far retreat. +She flew in the air, and her wail--we could hear it, +As she upward rose to the shining stars; +And we heard on the river, as we stood near it, +The falling drops of Wiwaste's tears." + +Wakawa thought of his daughter's words +Ere the south-wind came and the piping birds-- +"My Father, listen--my words are true," +And sad was her voice as the whippowil +When she mourns her mate by the moon-lit rill, +"Wiwaste lingers alone with you; +The rest are sleeping on yonder hill-- +Save one--and he an undutiful son-- +And you, my Father, will sit alone +When _Sisoka_[53] sings and the snow is gone." +His broad breast heaved on his troubled soul, +The shadow of grief o'er his visage stole +Like a cloud on the face of the setting sun. + +[Illustration] + +"She has followed the years that are gone," he said; +"The spirits the words of the witch fulfill; +For I saw the ghost of my father dead, +By the moon's dim light on the misty hill. +He shook the plumes on his withered head, +And the wind through his pale form whistled shrill. +And a low, sad voice on the hill I heard, +Like the mournful wail of a widowed bird." +Then lo, as he looked from his lodge afar, +He saw the glow of the Evening-star; +"And yonder," he said, "is Wiwaste's face; +She looks from her lodge on our fading race, +Devoured by famine, and fraud, and war, +And chased and hounded by fate and woe, +As the white wolves follow the buffalo;" +And he named the planet the _Virgin Star_.[54] + +"Wakawa," he muttered, "the guilt is thine! +She was pure--she was pure as the fawn unborn. +O why did I hark to the cry of scorn, +Or the words of the lying libertine? +Wakawa, Wakawa, the guilt is thine! +The springs will return with the voice of birds, +But the voice of my daughter will come no more. +She wakened the woods with her musical words, +And the sky-lark, ashamed of his voice, forbore. +She called back the years that had passed, and long +I heard their voice in her happy song. +O why did the chief of the tall _Hohe_ +His feet from _Kapoza_[6] so long delay? +For his father sat at my father's feast, +And he at Wakawa's--an honored guest. +He is dead!--he is slain on the Bloody Plain, +By the hand of the treacherous Chippeway; +And the face shall I never behold again +Of my brave young brother--the chief Chaske. +Death walks like a shadow among my kin; +And swift are the feet of the flying years +That cover Wakawa with frost and tears, +And leave their tracks on his wrinkled skin. +Wakawa, the voice of the years that are gone +Will follow thy feet like the shadow of death, +Till the paths of the forest and desert lone +Shall forget thy footsteps. O living breath, +Whence are thou, and whither so soon to fly? +And whence are the years? Shall I overtake +Their flying feet in the star-lit sky? +From his last long sleep will the warrior wake? +Will the morning break in Wakawa's tomb, +As it breaks and glows in the eastern skies? +Is it true?--will the spirits of kinsmen come +And bid the bones of the brave arise? +Wakawa, Wakawa, for thee the years +Are red with blood and bitter with tears. +Gone--brothers, and daughters, and wife--all gone +That are kin to Wakawa--but one--but one-- +Wakinyan Tanka--undutiful son! +And he estranged from his father's _tee_, +Will never return till the chief shall die. +And what cares he for his father's grief? +He will smile at my death--it will make him chief. +Woe burns in my bosom. Ho, warriors--Ho! +Raise the song of red war; for your chief must go +To drown his grief in the blood of the foe! +I shall fall. Raise my mound on the sacred hill. +Let my warriors the wish of their chief fulfill; +For my fathers sleep in the sacred ground. +The Autumn blasts o'er Wakawa's mound +Will chase the hair of the thistles' head, +And the bare-armed oak o'er the silent dead, +When the whirling snows from the north descend, +Will wail and moan in the midnight wind. +In the famine of winter the wolf will prowl, +And scratch the snow from the heap of stones, +And sit in the gathering storm and howl, +On the frozen mound, for Wakawa's bones. +But the years that are gone shall return again, +As the robin returns and the whippowil, +When my warriors stand on the sacred hill +And remember the deeds of their brave chief slain." + +Beneath the glow of the Virgin Star +They raised the song of the red war-dance. +At the break of dawn with the bow and lance +They followed the chief on the path of war. +To the north--to the forests of fir and pine-- +Led their stealthy steps on the winding trail, +Till they saw the Lake of the Spirit[55] shine +Through somber pines of the dusky dale. +Then they heard the hoot of the mottled owl;[56] +They heard the gray wolf's dismal howl; +Then shrill and sudden the war-whoop rose +From an hundred throats of their swarthy foes, +In ambush crouched in the tangled wood. +Death shrieked in the twang of their deadly bows, +And their hissing arrows drank brave men's blood. +From rock, and thicket, and brush, and brakes, +Gleamed the burning eyes of the "forest-snakes."[57] +From brake, and thicket, and brush, and stone, +The bow-string hummed and the arrow hissed, +And the lance of a crouching Ojibway shone, +Or the scalp-knife gleamed in a swarthy fist. +Undaunted the braves of Wakawa's band +Leaped into the thicket with lance and knife, +And grappled the Chippeways hand to hand; +And foe with foe, in the deadly strife, +Lay clutching the scalp of his foe and dead, +With a tomahawk sunk in his ghastly head, +Or his still heart sheathing a bloody blade. +Like a bear in the battle Wakawa raves, +And cheers the hearts of his falling braves. +But a panther crouches along his track-- +He springs with a yell on Wakawa's back! +The tall chief, stabbed to the heart, lies low; +But his left hand clutches his deadly foe, +And his red right clinches the bloody hilt +Of his knife in the heart of the slayer dyed. +And thus was the life of Wakawa spilt, +And slain and slayer lay side by side. +The unscalped corpse of their honored chief +His warriors snatched from the yelling pack, +And homeward fled on their forest track +With their bloody burden and load of grief. + +The spirits the words of the brave fulfill-- +Wakawa sleeps on the sacred hill, +And Wakinyan Tanka, his son, is chief. +Ah soon shall the lips of men forget +Wakawa's name, and the mound of stone +Will speak of the dead to the winds alone, +And the winds will whistle their mock regret. + +The speckled cones of the scarlet berries[58] +Lie red and ripe in the prairie grass. +The _Si-yo_[59] clucks on the emerald prairies +To her infant brood. From the wild morass, +On the sapphire lakelet set within it, +_Maga_ sails forth with her wee ones daily. +They ride on the dimpling waters gaily, +Like a fleet of yachts and a man-of-war. +The piping plover, the light-winged linnet, +And the swallow sail in the sunset skies. +The whippowil from her cover hies, +And trills her song on the amber air. +Anon to her loitering mate she cries: +"Flip, O Will!--trip, O Will!--skip, O Will!" +And her merry mate from afar replies: +"Flip I will--skip I will--trip I will;" +And away on the wings of the wind he flies. +And bright from her lodge in the skies afar +Peeps the glowing face of the Virgin Star. +The fox-pups[60] creep from their mother's lair, +And leap in the light of the rising moon; +And loud on the luminous, moonlit lake +Shrill the bugle-notes of the lover loon; +And woods and waters and welkin break +Into jubilant song--it is joyful June. + +But where is Wiwaste? O where is she-- +The virgin avenged--the queenly queen-- +The womanly woman--the heroine? +Has she gone to the spirits? and can it be +That her beautiful face is the Virgin Star +Peeping out from the door of her lodge afar, +Or upward sailing the silver sea, +Star-beaconed and lit like an avenue, +In the shining stern of her gold canoe? +No tidings came--nor the brave Chaske: +O why did the lover so long delay? +He promised to come with the robins in May +With the bridal gifts for the bridal day; +But the fair May-mornings have slipped away, +And where is the lover--the brave Chaske? + +But what of the venomous Harpstina-- +The serpent that tempted the proud Red Cloud, +And kindled revenge in his savage soul? +He paid for his crime with his own heart's blood, +But his angry spirit has brought her dole;[61] +It has entered her breast and her burning head, +And she raves and burns on her fevered bed. +"He is dead! He is dead!" is her wailing cry, +"And the blame is mine--it was I--it was I! +I hated Wiwaste, for she was fair, +And my brave was caught in her net of hair. +I turned his love to a bitter hate; +I nourished revenge, and I pricked his pride; +Till the Feast of the Virgins I bade him wait. +He had his revenge, but he died--he died! +And the blame is mine--it was I--it was I! +And his spirit burns me; I die--I die!" +Thus, alone in her lodge and her agonies, +She wails to the winds of the night, and dies. + +But where is Wiwaste? Her swift feet flew +To the somber shades of the tangled thicket. +She hid in the copse like a wary cricket, +And the fleetest hunters in vain pursue. +Seeing unseen from her hiding place, +She sees them fly on the hurried chase; +She sees their dark eyes glance and dart, +As they pass and peer for a track or trace, +And she trembles with fear in the copse apart, +Lest her nest be betrayed by her throbbing heart. + +Weary the hours; but the sun at last +Went down to his lodge in the west, and fast +The wings of the spirits of night were spread +O'er the darkling woods and Wiwaste's head. +Then slyly she slipped from her snug retreat, +And guiding her course by Waziya's star,[62] +That shone through the shadowy forms afar, +She northward hurried with silent feet; +And long ere the sky was aflame in the east, +She was leagues from the spot of the fatal feast. +'Twas the hoot of the owl that the hunters heard, +And the scattering drops of the threat'ning shower, +And the far wolf's cry to the moon preferred. +Their ears were their fancies--the scene was weird, +And the witches[63] dance at the midnight hour. +She leaped the brook and she swam the river; +Her course through the forest Wiwaste wist +By the star that gleamed through the glimmering mist +That fell from the dim moon's downy quiver. +In her heart she spoke to her spirit-mother: +"Look down from your _teepee_, O starry spirit. +The cry of Wiwaste. O mother, hear it; +And touch the heart of my cruel father. +He hearkened not to a virgin's words; +He listened not to a daughter's wail. +O give me the wings of the thunder-birds, +For his were wolves[52] follow Wiwaste's trail; +And guide my flight to the far _Hohe_-- +To the sheltering lodge of my brave Chaske." + +The shadows paled in the hazy east, +And the light of the kindling morn increased. +The pale-faced stars fled one by one, +And hid in the vast from the rising sun. +From woods and waters and welkin soon +Fled the hovering mists of the vanished moon. +The young robins chirped in their feathery beds, +The loon's song shrilled like a winding horn, +And the green hills lifted their dewy heads +To greet the god of the rising morn. +She reached the rim of the rolling prairie-- +The boundless ocean of solitude; +She hid in the feathery hazel-wood, +For her heart was sick and her feet were weary; +She fain would rest, and she needed food. +Alone by the billowy, boundless prairies, +She plucked the cones of the scarlet berries; +In feathering copse and the grassy field +She found the bulbs of the young _Tipsanna_,[43] +And the sweet _medo_ [64] that the meadows yield. +With the precious gift of his priceless manna +God fed his fainting and famished child. + +At night again to the northward far +She followed the torch of Waziya's star; +For leagues away o'er the prairies green, +On the billowy vast, may a man be seen, +When the sun is high and the stars are low; +And the sable breast of the strutting crow +Looms up like the form of the buffalo. +The Bloody River [40] she reached at last, +And boldly walked in the light of day, +On the level plain of the valley vast; +Nor thought of the terrible Chippeway. +She was safe from the wolves of her father's band, +But she trod on the treacherous "Bloody Land." + +[Illustration] + +And lo--from afar o'er the level plain-- +As far as the sails of a ship at sea +May be seen as they lift from the rolling main-- +A band of warriors rode rapidly. +She shadowed her eyes with her sun-browned hand; +All backward streamed on the wind her hair, +And terror spread o'er her visage fair, +As she bent her brow to the far-off band. +For she thought of the terrible Chippeway-- +The fiends that the babe and the mother slay; +And yonder they came in their war-array! + +She hid like a grouse in the meadow-grass, +And moaned--"I am lost!--I am lost! alas, +And why did I fly from my native land +To die by the cruel Ojibway's hand?" +And on rode the braves. She could hear the steeds +Come galloping on o'er the level meads; +And lowly she crouched in the waving grass, +And hoped against hope that the braves would pass. + +They have passed; she is safe--she is safe! +Ah no! They have struck her trail and the hunters halt. +Like wolves on the track of the bleeding doe, +That grappled breaks from the dread assault, +Dash the warriors wild on Wiwaste's trail. +She flies--but what can her flight avail? +Her feet are fleet, but the flying feet +Of the steeds of the prairies are fleeter still; +And where can she fly for a safe retreat? + +But hark to the shouting--"_Iho!--Iho!_"[22] +Rings over the wide plain sharp and shrill. +She halts, and the hunters come riding on; +But the horrible fear from her heart is gone, +For it is not the shout of the dreaded foe; +'Tis the welcome shout of her native land! + +Up galloped the chief of the band, and lo-- +The clutched knife dropped from her trembling hand; +She uttered a cry and she swooned away; +For there, on his steed in the blaze of day, +On the boundless prairie so far away, +With his polished bow and his feathers gay, +Sat the manly form of her own Chaske! + +There's a mote in my eye or a blot on the page, +And I cannot tell of the joyful greeting; +You may take it for granted, and I will engage, +There were kisses and tears at the strange, glad meeting; +For aye since the birth of the swift-winged years, +In the desert drear, in the field of clover, +In the cot, in the palace, and all the world over-- +Yea, away on the stars to the ultimate spheres, +The greeting of love to the long-sought lover-- +Is tears and kisses and kisses and tears. + +But why did the lover so long delay? +And whitherward rideth the chief to-day? +As he followed the trail of the buffalo, +From the _tees_ of _Kapoza_ a maiden, lo, +Came running in haste o'er the drifted snow. +She spoke to the chief of the tall _Hohe_: +"Wiwaste requests that the brave Chaske +Will abide with his band and his coming delay +Till the moon when the strawberries are ripe and red, +And then will the chief and Wiwaste wed-- +When the Feast of the Virgins is past," she said. +Wiwaste's wish was her lover's law; +And so his coming the chief delayed +Till the mid May blossoms should bloom and fade-- +But the lying runner was Harpstina. + +And now with the gifts for the bridal day +And his chosen warriors he took his way, +And followed his heart to his moon-faced maid. +And thus was the lover so long delayed; +And so as he rode with his warriors gay, +On that bright and beautiful summer day, +His bride he met on the trail mid-way. + +God arms the innocent. He is there-- +In the desert vast, in the wilderness, +On the bellowing sea, in the lion's lair, +In the mist of battle, and everywhere. +In his hand he holds with a father's care +The tender hearts of the motherless; +The maid and the mother in sore distress +He shields with his love and his tenderness; +He comforts the widowed--the comfortless-- +And sweetens her chalice of bitterness; +He clothes the naked--the numberless-- +His charity covers their nakedness-- +And he feeds the famished and fatherless +With the hand that feedeth the birds of air. +Let the myriad tongues of the earth confess +His infinite love and his holiness; +For his pity pities the pitiless, +His mercy flows to the merciless; +And the countless worlds in the realms above, +Revolve in the light of his boundless love. + +And what of the lovers? you ask, I trow. +She told him all ere the sun was low-- +Why she fled from the Feast to a safe retreat. +She laid her heart at her lover's feet, +And her words were tears and her lips were slow. +As she sadly related the bitter tale +His face was aflame and anon grew pale, +And his dark eyes flashed with a brave desire, +Like the midnight gleam of the sacred fire. [65] +"_Mitawin,_"[66] he said, and his voice was low, +"Thy father no more is the false Little Crow; +But the fairest plume shall Wiwaste wear +Of the great _Wanmdee_ in her midnight hair. +In my lodge, in the land of the tall _Hohe_, +The robins will sing all the long summer day +To the happy bride of the brave Chaske.'" + +Aye, love is tested by stress and trial +Since the finger of time on the endless dial +Began its rounds, and the orbs to move +In the boundless vast, and the sunbeams clove +The chaos; but only by fate's denial +Are fathomed the fathomless depths of love. +Man is the rugged and wrinkled oak, +And woman the trusting and tender vine +That clasps and climbs till its arms entwine +The brawny arms of the sturdy stock. +The dimpled babes are the flowers divine +That the blessing of God on the vine and oak +With their cooing and blossoming lips invoke. + +To the pleasant land of the brave _Hohe_ +Wiwaste rode with her proud Chaske. +She ruled like a queen in his bountiful _tee_, +And the life of the twain was a jubilee +Their wee ones climbed on the father's knee, +And played with his plumes of the great _Wanmdee_. +The silken threads of the happy years +They wove into beautiful robes of love +That the spirits wear in the lodge above; +And time from the reel of the rolling spheres +His silver threads with the raven wove; +But never the stain of a mother's tears +Soiled the shining web of their happy years. +When the wrinkled mask of the years they wore, +And the raven hair of their youth was gray, +Their love grew deeper, and more and more; +For he was a lover for aye and aye, +And ever her beautiful, brave Chaske. +Through the wrinkled mask of the hoary years +To the loving eyes of the lover aye +The blossom of beautiful youth appears. + +At last, when their locks were as white as snow, +Beloved and honored by all the band, +They silently slipped from their lodge below, +And walked together, and hand in hand, +O'er the Shining Path[68] to the Spirit-land, +Where the hills and the meadows for aye and aye +Are clad with the verdure and flowers of May, +And the unsown prairies of Paradise +Yield the golden maize and the sweet wild rice. +There, ever ripe in the groves and prairies, +Hang the purple plums and the luscious berries, +And the swarthy herds of the bison feed +On the sun-lit slope and the waving mead; +The dappled fawns from their coverts peep, +And countless flocks on the waters sleep; +And the silent years with their fingers trace +No furrows for aye on the hunter's face. + + + + +To the memory of my devoted wife dead and gone yet always with me I +dedicate + +PAULINE + +The Flower of my heart nursed into bloom by her loving care and ofttimes +watered with her tears + +H.L.G. + + + + +PAULINE + +_PART I_ + + +INTRODUCTION + +Fair morning sat upon the mountain-top, +Night skulking crept into the mountain-chasm. +The silent ships slept in the silent bay; +One broad blue bent of ether domed the heavens, +One broad blue distance lay the shadowy land, +One broad blue vast of silence slept the sea. +Now from the dewy groves the joyful birds +In carol-concert sang their matin songs +Softly and sweetly--full of prayer and praise. +Then silver-chiming, solemn-voiced bells +Rung out their music on the morning air, +And Lisbon gathered to the festival +In chapel and cathedral. Choral hymns +And psalms of sea-toned organs mingling rose +With sweetest incense floating up to heaven, +Bearing the praises of the multitudes; +And all was holy peace and holy happiness. +A rumbling of deep thunders in the deep; +The vast sea shuddered and the mountains groaned; +Up-heaved the solid earth--the nether rocks +Burst--and the sea--the earth--the echoing heavens +Thundered infernal ruin. On their knees +The trembling multitudes received the shock, +And dumb with sudden terror bowed their heads +To toppling spire and plunging wall and dome. + +So shook the mighty North the sudden roar +Of Treason thundering on the April air-- +An earthquake shock that jarred the granite hills +And westward rolled against th' eternal walls +Rock-built Titanic--for a moment shook: +Uprose a giant and with iron hands +Grasped his huge hammer, claspt his belt of steel, +And o'er the Midgard-monster mighty Thor +Loomed for the combat. + + Peace--O blessed Peace! +The war-worn veterans hailed thee with a shout +Of Alleluias;--homeward wound the trains, +And homeward marched the bayonet-bristling columns +To "_Hail Columbia_" from a thousand horns-- +Marched to the jubilee of chiming bells, +Marched to the joyful peals of cannon, marched +With blazing banners and victorious songs +Into the outstretched arms of love and home. + +But there be columns--columns of the dead +That slumber on an hundred battle-fields-- +No bugle-blast shall waken till the trump +Of the Archangel. O the loved and lost! +For them no jubilee of chiming bells; +For them no cannon-peal of victory; +For them no outstretched arms of love and home. +God's peace be with them. Heroes who went down, +Wearing their stars, live in the nation's songs +And stories--there be greater heroes still, +That molder in unnumbered nameless graves +Erst bleached unburied on the fields of fame +Won by their valor. Who will sing of these-- +Sing of the patriot-deeds on field and flood-- +Of these--the truer heroes--all unsung? +Where sleeps the modest bard in Quaker gray +Who blew the pibroch ere the battle lowered, +Then pitched his tent upon the balmy beach? +"Snow-bound," I ween, among his native hills. +And where the master hand that swept the lyre +Till wrinkled critics cried "Excelsior"? +Gathering the "Aftermath" in frosted fields. +Then, timid Muse, no longer shake thy wings +For airy realms and fold again in fear; +A broken flight is better than no flight; +Be thine the task, as best you may, to sing +The deeds of one who sleeps at Gettysburg +Among the thousands in a common grave. +The story of his life I bid you tell +As it was told one windy winter night +To veterans gathered around the festal board, +Fighting old battles over where the field +Ran red with wine, and all the battle-blare +Was merry laughter and the merry songs-- +Told when the songs were sung by him who heard +The pith of it from the dying soldier's lips-- +His Captain--tell it as the Captain told. + + +THE CAPTAIN'S STORY + +"Well, comrades, let us fight one battle more; +Let the cock crow--we'll guard the camp till morn. +And--since the singers and the merry ones +Are _hors de combat_--fill the cups again; +Nod if you must, but listen to a tale +Romantic--but the warp thereof is truth. +When the old Flag on Sumter's sea-girt walls +From its proud perch a fluttering ruin fell, +I swore an oath as big as Bunker Hill; +For I was younger then, nor battle-scarred, +And full of patriot-faith and patriot-fire. + +"I raised a company of riflemen, +Marched to the front, and proud of my command, +Nor seeking higher, led them till the day +Of triumph and the nation's jubilee. +Among the first that answered to my call +The hero came whose story you shall hear. +'Tis better I describe him: He was young-- +Near two and twenty--neither short nor tall-- +A slender student, and his tapering hands +Had better graced a maiden than a man: +Sad, thoughtful face--a wealth of raven hair +Brushed back in waves from forehead prominent; +A classic nose--half Roman and half Greek; +Dark, lustrous eyes beneath dark, jutting brows, +Wearing a shade of sorrow, yet so keen, +And in the storm of battle flashing fire. + +"'Well, boy,' I said, 'I doubt if you will do; +I need stout men for picket-line and march-- +Men that have bone and muscle--men inured +To toil and hardships--men, in short, my boy, +To march and fight and march and fight again.' +A queer expression lit his earnest face-- +Half frown--half smile. + + "'Well _try_ me.' That was all +He answered, and I put him on the roll-- +_Paul Douglas, private_--and he donned the blue. +Paul proved himself the best in my command; +I found him first at _reveille_, and first +In all the varied duties of the day. +His rough-hewn comrades, bred to boisterous ways, +Jeered at the slender youth with maiden hands, +Nicknamed him 'Nel,' and for a month or more +Kept up a fusillade of jokes and jeers. +Their jokes and jeers he heard but heeded not, +Or heeding did a kindly act for him +That jeered him loudest; so the hardy men +Came to look up to Paul as one above +The level of their rough and roistering ways. +He never joined the jolly soldier-sports, +But ever was the first at bugle-call, +Mastered the drill and often drilled the men. +Fatigued with duty, weary with the march +Under the blaze of the midsummer sun, +He murmured not--alike in sun or rain +His utmost duty eager to perform, +And ever ready--always just the same +Patient and earnest, sad and silent Paul. + +"The day of battle came--that Sabbath day, +Midsummer.[A] Hot and blistering as the flames +Of prairie-fires wind-driven, the burning sun +Blazed down upon us and the blinding dust +Wheeled in dense clouds and covered all our ranks, +As we marched on to battle. Then the roar +Of batteries broke upon us. Glad indeed +That music to my soldiers, and they cheered +And cheered again and boasted--all but Paul-- +And shouted _'On to Richmond!'_--He alone +Was silent--but his eyes were full of fire. + +[A] The first battle of Bull Run, July 21, 1861. + +"Then came the order--_'Forward, double quick!'_ +And we rushed into battle--formed our line +Facing the foe--the ambushed, deadly foe, +Hid in the thicket, with the Union flag-- +A cheat--hung out before it--luring us +Into a blazing hell. The battle broke +With wildest fury on us--crashed and roared +The rolling thunder of continuous fire. +We broke and rallied--charged and broke again, +And rallied still--broke counter-charge and charged +Loud-yelling, furious, on the hidden foe;-- +Met thrice our numbers and came flying back +Disordered and disheartened. Yet again +I strove to rally my discouraged men, +But hell was fairly howling;--only Paul-- +Eager, but bleeding from a bullet-wound +In the left arm--came bounding to my side. +But at that moment I was struck and fell-- +Fell prostrate; and a swooning sense of death +Came on me, and I saw and heard no more +Of battle on that Sabbath. + + "I awoke, +Confined and jolted in an ambulance +Piled with the wounded--driven recklessly +By one who chiefly cared to save himself. +Dizzy and faint I raised my head: my wound +Was not as dangerous as it might have been-- +A scalp-wound on the temple; there, you see--" +He put his finger on the ugly scar-- +"Half an inch deeper and some soldier friend, +Among the veterans gathered here to-night, +Perchance had told a briefer tale than mine. + +"In front and rear I saw the reckless rout-- +A broken army flying panic-struck-- +Our proud brigades of undulating steel +That marched at sunrise under blazoned flags, +Singing the victory ere the cannon roared, +And eager for the honors of the day-- +Like bison Indian-chased on windy plains, +Now broken and commingled fled the field. +Words of command were only wasted breath; +Colonels and brigadiers, on foot and soiled, +Were pushed and jostled by the hurrying hordes. +Anon the cry of _'Cavalry!'_ arose, +And army-teams came dashing down the road +And plunged into the panic. All the way +Was strewn with broken wagons, battery-guns, +Tents, muskets, knapsacks and exhausted men. +My men were mingled with the lawless crowd, +And in the swarm behind us, there was Paul-- +Silent and soldier-like, with knapsack on +And rifle on his shoulder, guarding me +And marching on behind the ambulance. +So all that dark and dreadful night we marched, +Each man a captain--captain of himself-- +Nor cared for orders on that wild retreat +To safety from disaster. All that night, +Silent and soldier-like my wounded Paul +Marched close behind and kept his faithful watch. +For ever and anon the jaded men, +Clamorous and threat'ning, sought to clamber in; +Whom Paul drove off at point of bayonet, +Wielding his musket with his good right arm. +But when the night was waning to the morn +I saw that he was weary and I made +A place for Paul and begged him to get in. +'No, Captain; no,' he answered,--'I will walk-- +I'm making bone and muscle--learning how +To march and fight and march and fight again.' +That silenced me, and we went rumbling on. +Till morning found us safe at Arlington. + +"A month off duty and a faithful nurse +Worked wonders and my head was whole again-- +Nay--to be candid--cracked a little yet. +My nurse was Paul. Albeit his left arm, +Flesh-wounded, pained him sorely for a time, +With filial care he dressed my battered head, +And wrote for me to anxious friends at home-- +But never wrote a letter for himself. +Thinking of this one day, I spoke of it:-- +A cloud came o'er his face. + + "'My friends,' he said, +'Are here among my comrades in the camp.' +That made a mystery and I questioned him: +He gave no answer--or evasive ones-- +Seeming to shrink from question, and to wrap +Himself within himself and live within. + +"Again we joined our regiment and marched; +Over the hills and dales of Maryland +Along the famous river wound our way. +On picket-duty at the frequent fords +For weary, laggard months were we employed +Guarding the broad Potomac, while our foes, +Stealthily watching for their human game, +Lurked like Apaches on the wooded shores. +Bands of enemy's cavalry by night +Along the line of river prowled, and sought +To dash across and raid in Maryland. +Three regiments guarded miles of river-bank, +And drilled alternately, and one was ours. +Off picket duty, alike in fair or foul, +With knapsacks on and bearing forty rounds, +From morn till night we drilled--battalion-drill-- +Often at double-quick for weary hours-- +Bearing our burdens in the blazing sun, +Till strong men staggered from the ranks and fell. +Aye, many a hardy man in those hard days +Was drilled and disciplined into his grave. Arose +Murmurs of discontent, and loud complaints +Fell on dull ears till patience was worn out +And mutiny was hinted. As for Paul +I never heard a murmur from his lips; +Nor did he ask a reason for the things +Unreasonable and hard required of him, +But straightway did his duty just as if +The nation's fate hung on it. I pitied Paul; +Slender of form and delicate, he bore +The toils and duties of the hardiest. +Ill from exposure, or fatigued and worn, +On picket hungered, shivering in the rain, +Or sweltering in full dress, with knapsack on, +Beneath the blaze of the mid-summer sun, +He held his spirit--always still the same +Patient and earnest, sad and silent Paul. + +"We posted pickets two by two. At night, +By turns each comrade slept and took the watch. +Once in September, in a drenching storm, +Three days and nights with neither tent nor fire +Paul and a comrade held a picket-post. +The equinox raged madly. Chilling winds +In angry gusts roared from the northern hills, +Dashing the dismal rain-clouds into showers +That fell in torrents over all the land. +In camp the soldiers crouched in dripping tents, +Or shivered by the camp-fires. I was ill +And gladly sought the shelter of a hut. +Orders were strict and often hard to bear-- +Nor tents nor fire upon the picket-posts-- +Cold rations and a canopy of storms. +I pitied Paul and would have called him in, +But that I had no man to take his place; +Nor did I know he took upon himself +A double task. His comrade on the post +Was ill, and so he made a shelter for him +With his own blankets and a bed within; +And took the watch of both upon himself. +And on the third night near the dawn of day, +In rubber cloak stole in upon the post +A pompous major, on the nightly round, +Unchallenged. All fatigued and drenched with rain, +Still on his post with rifle in his hand-- +Against a sheltering elm Paul stood and slept. +Muttering of death the brutal major stormed, +Then pitiless pricked the comrade with his sword, +And from his shelter drove him to the watch, +Burning with fever. There Paul interposed +And said: + + "'I ask no mercy at your hands; +I shall not whimper, but my comrade here +Is ill of fever; I have stood his watch: +Sir, if a human heart beats in your breast, +Send him to camp, or he will surely die.' + +"The pompous brute--vaingloriously great +In straps and buttons--haughtily silenced Paul, +Hand-bound and sent him guarded to the camp, +And the poor comrade shivering stood the watch +Till dawn of day and I was made aware. +Among the true were some vainglorious fools +Called by the fife and drum from native mire +To lord and strut in shoulder-straps and buttons. +Scrubs, born to brush the boots of gentlemen, +By sudden freak of fortune found themselves +Masters of better men, and lorded it +As only base and brutish natures can-- +Braves on parade and cowards under fire. + +"I interceded in my Paul's behalf, +Else he had suffered graver punishment, +But as himself for mercy would not beg-- +'A stubborn boy,' our bluff old colonel said-- +To extra duty for a month he went +Unmurmuring, storm or shine. When the cold rain +Poured down most pitiless Paul, drenched and wan, +Guarded the baggage and the braying mules. +When the hot sun at mid-day blazed and burned, +Like the red flame on Mauna Loa's top, +Withering the grass and parching earth and air, +I often saw him knapsacked and full-dressed, +Drilling the raw recruits at double-quick; +And yet he wore a patient countenance, +And went about his duty earnestly +As if it were a pleasure to obey. + +"The month wore off and mad disaster came-- +Gorging the blood of heroes at Ball's Bluff. +'Twas there the brave, unfaltering Baker fell +Fighting despair between the jaws of death. +Quenched was the flame that fired a thousand hearts; +Hushed was the voice that shook the senate-walls, +And rang defiance like a bugle-blast. +Broad o'er the rugged mountains to the north +Fell the incessant rain till, like a sea, +Him and the deadly ambush of the foe +The swollen river rolled and roared between. +Brave Baker saw the peril, but not his +The soul to shrink or falter, though he saw +His death-warrant in his orders. Forth he led +His proud brigade across the roaring chasm, +Firm and unfaltering into the chasm of death. +From morn till mid-day in a single boat +Unfit, by companies, the fearless band +Passed over the raging river; then advanced +Upon the ambushed foe. We heard the roll +Of volleys in the forest, and uprose, +From out the wood, a cloud of battle-smoke. +Then came the yell of foemen charging down +Rank upon rank and furious. Hand to hand, +The little band of heroes, flanked and pressed, +Fought thrice their numbers; fearless Baker led +In prodigies of valor; front and flank +Volleyed the deadly rifles; in the rear +The rapid, raging river rolled and roared. +Along the Maryland shore a mile below, +Eager to cross and reinforce our friends, +Ten thousand soldiers lay upon their arms; +And we had boats to spare. In all our ranks +There was not one who did not comprehend +The peril and the instant need of aid. +Chafing we waited orders. We could see +That Baker's men were fighting in retreat; +For ever nearer o'er the forest rolled +The smoke of battle. Orders came at last, +And up along the shore our regiment ran, +Eager to aid our comrades, but too late! +Baker had fallen in the battle-front; +He fought like Spartan and like Spartan fell +Defiant, clutching at the throat of fate. +Their leader lost, confusion followed fast; +Wild panic and red slaughter swept the field. +Powerless to saves we saw the farther shore +Covered with wounded and wild fugitives-- +Our own defeated and defenseless friends. +Shattered and piled with wounded men the boat +Pushed off to brave the river, while the foe +Pressed on the charge with fury, and refused +Mercy to the vanquished. Officers and men, +Cheating the savage foemen of their spoils, +Their flags and arms into the gurgling depths +Despairing hurled, and following plunged amain. +As numerous as the wild aquatic flocks +That float in autumn on Lake Nepigon, +The heads of swimmers moved upon the flood. +And still upon the shore a Spartan few-- +Shoulder to shoulder--back to back, as one-- +Amid the din and clang of clashing steel, +Surrounded held the swarming foes at bay. +As in the pre-historic centuries-- +Unnumbered ages ere the Pyramids-- +Whereof we read on pre-diluvian bones +And fretted flints in excavated caves, +When savage men abode in rocky dens, +And wrought their weapons from the fiery flint, +And clothed their tawny thighs in lion-skins-- +Before the mouth of some well-guarded cave, +Where smoked the savory flesh of mammoth, came +The great cave-bear unbidden to the feast. +Around the monster swarm the brawny men, +Wielding with sinewy arms and savage cries +Their flinty spears and tomahawks of stone. +Erect old bruin growls upon his foes, +And swings with mighty power his ponderous paws-- +Woe unto him who feels the crushing blow-- +Till, bleeding from an hundred wounds and blind, +With sudden plunge he falls at last, and dies +Amid the shouts of his wild enemies. +So fought the Spartan few, till one by one, +They fell surrounded by a wall of foes. +The river boiled beneath the storm of lead; +Weighed down with wounded comrades many sunk, +But more went down with bullets in their heads. +O! it was pitiful. The outstretched hands +Of men that erst had faced the battle-storm +Unshaken, grasping now in wild despair, +Wrung cries of pity from us. Vain our fire-- +The range too long--it fell upon our friends; +At which the foemen yelled their mad delight. +A storm of bullets poured upon the boat, +Mangling the mangled on her, till at last, +Shattered and over-laden, suddenly +She made a lurch to leeward and went down. + +"A shallow boat lay moored upon the shore; +Our gallant Colonel called for volunteers +In mercy's name to man it and push out. +But all could see the peril. Stout the heart +Would dare to face the raging flood and fire, +And to his call responded not a man-- +Save Paul and one who perished at the helm. +They went as if at bugle-call to drill; +Their comrades said, 'They never will return.' +Stoutly and steadily Paul rowed the boat +Athwart the turbid river's sullen tide, +And reached the wounded struggling in the flood. +Bravely they worked away and lifted in +The helpless till the boat would hold no more; +Others they helped to holds upon the rails, +Then pulled away the over-laden craft. +We cheered them from the shore. The maddened foe +With furious volleys answered--hitting oft +The little craft of mercy--hands anon +Let go their holds and sunk into the deep. +And in that storm Paul's gallant comrade fell. +Trimming his craft with caution Paul could make +But little headway with a single oar-- +Clutched in despair and madly wrenched away +By drowning souls the other. Firm and cool +Paul stood unscathed; then fell a sudden shower +That broke his bended oar-stem at the blade. +Down to the brink we crept and stretched our hands, +And shouted, 'Overboard, Paul! and save yourself.' + +"He stood a moment as if all were lost, +Then caught the rope, and stretching forth his hand, +Waved to the foe and plunged into the flood. +Slowly he towed the clumsy craft and swam, +Down-drifting with the rapid, rolling stream. +Cheering him on adown the shore we ran; +The current lent its aid and bore him in +Toward us, and beyond the range at last +Of foemen's fire he safely came to land, +Mooring his boat amid a storm of cheers. + +"Confined in hospital three days he lay +Fatigued and feverous, but tender hands +Nursed and restored him. Our old Colonel came +And thanked him--patting Paul paternally-- +And praised his daring. 'My brave boy,' he said, +'Had I a regiment of such men, by Jove! +I'd hew a path to Richmond and to fame.' +Paul made reply, and in his smile and tone +Mingled a touch of sarcasm: + + "'Thank you, sir; +But let me add--I fear the wary foe +Would nab your regiment napping on the field. +You have forgotten, Colonel--not so fast-- +I am the man that slept upon his post.' +Our bluff old Colonel laughed and turned away; +Ten minutes later came his kind reply-- +A basketful of luxuries from his mess. + +"Paul marched and fought and marched and fought again, +Patient and earnest through the bootless toils +And fiery trials of that dread campaign +Upon the Peninsula. 'Twas fitly called +'Campaign of Battles.' Aye, it sorely pierced +The scarred and bleeding nation, and drew blood +Deep from her vitals till she shook and reeled, +Like some huge giant staggering to his fall-- +Blinded with blood, yet struggling with his soul, +And stretching forth his ponderous, brawny arms, +Like Samson in the Temple, to o'erwhelm +And crush his mocking enemies in his fall. + +"Ah, Malvern! you remember Malvern Hill-- +That night of dreadful butchery! Round the top +Of the entrenched summit, parked and aimed, +Blazed like Vesuvius when he bellows fire +And molten lava into the midnight heavens, +An hundred crashing cannon, and the hill +Shook to the thunder of the mighty guns, +As ocean trembles to the bursting throes +Of submarine volcanoes; and the shells +From the embattled gun-boats--fiery fiends-- +Shrieked on the night and through the ether hissed +Like hell's infernals. Line supporting line, +From base to summit round the blazing hill, +Our infantry was posted. Crowned with fire, +And zoned by many a burning, blazing belt +From head to foot, and belching sulphurous flames, +The embattled hill appeared a raging fiend-- +The Lucifer of hell let loose to reign +Over a world wrapt in the final fires. + +"In solid columns massed our frenzied foes +Beat out their life against the blazing hill-- +Broke and re-formed and madly charged again, +And thundered like the storm-lashed, furious sea +Beating in vain against the solid cliffs. +Foremost in from our veteran regiment +Breasted the brunt of battle, but we bent +Beneath the onsets as the red-hot bar +Bends to the sledge, until our furious foes-- +Mown as the withered prairie-grass is mown +By wild October fires--fell back and left +A field of bloody agony and death +About the base, and victory on the hill. + +"I lost a score of riflemen that night; +My first lieutenant--his last battle over-- +Lay cut in twain upon the battle-line. +With lantern dim wide o'er the slaughter-field +I searched at midnight for my wounded men, +But chiefly searched for Paul. An hour or more +I sought among the groaning and the dead, +Stooping and to the dim light turning up +The ghastly faces, till at last I found +Him whom I sought, and on the outer line-- +Feet to the foe and silent face to heaven-- +Death pale and bleeding from a ragged wound +Pleading with feeble voice to let him be +And die upon the field, we bore him thence; +And tenderly his comrades carried him, +Sheltered with blankets, on the weary march +At dead of night in dismal storm begun. +We made a stand at Harrison's, and there +With careful hands we laid him on a cot. +Now I had learned to prize the noble boy; +My heart was touched with pity. Patiently +I watched o'er Paul and bathed his fevered brow, +And pressed the cooling sponge upon his lips, +And washed his wound and gave him nourishment. +'Twas all in vain, the surgeon said. I felt +That I could save him and I kept my watch. +A rib was crushed--beneath it one could see +The throbbing vitals--torn as we supposed, +But found unwounded. In his feverish sleep +He often moaned and muttered mysteries, +And, dreaming, spoke in low and tender tones +As if some loved one sat beside his cot. +I questioned him and sought the secret key +To solve his mystery, but all in vain. +A month of careful nursing turned the scale, +And he began to gain upon his wound. +Propt in his cot one evening as he sat +And I sat by him, thus I questioned him: +'There is a mystery about your life +That I would gladly fathom. Paul, I think +You well may trust me, and I fain would hear +The story of your life; right well I know +There is a secret sorrow in your heart.' + +[Illustration: STOOPING AND TO THE DIM LIGHT TURNING UP THE GHASTLY +FACES, TILL I AT LAST I FOUND HIM WHOM I SOUGHT.] + +"He turned his face and fixed his lustrous eyes +Upon mine own inquiringly, and held +His gaze upon me till his vacant stare +Told me full well his thoughts had wandered back +Into the depth of his own silent soul; +Then he looked down and sadly smiled and said: + +"'Captain, I have no history--not one page; +My book of life is but a blotted blank. +Let it be sealed; I would not open it, +Even to one who saved a worthless life, +Only to add a few more leaves in blank +To the blank volume. All that I now am +I offer to my country. If I live +And from this cot walk forth, 'twill only be +To march and fight and march and fight again,' +Until a surer aim shall bring me down +Where care and kindness can no more avail. +Under our country's flag a soldier's death +I hope to die and leave no name behind. +My only wish is this--for what I am, +Or have been, or have hoped to be, is now +A blank misfortune. I will say no more.' + +"I questioned Paul and pressed him further still +To tell his story, but he only shook +His head in silence sadly and lay back +And closed his eyes and whispered--'All is blank.' +That night he muttered often in his sleep; +I could not catch the sense of what he said; +I caught a name that he repeated oft-- +_Pauline_--so softly whispered that I knew +She was the blissful burden of his dreams. + +"Two moons had waxed and waned, and Paul arose, +Came to the camp and shared my tent and bed. +While in the hospital he helpless lay-- +To him unknown, and as the choice of all-- +Came his promotion to the vacant rank +Of him who fell at Malvern. But, alas, +Say what we would he would not take the place. +To us who importuned him, he replied: +'Comrades and friends, I did not join your ranks +For honor or for profit. All I am-- +A wreck perhaps of what I might have been-- +I freely offer in our country's cause; +And in her cause it is my wish to serve +A private soldier; I aspire to naught +But victory--and there be better men-- +Braver and hardier--such should have the place.' + +"His comrades cheered, but Paul, methought, was sad. +One evening as he sat upon his couch, +Communing with himself as he was wont, +I stood before him; looking in his face, +I said, '_Pauline_--her name is then, _Pauline_.' +All of a sudden up he rose amazed, +And looked upon me with such startled eyes +That I was pained and feared that I had done +A wrong to him whom I had learned to love. +Then he sat down upon his couch and groaned, +Pressing his hand upon his wound, and said: +'Captain, I pray you, tell me truthfully, +Wherefore you speak that name.' + +"I told him all +That I had heard him mutter in his dreams. +He listened calmly to the close and said: +'My friend, if you have any kind regard +For me who suffer more than you may know, +I pray you utter not that name again.' +And thereupon he turned and hid his face. + +"There was a mystery I might not fathom, +There was a history I might not hear: +Nor could I further press that saddened heart +To pour its secret sorrow in my ears. +Thereafter Paul was tenant of my tent-- +Sat at my mess and slept upon my couch, +Save when his duty called him from my side, +And not a word escaped his lips or mine +About his secret--yet how oft I found +My eyes upon him and my bridled tongue +Prone to a question; but that solemn face +Forbade me and he wore his mystery. + +"At that stern battle on Antietam's banks, +Where gallant Hooker led the fierce attack, +Paul bore a glorious part. Our starry flag, +Before a whirlwind of terrific fire, +Advancing proudly on the foe, went down. +Grim death and pale-faced panic seized the ranks. +Paul caught the flag and waving it aloft +Rallied our regiment. He came out unscathed. + +"At Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville he fought: +Grim in disaster--bravest in defeat, +He leaped not into danger without cause, +Nor shrunk he from it though a gulf of fire, +When duty bade him face it. All his aim-- +To win the victory; applause and praise +He almost hated; grimly he endured +The fulsome flattery of his comrades nerved +By his calm courage up to manlier deeds. + +"I saw him angered once--if one might call +His sullen silence anger--as by night +Across the Rappahannock, from the field +Where brave and gallant 'Stonewall' Jackson fell, +With hopeless hearts and heavy steps we marched. +Such sullen wrath on other human face +I never saw in all those bloody years. +One evening after, as he read to me +The fulsome General Order of our Chief-- +Congratulating officers and men +On their achievements in the late defeat-- +His handsome face grew rigid as he read, +And as he closed, down like a thunder-clap +Upon the mess-chest fell his clinched fist: +'Fit pap for fools!' he said--'an Iron Duke +Had ground the Southern legions into dust, +Or, by the gods!--the field of Chancellorsville +Had furnished graves for ninety thousand men!'[B] + +"That dark disaster sickened many a soul; +Stout hearts were sad and cowards cried for peace. +The vulture, perched hard by the eagle's crag, +Loud cawed his fellows from afar to feast. +Ill-omened bird--his carrion-cries were vain! +Again our veteran eagles plumed their wings, +And forth he fled from Montezuma's shores-- +A dastard flight--betraying unto death +Him whom he dazzled with a bauble crown. +Just retribution followed swift and sure-- +Germania's eagles plucked him at Sedan. +A gloomy month wore off, and then the news +That Lee, emboldened by his late success, +Had poured his legions upon Northern soil, +Rung through the camps, and thrilled the mighty heart +Of the Grand Army. Louder than the roar +Of brazen cannon on the battle-field. +Then rose and rolled our thunder-rounds of cheers. + +[B] Hooker had 90,000 men at Chancellorsville. + +We saw the dawn of victory--we should meet +Our wary foe upon familiar soil. +We cheered the news, we cheered the marching-orders, +We cheered our brave commander till the tears +Ran down his cheeks. Up from its sullen gloom +Leaped the Grand Army, as if God had writ +With fiery finger 'thwart the vault of heaven +A solemn promise of swift victory. + +"We marched. As rolls the deep, resistless flood +Of Mississippi, when the rains of June +Have swelled his thousand northern fountain-lakes +Above their barriers--rolls with restless roar, +Anon through rock-built gorges, and anon +Down through the prairied valley to the sea, +Gleaming and glittering in the summer sun, +By field and forest on his winding way, +So stretched and rolled the mighty column forth, +Winding among the hills and pouring out +Along the vernal valleys; so the sheen +Of moving bayonets glittered in the sun. +And as we marched there rolled upon the air, +Up from the vanguard-corps, a choral chant, +Feeble at first and far and far away, +But gathering volume as it rolled along +And regiment after regiment joined the choir, +Until an hundred thousand voices swelled +The surging chorus, and the solid hills +Shook to the thunder of the mighty song. +And ere it died away along the line, +The hill-tops caught the chorus--rolled away +From peak to peak the pealing thunder-chant, +Clear as the chime of bells on Sabbath morn: + +"'John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave; +John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave; +John Brown's body lies moldering in the grave; + But his soul is marching on. + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + His soul is marching on!' + +"And far away +The mountains echoed and re-echoed still-- + "'_Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + Glory, Glory, Halleluia! + His soul is marching on!'_ + + "Until the winds +Bore the retreating echoes southward far, +And the dull distance murmured in our ears. + +"Fast by the field where gallant Baker fell, +We crossed the famous river and advanced +To Frederick. There a transitory cloud +Gloomed the Grand Army--Hooker was relieved: +Fell from command at victory's open gate +The dashing, daring, soul-inspiring chief, +The idol of his soldiers, and they mourned. +He had his faults--they were not faults of heart-- +His gravest--fiery valor. Since that day, +The self-same fault--or virtue--crowned a chief +With laurel plucked on rugged Kenesaw. +Envy it was that wrought the hero's fall, +Envy, with hydra-heads and serpent-tongues, +Hissed on the wolfish clamors of the Press. +O fickle Fortune, how thy favors fall-- +Like rain upon the just and the unjust! +Throughout the army, as the soldiers read +The farewell-order, gloomy murmurs ran; +But our new chieftain cheered our drooping hearts. + +"That Meade would choose his battle-ground we knew, +And if not his the gallant dash and dare +That on Antietam's bloody battle-field +Snatched victory from defeat, our faith was firm +That he would fight to win, and hold the reins +Firmly in hand, nor sacrifice our lives +In wild assaults and fruitless daring deeds. + +"From Taneytown, at mid-day, on the hills +Of Gettysburg we heard the cannon boom. +Our gallant Hancock rode full speed away; +We under Gibbon swiftly following him +At midnight camped on Cemetery Hill. +Sharp the initial combat of the grand +On-coming battle, and the sulphurous smoke +Hung in blue wreaths above the silent vale +Between two hostile armies, mightier far +Than met upon the field of Marathon. +Or where the proud Carthago bowed to Rome. +Hope of the North and Liberty--the one; +Pride of the South--the other. On the hills-- +A rolling range of rugged, broken hills, +Stretching from Round-Top northward, bending off +And butting down upon a silver stream-- +In open field our veteran regiments lay. +Facing our battle-line and parallel-- +Beyond the golden valley to the west-- +Lay Seminary Ridge--a crest of hills +Covered with emerald groves and fields of gold +Ripe for the harvest: on this rolling range, +As numerous as the swarming ocean-fowl +That perch in squadrons on some barren isle +Far in the Arctic sea when summer's sun +With slanting spears invades the icy realm, +The Southern legions lay upon their arms. +As countless as the winter-evening stars +That glint and glow above the frosted fields +Twinkled and blazed upon that crest of hills +The camp-fires of the foe. Two mighty hosts, +Ready and panoplied for deadliest war, +And eager for the combat where the prize +Of victory was empire--for the foe +An empire borne upon the bended backs +Of toiling slaves in millions--but for us, +An empire grounded on the rights of man-- +Lay on their arms awaiting innocent morn +To light the field for slaughter to begin. + +"Silent above us spread the dusky heavens, +Silent below us lay the smoky vale, +Silent beyond, the dreadful crest of hills. +Anon the neigh of horse, a sentry's call, +Or rapid hoof-beats of a flying steed +Bearing an aid and orders, broke the dread, +Portentous silence. I was worn and slept. + +"The call of bugles wakened me. The dawn +Was stealing softly o'er the shadowy land, +And morning grew apace. Broad in the east +Uprose above the crest of hazy hills +Like some broad shield by fabled giant borne, +The golden sun, and flashed upon the field. +Ripe for the harvest stood the golden grain, +Nodding on gentle slopes and dewy hills. +Ready for the harvest death's grim reapers stood +Waiting the signal with impatient steel; +And morning passed, and mid-day. Here and there +The crack of rifles on the picket-line, +Or boom of solitary cannon broke +The myriad-voiced and dreadful monotone. +So fled the anxious hours until the hills +Sent forth their silent shadows to the east-- +And then their batteries opened on our left +Advanced into the valley. All along +The rolling crest of Seminary Ridge +Rolled up the smoke of cannon. Answered then +The grim artillery on our chain of hills' +And heaven was hideous with the bellowing boom, +The whiz of shot, the infernal shrieks of shells. +Down from the hills their charging columns came +A glittering mass of steel. As when the snow +Piled by an hundred winters on the peak +Of cloud-robed Bernard thunders down the cliffs, +Nor rocks nor forests stay the mighty mass, +And men and flocks in terror fly the death, +So thundering fell the columns of the foe, +Crushing through Sickles' corps in front and flank; +And, roaring onward like a mighty wind, +They rushed for Little Round-Top--rugged hill, +Key to our left and center--all exposed-- +Manned by a broken battery half unmanned. +But Hancock saw the peril. On stalwart steed +Foam-flecked, wide-nostriled, panting like a hound, +That stalwart soldier--Spartan to the soles-- +Came dashing down where, prone along the ridge +Upon the right, our sheltered regiment lay. +'_By the left flank, forward--double-quick!_'--We sprang +And dashed for Little Round-Top; formed our line +Flanking the broken battery. Up the slope, +Like frightened sheep when howling wolves pursue, +Fled Sickles' men in panic: hard behind +On came the Rebel columns. Hat in hand +Waving and shouting to his eager corps-- +Rode gallant Longstreet leading on the foe. + +"Where yonder field-wall bounds the trampled wheat +By grove and meadow, see--among the trees-- +Their bayonets gleam advancing. Line on line, +Column on column, in the field beyond, +Their hurrying ranks crowd glittering on and on. +High at the head their flaunting colors fly; +High o'er the roar their wild, triumphant yell +Shrills like the scream of panthers. + + +"Hancock's voice +Rang down our lines above the cannons' roar: +_'Advance, and take those colors'_[C]--Adown the slope +Like Bengal tigers springing at the hounds, +We sprang and met them at the border wall: +Muzzle to muzzle--steel to steel--we met, +And fought like Romans and like Romans fell. +Even as a cyclone, growling thunder, roars +Down through a dusky forest, and its path +Is strown with broken and uprooted pines +Promiscuous piled in broad and broken swaths, +So crashed our volleys through their serried ranks, +Mowing great swaths of death; yet on and on, +Closing the gaps and yelling like the fiends +That Dante heard along the gulf of hell, +Still came our furious foes. A cloud of smoke-- +Dense, sulphurous, stifling--covered all our ranks. +Our steady, deadly rifles crackled still, +And still their crashing volleys rolled and roared. +Our rifles blazed upon the blaze below; +The blaze below upon the blaze above, +And in the blaze the buzz of myriad bees +Whose stings were deadlier than the Libyan asp. +Five times our colors fell--five times arose +Defiant, flapping on the broken wall. + +[C] These are the very words used by General Hancock on this occasion. + +"We hold the perilous breach; on either hand +Our foes out-flank us, leap the sheltering wall +And pour their deadly, enfilading fire. +God shield our shattered ranks!--God help us! + + "Ho! +'Stars and Stripes' on the right!--Hurra!--Hurra! +The Green Mountain Boys to our aid!--Hurra!--Hurra. +Cannon-roar down on the left!--Our batteries are there-- +Hurling hot hell-fire'--See!--like sickled corn +The close-ranked foemen fall in toppling swaths: +But still with hurried steps and steady steel +They close the gaps--like madmen they press on! +With one wild yell they rush upon the wall! +Lo from our lines a sheet of crackling fire +Scorches their grimy faces--back they reel +And tumble--down and down--a writhing mass +Of slaughter and defeat! + + "Leaped on the wall +A thousand Blues and swung their caps in air, +Thundering their wild _Hurra!_ above the roar +And crash of cannon;--victory was ours. +Back to his crest of hills the baffled foe +Reluctant turned and fled the storm of death. + +"The smoke of battle floated from the field, +And lo the woodside piled with slaughter-heaps! +And lo the meadow dotted with the slain! +And lo the ranks of dead and dying men +That fighting fell behind the broken wall! + +"Only a handful of my men remained; +The rest lay dead or wounded on the field; +Nor skulked their captain, but by grace was spared. +Behold the miracle!--This Bible holds, +Embedded in its leaves, the Rebel lead +Aimed at my heart. But here a scratch and there-- +Not worth the mention where so many fell. +Paul, foremost ever in the deadly hail, +As if protected by a shield unseen, +Escaped unscathed. + + "We camped upon the hill. +Night hovered o'er us on her dusky wings; +Then all along our lines upon the hills +Blazed up the evening camp-fires. Facing us +Beyond the smoke-robed valley sparkled up +A chain of fires on Seminary Ridge. +A hum of mingled voices filled the air. +As when upon the vast, hoarse-moaning sea +And all along the rock-built somber shore +Murmurs the menace of the coming storm-- +The muttering of the tempest from afar, +The plash and seethe of surf upon the sand, +The roll of distant thunder in the heavens, +Unite and blend in one prevailing voice-- +So rose the mingled murmurs of our camps, +So rose the groans and moans of wounded men +Along the slope and valley, and so rolled +From yonder frowning parallel of hills +The muttered menace of our baffled foes; +And so from camp to camp and hill to hill +Rolled the deep mutter and the dreadful moan +Of an hundred thousand voices blent in one. + +"That night a multitude of friends and foes +Slept soundly--but they slept to wake no more. +But few indeed among the living slept; +We lay upon our arms and courted sleep +With open eyes and ears: the fears and hopes +That centered in the half-fought battle held +The balm of slumber from our weary limbs. +Anon the rattle of the random fire +Broke on our drowsy ears and startled us, +As one is startled by some horrid dream; +Whereat old veterans muttered in their sleep. + +"Midnight had passed, and I lay wakeful still, +When Paul arose and sat upon the sward. +He said: 'I cannot sleep; unbidden thoughts +That will not down crowd on my restless brain. +Captain, I know not how, but still I know +That I shall see but one more sunrise. Morn +Will bring the clash of arms--to-morrow's sun +Will look upon unnumbered ghastly heaps +And gory ranks of dead and dying men, +And ere it sink beyond the western hills +Up from this field will roll a mighty shout +Victorious, echoed over all the land, +Proclaiming joy to freemen everywhere. +And I shall fall. I cannot tell you how +I know it--but I feel it in my soul. +I pray that death may spare me till I hear +Our shout of _"Victory!"_ rolling o'er these hills: +Then will I lay me down and die in peace.' + +"I lightly said--'Sheer superstition, Paul; +I'll wager a month's pay you'll live to fight +A dozen battles yet. They ill become +A gallant soldier on the battle field-- +Such grandam superstitions. You have fought +Ever like a hero--do you falter now?' + +"'Captain,' he said, 'I shall not falter now, +But gladlier will I hail the rising sun. +Death has no terror for a heart like mine: +Say what you may and call it what you will-- +I know that I shall fall to rise no more +Before the sunset of the coming day. +If this be superstition--still I know; +If this be fear it will not hold me back.' +I answered: + + "'Friend, I hope this prophecy +Will prove you a false prophet; but, my Paul, +Have you no farewells for your friends at home? +No message for a nearer, dearer one?' + +"'None; there is none I knew in other days +Knows where or what I am. So let it be. +If there be those--not many--who may care +For one who cares so little for himself, +Surely my soldier-name in the gazette +Among the killed will bring no pang to them. +And then he laid himself upon the sward; +Perhaps he slept--I know not, for fatigue +O'ercame me and I slept. + + "The picket guns +At random firing wakened me. The morn +Came stealing softly o'er the somber hills; +Dark clouds of smoke hung hovering o'er the field. +Blood-red as risen from a sea of blood, +The tardy sun as if in dread arose, +And hid his face in the uprising smoke. +As when the pale moon, envious of the glow +And gleam and glory of the god of day, +Creeps in by stealth between the earth and him, +Eclipsing all his glory, and the green +Of hills and dales is changed to yellowish dun, +So fell the strange and lurid light of morn. +And as I gazed I heard the hunger-cries +Of vultures circling on their dusky wings +Above the smoke-hid valley; then they plunged +To gorge themselves upon the slaughter-heaps, +As at the Buddhist temples in Siam +Whereto the hideous vultures flock to feast +With famished dogs upon the pauper dead. + +"The day wore on. Two mighty armies stood +Defiant--watching--dreading to assault; +Each hoping that the other would assault +And madly dash against its glittering steel. +As in the jungles of the Chambeze-- +Glaring defiance with their fiery eyes-- +Two tawny lions--rival monarchs--meet +And fright the forest with their horrid roar; +But ere they close in bloody combat crouch +And wait and watch for vantage in attack; +So on their bannered hills the opposing hosts, +Eager to grapple in the tug of death, +Waited and watched for vantage in the fight. +Noon came. The fire of pickets died away. +All eyes were turned to Seminary Ridge, +For lo our sullen foemen--park on park-- +Had massed their grim artillery on our corps. +Hoarse voices sunk to whispers or were hushed; +The rugged hills stood listening in awe; +So dread the ominous silence that I heard +The hearts of soldiers throbbing along the line. + +"Up from yon battery curled a cloud of smoke, +Shrieked o'er our heads a solitary shell,-- +Then instantly in horrid concert roared +Two hundred cannon on the Rebel hills-- +Hurling their hissing thunderbolts--and then +An hundred bellowing cannon from our lines +Thundered their iron answer. Horrible +Rolled in the heavens the infernal thunders--rolled +From hill to hill the reverberating roar, +As if the earth were bursting with the throes +Of some vast pent volcano; rocked and reeled, +As in an earthquake-shock, the solid hills; +Anon huge fragments of the hillside rocks, +And limbs and splinters of shot-shattered trees +Danced in the smoke like demons; hissed and howled +The crashing shell-storm bursting over us. +Prone on the earth awaiting the grand charge, +To which we knew the heavy cannonade +Was but a prelude, for two hours we lay-- +Two hours that tried the very souls of men-- +And many a brave man never rose again. +Then ceased our guns to swell the infernal roar; +The roll and crash of cannon in our front +Lulled, and we heard the foeman's bugle-calls. +Then from the slopes of Seminary Ridge +Poured down the storming columns of the foe. +As when the rain-clouds from the rim of heaven +Are gathered by the four contending winds, +And madly whirled until they meet and clash +Above the hills and burst--down pours a sea +And plunges roaring down through gorge and glen, +So poured the surging columns of our foes +Adown the slopes and spread along the vale +In glittering ranks of battle--line on line-- +Mile-long. Above the roar of cannon rose +In one wild yell the Rebel battle-cry. +Flash in the sun their serried ranks of steel; +Before them swarm a cloud of skirmishers. +That eager host the gallant Pickett leads; +He right and left his fiery charger wheels; +Steadies the lines with clarion voice; anon +His outstretched saber gleaming points the way. +As mid the myriad twinkling stars of heaven +Flashes the blazing comet, and a column +Of fiery fury follows it, so flashed +The dauntless chief, so followed his wild host. + +"We waited grim and silent till they crossed +The center and began the dread ascent. +Then brazen bugles rang the clarion call; +Arose as one twice twenty thousand men, +And all our hillsides blazed with crackling fire. +With sudden crash and simultaneous roar +An hundred cannon opened instantly, +And all the vast hills shuddered under us. +Yelling their mad defiance to our fire +Still on and upward came our daring foes. +As when upon the wooded mountain-side +The unchained Loki[D] riots and the winds +Of an autumnal tempest lash the flames, +Whirling the burning fragments through the air-- +Huge blazing limbs and tops of blasted pines-- +Mowing wide swaths with circling scythes of fire, +So fell our fire upon the advancing host, +And lashed their ranks and mowed them into heaps, +Cleaving broad avenues of death. Still on +And up they come undaunted, closing up +The ghastly gaps and firing as they come. +As if protected by the hand of heaven, +Rides at their head their gallant leader still; +The tempest drowns his voice--his naming sword +Gleams in the flash of rifles. One wild yell--Like +the mad hunger-howl of famished wolves +Midwinter on the flying cabris'[E] trail, +Swelled by ten thousand hideous voices, shrills, +And through the battle-smoke the bravest burst. +Flutters their tattered banner on our wall! +Thunders their shout of victory! Appalled +Our serried ranks are broken--but in vain! +On either hand our cannon enfilade, +Crushing great gaps along the stalwart lines; +In front our deadly rifles volley still, +Mowing the toppling swaths of daring men. +Behold--they falter!--Ho!--they break!--they fly! +With one wild cheer that shakes the solid hills +Spring to the charge our eager infantry. +Headlong we press them down the bloody slope, +Headlong they fall before our leveled steel +And break in wild disorder, cast away +Their arms and fly in panic. All the vale +Is spread with slaughter and wild fugitives. +Wide o'er the field the scattered foemen fly; +Dread havoc and mad terror swift pursue +Till battle is but slaughter. Thousands fall-- +Thousands surrender, and the Southern flag +Is trailed upon the field. + +[D] Norse fire-fiend + +[E] Cabri--the small, fleet antelope of the northern plains, so called +by the Crees and half-breeds. + + "The day was ours, +And well we knew the worth of victory. +Loud rolled the rounds of cheers from corps to corps; +Comrades embraced each other; iron men +Shed tears of joy like women; men profane +Fell on their knees and thanked Almighty God. +Then _'Hail Columbia'_ rang the brazen horns, +And all the hill-tops shouted unto heaven; +The welkin shouted to the shouting hills--And +heavens and hill-tops shouted _'Victory!'_ + +"Night with her pall had wrapped the bloody field. +The little remnants of our regiment +Were gathered and encamped upon the hill. +Paul was not with them, and they could not tell +Aught of him. I had seen him in the fight +Bravest of all the brave. I saw him last +When first the foremost foemen reached our wall, +Thrusting them off with bloody bayonet, +And shouting to his comrades, _'Steady, men!'_ +Sadly I wandered back where we had met +The onset of the foe. The rounds of cheers +Repeated oft still swept from corps to corps, +And as I passed along the line I saw +Our dying comrades raise their weary heads, +And cheer with feeble voices. Even in death +The cry of victory warmed their hearts again. +Paul lay upon the ground where he had fought, +Fast by the flag that floated on the line. +He slept--or seemed to sleep, but on his brow +Sat such a deadly pallor that I feared +My Paul would never march and fight again. +I raised his head--he woke as from a dream; +I said, 'Be quiet--you are badly hurt; +I'll call a surgeon; we will dress your wound.' +He gravely said: + + "'Tis vain; for I have done +With camp and march and battle. Ere the dawn +Shall I be mustered out of your command, +And mustered into the Grand Host of heaven.' + +"I sought a surgeon on the field and found; +With me he came and opened the bloody blouse, +Felt the dull pulse and sagely shook his head. +A musket ball had done its deadly work; +There was no hope, he said, the man might live +A day perchance--but had no need of him. +I called his comrades and we carried him, +Stretched on his blankets, gently to our camp, +And laid him by the camp-fire. As the light +Fell on Paul's face he took my hand and said: + + + + +PART II + +PAUL' S HISTORY + + +"Captain, I hear the cheers. My soul is glad. +My days are numbered, but this glorious day-- +Like some far beacon on a shadowy cape +That cheers at night the storm-belabored ships-- +Will light the misty ages from afar. +This field shall be the Mecca. Here shall rise +A holier than the Caaba where men kiss +The sacred stone that flaming fell from heaven. +But O how many sad and aching hearts +Will mourn the loved ones never to return! +Thank God--no heart will hope for my return! +Thank God--no heart will mourn because I die! +Captain, at life's mid-summer flush and glow, +For him to die who leaves his golden hopes, +His mourning friends and idol-love behind, +It must be hard and seem a cruel thing. +After the victory--upon this field--For +me to die hath more of peace than pain; +For I shall leave no golden hopes behind, +No idol-love to pine because I die, +No friends to wait my coming or to mourn. +They wait my coming in the world beyond; +And wait not long, for I am almost there. +'Tis but a gasp, and I shall pass the bound +'Twixt life and death--through death to life again-- +Where sorrow cometh never. Pangs and pains +Of flesh or spirit will not pierce me there; +And two will greet me from the jasper walls-- +God's angels--with a song of holy peace, +And haste to meet me at the pearly gate, +And kiss the death-damp from my silent lips, +And lead me through the golden avenues-- +Singing Hosanna--to the Great White Throne." + +So there he paused and calmly closed his eyes, +And silently I sat and held his hand. +After a time, when we were left alone, +He spoke again with calmer voice and said: +"Captain, you oft have asked my history, +And I as oft refused. There is no cause +Why I should longer hold it from my friend +Who reads the closing chapter. It may teach +One soul to lean upon the arm of Christ-- +That hope and happiness find anchorage +Only in heaven. While my lonesome life +Saw death but dimly in the dull distance +My lips were sealed to the unhappy tale; +Under my pride I hid a heavy heart. + +"I was ambitious in my boyhood days, +And dreamed of fame and honors--misty fogs +That climb at morn the ragged cliffs of life, +Veiling the ragged rocks and gloomy chasms, +And shaping airy castles on the top +With bristling battlements and looming towers; +But melt away into ethereal air +Beneath the blaze of the mid-summer sun, +Till cliffs and chasms and all the ragged rocks +Are bare, and all the castles crumbled away. + +"There winds a river 'twixt two chains of hills-- +Fir-capped and rugged monuments of time; +A level vale of rich alluvial land, +Washed from the slopes through circling centuries, +And sweet with clover and the hum of bees, +Lies broad between the rugged, somber hills. +Beneath a shade of willows and of elms +The river slumbers in this meadowy lap. +Down from the right there winds a babbling branch, +Cleaving a narrower valley through the hills. +A grand bald-headed hill-cone on the right +Looms like a patriarch, and above the branch +There towers another. I have seen the day +When those bald heads were plumed with lofty pines. +Below the branch and near the river bank, +Hidden among the elms and butternuts, +The dear old cottage stands where I was born. +An English ivy clambers to the eaves; +An English willow planted by my hand +Now spreads its golden branches o'er the roof +Not far below the cottage thrives a town, +A busy town of mills and merchandise-- +Belle Meadows, fairest village of the vale. +Behind it looms the hill-cone, and in front +The peaceful river winds its silent way. +Beyond the river spreads a level plain-- +Once hid with somber firs--a tangled marsh-- +Now beautiful with fields and cottages, +And sweet in spring-time with the blooming plum, +And white with apple-blossoms blown like snow. +Beyond the plain a lower chain of hills, +In summer gemmed with fields of golden grain +Set in the emerald of the beechen woods. +In other days the village school-house stood +Below our cottage on a grassy mound +That sloped away unto the river's marge; +And on the slope a cluster of tall pines +Crowning a copse of beech and evergreen. +There in my boyhood days I went to school; +A maiden mistress ruled the little realm; +She taught the rudiments to rompish rogues, +And walked a queen with magic wand of birch. +My years were hardly ten when father died. +Sole tenants of our humble cottage home +My sorrowing mother and myself remained; +But she was all economy, and kept +With my poor aid a comfortable house. +I was her idol and she wrought at night +To keep me at my books, and used to boast +That I should rise above our humble lot. +How oft I listened to her hopeful words-- +Poured from the fountain of a mother's heart +Until I longed to wing the sluggard years +That bore me on to what I hoped to be. + +"We had a garden-plat behind the house-- +Beyond, an orchard and a pasture-lot; +In front a narrow meadow--here and there +Shaded with elms and branching butternuts. +In spring and summer in the garden-plat +I wrought my morning and my evening hours +And kept myself at school--no idle boy. + +"One bright May morning when the robins sang +There came to school a stranger queenly fair, +With eyes that shamed the ethereal blue of heaven, +And golden hair in ringlets--cheeks as soft, +As fresh and rosy as the velvet blush +Of summer sunrise on the dew-damp hills. +Hers was the name I muttered in my dreams. +For days my bashful heart held me aloof +Although her senior by a single year; +But we were brought together oft in class, +And when she learned my name she spoke to me, +And then my tongue was loosed and we were friends. +Before the advent of the steeds of steel +Her sire--a shrewd and calculating man-- +Had lately come and purchased timbered-lands +And idle mills, and made the town his home. +And he was well-to-do and growing rich, +And she her father's pet and only child. +In mind and stature for two happy years +We grew together at the village school. +We grew together!--aye, our tender hearts +There grew together till they beat as one. +Her tasks were mine, and mine alike were hers; +We often stole away among the pines-- +That stately cluster on the sloping hill-- +And conned our lessons from the selfsame book, +And learned to love each other o'er our tasks, +While in the pine-tops piped the oriole, +And from his branch the chattering squirrel chid +Our guileless love and artless innocence. +'Twas childish love perhaps, but day by day +It grew into our souls as we grew up. +Then there was opened in the prospering town +A grammar school, and thither went Pauline. +I missed her and was sad for many a day, +Till mother gave me leave to follow her. +In autumn--in vacation--she would come +With girlish pretext to our cottage home. +She often brought my mother little gifts, +And cheered her with sweet songs and happy words; +And I would pluck the fairest meadow-flowers +To grace a garland for her golden hair, +And fill her basket from the butternuts +That flourished in our little meadow field. +I found in her all I had dreamed of heaven. +So garlanded with latest-blooming flowers, +Chanting the mellow music of our hopes, +The silver-sandaled Autumn-hours tripped by. +And mother learned to love her; but she feared, +Knowing her heart and mine, that one rude hand +Might break our hopes asunder. Like a thief +I often crept about her father's house, +Under the evening shadows, eager-eyed, +Peering for one dear face, and lingered late +To catch the silver music of one voice +That from her chamber nightly rose to heaven. +Her father's face I feared--a silent man, +Cold-faced, imperative, by nature prone +To set his will against the beating world; +Warm-hearted but heart-crusted. + +[Illustration: WE OFTEN STOLE AWAY AMONG THE PINES, AND CONNED OUR +LESSONS FROM THE SELF-SAME BOOK] + + "Two years more +Thus wore away. Pauline grew up a queen. +A shadow fell across my sunny path;-- +A hectic flush burned on my mother's cheeks; +She daily failed and nearer drew to death. +Pauline would often come with sun-lit face, +Cheating the day of half its languid hours +With cheering chapters from the holy book, +And border tales and wizard minstrelsy: +And mother loved her all the better for it. +With feeble hands upon our sad-bowed heads, +And in a voice all tremulous with tears, +She said to us: 'Dear children, love each other-- +Bear and forbear, and come to me in heaven;' +And praying for us daily--drooped and died. + +[Illustration: "'DEAR CHILDREN? LOVE EACH OTHER,--BEAR AND FORBEAR, AND +COME TO ME IN HEAVEN'"] + +"After the sad and solemn funeral, +Alone and weeping and disconsolate, +I sat at evening by the cottage door. +I felt as if a dark and bitter fate +Had fallen on me in my tender years. +I seemed an aimless wanderer doomed to grope +In vain among the darkling years and die. +One only star shone through the shadowy mists. +The moon that wandered in the gloomy heavens +Was robed in shrouds; the rugged, looming hills +Looked desolate;--the silent river seemed +A somber chasm, while my own pet lamb, +Mourning disconsolate among the trees, +As if he followed some dim phantom-form, +Bleated in vain and would not heed my call. +On weary hands I bent my weary head; +In gloomy sadness fell my silent tears. + +"An angel's hand was laid upon my head-- +There in the moonlight stood my own Pauline-- +Angel of love and hope and holy faith-- +She flashed upon me bowed in bitter grief, +As falls the meteor down the night-clad heavens-- +In silence. Then about my neck she clasped +Her loving arms and on my shoulder drooped +Her golden tresses, while her silent tears +Fell warm upon my cheek like summer rain. +Heart clasped to heart and cheek to cheek we sat; +The moon no longer gloomed--her face was cheer; +The rugged hills were old-time friends again; +The peaceful river slept beneath the moon, +And my pet lamb came bounding to our side +And kissed her hand and mine as he was wont. +Then I awoke as from a dream and said: +'Tell me, beloved, why you come to me +In this dark hour--so late--so desolate?' +And she replied: + + "'My darling, can I rest +While you are full of sorrow? In my ear +A spirit seemed to whisper--"Arise and go +To comfort him disconsolate." Tell me, Paul, +Why should you mourn your tender life away? +I will be mother to you; nay, dear boy, +I will be more. Come, brush away these tears.' + +"My heart was full; I kissed her pleading eyes: +'You are an angel sent by one in heaven,' +I said,'to heal my heart, but I have lost +More than you know. The cruel hand of death +Hath left me orphan, friendless--poor indeed, +Saving the precious jewel of your love. +And what to do? I know not what to do, +I feel so broken by a heavy hand. +My mother hoped that I would work my way +To competence and honor at the bar. +But shall I toil in poverty for years +To learn a science that so seldom yields +Or wealth or honor save to silvered heads? +I know that path to fame and fortune leads +Through thorns and brambles over ragged rocks; +But can I follow in the common path +Trod by the millions, never to lift my head +Above the busy hordes that delve and drudge +For bare existence in this bitter world-- +And be a mite, a midge, a worthless worm, +No more distinguished from the common mass +Than one poor polyp in the coral isle +Is marked amid the myriads teeming there? +Yet 'tis not for myself. For you, Pauline, +Far up the slippery heights of wealth and fame +Would I climb bravely; but if I would climb +By any art or science, I must train +Unto the task my feet for many years, +Else I should slip and fall from rugged ways, +Too badly bruised to ever mount again.' +Then she: + + "'O Paul, if wealth were mine to give! +O if my father could but know my heart! +But fear not, Paul, our _Father_ reigns in heaven. +Follow your bent--'twill lead you out aright; +The highest mountain lessens as we climb; +Persistent courage wins the smile of fate. +Apply yourself to law and master it, +And I will wait. This sad and solemn hour +Is dark with doubt and gloom, but by and by +The clouds will lift and you will see God's face. +For there is one in heaven whose pleading tongue +Will pray for blessings on her only son +Of Him who heeds the little sparrow's fall;-- +And O if He will listen to my prayers, +The gates of heaven shall echo to my voice +Morning and evening,--only keep your heart.' +I said: + + "'Pauline, your prayers had rolled away +The ponderous stone that closed the tomb of Christ; +And while they rise to heaven for my success +I cannot doubt, or I should doubt my God. +I think I see a pathway through this gloom; +I have a kinsman'--and I told her where-- +'A lawyer; I have heard my mother say-- +A self-made man with charitable heart; +And I might go and study under him; +I think he would assist me.' + + "Then she sighed: +'Paul, can you leave me? You may study here +And here you are among your boyhood friends, +And here I should be near to cheer you on.' + +"I promised her that I would think of it-- +Would see what prospect offered in the town; +And then we walked together half-embraced, +But when we neared her vine-arched garden gate, +She bade me stay and kissed me a good-night +And bounded through the moonlight like a fawn. +I watched her till she flitted from my sight, +Then slowly homeward turned my lingering steps. +I wrote my kinsman on the morrow morn, +And broached my project to a worthy man +Who kept an office and a case of books-- +An honest lawyer. People called him learn'd, +But wanting tact and ready speech he failed. +The rest were pettifoggers--scurrilous rogues +Who plied the village justice with their lies, +And garbled law to suit the case in hand-- +Mean, querulous, small-brained delvers in the mire +Of men's misfortunes--crafty, cunning knaves, +Versed in chicane and trickery that schemed +To keep the evil passions of weak men +In petty wars, and plied their tongues profane +With cunning words to argue honest fools +Into their spider-meshes to be fleeced. +I laid my case before him; took advice-- +Well-meant advice--to leave my native town, +And study with my kinsman whom he knew. +A week rolled round and brought me a reply-- +A frank and kindly letter--giving me +That which I needed most--encouragement. +But hard it was to fix my mind to go; +For in my heart an angel whispered 'Stay.' +It might be better for my after years, +And yet perhaps,'twere better to remain. +I balanced betwixt my reason and my heart, +And hesitated. Her I had not seen +Since that sad night, and so I made resolve +That we should meet, and at her father's house. +So whispering courage to my timid heart +I went. With happy greeting at the door +She met me, but her face was wan and pale-- +So pale and wan I feared that she was ill. +I read the letter to her, and she sighed, +And sat in silence for a little time, +Then said: + +"'God bless you, Paul, may be 'tis best-- +I sometimes feel it is not for the best, +But I am selfish--thinking of myself. +Go like a man, but keep your boyish heart-- +Your boyish heart is all the world to me. +Remember, Paul, how I shall watch and wait; +So write me often: like the dew of heaven +To withering grass will come your cheering words. +To know that you are well and happy, Paul, +And good and true, will wing the weary months. +And let me beg you as a sister would-- +Not that I doubt you but because I love-- +Beware of wine--touch not the treacherous cup, +And guard your honor as you guard your life. +The years will glide away like scudding clouds +That fleetly chase each other o'er the hills, +And you will be a man before you know, +And I will be a woman. God will crown +Our dearest hopes if we but trust in Him.' + +"We sat in silence for a little time, +And she was weeping, so I raised her face +And kissed away her tears. She softly said: +'Paul, there is something I must say to you-- +Something I have no time to tell you now; +But we must meet again before you go-- +Under the pines where we so oft have met. +Be this the sign,'--She waved her graceful hand, +'Come when the shadows gather on the pines, +And silent stars stand sentinel in heaven; +Now Paul, forgive me--I must say--good-bye.' + +"I read her fear upon her anxious brow. +Lingering and clasped within her loving arms +I, through her dewy, deep, blue eyes, beheld +Her inmost soul, and knew that love was there. +Ah, then and there her father blustered in, +And caught us blushing in each other's arms! +He stood a moment silent and amazed: +Then kindling wrath distorted all his face, +He showered his anger with a tongue of fire. +O cruel words that stung my boyish pride! +O dagger words that stabbed my very soul! +I strove, but fury mastered--up I sprang, +And felt a giant as I stood before him. +My breath was hot with anger;--impious boy-- +Frenzied--forgetful of his silvered hairs-- +Forgetful of her presence, too, I raved, +And poured a madman's curses on his head. +A moan of anguish brought me to myself; +I turned and saw her sad, imploring face, +And tears that quenched the wild fire in my heart. +I pressed her hand and passed into the hall, +While she stood sobbing in a flood of tears, +And he stood choked with anger and amazed. +But as I passed the ivied porch he came +With bated breath and muttered in my ear-- +'_Beggar!_'--It stung me like a serpent's fang. +Pride-pricked and muttering like a maniac, +I almost flew the street and hurried home +To vent my anger to the silent elms. +_'Beggar!_'--an hundred times that long, mad night +I muttered with hot lips and burning breath; +I paced the walk with hurried tread, and raved; +I threw myself beneath the willow-tree, +And muttered like the muttering of a storm. +My little lamb came bleating mournfully; +Angered I struck him;--out among the trees +I wandered mumbling 'beggar' as I went, +And beating in through all my burning soul +The bitter thoughts it conjured, till my brain +Reeled and I sunk upon the dew-damp grass, +And--utterly exhausted--slept till morn. + +"I dreamed a dream--all mist and mystery. +I saw a sunlit valley beautiful +With purple vineyards and with garden-plats; +And in the vineyards and the garden-plats +Were happy-hearted youths and merry girls +Toiling and singing. Grandsires too were there, +Sitting contented under their own vines +And fig-trees, while about them merrily played +Their children's children like the sportive lambs +That frolicked on the foot-hills. Low of kine, +Full-uddered, homeward-wending from the meads, +Fell on the ear as soft as Hulder's loor +Tuned on the Norse-land mountains. Like a nest +Hid in a hawthorn-hedge a cottage stood +Embowered with vines beneath broad-branching elms +Sweet-voiced with busy bees. + +[Illustration: PAUL'S DREAM] + + "On either hand +Rose steep and barren mountains--mighty cliffs +Cragged and chasm'd and over-grown with thorns; +And on the topmost peak a golden throne +Blazoned with burning characters that read-- +'Climb'--it is yours.' Not far above the vale +I saw a youth, fair-browed and raven-haired, +Clambering among the thorns and ragged rocks; +And from his brow with torn and bleeding hand +He wiped great drops of sweat. Down through the vale +I saw a rapid river, broad and deep, +Winding in solemn silence to the sea-- +The sea all mist and fog. Lo as I stood +Viewing the river and the moaning sea, +A sail--and then another--flitted down +And plunged into the mist. A moment more, +Like shapeless shadows of the by-gone years, +I saw them in the mist and they were gone-- +Gone!--and the sea moaned on and seemed to say-- +_'Gone--and forever!_'--So I gladly turned +To look upon the throne--the blazoned throne +That sat upon the everlasting cliff. +The throne had vanished!--Lo where it had stood, +A bed of ashes and a gray-haired man +Sitting upon it bowed and broken down. +And so the vision passed. + + "The rising sun +Beamed full upon my face and wakened me, +And there beside me lay my pet--the lamb-- +Gazing upon me with his wondering eyes, +And all the fields were bright and beautiful, +And brighter seemed the world. I rose resolved. +I let the cottage and disposed of all; +The lamb went bleating to a neighbor's field; +And oft my heart ached, but I mastered it. +This was the constant burden of my brain-- +_'Beggar!_'--I'll teach him that I am a man; +I'll speak and he shall listen; I will rise, +And he shall see my course as I go up +Round after round the ladder of success. +Even as the pine upon the mountain-top +Towers o'er the maple on the mountain-side, +I'll tower above him. Then will I look down +And call him _Father_:--He shall call me _Son_.' + +"Thus hushing my sad heart the day drew nigh +Of parting, and the promised sign was given. +The night was dismal darkness--not one star +Twinkled in heaven; the sad, low-moaning wind +Played like a mournful harp among the pines. +I groped and listened through the darkling grove, +Peering with eager eyes among the trees, +And calling as I peered with anxious voice +One darling name. No answer but the moan +Of the wind-shaken pines. I sat me down +Under the dusky shadows waiting for her, +And lost myself in gloomy reverie. +Dim in the darksome shadows of the night, +While thus I dreamed, my darling came and crept +Beneath the boughs as softly as a hare, +And whispered 'Paul'--and I was at her side. +We sat upon a mound moss-carpeted-- +No eyes but God's upon us, and no voice +Spake to us save the moaning of the pines. +Few were the words we spoke; her silent tears, +Our clasping, trembling, lingering embrace, +Were more than words. Into one solemn hour, +Were pressed the fears and hopes of coming years. +Two tender hearts that only dared to hope +There swelled and throbbed to the electric touch +Of love as holy as the love of Christ. +She gave her picture and I gave a ring-- +My mother's--almost with her latest breath +She gave it me and breathed my darling's name. +I girt her finger, and she kissed the ring +In solemn pledge, and said: + + "'I bring a gift-- +The priceless gift of God unto his own: +O may it prove a precious gift to you, +As it has proved a precious gift to me; +And promise me to read it day by day-- +Beginning on the morrow--every day +A chapter--and I too will read the same.' + +"I took the gift--a precious gift indeed-- +And you may see how I have treasured it. +Here, Captain, put your hand upon my breast-- +An inner pocket--you will find it there." + +I opened the bloody blouse and thence drew forth +The Book of Christ all stained with Christian blood. +He laid his hand upon the holy book, +And closed his eyes as if in silent prayer. +I held his weary head and bade him rest. +He lay a moment silent and resumed: +"Let me go on if you would hear the tale; +I soon shall sleep the sleep that wakes no more. +O there were promises and vows as solemn +As Christ's own promises; but as we sat +The pattering rain-drops fell among the pines, +And in the branches the foreboding owl +With dismal hooting hailed the coming storm. +So in that dreary hour and desolate +We parted in the silence of our tears. + +"And on the morrow morn I bade adieu +To the old cottage home I loved so well-- +The dear old cottage home where I was born. +Then from my mother's grave I plucked a rose +Bursting in bloom--Pauline had planted it-- +And left my little hill-girt boyhood world. +I journeyed eastward to my journey's end; +At first by rail for many a flying mile, +By mail-coach thence from where the hurrying train +Leaps a swift river that goes tumbling on +Between a village and a mountain-ledge, +Chafing its rocky banks. There seethes and foams +The restless river round the roaring rocks, +And then flows on a little way and pours +Its laughing waters into a bridal lap. +Its flood is fountain-fed among the hills; +Far up the mossy brooks the timid trout +Lie in the shadow of vine-tangled elms. +Out from the village-green the roadway leads +Along the river up between the hills, +Then climbs a wooded mountain to its top, +And gently winds adown the farther side +Unto a valley where the bridal stream +Flows rippling, meadow-flower-and-willow-fringed, +And dancing onward with a merry song, +Hastes to the nuptials. From the mountain-top-- +A thousand feet above the meadowy vale-- +She seems a chain of fretted silver wound +With artless art among the emerald hills. +Thence up a winding valley of grand views-- +Hill-guarded--firs and rocks upon the hills, +And here and there a solitary pine +Majestic--silent--mourns its slaughtered kin, +Like the last warrior of some tawny tribe +Returned from sunset mountains to behold +Once more the spot where his brave fathers sleep. +The farms along the valley stretch away +On either hand upon the rugged hills-- +Walled into fields. Tall elms and willow-trees +Huge-trunked and ivy-hung stand sentinel +Along the roadway walls--storm-wrinkled trees +Planted by men who slumber on the hills. +Amid such scenes all day we rolled along, +And as the shadows of the western hills +Across the valley crept and climbed the slopes, +The sunset blazed their hazy tops and fell +Upon the emerald like a mist of gold. +And at that hour I reached my journey's end. +The village is a gem among the hills-- +Tall, towering hills that reach into the blue. +One grand old mountain-cone looms on the left +Far up toward heaven, and all around are hills. +The river winds among the leafy hills +Adown the meadowy dale; a shade of elms +And willows fringe it. In this lap of hills +Cluster the happy homes of men content +To let the great world worry as it will. +The court-house park, the broad, bloom-bordered streets, +Are avenues of maples and of elms-- +Grander than Tadmor's pillared avenue-- +Fair as the fabled garden of the gods. +Beautiful villas, tidy cottages, +Flower gardens, fountains, offices and shops, +All nestle in a dreamy wealth of woods. + +"Kind hearts received me. All that wealth could bring-- +Refinement, luxury and ease--was theirs; +But I was proud and felt my poverty, +And gladly mured myself among the books +To master 'the lawless science of the law.' +I plodded through the ponderous commentaries-- +Some musty with the mildew of old age; +And these I found the better for their years, +Like olden wine in cobweb-covered flasks. +The blush of sunrise found me at my books; +The midnight cock-crow caught me reading still; +And oft my worthy master censured me: +'A time for work,' he said, 'a time for play; +Unbend the bow or else the bow will break.' +But when I wearied--needing sleep and rest-- +A single word seemed whispered in my ear-- +'_Beggar_,' it stung me to redoubled toil. +I trod the ofttimes mazy labyrinths +Of legal logic--mined the mountain-mass +Of precedents conflicting--found the rule, +Then branched into the exceptions; split the hair +Betwixt this case and that--ran parallels-- +Traced from a 'leading case' through many tomes +Back to the first decision on the 'point,' +And often found a pyramid of law +Built with bad logic on a broken base +Of careless '_dicta;_'--saw how narrow minds +Spun out the web of technicalities +Till common sense and common equity +Were strangled in its meshes. Here and there +I came upon a broad, unfettered mind +Like Murray's--cleaving through the spider-webs +Of shallower brains, and bravely pushing out +Upon the open sea of common sense. +But such were rare. The olden precedents-- +Oft stepping-stones of tyranny and wrong-- +Marked easy paths to follow, and they ruled +The course of reason as the iron rails +Rule the swift wheels of the down-thundering train. + +"I rose at dawn. First in this holy book +I read my chapter. How the happy thought +That my Pauline would read--the self-same morn +The self-same chapter--gave the sacred text, +Though I had heard my mother read it oft, +New light and import never seen before. +For I would ponder over every verse, +Because I felt that she was reading it, +And when I came upon dear promises +Of Christ to man, I read them o'er and o'er, +Till in a holy and mysterious way +They seemed the whisperings of Pauline to me. +Later I learned to lay up for myself +'Treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust +Corrupteth, and where thieves do not break through, +Nor steal'--and where my treasures all are laid +My heart is, and my spirit longs to go. +O friend, if Jesus was but man of man-- +And if indeed his wondrous miracles +Were mythic tales of priestly followers +To chain the brute till Reason came from heaven-- +Yet was his mission unto man divine. +Man's pity wounds, but Jesus' pity heals: +He gave us balm beyond all earthly balm; +He gave us strength beyond all human strength; +He taught us love above the low desires; +He taught us hope beyond all earthly hope; +He taught us charity wherewith to build +From out the broken walls of barbarism, +The holy temple of the perfect man. + +"On every Sabbath-eve I wrote Pauline. +Page after page was burdened with my love, +My glowing hopes of golden days to come, +And frequent boast of rapid progress made. +With hungry heart and eager I devoured +Her letters; I re-read them twenty times. +At morning when I laid the Gospel down +I read her latest answer, and again +At midnight by my lamp I read it over, +And murmuring 'God bless her,' fell asleep +To dream that I was with her under the pines. + +"Thus fled four years--four years of patient toil +Sweetened with love and hope, and I had made +Swift progress in my studies. Master said +Another year would bring me to the bar-- +No fledgeling but full-feathered for the field. +And then her letters ceased. I wrote and wrote +Again, but still no answer. Day after day +The tardy mail-coach lagged a mortal hour, +While I sat listening for its welcome horn; +And when it came I hastened from my books +With hope and fear contending in my soul. +Day after day--no answer--back again +I turned my footsteps with a weary sigh. +It wore upon me and I could not rest; +It gnawed me to the marrow of my bones. +The heavy tomes grew dull and wearisome, +And sometimes hateful;--then I broke away +As from a prison and rushed wildly out +Among the elms along the river-bank-- +Baring my burning temples to the breeze-- +And drank the air of heaven like sparkling wine-- +Conjuring excuses for her;--was she ill? +Perhaps forbidden. Had another heart +Come in between us?--No, that could not be; +She was all constancy and promise-bound. +A month, which seemed to me a laggard year, +Thus wore away. At last a letter came. +O with what springing step I hurried back-- +Back to my private chamber and my desk! +With what delight--what eager, trembling hand-- +The well-known seal that held my hopes I broke! +Thus ran the letter: + + "'Paul, the time has come +When we must both forgive while we forget. +Mine was a girlish fancy. We outgrow +Such childish follies in our later years. +Now I have pondered well and made an end. +I cannot wed myself to want, and curse +My life life-long, because a girlish freak +Of folly made a promise. So--farewell.' + +"My eyes were blind with passion as I read. +I tore the letter into bits and stamped +Upon them, ground my teeth and cursed the day +I met her, to be jilted. All that night +My thoughts ran riot. Round the room I strode +A raving madman--savage as a Sioux; +Then flung myself upon my couch in tears, +And wept in silence, and then stormed again. +'_Beggar!_'--it raised the serpent in my breast-- +Mad pride--bat-blind. I seized her pictured face +And ground it under my heel. With impious hand +I caught the book--the precious gift she gave, +And would have burned it, but that still small voice +Spake in my heart and bade me spare the book. + +"Then with this Gospel clutched in both my hands, +I swore a solemn oath that I would rise, +If God would spare me;--she should see me rise, +And learn what she had lost.--Yes, I would mount +Merely to be revenged. I would not cringe +Down like a spaniel underneath the lash, +But like a man would teach my proud Pauline +And her hard father to repent the day +They called me '_beggar_.' Thus I raved and stormed +That mad night out;--forgot at dawn of morn +This holy book, but fell to a huge tome +And read two hundred pages in a day. +I could not keep the thread of argument; +I could not hold my mind upon the book; +I could not break the silent under-tow +That swept all else from out my throbbing brain +But false Pauline. I read from morn till night, +But having closed the book I could not tell +Aught of its contents. Then I cursed myself, +And muttered--'Fool--can you not shake it off-- +This nightmare of your boyhood?--Brave, indeed-- +Crushed like a spaniel by this false Pauline! +Crushed am I?--By the gods, I'll make an end, +And she shall never know it nettled me!' +So passed the weary days. My cheeks grew thin; +I needed rest, I said, and quit my books +To range the fields and hills with fowling-piece +And '_mal prepense_' toward the feathery flocks. +The pigeons flew from tree-tops o'er my head; +I heard the flap of wings--and they were gone; +The pheasant whizzed from bushes at my feet +Unseen until its sudden whir of wings +Startled and broke my wandering reverie; +And then I whistled and relapsed to dreams, +Wandering I cared not whither--wheresoe'er +My silent gun still bore its primal charge. +So gameless, but with cheeks and forehead tinged +By breeze and sunshine, I returned to books. +But still a phantom haunted all my dreams-- +Awake or sleeping, for awake I dreamed-- +A spectre that I could not chase away-- +The phantom-form of my own false Pauline. + +"Six months wore off--six long and weary months; +Then came a letter from a school-boy friend-- +In answer to the queries I had made-- +Filled with the gossip of my native town. +Unto her father's friend--a bachelor, +Her senior by full twenty years at least-- +Dame Rumor said Pauline had pledged her hand. +I knew him well--a sly and cunning man-- +A honey-tongued, false-hearted flatterer. +And he my rival--carrying off my prize? +But what cared I? 'twas all the same to me-- +Yea, better for the sweet revenge to come. +So whispered pride, but in my secret heart +I cared, and hoped whatever came to pass +She might be happy all her days on earth, +And find a happy haven at the end. + +"My thoughtful master bade me quit my books +A month at least, for I was wearing out. +'Unbend the bow,' he said. His watchful eye +Saw toil and care at work upon my cheeks; +He could not see the canker at my heart, +But he had seen pale students wear away +With overwork the vigor of their lives; +And so he gave me means and bade me go +To romp a month among my native hills. +I went, but not as I had left my home-- +A bashful boy, uncouth and coarsely clad, +But clothed and mannered like a gentleman. + +"My school-boy friend gave me a cordial greeting; +That honest lawyer bade me welcome, too, +And doted on my progress and the advice +He gave me ere I left my native town. +Since first the iron-horse had coursed the vale +Five years had fled--five prosperous, magic years, +And well nigh five since I had left my home. +These prosperous years had wrought upon the place +Their wonders till I hardly knew the town. +The broad and stately blocks of brick that shamed +The weather-beaten wooden shops I knew +Seemed the creation of some magic hand. +Adown the river bank the town had stretched, +Sweeping away the quiet grove of pines +Where I had loved to ramble when a boy +And see the squirrels leap from tree to tree +With reckless venture, hazarding a fall +To dodge the ill-aimed arrows from my bow. +The dear old school-house on the hill was gone: +A costly church, tall-spired and built of stone +Stood in its stead--a monument to man. +Unholy greed had felled the stately pines, +And all the slope was bare and desolate. +Old faces had grown older; some were gone, +And many unfamiliar ones had come. +Boys in their teens had grown to bearded men, +And girls to womanhood, and all was changed, +Save the old cottage-home where I was born. +The elms and butternuts in the meadow-field +Still wore the features of familiar friends; +The English ivy clambered to the roof, +The English willow spread its branches still, +And as I stood before the cottage-door +My heart-pulse quickened, for methought I heard +My mother's footsteps on the ashen floor. + +"The rumor I had heard was verified; +The wedding-day was named and near at hand. +I met my rival: gracious were his smiles: +Glad as a boy that robs the robin's nest +He grasped the hands of half the men he met. +Pauline, I heard, but seldom ventured forth, +Save when her doting father took her out +On Sabbath morns to breathe the balmy air, +And grace with her sweet face his cushioned pew. +The smooth-faced suitor, old dame Gossip said, +Made daily visits to her father's house, +And played the boy at forty years or more, +While she had held him off to draw him on. + +[Illustration] + +"I would not fawn upon the hand that smote; +I would not cringe beneath its cruel blow, +Nor even let her know I cared for it. +I kept aloof--as proud as Lucifer. +But when the church-bells chimed on Sabbath morn +To that proud monument of stone I went-- +Her father's pride, since he had led the list +Of wealthy patrons who had builded it-- +To hear the sermon--for methought Pauline +Would hear it too. Might I not see her face, +And she not know I cared to look upon it? +She came not, and the psalms and sermon fell +Upon me like an autumn-mist of rain. +I met her once by chance upon the street-- +The day before the appointed wedding-day-- +Her and her father--she upon his arm. +'Paul--O Paul!' she said and gave her hand. +I took it with a cold and careless air-- +Begged pardon--had forgotten;--'Ah--Pauline?-- +Yes, I remembered;--five long years ago-- +And I had made so many later friends, +And she had lost so much of maiden bloom!' +Then turning met her father face to face, +Bowed with cold grace and haughtily passed on. +'This is revenge,' I muttered. Even then +My heart ached as I thought of her pale face, +Her pleading eyes, her trembling, clasping hand! +And then and there I would have turned about +To beg her pardon and an interview, +But pride--that serpent ever in my heart-- +Hissed '_beggar_,' and I cursed her with the lips +That oft had poured my love into her ears. +'She marries gold to-morrow--let her wed! +She will not wed a beggar, but I think +She'll wed a life-long sorrow--let her wed! +Aye--aye--I hope she'll live to curse the day +Whereon she broke her sacred promises. +And I forgive her?--yea, but not forget. +I'll take good care that she shall not forget; +I'll prick her memory with a bitter thorn +Through all her future. Let her marry gold!' +Thus ran my muttered words, but in my heart +There ran a counter-current; ere I slept +Its silent under-tow had mastered all-- +'Forgive and be forgiven.' I resolved +That on the morning of her wedding-day +Would I go kindly and forgive Pauline, +And send her to the altar with my blessing. +That night I read a chapter in this book-- +The first for many months, and fell asleep +Beseeching God to bless her. + Then I dreamed +That we were kneeling at my mother's bed-- +Her death-bed, and the feeble, trembling hands +Of her who loved us rested on our heads, +And in a voice all tremulous with tears +My mother said: 'Dear children, love each other; +Bear and forbear, and come to me in heaven.' + +"I wakened once--at midnight--a wild cry-- +'_Paul, O Paul!_' rang through my dreams and broke +My slumber. I arose, but all was still, +And then I, slept again and dreamed till morn. +In all my dreams her dear, sweet face appeared-- +Now radiant as a star, and now all pale-- +Now glad with smiles and now all wet with tears. +Then came a dream that agonized my soul, +While every limb was bound as if in chains. +Methought I saw her in the silent night +Leaning o'er misty waters dark and deep: +A moan--a plash of waters--and, O Christ!-- +Her agonized face upturned--imploring hands +Stretched out toward me, and a wailing cry-- +'_Paul, O Paul!_' Then face and hands went down, +And o'er her closed the deep and dismal flood +Forever--but it could not drown the cry: +'_Paul, O Paul!_' was ringing in my ears; +'_Paul, O Paul!_' was throbbing in my heart; +And moaning, sobbing in my shuddering soul +Trembled the wail of anguish--'_Paul, O Paul!_' + +"Then o'er the waters stole the silver dawn, +And lo a fairy boat with silken sail! +And in the boat an angel at the helm, +And at her feet the form of her I loved. +The white mists parted as the boat sped on +In silence, lessening far and far away. +And then the sunrise glimmered on the sail +A moment, and the angel turned her face: +My mother!--and I gave a joyful cry, +And stretched my hands, but lo the hovering mists +Closed in around them and the vision passed. + +"The morning sun stole through the window-blinds +And fell upon my face and wakened me, +And I lay musing--thinking of Pauline. +Yes, she should know the depths of all my heart-- +The love I bore her all those lonely years; +The hope that held me steadfast to my toil, +And feel the higher and the holier love +Her precious gift had wakened in my soul. +Yea, I would bless her for that precious gift-- +I had not known its treasures but for her, +And O for that would I forgive her all, +And bless the hand that smote me to the soul. +That would be comfort to me all my days, +And if there came a bitter time to her, +'Twould pain her less to know that I forgave. + +"A hasty rapping at my chamber-door; +In came my school-boy friend whose guest I was, +And said: + 'Come, Paul, the town is all ablaze! +A sad--a strange--a marvelous suicide! +Pauline, who was to be a bride to-day, +Was missed at dawn and after sunrise found-- +Traced by her robe and bonnet on the bridge, +Whence she had thrown herself and made an end--' + +"And he went on, but I could hear no more; +It fell upon me like a flash from heaven. +As one with sudden terror dumb, I turned +And in my pillow buried up my face. +Tears came at last, and then my friend passed out +In silence. O the agony of that hour! +O doubts and fears and half-read mysteries +That tore my heart and tortured all my soul! + +"I arose. About the town the wildest tales +And rumors ran; dame Gossip was agog. +Some said she had been ill and lost her mind, +Some whispered hints, and others shook their heads +But none could fathom the marvelous mystery. +Bearing a bitter anguish in my heart, +Half-crazed with dread and doubt and boding fears, +Hour after hour alone, disconsolate, +Among the scenes where we had wandered oft +I wandered, sat where once the stately pines +Domed the fair temple where we learned to love. +O spot of sacred memories--how changed! +Yet chiefly wanting one dear, blushing face +That, in those happy days, made every place +Wherever we might wander--hill or dale-- +Garden of love and peace and happiness. +So heavy-hearted I returned. My friend +Had brought for me a letter with his mail. +I knew the hand upon the envelope-- +With throbbing heart I hastened to my room; +With trembling hands I broke the seal and read. +One sheet inclosed another--one was writ +At midnight by my loved and lost Pauline. +Inclosed within, a letter false and forged, +Signed with my name--such perfect counterfeit, +At sight I would have sworn it was my own. +And thus her letter ran: + + "'Beloved Paul, +May God forgive you as my heart forgives. +Even as a vine that winds about an oak, +Rot-struck and hollow-hearted, for support, +Clasping the sapless branches as it climbs +With tender tendrils and undoubting faith, +I leaned upon your troth; nay, all my hopes-- +My love, my life, my very hope of heaven-- +I staked upon your solemn promises. +I learned to love you better than my God; +My God hath sent me bitter punishment. +O broken pledges! what have I to live +And suffer for? Half mad in my distress, +Yielding at last to father's oft request, +I pledged my hand to one whose very love +Would be a curse upon me all my days. +To-morrow is the promised wedding day; +To morrow!--but to-morrow shall not come! +Come gladlier, death, and make an end of all! +How many weary days and patiently +I waited for a letter, and at last +It came--a message crueler than death. +O take it back!--and if you have a heart +Yet warm to pity her you swore to love, +Read it--and think of those dear promises-- +O sacred as the Savior's promises-- +You whispered in my ear that solemn night +Beneath the pines, and kissed away my tears. +And know that I forgive, beloved Paul: +Meet me in heaven. God will not frown upon +The sin that saves me from a greater sin, +And sends my soul to Him. Farewell--Farewell.'" + +Here he broke down. Unto his pallid lips +I held a flask of wine. He sipped the wine +And closed his eyes in silence for a time, +Resuming thus: + + "You see the wicked plot. +We both were victims of a crafty scheme +To break our hearts asunder. Forgery +Had done its work and pride had aided it. +The spurious letter was a cruel one-- +Casting her off with utter heartlessness, +And boasting of a later, dearer love, +And begging her to burn the _billets-doux_ +A moon-struck boy had sent her ere he found +That pretty girls were plenty in the world. + +"Think you my soul was roiled with anger?--No;-- +God's hand was on my head. A keen remorse +Gnawed at my heart. O false and fatal pride +That blinded me, else I had seen the plot +Ere all was lost--else I had saved a life +To me most precious of all lives on earth-- +Yea, dearer then than any soul in heaven! +False pride--the ruin of unnumbered souls-- +Thou art the serpent ever tempting me; +God, chastening me, has bruised thy serpent head. +O faithful heart in silence suffering-- +True unto death to one she could but count +A perjured villain, cheated as she was! +Captain, I prayed--'twas all that I could do. +God heard my prayer, and with a solemn heart, +Bearing the letters in my hand, I went +To ask a favor of the man who crushed +And cursed my life--to look upon her face-- +Only to look on her dear face once more. + +"I rung the bell--a servant bade me in. +I waited long. At last the father came-- +All pale and suffering. I could see remorse +Was gnawing at his heart; as I arose +He trembled like a culprit on the drop. +'O, sir,' he said, 'whatever be your quest, +I pray you leave me with my dead to-day; +I cannot look on any living face +Till her dead face is gone forevermore.' + +"'And who hath done this cruel thing?' I said. +'Explain,' he faltered. 'Pray _you_, sir, explain!' +I said, and thrust the letters in his hand. +And as he sat in silence reading hers, +I saw the pangs of conscience on his face; +I saw him tremble like a stricken soul; +And then a tear-drop fell upon his hand; +And there we sat in silence. Then he groaned +And fell upon his knees and hid his face, +And stretched his hand toward me wailing out-- +'I cannot bear this burden on my soul; +O Paul!--O God!--forgive me or I die.' + +"His anguish touched my heart. I took his hand, +And kneeling by him prayed a solemn prayer-- +'Father, forgive him, for he knew not what +He did who broke the bond that bound us twain. +O may her spirit whisper in his ear +Forever--God is love and all is well. + +"The iron man--all bowed and broken down-- +Sobbed like a child. He laid his trembling hand +With many a fervent blessing on my head, +And, with the crust all crumbled from his heart, +Arose and led me to her silent couch; +And I looked in upon my darling dead. +Mine--O mine in heaven forevermore! +God's angel sweetly smiling in her sleep; +How beautiful--how radiant of heaven! +The ring I gave begirt her finger still; +Her golden hair was wreathed with immortelles; +The lips half-parted seemed to move in psalm +Or holy blessing. As I kissed her brow, +It seemed as if her dead cheeks flushed again +As in those happy days beneath the pines; +And as my warm tears fell upon her face, +Methought I heard that dear familiar voice +So full of love and faith and calmest peace, +So near and yet so far and far away, +So mortal, yet so spiritual--like an air +Of softest music on the slumbering bay +Wafted on midnight wings to silent shores, +When myriad stars are twinkling in the sea: + +[Illustration: 'AND I LOOKED IN UPON MY DARLING DEAD.'] + +"'_Paul, O Paul, forgive and be forgiven; +Earth is all trial;--there is peace in heaven_.' + +"Aye, Captain, in that sad and solemn hour +I laid my hand upon the arm of Christ, +And he hath led me all the weary way +To this last battle. I shall win through Him; +And ere you hear the _reveille_ again +Paul and Pauline, amid the psalms of heaven, +Embraced will kneel and at the feet of God +Receive His benediction. Let me sleep. +You know the rest;--I'm weary and must sleep. +An angel's bugle-blast will waken me, +But not to pain, for there is peace in heaven." + +He slept, but not the silent sleep of death. +I felt his fitful pulse and caught anon +The softly-whispered words "_Pauline_," and "_Peace_." +Anon he clutched with eager, nervous hand, +And in hoarse whisper shouted--"_Steady, men_!" +Then sunk again. Thus passed an hour or more +And he woke, half-raised himself and said +With feeble voice and eyes strange luster-lit: + +"Captain, my boat is swiftly sailing out +Into the misty and eternal sea +From out whose waste no mortal craft returns. +The fog is closing round me and the mist +Is damp and cold upon my hands and face. +Why should I fear?--the loved have gone before: +I seem to hear the plash of coming oars; +The mists are lifting and the boat is near. +'Tis well. To die as I am dying now-- +A soldier's death amid the gladsome shouts +Of victory for which my puny hands +Did their full share, albeit it was small, +Was all my late ambition. Bring the Flag, +And hold it over my head. Let me die thus +Under the stars I've followed. Dear old Flag--" + +But here his words became inaudible, +As in the mazes of the Mammoth Cave, +Fainter and fainter on the listening ear, +The low, retreating voices die away. +His eyes were closed; a gentle smile of peace +Sat on his face. I held his nerveless hand, +And bent my ear to catch his latest breath; +And as the spirit fled the pulseless clay, +I heard--or thought I heard--his wonder-words-- +"_Pauline,--how beautiful!_" + + As I arose +The gray dawn paled the shadows in the east. + + + + +THE SEA-GULL.[1] + +THE LEGEND OF THE PICTURED ROCKS OF LAKE SUPERIOR. OJIBWAY + + +_In the measure of Hiawatha._ + +[The numerals refer to Notes to The Sea-Gull, in Appendix.] + + +On the shore of Gitchee Gumee[2]-- +Deep, mysterious, mighty waters-- +Where the manitoes--the spirits-- +Ride the storms and speak in thunder, +In the days of Neme-Shomis,[3] +In the days that are forgotten, +Dwelt a tall and tawny hunter-- +Gitchee Pez-ze-u the Panther, +Son of Waub-Ojeeg,[4] the warrior, +Famous Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior. +Strong was he and fleet as roebuck, +Brave was he and very stealthy; +On the deer crept like a panther; +Grappled with Makwa,[5] the monster, +Grappled with the bear and conquered; +Took his black claws for a necklet, +Took his black hide for a blanket. + +When the Panther wed the Sea-Gull, +Young was he and very gladsome; +Fair was she and full of laughter; +Like the robin in the spring-time, +Sang from sunrise till the sunset; +For she loved the handsome hunter. +Deep as Gitchee Gumee's waters +Was her love--as broad and boundless; +And the wedded twain were happy-- +Happy as the mated robins. +When their first-born saw the sunlight +Joyful was the heart of Panther, +Proud and joyful was the mother. +All the days were full of sunshine, +All the nights were full of starlight. +Nightly from the land of spirits +On them smiled the starry faces-- +Faces of their friends departed. +Little moccasins she made him, +Feathered cap and belt of wampum; +From the hide of fawn a blanket, +Fringed with feathers, soft as sable; +Singing at her pleasant labor, +By her side the tekenagun, [6] +And the little hunter in it, +Oft the Panther smiled and fondled, +Smiled upon the babe and mother, +Frolicked with the boy and fondled, +Tall he grew and like his father, +And they called the boy the Raven-- +Called him Kak-kah-ge--the Raven. +Happy hunter was the Panther. +From the woods he brought the pheasant, +Brought the red deer and the rabbit, +Brought the trout from Gitchee Gumee-- +Brought the mallard from the marshes-- +Royal feast for boy and mother: +Brought the hides of fox and beaver, +Brought the skins of mink and otter, +Lured the loon and took his blanket, +Took his blanket for the Raven. +Winter swiftly followed winter, +And again the tekenagun +Held a babe--a tawny daughter, +Held a dark-eyed, dimpled daughter; +And they called her Waub-omee-mee +Thus they named her--the White-Pigeon. +But as winter followed winter +Cold and sullen grew the Panther; +Sat and smoked his pipe in silence; +When he spoke he spoke in anger; +In the forest often tarried +Many days, and homeward turning, +Brought no game unto his wigwam; +Only brought his empty quiver, +Brought his dark and sullen visage. + +Sad at heart and very lonely +Sat the Sea-Gull in the wigwam; +Sat and swung the tekenagun +Sat and sang to Waub-omee-mee: +Thus she sang to Waub-omee-mee, +Thus the lullaby she chanted: + + Wa-wa, wa-wa, wa-we-yea; + Kah-ween, nee-zheka ke-diaus-ai, + Ke-gah nau-wai, ne-me-go s'ween, + Ne-baun, ne-baun, ne-daun-is ais, + Wa-wa, wa-wa, wa-we-yea; + Ne-baun, ne-baun, ne-daun-is-ais, + E-we wa-wa, wa-we-yea, + E-we wa-wa, wa-we-yea. + + TRANSLATION + + Swing, swing, little one, lullaby; + Thou'rt not left alone to weep; + Mother cares for you--she is nigh; + Sleep, my little one, sweetly sleep; + Swing, swing, little one, lullaby; + Mother watches you--she is nigh; + Gently, gently, wee one, swing; + Gently, gently, while I sing + E-we wa-wa--lullaby, + E-we wa-wa--lullaby. + +Homeward to his lodge returning +Kindly greeting found the hunter, +Fire to warm and food to nourish, +Golden trout from Gitchee Gumee, +Caught by Kah-kah-ge--the Raven. +With a snare he caught the rabbit-- +Caught Wabose,[7] the furry-footed, +Caught Penay,[7] the forest-drummer; +Sometimes with his bow and arrows, +Shot the red deer in the forest, +Shot the squirrel in the pine-top, +Shot Ne-ka, the wild-goose, flying. +Proud as Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior, +To the lodge he bore his trophies. +So when homeward turned the Panther, +Ever found he food provided, +Found the lodge-fire brightly burning, +Found the faithful Sea-Gull waiting. +"You are cold," she said, "and famished; +Here are fire and food, my husband." +Not by word or look he answered; +Only ate the food provided, +Filled his pipe and pensive puffed it, +Sat and smoked in sullen silence. +Once--her dark eyes full of hunger-- +Thus she spoke and thus besought him: +"Tell me, O my silent Panther, +Tell me, O beloved husband, +What has made you sad and sullen? +Have you met some evil spirit-- +Met some goblin in the forest? +Has he put a spell upon you-- +Filled your heart with bitter waters, +That you sit so sad and sullen, +Sit and smoke, but never answer, +Only when the storm is on you?" + +Gruffly then the Panther answered: +"Brave among the brave is Panther +Son of Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior, +And the brave are ever silent; +But a whining dog is woman, +Whining ever like a coward." +Forth into the tangled forest, +Threading through the thorny thickets, +Treading trails on marsh and meadow, +Sullen strode the moody hunter. +Saw he not the bear or beaver, +Saw he not the elk or roebuck; +From his path the red fawn scampered, +But no arrow followed after; +From his den the sly wolf listened, +But no twang of bow-string heard he. +Like one walking in his slumber, +Listless, dreaming, walked the Panther; +Surely had some witch bewitched him, +Some bad spirit of the forest. + +When the Sea-Gull wed the Panther, +Fair was she and full of laughter; +Like the robin in the spring-time, +Sang from sunrise till the sunset; +But the storms of many winters +Sifted frost upon her tresses, +Seamed her tawny face with wrinkles. +Not alone the storms of winters +Seamed her tawny face with wrinkles. +Twenty winters for the Panther +Had she ruled the humble wigwam; +For her haughty lord and master +Borne the burdens on the journey, +Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire, +Tanned the skins of bear and beaver, +Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer; +Made him moccasins and leggins, +Decked his hood with quills and feathers-- +Colored quills of Kaug,[8] the thorny, +Feathers from Kenew,[8] the eagle. +For a warrior brave was Panther; +Often had he met the foemen, +Met the bold and fierce Dakotas, +Westward on the war-path met them; +And the scalps he won were numbered, +Numbered seven by Kenew-feathers. +Sad at heart was Sea-Gull waiting, +Watching, waiting in the wigwam; +Not alone the storms of winters +Sifted frost upon her tresses. + +Ka-be-bon-ik-ka, the mighty,[9] +He that sends the cruel winter, +He that turned to stone the Giant, +From the distant Thunder-mountain, +Far across broad Gitchee Gumee, +Sent his warning of the winter, +Sent the white frost and Kewaydin,[10] +Sent the swift and hungry North-wind. +Homeward to the South the Summer +Turned and fled the naked forests. +With the Summer flew the robin, +Flew the bobolink and blue-bird. +Flock-wise following chosen leaders, +Like the shaftless heads of arrows +Southward cleaving through the ether, +Soon the wild-geese followed after. +One long moon the Sea-Gull waited, +Watched and waited for her husband, +Till at last she heard his footsteps, +Heard him coming through the thicket. +Forth she went to met her husband, +Joyful went to greet her husband. +Lo behind the haughty hunter, +Closely following in his footsteps, +Walked a young and handsome woman, +Walked the Red Fox from the island-- +Gitchee Menis the Grand Island-- +Followed him into the wigwam, +Proudly took her seat beside him. +On the Red Fox smiled the hunter, +On the hunter smiled the woman. + +Old and wrinkled was the Sea-Gull, +Good and true, but old and wrinkled. +Twenty winters for the Panther +Had she ruled the humble wigwam, +Borne the burdens on the journey, +Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire, +Tanned the skins of bear and beaver, +Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer, +Made him moccasins and leggins, +Decked his hood with quills and feathers, +Colored quills of Kaug, the thorny, +Feathers from the great war-eagle; +Ever diligent and faithful, +Ever patient, ne'er complaining. +But like all brave men the Panther +Loved a young and handsome woman; +So he dallied with the danger, +Dallied with the fair Algonkin,[11] +Till a magic mead she gave him, +Brewed of buds of birch and cedar.[12] +Madly then he loved the woman; +Then she ruled him, then she held him +Tangled in her raven tresses, +Tied and tangled in her tresses. + +Ah, the tall and tawny Panther! +Ah, the brave and brawny Panther! +Son of Waub-Ojeeg, the warrior! +With a slender hair she led him, +With a slender hair she drew him, +Drew him often to her wigwam; +There she bound him, there she held him +Tangled in her raven tresses, +Tied and tangled in her tresses. +Ah, the best of men are tangled-- +Sometimes tangled in the tresses +Of a fair and crafty woman. + +So the Panther wed the Red Fox, +And she followed to his wigwam. +Young again he seemed and gladsome, +Glad as Raven when the father +Made his first bow from the elm-tree, +From the ash-tree made his arrows, +Taught him how to aim his arrows, +How to shoot Wabose--the rabbit. +Then again the brawny hunter +Brought the black bear and the beaver, +Brought the haunch of elk and red-deer, +Brought the rabbit and the pheasant-- +Choicest bits of all for Red Fox. +For her robes he brought the sable, +Brought the otter and the ermine, +Brought the black-fox tipped with silver. + +But the Sea-Gull murmured never, +Not a word she spoke in anger, +Went about her work as ever, +Tanned the skins of bear and beaver, +Tanned the hides of moose and red-deer, +Gathered fagots for the lodge-fire, +Gathered rushes from the marshes; +Deftly into mats she wove them; +Kept the lodge as bright as ever. +Only to herself she murmured, +All alone with Waub-omee-mee, +On the tall and toppling highland, +O'er the wilderness of waters; +Murmured to the murmuring waters, +Murmured to the Nebe-naw-baigs-- +To the spirits of the waters; +On the wild waves poured her sorrow. +Save the infant on her bosom +With her dark eyes wide with wonder, +None to hear her but the spirits, +And the murmuring pines above her. +Thus she cast away her burdens, +Cast her burdens on the waters; +Thus unto the good Great Spirit, +Made her lowly lamentation: +"Wahonowin!--showiness![13] +Gitchee Manito, bena-nin! +Nah, Ba-ba, showain nemeshin! +Wahonowin!--Wahonowin!" + +Ka-be-bon-ik-ka,[9] the mighty, +He that sends the cruel winter, +From the distant Thunder-mountain +On the shore of Gitchee Gumee, +On the rugged northern border, +Sent his solemn, final warning, +Sent the white wolves of the Nor'land.[14] +Like the dust of stars in ether-- +In the Pathway of the Spirits,[15] +Like the sparkling dust of diamonds, +Fell the frost upon the forest, +On the mountains and the meadows, +On the wilderness of woodland, +On the wilderness of waters. +All the lingering fowls departed-- +All that seek the South in winter, +All but Shingebis, the diver;[16] +He defies the Winter-maker, +Sits and laughs at Winter-maker. + +Ka-be-bon-ik-ka, the mighty, +From his wigwam called Kewaydin-- +From his home among the icebergs, +From the sea of frozen waters, +Called the swift and hungry North-wind. +Then he spread his mighty pinions +Over all the land and shook them. +Like the white down of Waubese[17] +Fell the feathery snow and covered +All the marshes and the meadows, +All the hill-tops and the highlands. +Then old Peboean[18]--the winter-- +Laughed along the stormy waters, +Danced upon the windy headlands, +On the storm his white hair streaming, +And his steaming breath, ascending, +On the pine-tops and the cedars +Fell in frosty mists of silver, +Sprinkling spruce and fir with silver, +Sprinkling all the woods with silver. + +By the lodge-fire all the winter +Sat the Sea-Gull and the Red Fox, +Sat and kindly spoke and chatted, +Till the twain seemed friends together. +Friends they seemed in word and action, +But within the breast of either +Smoldered still the baneful embers-- +Fires of jealousy and hatred-- +Like a camp-fire in the forest +Left by hunters and deserted; +Only seems a bed of ashes, +But the East wind, Wabun-noodin, +Scatters through the woods the ashes, +Fans to flame the sleeping embers, +And the wild-fire roars and rages, +Roars and rages through the forest. +So the baneful embers smoldered, +Smoldered in the breast of either. +From the far-off Sunny Islands, +From the pleasant land of Summer, +Where the spirits of the blessed +Feel no more the fangs of hunger, +Or the cold breath of Kewaydin, +Came a stately youth and handsome, +Came Segun,[19] the foe of Winter. +Like the rising sun his face was, +Like the shining stars his eyes were, +Light his footsteps as the Morning's, +In his hand were buds and blossoms, +On his brow a blooming garland. +Straightway to the icy wigwam +Of old Peboean, the Winter, +Strode Segun and quickly entered. +There old Peboean sat and shivered, +Shivered o'er his dying lodge-fire. + +"Ah, my son, I bid you welcome; +Sit and tell me your adventures; +I will tell you of my power; +We will pass the night together." +Thus spake Peboean--the Winter; +Then he filled his pipe and lighted; +Then by sacred custom raised it +To the spirits in the ether; +To the spirits in the caverns +Of the hollow earth he lowered it. +Thus he passed it to the spirits, +And the unseen spirits puffed it. +Next himself old Peboean honored; +Thrice he puffed his pipe and passed it, +Passed it to the handsome stranger. + +"Lo I blow my breath," said Winter, +"And the laughing brooks are silent. +Hard as flint become the waters, +And the rabbit runs upon them." + +Then Segun, the fair youth, answered: +"Lo I breathe upon the hillsides, +On the valleys and the meadows, +And behold as if by magic-- +By the magic of the spirits, +Spring the flowers and tender grasses." + +Then old Peboean replying: +"_Nah!_[20] I breathe upon the forests, +And the leaves fall sere and yellow; +Then I shake my locks and snow falls, +Covering all the naked landscape." + +Then Segun arose and answered: +"_Nashke!_[20]--see!--I shake my ringlets; +On the earth the warm rain falleth, +And the flowers look up like children +Glad-eyed from their mother's bosom. +Lo my voice recalls the robin, +Brings the bobolink and bluebird, +And the woods are full of music. +With my breath I melt their fetters, +And the brooks leap laughing onward." + +Then old Peboean looked upon him, +Looked and knew Segun, the Summer. +From his eyes the big tears started +And his boastful tongue was silent. +Now Keezis--the great life-giver, +From his wigwam in Waubu-nong[21] +Rose and wrapped his shining blanket +Round his giant form and started, +Westward started on his journey, +Striding on from hill to hill-top. +Upward then he climbed the ether-- +On the Bridge of Stars[22] he traveled, +Westward traveled on his journey +To the far-off Sunset Mountains-- +To the gloomy land of shadows. + +On the lodge-poles sang the robin-- +And the brooks began to murmur. +On the South-wind floated fragrance +Of the early buds and blossoms. +From old Peboean's eyes the tear-drops +Down his pale face ran in streamlets; +Less and less he grew in stature +Till he melted down to nothing; +And behold, from out the ashes, +From the ashes of his lodge-fire, +Sprang the Miscodeed[23] and, blushing, +Welcomed Segun to the North-land. + +So from Sunny Isles returning, +From the Summer-Land of spirits, +On the poles of Panther's wigwam +Sang Opee-chee--sang the robin. +In the maples cooed the pigeons-- +Cooed and wooed like silly lovers. +"Hah!--hah!" laughed the crow derisive, +In the pine-top, at their folly-- +Laughed and jeered the silly lovers. +Blind with love were they, and saw not; +Deaf to all but love, and heard not; +So they cooed and wooed unheeding, +Till the gray hawk pounced upon them, +And the old crow shook with laughter. + +[Illustration: SEGUN AND PEBOAN] + +On the tall cliff by the sea-shore +Red Fox made a swing. She fastened +Thongs of moose-hide to the pine-tree, +To the strong arm of the pine-tree. +Like a hawk, above the waters, +There she swung herself and fluttered, +Laughing at the thought of danger, +Swung and fluttered o'er the waters. +Then she bantered Sea-Gull, saying, +"See!--I swing above the billows! +Dare you swing above the billows-- +Swing like me above the billows?" + +To herself said Sea-Gull--"Surely +I will dare whatever danger +Dares the Red Fox--dares my rival; +She shall never call me coward." +So she swung above the waters-- +Dizzy height above the waters, +Pushed and aided by her rival, +To and fro with reckless daring, +Till the strong tree rocked and trembled, +Rocked and trembled with its burden. +As above the yawning billows +Flew the Sea-Gull like a whirlwind, +Red Fox, swifter than red lightning, +Cut the thongs, and headlong downward, +Like an osprey from the ether, +Like a wild-goose pierced with arrows, +Fluttering fell the frantic woman, +Fluttering fell into the waters-- +Plunged and sunk beneath the waters! +Hark!--the wailing of the West-wind! +Hark!--the wailing of the waters, +And the beating of the billows! +But no more the voice of Sea-Gull. + +[Illustration: FLUTTERING FELL THE FRANTIC WOMAN] + +In the wigwam sat the Red Fox, +Hushed the wail of Waub-omee-mee, +Weeping for her absent mother. +With the twinkling stars the hunter +From the forest came and Raven. +"Sea-Gull wanders late," said Red Fox, +"Late she wanders by the sea-shore, +And some evil may befall her." +In the misty morning twilight +Forth went Panther and the Raven, +Searched the forest and the marshes, +Searched for leagues along the lake-shore, +Searched the islands and the highlands; +But they found no trace or tidings, +Found no track in marsh or meadow, +Found no trail in fen or forest, +On the shore-sand found no footprints. +Many days they sought and found not. +Then to Panther spoke the Raven: +"She is in the Land of Spirits-- +Surely in the Land of Spirits. +High at midnight I beheld her-- +Like a flying star beheld her-- +To the waves of Gitchee Gumee +Downward flashing through the ether. +Thus she flashed that I might see her, +See and know my mother's spirit; +Thus she pointed to the waters, +And beneath them lies her body, +In the wigwam of the spirits-- +In the lodge of Nebe-naw-baigs."[24] + +Then spoke Panther to the Raven: +"On the tall cliff by the waters +Wait and watch with Waub-omee-mee. +If the Sea-Gull hear the wailing +Of her infant she will answer." + +On the tall cliff by the waters +So the Raven watched and waited; +All the day he watched and waited, +But the hungry infant slumbered, +Slumbered by the side of Raven, +Till the pines' gigantic shadows +Stretched and pointed to Waubu-nong[21]-- +To the far-off land of Sunrise; +Then the wee one woke and, famished, +Made a long and piteous wailing. + +From afar where sky and waters +Meet in misty haze and mingle, +Straight toward the rocky highland, +Straight as flies the feathered arrow, +Straight to Raven and the infant, +Swiftly flew a snow-white sea-gull-- +Flew and touched the earth a woman. +And behold, the long-lost mother +Caught her wailing child and nursed her, +Sang a lullaby and nursed her. + +Thrice was wound a chain of silver +Round her waist and strongly fastened. +Far away into the waters-- +To the wigwam of the spirits-- +To the lodge of Nebe-naw-baigs-- +Stretched the magic chain of silver. +Spoke the mother to the Raven: +"O my son--my brave young hunter, +Feed my tender little orphan; +Be a father to my orphan; +Be a mother to my orphan-- +For the crafty Red Fox robbed us-- +Robbed the Sea-Gull of her husband, +Robbed the infant of her mother. +From this cliff the treacherous woman +Headlong into Gitchee Gumee +Plunged the mother of my orphan. +Then a Nebe-naw-baig caught me-- +Chief of all the Nebe-naw-baigs-- +Took me to his shining wigwam, +In the cavern of the waters, +Deep beneath the mighty waters. +All below is burnished copper, +All above is burnished silver +Gemmed with amethyst and agates. +As his wife the Spirit holds me; +By this silver chain he holds me. + +"When my little one is famished, +When with long and piteous wailing +Cries the orphan for her mother, +Hither bring her, O my Raven; +I will hear her--I will answer. +Now the Nebe-naw-baig calls me-- +Pulls the chain--I must obey him." +Thus she spoke, and in the twinkling +Of a star the spirit-woman +Changed into a snow-white sea-gull, +Spread her wings and o'er the waters +Swiftly flew and swiftly vanished. +Then in secret to the Panther +Raven told his tale of wonder. +Sad and sullen was the hunter; +Sorrow gnawed his heart like hunger; +All the old love came upon him, +And the new love was a hatred. +Hateful to his heart was Red Fox, +But he kept from her the secret-- +Kept his knowledge of the murder. +Vain was she and very haughty-- +Oge-ma-kwa[25] of the wigwam. +All in vain her fond caresses +On the Panther now she lavished; +When she smiled his face was sullen, +When she laughed he frowned upon her; +In her net of raven tresses +Now no more she held him tangled. +Now through all her fair disguises +Panther saw an evil spirit, +Saw the false heart of the woman. + +On the tall cliff o'er the waters +Raven sat with Waub-omee-mee, +Sat and watched again and waited, +Till the wee one, faint and famished, +Made a long and piteous wailing. +Then again the snow-white Sea-Gull, +From afar where sky and waters +Meet in misty haze and mingle, +Straight toward the rocky highland, +Straight as flies the feathered arrow, +Straight to Raven and the infant, +With the silver chain around her, +Flew and touched the earth a woman. +In her arms she caught her infant-- +Caught the wailing Waub-omee-mee, +Sang a lullaby and nursed her. +Sprang the Panther from the thicket-- +Sprang and broke the chain of silver! +With his tomahawk he broke it. +Thus he freed the willing Sea-Gull-- +From the Water-Spirit freed her, +From the Chief of Nebe-naw-baigs. + +Very angry was the Spirit; +When he drew the chain of silver, +Drew and found that it was broken, +Found that he had lost the woman, +Very angry was the Spirit. +Then he raged beneath the waters, +Raged and smote the mighty waters, +Till the big sea boiled and bubbled, +Till the white-haired, bounding billows +Roared around the rocky headlands, +Rolled and roared upon the shingle. + +To the wigwam happy Panther, +As when first he wooed and won her +Led his wife--as young and handsome. +For the waves of Gitchee Gumee +Washed away the frost and wrinkles, +And the spirits by their magic +Made her young and fair forever. + +In the wigwam sat the Red Fox, +Sat and sang a song of triumph, +For she little dreamed of danger, +Till the haughty hunter entered, +Followed by the happy mother, +Holding in her arms her infant. +When the Red Fox saw the Sea-Gull-- +Saw the dead a living woman, +One wild cry she gave despairing, +One wild cry as of a demon. +Up she sprang and from the wigwam +To the tall cliff flew in terror; +Frantic sprang upon the margin, +Frantic plunged into the waters, +Headlong plunged into the waters. + +Dead she tossed upon the billows; +For the Nebe-naw-baigs knew her, +Knew the crafty, wicked woman, +And they cast her from the waters, +Spurned her from their shining wigwams; +Far away upon the shingle +With the roaring waves they cast her. +There upon her bloated body +Fed the cawing crows and ravens, +Fed the hungry wolves and foxes. + +On the shore of Gitchee Gumee, +Ever young and ever handsome, +Long and happy lived the Sea-Gull, +Long and happy with the Panther. +Evermore the happy hunter +Loved the mother of his children. +Like a red star many winters +Blazed their lodge-fire on the sea-shore. +O'er the Bridge of Souls[26] together +Walked the Sea-Gull and the Panther. +To the far-off Sunny Islands-- +To the Summer-Land of Spirits, +Sea-Gull journeyed with her husband-- +Where no more the happy hunter +Feels the fangs of frost or famine, +Or the keen blasts of Kewaydin, +Where no pain or sorrow enters, +And no crafty, wicked woman. +There she rules his lodge forever, +And the twain are very happy, +On the far-off Sunny Islands, +In the Summer-Land of Spirits. +On the rocks of Gitchee Gumee-- +On the Pictured Rocks--the legend +Long ago was traced and written, +Pictured by the Water-Spirits; +But the storms of many winters +Have bedimmed the pictured story, +So that none can read the legend +But the Jossakeeds,[27] the prophets. + +POETRY. + + +I had rather write one word upon the rock +Of ages than ten thousand in the sand. +The rock of ages! lo I cannot reach +Its lofty shoulders with my puny hand: +I can but touch the sands about its feet. +Yea, I have painted pictures for the blind, +And sung my sweetest songs to ears of stone. +What matter if the dust of ages drift +Five fathoms deep above my grave unknown, +For I have sung and loved the songs I sung. +Who sings for fame the Muses may disown; +Who sings for gold will sing an idle song; +But he who sings because sweet music springs +Unbidden from his heart and warbles long, +May haply touch another heart unknown. +There is sweeter poetry in the hearts of men +Than ever poet wrote or minstrel sung; +For words are clumsy wings for burning thought. +The full heart falters on the stammering tongue, +And silence is more eloquent than song +When tender souls are wrung by grief or shameful wrong. + +The grandest poem is God's Universe: +In measured rhythm the planets whirl their course: +Rhythm swells and throbs in every sun and star, +In mighty ocean's organ-peals and roar, +In billows bounding on the harbor-bar, +In the blue surf that rolls upon the shore, +In the low zephyr's sigh, the tempest's sob, +In the rain's patter and the thunder's roar; +Aye, in the awful earthquake's shuddering throb, +When old Earth cracks her bones and trembles to her core. + +I hear a piper piping on a reed +To listening flocks of sheep and bearded goats; +I hear the larks shrill-warbling o'er the mead +Their silver sonnets from their golden throats; +And in my boyhood's clover-fields I hear +The twittering swallows and the hum of bees. +Ah, sweeter to my heart and to my ear +Than any idyl poet ever sung, +The low, sweet music of their melodies; +Because I listened when my soul was young, +In those dear meadows under maple trees. +My heart they molded when its clay was moist, +And all my life the hum of honey-bees +Hath waked in me a spirit that rejoiced, +And touched the trembling chords of tenderest memories. + +I hear loud voices and a clamorous throng +With braying bugles and with bragging drums-- +Bards and bardies laboring at a song. +One lifts his locks, above the rest preferred, +And to the buzzing flies of fashion thrums +A banjo. Lo him follow all the herd. +When Nero's wife put on her auburn wig, +And at the Coliseum showed her head, +The hair of every dame in Rome turned red; +When Nero fiddled all Rome danced a jig. +Novelty sets the gabbling geese agape, +And fickle fashion follows like an ape. +Aye, brass is plenty; gold is scarce and dear; +Crystals abound, but diamonds still are rare. +Is this the golden age, or the age of gold? +Lo by the page or column fame is sold. +Hear the big journal braying like an ass; +Behold the brazen statesmen as they pass; +See dapper poets hurrying for their dimes +With hasty verses hammered out in rhymes: +The Muses whisper--'"Tis the age of brass." +Workmen are plenty, but the masters few-- +Fewer to-day than in the days of old. +Rare blue-eyed pansies peeping pearled with dew, +And lilies lifting up their heads of gold, +Among the gaudy cockscombs I behold, +And here and there a lotus in the shade; +And under English oaks a rose that ne'er will fade. + +Fair barks that flutter in the sun your sails, +Piping anon to gay and tented shores +Sweet music and low laughter, it is well +Ye hug the haven when the tempest roars, +For only stalwart ships of oak or steel +May dare the deep and breast the billowy sea +When sweeps the thunder-voiced, dark hurricane, +And the mad ocean shakes his shaggy mane, +And roars through all his grim and vast immensity. + +The stars of heaven shine not till it is dark. +Seven cities strove for Homer's bones, 'tis said, +"Through which the living Homer begged for bread." +When in their coffins they lay dumb and stark +Shakespeare began to live, Dante to sing, +And Poe's sweet lute began its werbelling. +Rear monuments of fame or flattery-- +Think ye their sleeping souls are made aware? +Heap o'er their heads sweet praise or calumny-- +Think ye their moldering ashes hear or care? +Nay, praise and fame are by the living sought; +But he is wise who scorns their flattery, +And who escapes the tongue of calumny +May count himself an angel or a naught: +Lo over Byron's grave a maggot writhes distraught. + +Genius is patience, labor and good sense. +Steel and the mind grow bright by frequent use; +In rest they rust. A goodly recompense +Comes from hard toil, but not from its abuse. +The slave, the idler, are alike unblessed; +Aye, in loved labor only is there rest. +But he will read and range and rhyme in vain +Who hath no dust of diamonds in his brain; +And untaught genius is a gem undressed. +The life of man is short, but Art is long, +And labor is the lot of mortal man, +Ordained by God since human time began: +Day follows day and brings its toil and song. +Behind the western mountains sinks the moon, +The silver dawn steals in upon the dark, +Up from the dewy meadow wheels the lark +And trills his welcome to the rising sun, +And lo another day of labor is begun. + +Poets are born, not made, some scribbler said, +And every rhymester thinks the saying true: +Better unborn than wanting labor's aid: +Aye, all great poets--all great men--are made +Between the hammer and the anvil. Few +Have the true metal, many have the fire. +No slave or savage ever proved a bard; +Men have their bent, but labor its reward, +And untaught fingers cannot tune the lyre. +The poet's brain with spirit-vision teems; +The voice of nature warbles in his heart; +A sage, a seer, he moves from men apart, +And walks among the shadows of his dreams; +He sees God's light that in all nature beams; +And when he touches with the hand of art +The song of nature welling from his heart, +And guides it forth in pure and limpid streams, +Truth sparkles in the song and like a diamond gleams. + +Time and patience change the mulberry-leaf +To shining silk; the lapidary's skill +Makes the rough diamond sparkle at his will, +And cuts a gem from quartz or coral-reef. +Better a skillful cobbler at his last +Than unlearned poet twangling on the lyre; +Who sails on land and gallops on the blast, +And mounts the welkin on a braying ass, +Clattering a shattered cymbal bright with brass, +And slips his girth and tumbles in the mire. +All poetry must be, if it be true, +Like the keen arrows of the--Grecian god +Apollo, that caught fire as they flew. +Ah, such was Byron's, but alas he trod +Ofttimes among the brambles and the rue, +And sometimes dived full deep and brought up mud. +But when he touched with tears, as only he +Could touch, the tender chords of sympathy, +His coldest critics warmed and marveled much, +And all old England's heart throbbed to his thrilling touch. + +Truth is the touchstone of all genius Art, +In poet, painter, sculptor, is the same: +What cometh from the heart goes to the heart, +What comes from effort only is but tame. +Nature the only perfect artist is: +Who studies Nature may approach her skill; +Perfection hers, but never can be his, +Though her sweet voice his very marrow thrill; +The finest works of art are Nature's shadows still. + +Look not for faultless men or faultless art; +Small faults are ever virtue's parasites: +As in a picture shadows show the lights, +So human foibles show a human heart. + +O while I live and linger on the brink +Let the dear Muses be my company; +Their nectared goblets let my parched lips drink; +Ah, let me drink the _soma_ of their lips! +As humming-bird the lily's nectar sips, +Or _Houris_ sip the wine of Salsabil. +Aye, let me to their throbbing music thrill, +And let me never for one moment think, +Although no laurel crown my constancy, +Their gracious smiles are false, their dearest kiss a lie. + + + + +TWENTY YEARS AGO + + +I am growing old and weary + Ere yet my locks are gray; +Before me lies eternity, + Behind me--but a day. +How fast the years are vanishing! + They melt like April snow: +It seems to me but yesterday-- + Twenty years ago. + +There's the school-house on the hill-side, + And the romping scholars all; +Where we used to con our daily tasks, + And play our games of ball. +They rise to me in visions-- + In sunny dreams--and ho' +I sport among the boys and girls + Twenty years ago. + +We played at ball in summer time-- + We boys--with hearty will; +With merry shouts in winter time + We coasted on the hill. +We would choose our chiefs, divide in bands, + And build our forts of snow, +And storm those forts right gallantly-- + Twenty years ago. + +Last year in June I visited + That dear old sacred spot, +But the school-house on the hill-side + And the merry shouts were not. +A church was standing where it stood; + I looked around, but no-- +I could not see the boys and girls + Of twenty years ago. + +There was sister dear, and brother, + Around the old home-hearth; +And a tender, Christian mother, + Too angel-like for earth. +She used to warn me from the paths + Where thorns and brambles grow, +And lead me in the "narrow way"-- + Twenty years ago. + +I loved her and I honored her + Through all my boyhood years; +I knew her joys--I knew her cares-- + I knew her hopes and fears. +But alas, one autumn morning + She left her home below, +And she left us there a-weeping-- + Twenty years ago. + +They bore her to the church-yard, + With slow and solemn pace; +And there I took my last fond look + On her dear, peaceful face. +They lowered her in her silent grave, + While we bowed our heads in woe, +And they heaped the sods above her head-- + Twenty years ago. + +That low, sweet voice--my mother's voice-- + I never can forget; +And in those loving eyes I see + The big tears trembling yet. +I try to tread the "narrow way;" + I stumble oft I know: +I miss--how much!--the helping hand + Of twenty years ago. + +Mary--(Mary I will call you-- + 'Tis not the old-time name) +Sainted Mary--blue-eyed Mary-- + Are you in heaven the same? +Are your eyes as bright and beautiful, + Your cheeks as full of glow, +As when the school-boy kissed you, May, + Twenty years ago? + +How we swung upon the grape-vine + Down by the Genesee; + And I caught the speckled trout for you, + While you gathered flowers for me: + How we rambled o'er the meadows + With brows and cheeks aglow, + And hearts like God's own angels-- + Twenty years ago. + +[Illustration: HOW, WE SWUNG UPON THE GRAPE-VINE DOWN BY THE GENESEE, +AND I CAUGHT THE SPECKLED TROUT FOR YOU, WHILE YOU GATHERED FLOWERS FOR +ME] + +How our young hearts grew together + Until they beat as one; +Distrust it could not enter; + Cares and fears were none. +All my love was yours, dear Mary, + 'Twas boyish love, I know; +But I ne'er have loved as then I loved-- + Twenty years ago. + +How we pictured out the future-- + The golden coming years, +And saw no cloud in all our sky, + No gloomy mist of tears; +But ah--how vain are human hopes! + The angels came--and O-- +They bore my darling up to heaven-- + Twenty years ago. + +I will not tell--I cannot tell-- + What anguish wrung my soul; +But a silent grief is on my heart + Though the years so swiftly roll; +And I cannot shake it off, May, + This lingering sense of woe, +Though I try to drown the memory + Of twenty years ago. + +I am fighting life's stern battle, May, + With all my might and main; +But a seat by you and mother there + Is the dearest prize to gain; +And I know you both are near me, + Whatever winds may blow, +For I feel your spirits cheer me + Like twenty years ago. + + + + +BETZKO + +A HUNGARIAN LEGEND + +Stibor had led in many a fight, + And broken a score of swords +In furious frays and bloody raids + Against the Turkish hordes. + +And Sigismund, the Polish king, + Who joined the Magyar bands, +Bestowed upon the valiant knight + A broad estate of lands. + +Once when the wars were o'er, the knight + Was holding wassail high, +And the valiant men that followed him + Were at the revelry. + +Betzko, his Jester, pleased him so + He vowed it his the task +To do whatever in human power + His witty Fool might ask. + +"Build on yon cliff," the Jester cried, + In drunken jollity, +"A mighty castle high and wide, + And name it after me." + +"Ah, verily a Jester's prayer," + Exclaimed the knightly crew, +"To ask of such a noble lord + What you know he cannot do." + +"Who says I cannot," Stibor cried, + "Do whatsoe'er I will? +Within one year a castle shall stand + On yonder rocky hill-- + +"A castle built of ponderous stones, + To give me future fame; +In honor of my witty Fool, + Betzko shall be its name." + +Now the cliff was high three hundred feet, + And perpendicular; +And the skill that could build a castle there + Must come from lands afar. + +And craftsmen came from foreign lands, + Italian, German and Jew-- +Apprentices and fellow-craftsmen, + And master-masons, too. + +And every traveler journeying + Along the mountain-ways +Was held to pay his toll of toil + On the castle for seven days. + +Slowly they raised the massive towers + Upon the steep ascent, +And all around a thousand hands + Built up the battlement. + +Three hundred feet above the glen-- + (By the steps five hundred feet)-- +The castle stood upon the cliff + At the end of the year--complete. + +Now throughout all the Magyar land + There's none other half so high, +So massive built, so strong and grand;-- + It reaches the very sky. + +But from that same high battlement + (Say tales by gypsies told) +The valiant Stibor met his death + When he was cross and old. + +I'll tell you the tale as they told it to me, + And I doubt not it is true, +For 'twas handed down from the middle ages + From the lips of knights who knew. + +One day when the knight was old and cross, + And a little the worse for grog, +Betzko, the Jester, thoughtlessly + Struck Stibor's favorite dog. + +Now the dog was a hound and Stibor's pet, + And as white as Carpathian snow, +And Stibor hurled old Betzko down + From the walls to the rocks below. + +And as the Jester headlong fell + From the dizzy, dreadful height, +He muttered a curse with his latest breath + On the head of the cruel knight. + +One year from that day old Stibor held + His drunken wassail long, +And spent the hours till the cock crew morn + In jest and wine and song. + +Then he sought his garden on the cliff, + And lay down under a vine +To sleep away the lethargy + Of a wassail-bowl of wine. + +While sleeping soundly under the shade, + And dreaming of revelries, +An adder crawled upon his breast, + And bit him in both his eyes. + +Blinded and mad with pain he ran + Toward the precipice, +Unheeding till he headlong fell + Adown the dread abyss. + +Just where old Betzko's blood had dyed + With red the old rocks gray, +Quivering and bleeding and dumb and dead + Old Stibor's body lay. + + + + +WESSELENYI + +A HUNGARIAN TALE + + +When madly raged religious war + O'er all the Magyar land +And royal archer and hussar + Met foemen hand to hand, +A princess fair in castle strong + The royal troops defied +And bravely held her fortress long + Though help was all denied. + +Princess Maria was her name-- + Brave daughter nobly sired; +She caught her father's trusty sword + When bleeding he expired, +And bravely rallied warders all + To meet the storming foe, +And hurled them from the rampart-wall + Upon the crags below. + +Prince Casimir--her father--built + Murana high and wide; +It sat among the mountain cliffs-- + The Magyars' boast and pride. +Bold Wesselenyi--stalwart knight, + Young, famed and wondrous fair, +With a thousand men besieged the height, + And led the bravest there. + +And long he tried the arts of war + To take that castle-hold, +Till many a proud and plumed hussar + Was lying stiff and cold; +And still the frowning castle stood + A grim, unbroken wall, +Like some lone rock in stormy seas + That braves the billows all. + +Bold Wesselenyi's cheeks grew thin; + A solemn oath he sware +That if he failed the prize to win + His bones should molder there. +Two toilsome months had worn away, + Two hundred men were slain, +His bold assaults were baffled still, + And all his arts were vain. + +But love is mightier than the sword, + He clad him in disguise-- +In the dress of an inferior lord-- + To win the noble prize. +He bade his armed men to wait, + To cease the battle-blare +And sought alone the castle-gate + To hold a parley there. + +Aloft a flag of truce he bore: + Her warders bade him pass; +Within he met the princess fair + All clad in steel and brass. +Her bright, black eyes and queenly art, + Sweet lips and raven hair, +Smote bold young Wesselenyi's heart + While he held parley there. + +Cunning he talked of great reward + And royal favor, too, +If she would yield her father's sword; + She sternly answered "No." +But even while they parleyed there + Maria's lustrous eyes +Looked tenderly and lovingly + On the chieftain in disguise. + +"Go tell your gallant chief," she said, + "To keep his paltry pelf; +The knight who would my castle win, + Must dare to come himself." +And forth she sternly bade him go, + But followed with her eyes. +I ween she knew the brave knight well + Through all his fair disguise. + +But when had dawned another morn, + He bade his bugleman +To sound again the parley-horn + Ere yet the fray began. +And forth he sent a trusty knight + To seek the castle-gate +And to the princess privately + His message to relate;-- + +That he it was who in disguise + Her warders bade to pass, +And while he parleyed there her eyes + Had pierced his plates of brass. +His heart he offered and his hand, + And pledged a signet-ring +If she would yield her brave command + Unto his gracious king. + +"Go tell your chief," Maria cried-- + "Audacious as he is-- +If he be worthy such a bride + My castle and hand are his. +But he should know that lady fair + By faint heart ne'er was won; +So let your gallant chieftain, sir, + Come undisguised alone. + +"And he may see in the northern tower, + Over yonder precipice, +A lone, dim light at the midnight hour + Shine down the dark abyss. +And over the chasm's dungeon-gloom + Shall a slender ladder hang; +And if alone he dare to come,-- + Unarmed--without a clang, + +"More of his suit your chief shall hear + Perhaps may win the prize; +Tell him the way is hedged with fear,-- + One misstep and he dies. +Nor will I pledge him safe retreat + From out yon guarded tower; +My watchful warders all to cheat + May be beyond my power." + +At midnight's dark and silent hour + The tall and gallant knight +Sought on the cliff the northern tower, + And saw the promised light. +With toil he climbed the cragged cliff, + And there the ladder found; +And o'er the yawning gulf he clomb + The ladder round by round. + +And as he climbed the ladder bent + Above the yawning deep, +But bravely to the port he went + And entered at a leap +Full twenty warders thronged the hall + Each with his blade in hand; +They caught the brave knight like a thrall + And bound him foot and hand. + +They tied him fast to an iron ring, + At Maria's stern command, +And then they jeered--"God save the king + And all his knightly band!" +They bound a bandage o'er his eyes, + Then the haughty princess said: +"Audacious knight, I hold a prize,-- + My castle or your head! + +"Now, mark!--desert the king's command, + And join your sword with mine, +And thine shall be my heart and hand, + This castle shall be thine. +I grant one hour for thee to choose, + My bold and gallant lord; +And if my offer you refuse + You perish by the sword!" + +He spoke not a word, but his face was pale + And he prayed a silent prayer; +But his heart was oak and it could not quail, + And a secret oath he sware. +And grim stood the warders armed all, + In the torches' flicker and flare, +As they watch for an hour in the gloomy hall + The brave knight pinioned there. + +The short--the flying hour is past, + The warders have bared his breast; +The bugler bugles a doleful blast; + Will the pale knight stand the test? +He has made his choice--he will do his part, + He has sworn and he cannot lie, +And he cries with the sword at his beating heart,-- + "_Betray?--nay--better to die!_" + +Suddenly fell from his blue eyes + The silken, blinding bands, +And while he looked in sheer surprise + They freed his feet and hands. +"I give thee my castle," Maria cried, + "And I give thee my heart and hand, +And Maria will be the proudest bride + In all this Magyar land. + +"Grant heaven that thou be true to me + As thou art to the king, +And I'll bless the day I gave to thee + My castle for a ring." +The red blood flushed to the brave knight's face + As he looked on the lady fair; +He sprang to her arms in a fond embrace, + And he married her then and there. + +So the little blind elf with his feathered shaft + Did more than the sword could do, +For he conquered and took with his magical craft + Her heart and her castle, too. + +[Illustration: WESSELENYI] + + + + +ISABEL + + + Fare-thee-well: + On my soul the toll of bell +Trembles. Thou art calmly sleeping +While my weary heart is weeping: + I cannot listen to thy knell: + Fare-thee-well. + + Sleep and rest: + Sorrow shall not pain thy breast, +Pangs and pains that pierce the mortal +Cannot enter at the portal + Of the Mansion of the Blest: + Sleep and rest. + + Slumber sweet, + Heart that nevermore will beat +At the footsteps of thy lover; +All thy cares and fears are over. + In thy silent winding-sheet + Slumber sweet. + + Fare-thee-well: + In the garden and the dell +Where thou lov'dst to stroll and meet me, +Nevermore thy kiss shall greet me, + Nevermore, O Isabel! + Fare-thee-well. + + We shall meet-- + Where the wings of angels beat: +When my toils and cares are over, +Thou shalt greet again thy lover-- + Robed and crowned at Jesus' feet + We shall meet. + + Watch and wait + At the narrow, golden gate; +Watch my coming,--wait my greeting, +For my years are few and fleeting + And my love shall not abate: + Watch and wait. + + So farewell, + O my darling Isabel; +Till we meet in the supernal +Mansion and with love eternal + In the golden city dwell, + Fare-thee-well. + + + + +BYRON AND THE ANGEL + +_Poet:_ + +"Why this fever--why this sighing?-- +Why this restless longing--dying +For--a something--dreamy something, +Undefined, and yet defying +All the pride and power of manhood? + +"O these years of sin and sorrow! +Smiling while the iron harrow +Of a keen and biting longing +Tears and quivers in the marrow +Of my being every moment-- +Of my very inmost being. + +"What to me the mad ambition +For men's praise and proud position-- +Struggling, fighting to the summit +Of its vain and earthly mission, +To lie down on bed of ashes-- +Bed of barren, bitter ashes? + +"Cure this fever? I have tried it; +Smothered, drenched it and defied it +With a will of brass and iron; +Every smile and look denied it; +Yet it heeded not denying, +And it mocks at my defying +While my very soul is dying. + +"Is there balm in Gilead?--tell me! +Nay--no balm to soothe and quell me? +Must I tremble in this fever? +Death, O lift thy hand and fell me; +Let me sink to rest forever +Where this burning cometh never. + +"Sometimes when this restless madness +Softens down to mellow sadness, +I look back on sun-lit valleys +Where my boyish heart of gladness +Nestled without pain or longing-- +Nestled softly in a vision +Full of love and hope's fruition, +Lulled by morning songs of spring-time. + +"Then I ponder, and I wonder +Was some heart-chord snapped asunder +When the threads were soft and silken? +Did some fatal boyish blunder +Plant a canker in my bosom +That hath ever burned and rankled? + +"O this thirsting, thirsting hanker! +O this burning, burning canker' +Driving Peace and Hope to shipwreck-- +Without rudder, without anchor, +On the reef-rocks of Damnation!" + +_Invisible Angel:_ + +"Jesus--Son of Virgin Mary; +Lift the burden from the weary: +Pity, Jesus, and anoint him +With the holy balm of Gilead." + +_Poet:_ + +"Yea, Christ Jesus, pour thy blessings +On these terrible heart-pressings: +O I bless thee, unseen Angel; +Lead me--teach me, holy Spirit." + +_Angel:_ + + "There is balm in Gilead! + There is balm in Gilead! +Peace awaits thee with caressings-- +Sitting at the feet of Jesus-- +At the right-hand of Jehovah-- +At the blessed feet of Jesus;--Alleluia!" + + + + +CHRISTMAS EVE + +I + + +From church and chapel and dome and tower, + Near--far and everywhere, +The merry bells chime loud and clear + Upon the frosty air. + +All down the marble avenues + The lamp-lit casements glow, +And from an hundred palaces + Glad carols float and flow. + +A thousand lamps from street to street + Blaze on the dusky air, +And light the way for happy feet + To carol, praise and prayer. + +'Tis Christmas eve. In church and hall + The laden fir-trees bend; +Glad children throng the festival + And grandsires too attend. + +Fur-wrapped and gemmed with pearls and gold, + Proud ladies rich and fair +As Egypt's splendid queen of old + In all her pomp are there. + +And many a costly, golden gift + Hangs on each Christmas-tree, +While round and round the carols drift + In waves of melody. + + + +II + + +In a dim and dingy attic, + Away from the pomp and glare, +A widow sits by a flickering lamp, + Bowed down by toil and care. + +On her toil-worn hand her weary head, + At her feet a shoe half-bound, +On the bare, brown table a loaf of bread, + And hunger and want around. + +By her side at the broken window, + With her rosy feet all bare, +Her little one carols a Christmas tune + To the chimes on the frosty air. + +And the mother dreams of the by-gone years + And their merry Christmas-bells, +Till her cheeks are wet with womanly tears, + And a sob in her bosom swells. + +[Illustration: AND THE MOTHER DREAMS OF THE BY GONE YEARS, AND THEIR +MERRY CHRISTMAS BELLS] + +The child looked up; her innocent ears + Had caught the smothered cry; +She saw the pale face wet with tears + She fain would pacify. + +"Don't cry, mama," she softly said-- + "Here's a Christmas gift for you," +And on the mother's cheek a kiss + She printed warm and true. + +"God bless my child!" the mother cried + And caught her to her breast-- +"O Lord, whose Son was crucified, + Thy precious gift is best. + +"If toil and trouble be my lot + While on life's sea I drift, +O Lord, my soul shall murmur not, + If Thou wilt spare Thy gift." + + + + +OUT OF THE DEPTHS + +And the scribes and Pharisees brought unto him a woman taken in +adultery, and when they had set her in the midst, they said unto him +"Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses in +the law commanded us that such be stoned; but what sayest thou?"--[_St. +John_, Chap, viii; 3, 4, 5. + +Reach thy hand to me, O Jesus; + Reach thy loving hand to me, +Or I sink, alas, and perish + In my sin and agony. + +From the depths I cry, O Jesus, + Lifting up mine eyes to thee; +Save me from my sin and sorrow + With thy loving charity. + +Pity, Jesus--blessed Savior; + I am weak, but thou art strong; +Fill my heart with prayer and praises, + Fill my soul with holy song. + +Lift me up, O sacred Jesus-- + Lift my bruised heart to thee; +Teach me to be pure and holy + As the holy angels be. + +Scribes and Pharisees surround me: + Thou art writing in the sand: +Must I perish, Son of Mary? + Wilt thou give the stern command? + +Am I saved?--for Jesus sayeth-- + "Let the sinless cast a stone." +Lo the Scribes have all departed, + And the Pharisees are gone! + +"Woman, where are thine accusers?" + (They have vanished one by one.) +"Hath no man condemned thee, woman?" + And she meekly answered--"None." + +Then he spake His blessed answer-- + Balm indeed for sinners sore-- +"Neither then will I condemn thee: + Go thy way and sin no more." + + +FAME + +Dust of the desert are thy walls + And temple-towers, O Babylon! +O'er crumbled halls the lizard crawls, + And serpents bask in blaze of sun. + +In vain kings piled the Pyramids; + Their tombs were robbed by ruthless hands. +Who now shall sing their fame and deeds, + Or sift their ashes from the sands? + +Deep in the drift of ages hoar + Lie nations lost and kings forgot; +Above their graves the oceans roar, + Or desert sands drift o'er the spot. + +A thousand years are but a day + When reckoned on the wrinkled earth; +And who among the wise shall say + What cycle saw the primal birth + +Of man, who lords on sea and land, + And builds his monuments to-day, +Like Syrian on the desert sand, + To crumble and be blown away. + +Proud chiefs of pageant armies led + To fame and death their followers forth, +Ere Helen sinned and Hector bled, + Or Odin ruled the rugged North. + +And poets sang immortal praise + To mortal heroes ere the fire +Of Homer blazed in Ilion lays, + Or Brage tuned the Northern lyre. + +For fame men piled the Pyramids; + Their names have perished with their bones: +For fame men wrote their boasted deeds + On Babel bricks and Runic stones-- + +On Tyrian temples, gates of brass, + On Roman arch and Damask blades, +And perished like the desert grass + That springs to-day--to-morrow--fades. + +And still for fame men delve and die + In Afric heat and Arctic cold; +For fame on flood and field they vie, + Or gather in the shining gold. + +Time, like the ocean, onward rolls + Relentless, burying men and deeds; +The brightest names, the bravest souls, + Float but an hour like ocean weeds, + +Then sink forever. In the slime-- + Forgotten, lost forevermore, +Lies Fame from every age and clime; + Yet thousands clamor on the shore. + +Immortal Fame!--O dust and death! + The centuries as they pass proclaim +That Fame is but a mortal breath, + That man must perish--name and fame. + +The earth is but a grain of sand-- + An atom in a shoreless sea; +A million worlds lie in God's hand-- + Yea, myriad millions--what are we? + +O mortal man of bone and blood! + Then is there nothing left but dust? +God made us; He is wise and good, + And we may humbly hope and trust. + + + + +WINONA. + +_When the meadow-lark trilled o'er the leas + and the oriole piped in the maples, +From my hammock, all under the trees, + by the sweet-scented field of red clover, +I harked to the hum of the bees, + as they gathered the mead of the blossoms, +And caught from their low melodies + the air of the song of Winona_. + + +(In pronouncing Dakota words give "a" the sound of "ah,"--"e" the sound +of "a,"--"i" the sound of "e" and "u" the sound of "oo." Sound "ee" as +in English. The numerals refer to Notes in appendix.) + + * * * * * + +Two hundred white Winters and more + have fled from the face of the Summer, +Since here on the oak-shaded shore + of the dark-winding, swift Mississippi, +Where his foaming floods tumble and roar + o'er the falls and the white-rolling rapids, +In the fair, fabled center of Earth, + sat the Indian town of _Ka-tha-ga_. [86] +Far rolling away to the north, and the south, + lay the emerald prairies, +All dotted with woodlands and lakes, + and above them the blue bent of ether. +And here where the dark river breaks into spray + and the roar of the _Ha-Ha_, [76] +Where gathered the bison-skin _tees_[F] + of the chief tawny tribe of Dakotas; +For here, in the blast and the breeze, + flew the flag of the chief of _Isantees_, [86] +Up-raised on the stem of a lance-- + the feathery flag of the eagle. +And here to the feast and the dance, + from the prairies remote and the forests, +Oft gathered the out-lying bands, + and honored the gods of the nation. +On the islands and murmuring strands + they danced to the god of the waters, +_Unktehee_, [69] who dwelt in the caves, + deep under the flood of the _Ha-Ha_; [76] +And high o'er the eddies and waves + hung their offerings of furs and tobacco,[G] +And here to the Master of life-- + _Anpe-tu-wee_, [70] god of the heavens, +Chief, warrior, and maiden, and wife, + burned the sacred green sprigs of the cedar. [50] +And here to the Searcher-of-hearts-- + fierce _Ta-ku Skan-skan_, [51] the avenger, +Who dwells in the uppermost parts of the earth, + and the blue, starry ether, +Ever watching, with all-seeing eyes, + the deeds of the wives and the warriors, +As an osprey afar in the skies, + sees the fish as they swim in the waters, +Oft spread they the bison-tongue feast, + and singing preferred their petitions, +Till the Day-Spirit[70] rose in the East-- + in the red, rosy robes of the morning, +To sail o'er the sea of the skies, + to his lodge in the land of the shadows, +Where the black-winged tornadoes[H] arise, + rushing loud from the mouths of their caverns. +And here with a shudder they heard, + flying far from his _tee_ in the mountains, +_Wa-kin-yan_,[32] the huge Thunder-Bird, + with the arrows of fire in his talons. + +[F] _Tee--teepee_, the Dakota name for tent or wigwam + +[G] See _Hennepin's Description of Louisiana_, by Shea, pp. 243 and 256. +_Parkman's Discovery_, p. 246--and _Carver's Travels_, p. 67. + +[Illustration: FALLS OF ST. ANTHONY. +FACSIMILE OF THE CUT IN CARVER'S TRAVELS, PUBLISHED AT LONDON, IN 1778, +FROM A SURVEY AND SKETCH MADE BY CAPT. J. CARVER, NOV. 17, 1766. +PERPENDICULAR FALL, 30 FEET; BREADTH NEAR 600 FEET.] + +[H] The Dakotas, like the ancient Romans and Greeks, think the home of +the winds is in the caverns of the mountains, and their great +Thunder-bird resembles in many respects the Jupiter of the Romans and +the Zeus of the Greeks. The resemblance of the Dakota mythology to that +of the older Greeks and Romans is striking. + +Two hundred white Winters and more + have fled from the face of the Summer +Since here by the cataract's roar, + in the moon of the red-blooming lilies,[71] +In the _tee_ of Ta-te-psin[I] was born + Winona--wild-rose of the prairies. +Like the summer sun peeping, at morn, + o'er the hills was the face of Winona. +And here she grew up like a queen-- + a romping and lily-lipped laughter, +And danced on the undulant green, + and played in the frolicsome waters, +Where the foaming tide tumbles and whirls + o'er the murmuring rocks in the rapids; +And whiter than foam were the pearls + that gleamed in the midst of her laughter. +Long and dark was her flowing hair flung + like the robe of the night to the breezes; +And gay as the robin she sung, + or the gold-breasted lark of the meadows. +Like the wings of the wind were her feet, + and as sure as the feet of _Ta-to-ka_[J] +And oft like an antelope fleet + o'er the hills and the prairies she bounded, +Lightly laughing in sport as she ran, + and looking back over her shoulder +At the fleet-footed maiden or man + that vainly her flying feet followed. +The belle of the village was she, + and the pride of the aged Ta-te-psin, +Like a sunbeam she lighted his _tee_, + and gladdened the heart of her father. + +[I] _Tate_--wind,--_psin_--wild-rice--wild-rice wind. + +[J] mountain antelope. + +In the golden-hued _Wazu-pe-wee_-- + the moon when the wild-rice is gathered; +When the leaves on the tall sugar-tree + are as red as the breast of the robin, +And the red-oaks that border the lea + are aflame with the fire of the sunset, +From the wide, waving fields of wild-rice-- + from the meadows of _Psin-ta-wak-pa-dan_,[K] +Where the geese and the mallards rejoice, + and grow fat on the bountiful harvest, +Came the hunters with saddles of moose + and the flesh of the bear and the bison, +And the women in birch-bark canoes + well laden with rice from the meadows. + +[K] Little Rice River. It bears the name of Rice Creek to-day and +empties into the Mississippi from the east, a few miles above +Minneapolis. + +With the tall, dusky hunters, behold, + came a marvelous man or a spirit, +White-faced and so wrinkled and old, + and clad in the robe of the raven. +Unsteady his steps were and slow, + and he walked with a staff in his right hand, +And white as the first-falling snow + were the thin locks that lay on his shoulders. +Like rime-covered moss hung his beard, + flowing down from his face to his girdle; +And wan was his aspect and weird, + and often he chanted and mumbled +In a strange and mysterious tongue, + as he bent o'er his book in devotion, +Or lifted his dim eyes and sung, + in a low voice, the solemn "_Te Deum_," +Or Latin, or Hebrew, or Greek-- + all the same were his words to the warriors,-- +All the same to the maids and the meek, + wide-wondering-eyed, hazel-brown children. + +Father Rene Menard [L]--it was he, + long lost to his Jesuit brothers, +Sent forth by an holy decree + to carry the Cross to the heathen. +In his old age abandoned to die, + in the swamps, by his timid companions, +He prayed to the Virgin on high, + and she led him forth from the forest; +For angels she sent him as men-- + in the forms of the tawny Dakotas, +And they led his feet from the fen, + from the slough of despond and the desert, +Half dead in a dismal morass, + as they followed the red-deer they found him, +In the midst of the mire and the grass, + and mumbling "_Te Deum laudamus._" +"_Unktomee[72]--Ho!_" muttered the braves, + for they deemed him the black Spider-Spirit +That dwells in the drearisome caves, + and walks on the marshes at midnight, +With a flickering torch in his hand, + to decoy to his den the unwary. +His tongue could they not understand, + but his torn hands all shriveled with famine +He stretched to the hunters and said: + "He feedeth his chosen with manna; +And ye are the angels of God + sent to save me from death in the desert." +His famished and woe-begone face, + and his tones touched the hearts of the hunters; +They fed the poor father apace, + and they led him away to _Ka-tha-ga._ + +[L] See the account of Father Menard, his mission and disappearance in +the wilderness. _Neill's Hist. Minnesota_, pp 104-107, inc. + +There little by little he learned + the tongue of the tawny Dakotas; +And the heart of the good father yearned + to lead them away from their idols-- +Their giants[16] and dread Thunder-birds-- + their worship of stones[73] and the devil. +"_Wakan-de!_"[M] they answered his words, + for he read from his book in the Latin, +Lest the Nazarene's holy commands + by his tongue should be marred in translation; +And oft with his beads in his hands, + or the cross and the crucified Jesus, +He knelt by himself on the sands, + and his dim eyes uplifted to heaven. +But the braves bade him look to the East-- + to the silvery lodge of _Han-nan-na_;[N] +And to dance with the chiefs at the feast-- + at the feast of the Giant _Heyo-ka._[16] +They frowned when the good father spurned + the flesh of the dog in the kettle, +And laughed when his fingers were burned + in the hot, boiling pot of the giant. +"The Black-robe" they called the poor priest, + from the hue of his robe and his girdle; +And never a game or a feast + but the father must grace with his presence. +His prayer-book the hunters revered,-- + they deemed it a marvelous spirit; +It spoke and the white father heard,-- + it interpreted visions and omens. +And often they bade him to pray + this marvelous spirit to answer, +And tell where the sly Chippewa + might be ambushed and slain in his forest. +For Menard was the first in the land, + proclaiming, like John in the desert, +"The Kingdom of Heaven is at hand; + repent ye, and turn from your idols." +The first of the brave brotherhood that, + threading the fens and the forest, +Stood afar by the turbulent flood + at the falls of the Father of Waters. + +[Illustration: FATHER RENE MENARD] + +[M] It is wonderful! + +[N] The morning. + +In the lodge of the Stranger[O] he sat, + awaiting the crown of a martyr; +His sad face compassion begat + in the heart of the dark-eyed Winona. +Oft she came to the _teepee_ and spoke; + she brought him the tongue of the bison, +Sweet nuts from the hazel and oak, + and flesh of the fawn and the mallard. +Soft _hanpa_[P] she made for his feet + and leggins of velvety fawn-skin, +A blanket of beaver complete, + and a hood of the hide of the otter. +And oft at his feet on the mat, + deftly braiding the flags and the rushes, +Till the sun sought his _teepee_ + she sat, enchanted with what he related +Of the white-winged ships on the sea + and the _teepees_ far over the ocean, +Of the love and the sweet charity of the Christ + and the beautiful Virgin. + +[O] A lodge set apart for guests of the village. + +[P] Moccasins. + +She listened like one in a trance + when he spoke of the brave, bearded Frenchmen, +From the green, sun-lit valleys of France + to the wild _Hochelaga_[Q] transplanted, +Oft trailing the deserts of snow + in the heart of the dense Huron forests, +Or steering the dauntless canoe + through the waves of the fresh-water ocean. +"Yea, stronger and braver are they," + said the aged Menard to Winona, +"Than the head-chief, tall Wazi-kute,[74] + but their words are as soft as a maiden's, +Their eyes are the eyes of the swan, + but their hearts are the hearts of the eagles; +And the terrible _Masa Wakan_[R] + ever walks by their side like a spirit; +Like a Thunder-bird, roaring in wrath, + flinging fire from his terrible talons, +He sends to their enemies death + in the flash of the fatal _Wakandee_."[S] + +[Q] The Ottawa name for the region of the St. Lawrence River. + +[R] "Mysterious metal"--or metal having a spirit in it. This is the +common name applied by the Dakotas to all firearms. + +[S] Lightning. + +The Autumn was past and the snow + lay drifted and deep on the prairies; +From his _teepee_ of ice came the foe-- + came the storm-breathing god of the winter. +Then roared in the groves, on the plains, + on the ice-covered lakes and the river, +The blasts of the fierce hurricanes + blown abroad from the breast of _Waziya_. [3] +The bear cuddled down in his den, + and the elk fled away to the forest; +The pheasant and gray prairie-hen + made their beds in the heart of the snow-drift; +The bison herds huddled and stood + in the hollows and under the hill-sides, +Or rooted the snow for their food + in the lee of the bluffs and the timber; +And the mad winds that howled from the north, + from the ice-covered seas of _Waziya_, +Chased the gray wolf and silver-fox forth + to their dens in the hills of the forest. + +Poor Father Menard--he was ill; + in his breast burned the fire of a fever; +All in vain was the magical skill + of _Wicasta Wakan_ [61] with his rattle; +Into soft, child-like slumber he fell, + and awoke in the land of the blessed-- +To the holy applause of "Well-done!" + and the harps in the hands of the angels. +Long he carried the cross and he won + the coveted crown of a martyr. + +In the land of the heathen he died, + meekly following the voice of his Master, +One mourner alone by his side-- + Ta-te-psin's compassionate daughter. +She wailed the dead father with tears, + and his bones by her kindred she buried. +Then winter followed winter. The years + sprinkled frost on the head of her father; +And three weary winters she dreamed + of the fearless and fair, bearded Frenchmen; +At midnight their swift paddles gleamed + on the breast of the broad Mississippi, +And the eyes of the brave strangers beamed + on the maid in the midst of her slumber. + +She lacked not admirers; + the light of the lover oft burned in her _teepee_-- +At her couch in the midst of the night,-- + but she never extinguished the flambeau. +The son of Chief Wazi-kute-- + a fearless and eagle-plumed warrior-- +Long sighed for Winona, + and he was the pride of the band of _Isantees_. +Three times, in the night at her bed, + had the brave held the torch of the lover, [75] +And thrice had she covered her head + and rejected the handsome Tamdoka. [T] + +[T] Tah-mdo-kah, literally, the buck-deer. + +'Twas Summer. The merry-voiced birds + trilled and warbled in woodland and meadow; +And abroad on the prairies the herds + cropped the grass in the land of the lilies,-- +And sweet was the odor of rose + wide-wafted from hillside and heather; +In the leaf-shaded lap of repose + lay the bright, blue-eyed babes of the summer; +And low was the murmur of brooks, + and low was the laugh of the _Ha-Ha_; [76] +And asleep in the eddies and nooks + lay the broods of _maga_ [60]and the mallard. +'Twas the moon of _Wasunpa_. [71] + The band lay at rest in the tees at _Ka-tha-ga_, +And abroad o'er the beautiful land + walked the spirits of Peace and of Plenty-- +Twin sisters, with bountiful hand + wide scattering wild-rice and the lilies. +_An-pe-tu-wee_[70] walked in the west-- + to his lodge in the far-away mountains, +And the war-eagle flew to her nest + in the oak on the Isle of the Spirit.[U] +And now at the end of the day, + by the shore of the Beautiful Island,[V] +A score of fair maidens and gay + made joy in the midst of the waters. +Half-robed in their dark, flowing hair, + and limbed like the fair Aphrodite, +They played in the waters, and there + they dived and they swam like the beavers, +Loud-laughing like loons on the lake + when the moon is a round shield of silver, +And the songs of the whippowils wake + on the shore in the midst of the maples. + +But hark!--on the river a song,-- + strange voices commingled in chorus; +On the current a boat swept along + with DuLuth and his hardy companions; +To the stroke of their paddles they sung, + and this the refrain that they chanted: + + "Dans mon chemin j'ai rencontre + Deux cavaliers bien montes. + Lon, lon, laridon daine, + Lon, lon, laridon da." + + "Deux cavaliers bien montes; + L'un a cheval, et l'autre a pied. + Lon, lon, laridon daine, + Lon, lon, laridon da."[W] + +[U] The Dakotas say that for many years in olden times war-eagles made +their nests in oak trees on Spirit-island--_Wanagi-wita_, just below the +Falls till frightened away by the advent of white men. + +[V] The Dakotas called Nicollet Island _Wi-ta Waste_--the Beautiful +Island. + +[W] A part of one of the favorite songs of the French _voyageurs_. + +[Illustration: ARRIVAL OF DULUTH AT KATHAGA] + +Like the red, dappled deer in the glade + alarmed by the footsteps of hunters, +Discovered, disordered, dismayed, + the nude nymphs fled forth from the waters, +And scampered away to the shade, + and peered from the screen of the lindens. + +A bold and adventuresome man was DuLuth, + and a dauntless in danger, +And straight to _Kathaga_ he ran, + and boldly advanced to the warriors, +Now gathering, a cloud on the strand, + and gazing amazed on the strangers; +And straightway he offered his hand + unto Wazi-kute, the _Itancan_.[X] +To the Lodge of the Stranger were led + DuLuth and his hardy companions; +Robes of beaver and bison were spread, + and the Peace-pipe[23] was smoked with the Frenchman. + +[X] Head-chief + +There was dancing and feasting at night, + and joy at the presents he lavished. +All the maidens were wild with delight + with the flaming red robes and the ribbons, +With the beads and the trinkets untold, + and the fair, bearded face of the giver; +And glad were they all to behold + the friends from the Land of the Sunrise. +But one stood apart from the rest-- + the queenly and silent Winona, +Intently regarding the guest-- + hardly heeding the robes and the ribbons, +Whom the White Chief beholding admired, + and straightway he spread on her shoulders +A lily-red robe and attired + with necklet and ribbons the maiden. +The red lilies bloomed in her face, + and her glad eyes gave thanks to the giver, +And forth from her _teepee_ apace + she brought him the robe and the missal +Of the father--poor Rene Menard; + and related the tale of the "Black Robe." +She spoke of the sacred regard + he inspired in the hearts of Dakotas; +That she buried his bones with her kin, + in the mound by the Cave of the Council; +That she treasured and wrapt in the skin + of the red-deer his robe and his prayer book-- +"Till his brothers should come from the East-- + from the land of the far _Hochelaga_, +To smoke with the braves at the feast, + on the shores of the Loud-laughing Waters. [16] +For the 'Black Robe' spake much of his youth + and his friends in the Land of the Sunrise; +It was then as a dream; now in truth + I behold them, and not in a vision." +But more spake her blushes, I ween, + and her eyes full of language unspoken, +As she turned with the grace of a queen + and carried her gifts to the _teepee_. + +Far away from his beautiful France-- + from his home in the city of Lyons, +A noble youth full of romance, + with a Norman heart big with adventure, +In the new world a wanderer, by chance + DuLuth sought the wild Huron forests. +But afar by the vale of the Rhone, + the winding and musical river, +And the vine-covered hills of the Saone, + the heart of the wanderer lingered,-- +'Mid the vineyards and mulberry trees, + and the fair fields of corn and of clover +That rippled and waved in the breeze, + while the honey-bees hummed in the blossoms. +For there, where th' impetuous Rhone, + leaping down from the Switzerland mountains, +And the silver-lipped, soft-flowing Saone, + meeting, kiss and commingle together, +Down winding by vineyards and leas, + by the orchards of fig-trees and olives, +To the island-gemmed, sapphire-blue seas + of the glorious Greeks and the Romans; +Aye, there, on the vine-covered shore, + 'mid the mulberry-trees and the olives, +Dwelt his blue-eyed and beautiful Flore, + with her hair like a wheat-field at harvest, +All rippled and tossed by the breeze, + and her cheeks like the glow of the morning, +Far away o'er the emerald seas, + as the sun lifts his brow from the billows, +Or the red-clover fields when the bees, + singing sip the sweet cups of the blossoms. +Wherever he wandered-- + alone in the heart of the wild Huron forests, +Or cruising the rivers unknown + to the land of the Crees or Dakotas-- +His heart lingered still on the Rhone, + 'mid the mulberry trees and the vineyards, +Fast-fettered and bound by the zone + that girdled the robes of his darling. +Till the red Harvest Moon[71] he remained + in the vale of the swift Mississippi. +The esteem of the warriors he gained, + and the love of the dark-eyed Winona. +He joined in the sports and the chase; + with the hunters he followed the bison, +And swift were his feet in the race + when the red elk they ran on the prairies. +At the Game of the Plum-stones[77] he played, + and he won from the skillfulest players; +A feast to _Wa'tanka_[78] he made, + and he danced at the feast of _Heyoka_.[16] +With the flash and the roar of his gun + he astonished the fearless Dakotas; +They called it the "_Maza Wakan_"-- + the mighty, mysterious metal. +"'Tis a brother," they said, "of the fire + in the talons of dreadful Wakinyan,'[32] +When he flaps his huge wings in his ire, + and shoots his red shafts at _Unktehee_."[69] + +The _Itancan_,[74] tall Wazi-kute, + appointed a day for the races. +From the red stake that stood by his _tee_, + on the southerly side of the _Ha-ha_, +O'er the crest of the hills and the dunes + and the billowy breadth of the prairie, +To a stake at the Lake of the Loons[79]-- + a league and return--was the distance. +They gathered from near and afar, + to the races and dancing and feasting; +Five hundred tall warriors were there + from _Kapoza_[6] and far-off _Keoza_;[8] +_Remnica_[Y] too, furnished a share + of the legions that thronged to the races, +And a bountiful feast was prepared + by the diligent hands of the women, +And gaily the multitudes fared + in the generous _tees_ of _Kathaga_. +The chief of the mystical clan + appointed a feast to _Unktehee_-- +The mystic "_Wacipee Wakan_"[Z]-- + at the end of the day and the races. +A band of sworn brothers are they, + and the secrets of each one are sacred, +And death to the lips that betray + is the doom of the swarthy avengers, +And the son of tall _Wazi-kute_ + was the chief of the mystical order. + +[Y] Pronounced Ray-mne-chah--The village of the Mountains, situate where +Red Wing now stands. + +[Z] Sacred Dance--The Medicine-dance--See description _infra._ + + + + +THE FOOT RACES. + +On an arm of an oak hangs the prize + for the swiftest and strongest of runners-- +A blanket as red as the skies, + when the flames sweep the plains in October. +And beside it a strong, polished bow, + and a quiver of iron-tipped arrows, +Which _Kapoza's_ tall chief will bestow + on the fleet-footed second that follows. +A score of swift runners are there + from the several bands of the nation, +And now for the race they prepare, + and among them fleet-footed Tamdoka. +With the oil of the buck and the bear + their sinewy limbs are annointed, +For fleet are the feet of the deer + and strong are the limbs of the bruin. + +Hark!--the shouts and the braying of drums, + and the Babel of tongues and confusion! +From his _teepee_ the tall chieftain comes, + and DuLuth brings a prize for the runners-- +A keen hunting-knife from the Seine, + horn-handled and mounted with silver. +The runners are ranged on the plain, + and the Chief waves a flag as a signal, +And away like the gray wolves they fly-- + like the wolves on the trail of the red-deer; +O'er the hills and the prairie they vie, + and strain their strong limbs to the utmost, +While high on the hills hangs a cloud + of warriors and maidens and mothers, +To see the swift-runners, and loud + are the cheers and the shouts of the warriors. + +Now swift from the lake they return + o'er the emerald hills of the prairies; +Like grey-hounds they pant and they yearn, + and the leader of all is Tamdoka. +At his heels flies _Hu-pa-hu,_[AA] + the fleet--the pride of the band of _Kaoza_,-- +A warrior with eagle-winged feet, + but his prize is the bow and the quiver. +Tamdoka first reaches the post, + and his are the knife and the blanket, +By the mighty acclaim of the host + and award of the chief and the judges. +Then proud was the tall warrior's stride, + and haughty his look and demeanor; +He boasted aloud in his pride, + and he scoffed at the rest of the runners. +"Behold me, for I am a man![AB] + my feet are as swift as the West-wind. +With the coons and the beavers I ran; + but where is the elk or the _cabri?_[80] +Come!--where is the hunter will dare + match his feet with the feet of Tamdoka? +Let him think of _Tate_[AC] and beware, + ere he stake his last robe on the trial." +"_Oho! Ho! Ho-heca!_"[AD] they jeered, + for they liked not the boast of the boaster; +But to match him no warrior appeared, + for his feet wore the wings of the west-wind. + +[AA] The wings. + +[AB] A favorite boast of the Dakota braves. + +[AC] The wind. + +[AD] About equivalent to Oho!--Aha!--fudge! + +Then forth from the side of the chief + stepped DuLuth and he looked on the boaster; +"The words of a warrior are brief,-- + I will run with the brave," said the Frenchman; +"But the feet of Tamdoka are tired; + abide till the cool of the sunset." +All the hunters and maidens admired, + for strong were the limbs of the stranger. +"_Hiwo Ho!_"[AE] they shouted + and loud rose the cheers of the multitude mingled; +And there in the midst of the crowd + stood the glad-eyed and blushing Winona. + +[AE] Hurra there! + +Now afar o'er the plains of the west + walked the sun at the end of his journey, +And forth came the brave and the guest, + at the tap of the drum, for the trial. +Like a forest of larches the hordes + were gathered to witness the contest; +As loud as the drums were their words + and they roared like the roar of the _Ha-ha._ +For some for Tamdoka contend, + and some for the fair, bearded stranger, +And the betting runs high to the end, + with the skins of the bison and beaver. +A wife of tall _Wazi-kute_-- + the mother of boastful Tamdoka-- +Brought her handsomest robe from the _tee_ + with a vaunting and loud proclamation: +She would stake her last robe on her son + who, she boasted, was fleet as the _cabri_, +And the tall, tawny chieftain looked on, + approving the boast of the mother. +Then fleet as the feet of a fawn + to her lodge ran the dark-eyed Winona, +She brought and she spread on the lawn, + by the side of the robe of the boaster, +The lily-red mantel DuLuth, + with his own hands, had laid on her shoulders. +"Tamdoka is swift, but forsooth, + the tongue of his mother is swifter," +She said, and her face was aflame + with the red of the rose and the lily, +And loud was the roar of acclaim; + but dark was the face of Tamdoka. +They strip for the race and prepare,-- + DuLuth in his breeches and leggins; +And the brown, curling locks of his hair + down droop to his bare, brawny shoulders, +And his face wears a smile debonair, + as he tightens his red sash around him; +But stripped to the moccasins bare, + save the belt and the breech-clout of buckskin, +Stands the haughty Tamdoka aware + that the eyes of the warriors admire him; +For his arms are the arms of a bear + and his legs are the legs of a panther. + +The drum beats,--the chief waves the flag, + and away on the course speed the runners, +And away leads the brave like a stag,-- + like a bound on his track flies the Frenchman; +And away haste the hunters once more + to the hills, for a view to the lakeside, +And the dark-swarming hill-tops, they roar + with the storm of loud voices commingled. +Far away o'er the prairie they fly, + and still in the lead is Tamdoka, +But the feet of his rival are nigh, + and slowly he gains on the hunter. +Now they turn on the post at the lake,-- + now they run full abreast on the home-stretch: +Side by side they contend for the stake + for a long mile or more on the prairie +They strain like a stag and a hound, + when the swift river gleams through the thicket, +And the horns of the riders resound, + winding shrill through the depths of the forest. +But behold!--at full length on the ground + falls the fleet-footed Frenchman abruptly, +And away with a whoop and a bound + springs the eager, exulting Tamdoka +Long and loud on the hills is the + shout of his swarthy admirers and backers, +"But the race is not won till it's out," + said DuLuth, to himself as he gathered, +With a frown on his face, for the foot + of the wily Tamdoka had tripped him. +Far ahead ran the brave on the route, + and turning he boasted exultant. +Like spurs to the steed to DuLuth + were the jeers and the taunts of the boaster; +Indignant was he and red wroth + at the trick of the runner dishonest; +And away like a whirlwind he speeds-- + like a hurricane mad from the mountains; +He gains on Tamdoka,--he leads!-- + and behold, with the spring of a panther, +He leaps to the goal and succeeds, + 'mid the roar of the mad acclamation. +Then glad as the robin in May + was the voice of Winona exulting; +Tamdoka turned sullen away, + and sulking he walked by the river; +He glowered as he went and the fire + of revenge in his bosom was kindled: +Dark was his visage with ire + and his eyes were the eyes of a panther. + + +THE WAKAN-WACEPEE, OR SACRED DANCE. [81] + +Lo the lights in the _"Teepee-Wakan!"_ + 'tis the night of the _Wakan Wacepee_. +Round and round walks the chief of the clan, + as he rattles the sacred _Ta-sha-kay_; [81] +Long and loud on the _Chan-che-ga_ [81] + beat the drummers with magical drumsticks, +And the notes of the _Cho-tanka_ [81] + greet like the murmur of winds on the waters. +By the friction of white-cedar wood + for the feast was a Virgin-fire [20] kindled. +They that enter the firm brotherhood + first must fast and be cleansed by _E-nee-pee_;[81] +And from foot-sole to crown of the head + must they paint with the favorite colors; +For _Unktehee_ likes bands of blood-red, + with the stripings of blue intermingled. +In the hollow earth, dark and profound, + _Unktehee_ and fiery _Wakinyan_ +Long fought, and the terrible sound + of the battle was louder than thunder; +The mountains were heaved and around + were scattered the hills and the boulders, +And the vast solid plains of the ground + rose and fell like the waves of the ocean. +But the god of the waters prevailed. + _Wakin-yan_ escaped from the cavern, +And long on the mountains he wailed, + and his hatred endureth forever. + +When _Unktehee_ had finished the earth, + and the beasts and the birds and the fishes, +And men at his bidding came forth + from the heart of the huge hollow mountains,[69] +A band chose the god from the hordes, + and he said: "Ye are the sons of _Unktehee_: +Ye are lords of the beasts and the birds, + and the fishes that swim in the waters. +But hearken ye now to my words,-- + let them sound in your bosoms forever: +Ye shall honor _Unktehee_ and hate _Wakinyan_, + the Spirit of Thunder, +For the power of _Unktehee_ is great, + and he laughs at the darts of _Wakinyan_. +Ye shall honor the Earth and the Sun,-- + for they are your father and mother; [70] +Let your prayer to the Sun be:-- + _Wakan Ate; on-si-md-da ohee-nee_."[AF] +And remember the _Taku Wakan_[73] + all-pervading in earth and in ether-- +Invisible ever to man, + but He dwells in the midst of all matter; +Yea, he dwells in the heart of the stone-- + in the hard granite heart of the boulder; +Ye shall call him forever _Tunkan_-- + grandfather of all the Dakotas. +Ye are men that I choose for my own; + ye shall be as a strong band of brothers, +Now I give you the magical bone + and the magical pouch of the spirits,[AG] +And these are the laws ye shall heed: + Ye shall honor the pouch and the giver. +Ye shall walk as twin-brothers; in need, + one shall forfeit his life for another. +Listen not to the voice of the crow.[AH] + Hold as sacred the wife of a brother. +Strike, and fear not the shaft of the foe, + for the soul of the brave is immortal. +Slay the warrior in battle, + but spare the innocent babe and the mother. +Remember a promise,--beware,-- + let the word of a warrior be sacred +When a stranger arrives at the _tee_-- + be he friend of the band or a foeman, +Give him food; let your bounty be free; + lay a robe for the guest by the lodge-fire; +Let him go to his kindred in peace, + if the peace-pipe he smoke in the _teepee_; +And so shall your children increase, + and your lodges shall laugh with abundance. +And long shall ye live in the land, + and the spirits of earth and the waters +Shall come to your aid, at command, + with the power of invisible magic. +And at last, when you journey afar-- + o'er the shining "_Wanagee Ta-chan-ku_,"[68] +You shall walk as a red, shining star[8] + in the land of perpetual summer." + +[AF] "Sacred Spirit! Father! have pity on me always." + +[AG] Riggs' Takoo Wakan, p. 90. + +[AH] Slander. + +All the night in the _teepee_ they sang, + and they danced to the mighty _Unktehee_, +While the loud-braying _Chan-che-ga_ rang + and the shrill-piping flute and the rattle, +Till _Anpetuwee_ [70] rose in the east-- + from the couch of the blushing _Han-nan-na_, +And thus at the dance and the feast + sang the sons of _Unktehee_ in chorus: + + "Wa-du-ta o-hna mi-ka-ge! + Wa-du-ta o-hna mi-ka-ge! + Mini-yata ite wakande maku, + Ate wakan--Tunkansidan. + + Tunkansidan pejihuta wakan + Micage--he Wicage! + Miniyata ite wakande maku. + Taukansidan ite, nape du-win-ta woo, + Wahutopa wan yuha, nape du-win-ta woo." + +TRANSLATION. + + In red swan-down he made it for me; + In red swan-down he made it for me; + He of the water--he of the mysterious face-- + Gave it to me; + Sacred Father--Grandfather! + + Grandfather made me magical medicine. + That is true! + Being of mystery,--grown in the water-- + He gave it to me! + To the face of our Grandfather stretch out your hand; + Holding a quadruped, stretch out your hand! + +Till high o'er the hills of the east + _Anpetuwee_ walked on his journey, +In secret they danced at the feast, + and communed with the mighty _Unktehee_. +Then opened the door of the _tee_ + to the eyes of the wondering Dakotas, +And the sons of _Unktehee_ to be, + were endowed with the sacred _Ozuha_[82] +By the son of tall Wazi-kute, Tamdoka, + the chief of the Magi. +And thus since the birth-day of man-- + since he sprang from the heart of the mountains,[69] +Has the sacred "_Wacepee Wakan_" + by the warlike Dakotas been honored, +And the god-favored sons of the clan + work their will with the help of the spirits. + + +WINONA'S WARNING. + +'Twas sunrise; the spirits of mist + trailed their white robes on dewy savannas, +And the flowers raised their heads to be kissed + by the first golden beams of the morning. +The breeze was abroad with the breath + of the rose of the Isles of the Summer, +And the humming-bird hummed on the heath + from his home in the land of the rainbow.[AI] +'Twas the morn of departure. DuLuth + stood alone by the roar of the _Ha-ha_; +Tall and fair in the strength of his youth + stood the blue-eyed and fair-bearded Frenchman. +A rustle of robes on the grass broke his dream + as he mused by the waters, +And, turning, he looked on the face of Winona, + wild-rose of the prairies, +Half hid in her dark, flowing hair, + like the round, golden moon in the pine-tops. +Admiring he gazed--she was fair + as his own blooming Flore in her orchards, +With her golden locks loose on the air, + like the gleam of the sun through the olives, +Far away on the vine-covered shore, + in the sun-favored land of his fathers. +"Lists the chief to the cataract's roar + for the mournful lament of the Spirit?"[AJ] +Said Winona,--"The wail of the sprite + for her babe and its father unfaithful, +Is heard in the midst of the night, + when the moon wanders dim in the heavens." + +"Wild-Rose of the Prairies," he said, + "DuLuth listens not to the _Ha-ha_, +For the wail of the ghost of the dead + for her babe and its father unfaithful; +But he lists to a voice in his heart + that is heard by the ear of no other, +And to-day will the White Chief depart; + he returns to the land of the sunrise." +"Let Winona depart with the chief,-- + she will kindle the fire in his _teepee_; +For long are the days of her grief, + if she stay in the _tee_ of Ta-te-psin," +She replied, and her cheeks were aflame + with the bloom of the wild prairie lilies. +"_Tanke_[AK], is the White Chief to blame?" + said DuLuth to the blushing Winona. +"The White Chief is blameless," she said, + "but the heart of Winona will follow +Wherever thy footsteps may lead, + O blue-eyed, brave Chief of the white men. +For her mother sleeps long in the mound, + and a step-mother rules in the _teepee_, +And her father, once strong and renowned, + is bent with the weight of his winters. +No longer he handles the spear,-- + no longer his swift, humming arrows +Overtake the fleet feet of the deer, + or the bear of the woods, or the bison; +But he bends as he walks, and the wind + shakes his white hair and hinders his footsteps; +And soon will he leave me behind, + without brother or sister or kindred. +The doe scents the wolf in the wind, + and a wolf walks the path of Winona. +Three times have the gifts for the bride[55] + to the lodge of Ta-te-psin been carried, +But the voice of Winona replied + that she liked not the haughty Tamdoka. +And thrice were the gifts sent away, + but the tongue of the mother protested, +And the were-wolf[52] still follows his prey, + and abides but the death of my father." + +[AI] The Dakotas say the humming-bird comes from the "Land of the +rain-bow." + +[AJ] See Legend of the Falls, or Note 28--Appendix. + +[AK] My Sister. + +"I pity Winona," he said, + "but my path is a pathway of danger, +And long is the trail for the maid + to the far-away land of the sunrise; +And few are the braves of my band, + and the braves of Tamdoka are many; +But soon I return to the land, + and a cloud of my hunters will follow. +When the cold winds of winter return + and toss the white robes of the prairies, +The fire of the White Chief will burn + in his lodge at the Meeting-of-Waters;[AL] +And when from the Sunrise again + comes the chief of the sons of the Morning, +Many moons will his hunters remain + in the land of the friendly Dakotas. +The son of Chief Wazi-Kute guides + the White Chief afar on his journey; +Nor long on the _Tanka Mede_[AM]-- + on the breast of the blue, bounding billows-- +Shall the bark of the Frenchman delay, + but his pathway shall kindle behind him." + +[AL] Mendota--properly Mdo-te--meaning the out-let of a lake or river +into another, commonly applied to the region about Fort Snelling. + +[AM] _Tanka-Mede_--Great Lake, i.e. Lake Superior. The Dakotas seem to +have had no other name for it. They generally referred to it as +_Mini-ya-ta--There at the water_. + +She was pale, and her hurried voice + swelled with alarm as she questioned replying-- +"Tamdoka thy guide?--I beheld + thy death in his face at the races. +He covers his heart with a smile, + but revenge never sleeps in his bosom; +His tongue--it is soft to beguile; + but beware of the pur of the panther! +For death, like a shadow, will walk + by thy side in the midst of the forest, +Or follow thy path like a hawk + on the trail of a wounded _Mastinca_.[AN] +A son of _Unktehee_ is he,-- + the Chief of the crafty magicians; +They have plotted thy death; + I can see thy trail--it is red in the forest; +Beware of Tamdoka,--beware. + Slumber not like the grouse of the woodlands, +With head under wing, for the glare + of the eyes that sleep not are upon thee." + +[AN] The rabbit. The Dakotas called the Crees "Mastincapi"--Rabbits. + +"Winona, fear not," said DuLuth, + "for I carry the fire of _Wakinyan_[AO] +And strong is the arm of my youth, + and stout are the hearts of my warriors; +But Winona has spoken the truth, + and the heart of the White Chief is thankful. +Hide this in thy bosom, dear maid,-- + 'tis the crucified Christ of the white men.[AP] +Lift thy voice to his spirit in need, + and his spirit will hear thee and answer; +For often he comes to my aid; + he is stronger than all the Dakotas; +And the Spirits of evil, afraid, + hide away when he looks from the heavens." +In her swelling, brown bosom she hid + the crucified Jesus in silver; +"_Niwaste_,"[AQ] she sadly replied; + in her low voice the rising tears trembled; +Her dewy eyes turned she aside, + and she slowly returned to the _teepees_. +But still on the swift river's strand, + admiring the graceful Winona, +As she gathered, with brown, dimpled hand, + her hair from the wind, stood the Frenchman. + + +DULUTH'S DEPARTURE + +To bid the brave White Chief adieu, + on the shady shore gathered the warriors; +His glad boatmen manned the canoe, + and the oars in their hands were impatient. +Spake the Chief of _Isantees_: + "A feast will await the return of my brother. +In peace rose the sun in the East, + in peace in the West he descended. +May the feet of my brother be swift + till they bring him again to our _teepees_, +The red pipe he takes as a gift, + may he smoke that red pipe many winters. +At my lodge-fire his pipe shall be lit, + when the White Chief returns to _Kathaga_; +On the robes of my _tee_ shall he sit; + he shall smoke with the chiefs of my people. +The brave love the brave, and his son + sends the Chief as a guide for his brother, +By the way of the _Wakpa Wakan_[AR] + to the Chief at the Lake of the Spirits. +As light as the foot-steps of dawn + are the feet of the stealthy Tamdoka; +He fears not the _Maza Wakan_;[AS] + he is sly as the fox of the forest. +When he dances the dance of red war + howl the wolves by the broad _Mini-ya-ta_,[AT] +For they scent on the south-wind afar + their feast on the bones of Ojibways." +Thrice the Chief puffed the red pipe of peace, + ere it passed to the lips of the Frenchman. +Spake DuLuth: "May the Great Spirit bless + with abundance the Chief and his people; +May their sons and their daughters increase, + and the fire ever burn in their _teepees_." +Then he waved with a flag his adieu + to the Chief and the warriors assembled; +And away shot Tamdoka's canoe + to the strokes of ten sinewy hunters; +And a white path he clove up the blue, + bubbling stream of the swift Mississippi; +And away on his foaming trail flew, + like a sea-gull, the bark of the Frenchman. + +[AO] i.e. fire-arms which the Dakotas compare to the roar of the wings +of the Thunder-bird and the fierey arrows he shoots. + +[AP] DuLuth was a devout Catholic. + +[AQ] _Nee-wah-shtay_--Thou art good. + +[AR] Spirit-River, now called Rum River. + +[AS] Fire-arm--spirit-metal. + +[AT] Lake Superior--at that time the home of the Ojibways (Chippewas). + +[Illustration: TWO HUNDRED WHITE WINTERS AND MORE HAVE FLED FROM THE +FACE OF THE SUMMER ... + + * * * * * + +AH, LITTLE HE DREAMED THEN, FORSOOTH, THAT A CITY WOULD STAND ON THAT +HILL SIDE] + +Then merrily rose the blithe song + of the _voyageurs_ homeward returning, +And thus, as they glided along, + sang the bugle-voiced boatmen in chorus: + + SONG. + + Home again! home again! bend to the oar! + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur._ + He rides on the river with his paddle in his hand, + And his boat is his shelter on the water and the land. + The clam has his shell and the water-turtle too, + But the brave boatman's shell is his birch-bark canoe. + So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar; + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur._ + + Home again! home again! bend to the oar! + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_, + His couch is as downy as a couch can be, + For he sleeps on the feathers of the green fir-tree. + He dines on the fat of the pemmican-sack, + And his _eau de vie_ is the _eau de lac_. + So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar; + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_. + + Home again! home again! bend to the oar! + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_. + The brave, jolly boatman,--he never is afraid + When he meets at the portage a red, forest maid, + A Huron, or a Cree, or a blooming Chippeway; + And he marks his trail with the _bois brules_[AU] + So pull away, boatmen; bend to the oar; + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_. + Home again! home again! bend to the oar! + Merry is the life of the gay _voyageur_. + +In the reeds of the meadow the stag + lifts his branchy head stately and listens, +And the bobolink, perched on the flag, + her ear sidelong bends to the chorus. +From the brow of the Beautiful Isle,[AV] + half hid in the midst of the maples, +The sad-faced Winona, the while, + watched the boat growing less in the distance, +Till away in the bend of the stream, + where it turned and was lost in the lindens, +She saw the last dip and the gleam + of the oars ere they vanished forever. + + +[AU] "Burnt woods"--half-breeds. + +[AV] _Wita Waste_--"Beautiful Island"; the Dakota name for Nicollet +Island. + +Still afar on the waters the song, + like bridal bells distantly chiming, +The stout, jolly boatmen prolong, + beating time with the stroke of their paddles; +And Winona's ear, turned to the breeze, + lists the air falling fainter and fainter, +Till it dies like the murmur of bees + when the sun is aslant on the meadows. +Blow, breezes,--blow softly and sing + in the dark, flowing hair of the maiden; +But never again shall you bring + the voice that she loves to Winona. + + +THE CANOE RACE. + +Now a light rustling wind from the South + shakes his wings o'er the wide, wimpling waters: +Up the dark-winding river DuLuth + follows fast in the wake of Tamdoka. +On the slopes of the emerald shores + leafy woodlands and prairies alternate; +On the vine-tangled islands the flowers + peep timidly out at the white men; +In the dark-winding eddy the loon + sits warily watching and voiceless, +And the wild-goose, in reedy lagoon, + stills the prattle and play of her children. +The does and their sleek, dappled fawns + prick their ears and peer out from the thickets, +And the bison-calves play on the lawns, + and gambol like colts in the clover. +Up the still-flowing _Wakpa Wakan's_ + winding path through the groves and the meadows, +Now DuLuth's brawny boatmen pursue + the swift-gliding bark of Tamdoka; +And hardly the red braves out-do + the stout, steady oars of the white men. + +Now they bend to their oars in the race-- + the ten tawny braves of Tamdoka; +And hard on their heels in the chase + ply the six stalwart oars of the Frenchmen. +In the stern of his boat sits DuLuth; + in the stern of his boat sits Tamdoka, +And warily, cheerily, both urge + the oars of their men to the utmost. +Far-stretching away to the eyes, + winding blue in the midst of the meadows, +As a necklet of sapphires that lies + unclaspt in the lap of a virgin, +Here asleep in the lap of the plain + lies the reed-bordered, beautiful river. +Like two flying coursers that strain, + on the track, neck and neck on the home-stretch, +With nostrils distended and mane froth-flecked, + and the neck and the shoulders, +Each urged to his best by the cry + and the whip and the rein of his rider, +Now they skim o'er the waters and fly, + side by side, neck and neck, through the meadows, +The blue heron flaps from the reeds, + and away wings her course up the river: +Straight and swift is her flight o'er the meads, + but she hardly outstrips the canoemen. +See! the _voyageurs_ bend to their oars + till the blue veins swell out on their foreheads; +And the sweat from their brawny breasts pours; + but in vain their Herculean labor; +For the oars of Tamdoka are ten, + and but six are the oars of the Frenchman, +And the red warriors' burden of men + is matched by the _voyageurs'_ luggage. +Side by side, neck and neck, for a mile, + still they strain their strong arms to the utmost, +Till rounding a willowy isle, + now ahead creeps the boat of Tamdoka, +And the neighboring forests profound, + and the far-stretching plain of the meadows +To the whoop of the victors resound, + while the panting French rest on their paddles. + + +IN CAMP. + +With sable wings wide o'er the land + night sprinkles the dew of the heavens; +And hard by the dark river's strand, + in the midst of a tall, somber forest, +Two camp fires are lighted and beam + on the trunks and the arms of the pine trees. +In the fitful light darkle and gleam + the swarthy-hued faces around them. +And one is the camp of DuLuth, + and the other the camp of Tamdoka. +But few are the jests and uncouth + of the voyageurs over their supper, +While moody and silent the braves + round their fire in a circle sit crouching; +And low is the whisper of leaves + and the sough of the wind in the branches; +And low is the long-winding howl + of the lone wolf afar in the forest; +But shrill is the hoot of the owl, + like a bugle-blast blown in the pine-tops, +And the half-startled _voyageurs_ scowl + at the sudden and saucy intruder. +Like the eyes of the wolves are the eyes + of the watchful and silent Dakotas; +Like the face of the moon in the skies, + when the clouds chase each other across it, +Is Tamdoka's dark face in the light + of the flickering flames of the camp-fire. +They have plotted red murder by night, + and securely contemplate their victims. +But wary and armed to the teeth + are the resolute Frenchmen, and ready, +If need be, to grapple with death, + and to die hand to hand in the forest. +Yet skilled in the arts and the wiles + of the cunning and crafty _Algonkins_[AW] +They cover their hearts with their smiles, + and hide their suspicions of evil. +Round their low, smouldering fire, + feigning sleep, lie the watchful and wily Dakotas; +But DuLuth and his _voyageurs_ heap + their fire that shall blaze till the morning, +Ere they lay themselves snugly to rest, + with their guns by their sides on the blankets, +As if there were none to molest + but the gray, skulking wolves of the forest. + +[AW] Ojibways. + +'Tis midnight. The rising moon gleams, + weird and still, o'er the dusky horizon; +Through the hushed, somber forest she beams, + and fitfully gloams on the meadows; +And a dim, glimmering pathway she paves, + at times, on the dark stretch of river. +The winds are asleep in the caves-- + in the heart of the far-away mountains; +And here on the meadows and there, + the lazy mists gather and hover; +And the lights of the Fen-Spirits[72] flare + and dance on the low-lying marshes, +As still as the footsteps of death + by the bed of the babe and its mother; +And hushed are the pines, and beneath + lie the weary-limbed boatmen in slumber. +Walk softly,--walk softly, O Moon, + through the gray, broken clouds in thy pathway, +For the earth lies asleep and the boon + of repose is bestowed on the weary. +Toiling hands have forgotten their care; + e'en the brooks have forgotten to murmur; +But hark!--there's a sound on the air!-- + 'tis the light-rustling robes of the Spirits, +Like the breath of the night in the leaves + or the murmur of reeds on the river, +In the cool of the mid-summer eyes, + when the blaze of the day has descended. +Low-crouching and shadowy forms, + as still as the gray morning's footsteps, +Creep sly as the serpent that charms, + on her nest in the meadow, the plover; +In the shadows of pine-trunks they creep, + but their panther-eyes gleam in the fire-light, +As they peer on the white-men asleep, + in the glow of the fire, on their blankets. +Lo in each swarthy right-hand a knife; + in the left-hand, the bow and the arrows! +Brave Frenchmen, awake to the strife!-- + or you sleep in the forest forever. +Nay, nearer and nearer they glide, + like ghosts on the field of their battles, +Till close on the sleepers, they bide + but the signal of death from Tamdoka. +Still the sleepers sleep on. Not a breath + stirs the leaves of the awe-stricken forest; +The hushed air is heavy with death; + like the footsteps of death are the moments. +"_Arise!_"--At the word, with a bound, + to their feet spring the vigilant Frenchmen; +And the depths of the forest resound + to the crack and the roar of their rifles; +And seven writhing forms on the ground + clutch the earth. From the pine-tops the screech-owl +Screams and flaps his wide wings in affright, + and plunges away through the shadows; +And swift on the wings of the night + flee the dim, phantom-forms through the darkness. +Like _cabris_[80] when white wolves pursue, + fled the four yet remaining Dakotas; +Through forest and fen-land they flew, + and wild terror howled on their footsteps. +And one was Tamdoka. DuLuth + through the night sent his voice like a trumpet: +"Ye are _Sons of Unktehee_, forsooth! + Return to your mothers, ye cowards!" +His shrill voice they heard as they fled, + but only the echoes made answer. +At the feet of the brave Frenchmen, dead, + lay seven swarthy _Sons of whitehead_; +And there, in the midst of the slain, + they found, as it gleamed in the fire-light, +The horn-handled knife from the Seine, + where it fell from the hand of Tamdoka. + +[Illustration: NEARER AND NEARER THEY GLIDE LIKE GHOSTS ON THE FIELDS OF +THEIR BATTLES. TILL CLOSE ON THE SLEEPERS, THEY BIDE FOR THE SIGNAL OF +DEATH FROM TAMDOKA] + +In the gray of the morn, ere the sun + peeped over the dewy horizon, +Their journey again was begun, + and they toiled up the swift, winding river; +And many a shallow they passed + on their way to the Lake of the Spirits;[AX] +But dauntless they reached it at last, + and found Akee-pa-kee-tin's[AY] village, +On an isle in the midst of the lake; + and a day in his teepees they tarried. +Of the deed in the wilderness spake, + to the brave Chief, the frank-hearted Frenchman. +A generous man was the Chief, + and a friend of the fearless explorer; +And dark was his visage with grief + at the treacherous act of the warriors. +"Brave Wazi-kute is a man, + and his heart is as clear as the sunlight; +But the head of a treacherous clan + and a snake-in-the-grass, is Tamdoka," +Said the chief; and he promised DuLuth, + on the word of a friend and a warrior, +To carry the pipe and the truth + to his cousin, the chief at Kathaga; +For thrice at the _Tanka Mede_ + he smoked in the lodge of the Frenchman; +And thrice had he carried away + the bountiful gifts of the trader. + +[AX] Mille Lacs + +[AY] See Hennepin's account of "Aqui-pa-que-tin," and his village. +Shea's Hennepin, 225. + +When the chief could no longer prevail + on the white men to rest in his _teepees_, +He guided their feet on the trail + to the lakes of the winding Rice-River.[AZ] +Now on speeds the light bark canoe, + through the lakes to the broad _Gitchee Seebee_;[BA] +And up the great river they row,-- + up the Big Sandy Lake and Savanna; +And down through the meadows they go + to the river of blue _Gitchee-Gumee_.[BB] +Still onward they speed to the Dalles-- + to the roar of the white-rolling rapids, +Where the dark river tumbles and falls + down the ragged ravine of the mountains. +And singing his wild jubilee + to the low-moaning pines and the cedars, +Rushes on to the unsalted sea + o'er the ledges upheaved by volcanoes. +Their luggage the _voyageurs_ bore + down the long, winding path of the portage,[BC] +While they mingled their song with the roar + of the turbid and turbulent waters. +Down-wimpling and murmuring there + 'twixt two dewy hills winds a streamlet, +Like a long, flaxen ringlet of hair + on the breast of a maid in her slumber. + +All safe at the foot of the trail, + where they left it, they found their felucca, +And soon to the wind spread the sail, + and glided at ease through the waters,-- +Through the meadows and lakelets and forth, + round the point stretching south like a finger, +From the pine-plumed hills on the north, + sloping down to the bay and the lake-side +And behold, at the foot of the hill, + a cluster of Chippewa wigwams, +And the busy wives plying with skill + their nets in the emerald waters. +Two hundred white winters and more + have fled from the face of the Summer +Since DuLuth on that wild, somber shore, + in the unbroken forest primeval, +From the midst of the spruce and the pines, + saw the smoke of the wigwams up-curling, +Like the fumes from the temples and shrines + of the Druids of old in their forests. +Ah, little he dreamed then, forsooth, + that a city would stand on that hill-side, +And bear the proud name of DuLuth, + the untiring and dauntless explorer,-- +A refuge for ships from the storms, + and for men from the bee-hives of Europe, +Out-stretching her long, iron arms + o'er an empire of Saxons and Normans. + +[AZ] Now called "Mud River"--it empties into the Mississippi at Aitkin. + +[BA] _Gitchee See-bee_--Big River--is the Ojibway name for the +Mississippi, which is a corruption of Gitchee Seebee--as Michigan is a +corruption of _Gitchee Gumee_--Great Lake, the Ojibway name of Lake +Superior. + +[BB] The Ojibways called the St. Louis River _Gitchee-Gumee +See-bee_--_Great-lake River_, i.e. the river of the Great Lake (Lake +Superior). + +[BC] The route of DuLuth above described--from the mouth of the +Wild-Rice (Mud) River, to Lake Superior--was for centuries, and still +is, the Indians' canoe-route. I have walked over the old portage from +the foot of the Dalles to the St. Louis above--trod by the feet of +half-breeds and _voyageurs_ for more than two centuries, and by the +Indians for perhaps a thousand years. + +The swift west-wind sang in the sails, + and on flew the boat like a sea-gull, +By the green, templed hills and the dales, + and the dark, rugged rocks of the North Shore; +For the course of the brave Frenchman lay + to his fort at the _Gah-mah-na-tek-wahk,_[83] +By the shore of the grand Thunder Bay, + where the gray rocks loom up into mountains; +Where the Stone Giant sleeps on the Cape, + and the god of the storms makes the thunder,[83] +And the _Makinak_[83] lifts his huge shape + from the breast of the blue-rolling waters. +And thence to the south-westward led his course + to the Holy Ghost Mission,[84] +Where the Black Robes, the brave shepherds, + fed their wild sheep on the isle _Wauga-ba-me_,[94] +In the enchanting _Cha-quam-e-gon_ Bay + defended by all the Apostles,[BD] +And thence, by the Ke-we-naw, + lay his course to the Mission Sainte Marie,[BE] +Now the waves clap their myriad hands, + and streams the white hair of the surges; +DuLuth at the steady helm stands, + and he hums as he bounds o'er the billows: + + O sweet is the carol of bird, + And sweet is the murmur of streams, + But sweeter the voice that I heard-- + In the night--in the midst of my dreams. + +[BD] The Apostle Islands. + +[BE] At the Sault Ste. Marie. + + + +WINONA AND TA-TE-PSIN. + +'Tis the moon of the sere, falling leaves. + From the heads of the maples the west-wind +Plucks the red-and-gold plumage and grieves + on the meads for the rose and the lily; +Their brown leaves the moaning oaks strew, + and the breezes that roam on the prairies, +Low-whistling and wanton pursue + the down of the silk-weed and thistle. +All sere are the prairies and brown + in the glimmer and haze of the Autumn; +From the far northern marshes flock down, + by thousands, the geese and the mallards. +From the meadows and wide-prairied plains, + for their long southward journey preparing. +In croaking flocks gather the cranes, + and choose with loud clamor their leaders. +The breath of the evening is cold, + and lurid along the horizon +The flames of the prairies are rolled, + on the somber skies flashing their torches. +At noontide a shimmer of gold + through the haze pours the sun from his pathway. +The wild-rice is gathered and ripe, +von the moors, lie the scarlet _po-pan-ka_,[BF] +_Michabo_[85] is smoking his pipe,-- + 'tis the soft, dreamy Indian Summer, +When the god of the South[3] as he flies + from _Waziya_, the god of the Winter, +For a time turns his beautiful eyes, + and backward looks over his shoulder. + +[BF] Cranberries. + +It is noon. From his path in the skies + the red sun looks down on _Kathaga_. +Asleep in the valley it lies, + for the swift hunters follow the bison. +Ta-te-psin, the aged brave, bends + as he walks by the side of Winona; +Her arm to his left hand she lends, + and he feels with his staff for the pathway; +On his slow, feeble footsteps attends + his gray dog, the watchful Wichaka; [a] +For blind in his years is the chief + of a fever that followed the Summer, +And the days of Ta-te-psin are brief. + Once more by the dark-rolling river +Sits the Chief in the warm, dreamy haze + of the beautiful Summer in Autumn; +And the faithful dog lovingly lays his head + at the feet of his master. +On a dead, withered branch sits a crow, + down-peering askance at the old man; +On the marge of the river below + romp the nut-brown and merry-voiced children, +And the dark waters silently flow, + broad and deep, to the plunge of the Ha-ha. + +[a] Wee-chah kah--literally "Faithful". + +By his side sat Winona. + He laid his thin, shriveled hand on her tresses, +"Winona my daughter," he said, + "no longer thy father beholds thee; +But he feels the long locks of thy hair, + and the days that are gone are remembered, +When Sisoka [BG] sat faithful and fair + in the lodge of swift footed Ta-te-psin. +The white years have broken my spear; + from my bow they have taken the bow-string; +But once on the trail of the deer, + like a gray wolf from sunrise till sunset, +By woodland and meadow and mere, + ran the feet of Ta-te-psin untiring. +But dim are the days that are gone, + and darkly around me they wander, +Like the pale, misty face of the moon + when she walks through the storm of the winter; +And sadly they speak in my ear. + I have looked on the graves of my kindred. +The Land of the Spirits is near. + Death walks by my side like a shadow. +Now open thine ear to my voice, + and thy heart to the wish of thy father, +And long will Winona rejoice + that she heeded the words of Ta-te-psin. +The cold, cruel winter is near, + and famine will sit in the teepee. +What hunter will bring me the deer, + or the flesh of the bear or the bison? +For my kinsmen before me have gone; + they hunt in the land of the shadows. +In my old age forsaken, alone, + must I die in my teepee of hunger? +Winona, Tamdoka can make my empty lodge + laugh with abundance; +For thine aged and blind father's sake, + to the son of the Chief speak the promise. +For gladly again to my tee + will the bridal gifts come for my daughter. +A fleet-footed hunter is he, + and the good spirits feather his arrows; +And the cold, cruel winter + will be a feast-time instead of a famine." + +[BG] The Robin--the name of Winona's Mother. + + +"My father," she said, and her voice + was filial and full of compassion, +"Would the heart of Ta-te-psin rejoice + at the death of Winona, his daughter? +The crafty Tamdoka I hate. + Must I die in his _teepee_ of sorrow? +For I love the White Chief and I wait + his return to the land of Dakotas. +When the cold winds of winter return, + and toss the white robes of the prairies, +The fire of the White Chief will burn + in his lodge at the Meeting-of-Waters. +Winona's heart followed his feet + far away to the land of the Morning, +And she hears in her slumber his sweet, + kindly voice call the name of thy daughter. +My father, abide, I entreat, + the return of the brave to _Katahga_. +The wild-rice is gathered, the meat + of the bison is stored in the _teepee_; +Till the Coon-Moon[71] enough and to spare; + and if then the white warrior return not, +Winona will follow the bear and the coon + to their dens in the forest. +She is strong; she can handle the spear; + she can bend the stout bow of the hunter; +And swift on the trail of the deer + will she run o'er the snow on her snow-shoes. +Let the step-mother sit in the tee, + and kindle the fire for my father; +And the cold, cruel winter shall be + a feast-time instead of a famine." +"The White Chief will never return," + half angrily muttered Ta-te-psin; +"His camp-fire will nevermore burn + in the land of the warriors he slaughtered. +I grieve, for my daughter has said + that she loves the false friend of her kindred; +For the hands of the White Chief are red + with the blood of the trustful Dakotas." + +Then warmly Winona replied, + "Tamdoka himself is the traitor, +And the brave-hearted stranger had died + by his treacherous hand in the forest, +But thy daughter's voice bade him beware + of the sly death that followed his footsteps. +The words of Tamdoka are fair, + but his heart is the den of the serpents. +When the braves told their tale like a bird + sang the heart of Winona rejoicing, +But gladlier still had she heard + of the death of the crafty Tamdoka. +The Chief will return; he is bold, + and he carries the fire of Wakinyan: +To our people the truth will be told, + and Tamdoka will hide like a coward." +His thin locks the aged brave shook; + to himself half inaudibly muttered; +To Winona no answer he spoke,--only moaned he "_Micunksee! Micunksee_![BH] +In my old age forsaken and blind! + _Yun-he-he! Micunksee! Micunksee_!"[BI] +And Wichaka, the pitying dog, + whined as he looked on the face of his master. + +[BH] My Daughter; My Daughter. + +[BI] Alas, O My Daughter,--My Daughter! + + + +FAMINE. + +_Waziya_ came down from the North-- + from the land of perpetual winter. +From his frost-covered beard issued forth the sharp-biting, + shrill-whistling North-wind; +At the touch of his breath + the wide earth turned to stone, and the lakes and the rivers: +From his nostrils the white vapors rose, + and they covered the sky like a blanket. +Like the down of _Maga_[BJ] fell the snows, + tossed and whirled into heaps by the North-wind. +Then the blinding storms roared on the plains, + like the simoons on sandy Sahara; +From the fangs of the fierce hurricanes + fled the elk and the deer and the bison. +Ever colder and colder it grew, + till the frozen ground cracked and split open; +And harder and harder it blew, + till the hillocks were bare as the boulders. +To the southward the buffalos fled, + and the white rabbits hid in their burrows; +On the bare sacred mounds of the dead + howled the gaunt, hungry wolves in the night-time, +The strong hunters crouched in their _tees_; + by the lodge-fires the little ones shivered; +And the Magic-Men[BK] danced to appease, + in their _teepee_, the wrath of _Waziya_; +But famine and fatal disease, + like phantoms, crept into the village. +The Hard Moon[BL] was past, but the moon + when the coons make their trails in the forest[BM] +Grew colder and colder. The coon, + or the bear, ventured not from his cover; +For the cold, cruel Arctic simoon + swept the earth like the breath of a furnace. +In the _tee_ of Ta-te-psin the store + of wild-rice and dried meat was exhausted; +And Famine crept in at the door, + and sat crouching and gaunt by the lodge-fire. +But now with the saddle of deer + and the gifts came the crafty Tamdoka; +And he said, "Lo I bring you good cheer, + for I love the blind Chief and his daughter. +Take the gifts of Tamdoka, for dear + to his heart is the dark-eyed Winona." +The aged Chief opened his ears; + in his heart he already consented: +But the moans of his child and her tears + touched the age-softened heart of the father, +And he said, "I am burdened with years,-- + I am bent by the snows of my winters; +Ta-te-psin will die in his _tee_; + let him pass to the Land of the Spirits; +But Winona is young; she is free + and her own heart shall choose her a husband." +The dark warrior strode from the _tee_; + low-muttering and grim he departed; +"Let him die in his lodge," muttered he, + "but Winona shall kindle my lodge-fire." + +Then forth went Winona. The bow + of Ta-te-psin she took and his arrows, +And afar o'er the deep, drifted snow + through the forest she sped on her snow shoes. +Over meadow and ice-covered mere, + through the thickets of red-oak and hazel, +She followed the tracks of the deer, + but like phantoms they fled from her vision. +From sunrise to sunset she sped; + half famished she camped in the thicket; +In the cold snow she made her lone bed; + on the buds of the birch[BN] made her supper. +To the dim moon the gray owl preferred, + from the tree-top, his shrill lamentation, +And around her at midnight she heard + the dread famine-cries of the gray wolves. +In the gloam of the morning again + on the trail of the red-deer she followed-- +All day long through the thickets in vain, + for the gray wolves were chasing the roebucks; +And the cold, hungry winds from the plain + chased the wolves and the deer and Winona. + +[BJ] Wild-goose + +[BK] Medicine-men. + +[BL] January. + +[BM] February. + +[BN] The pheasant feeds on birch-buds in winter. Indians eat them when +very hungry. + +In the twilight of sundown she sat + in the forest, all weak and despairing; +Ta-te-psin's bow lay at her feet, + and his otter-skin quiver of arrows +"He promised,--he promised," she said,-- + half-dreamily uttered and mournful,-- +"And why comes he not? Is he dead? + Was he slain by the crafty Tamdoka? +Must Winona, alas, make her choice-- + make her choice between death and Tamdoka? +She will die, but her soul will rejoice + in the far Summer-land of the spirits. +Hark! I hear his low, musical voice! + he is coming! My White Chief is coming! +Ah, no, I am half in a dream!-- + 'twas the memory of days long departed; +But the birds of the green Summer seem + to be singing above in the branches." +Then forth from her bosom she drew + the crucified Jesus in silver. +In her dark hair the cold north-wind blew, + as meekly she bent o'er the image. +"O Christ of the Whiteman," she prayed, + "lead the feet of my brave to Kathaga; +Send a good spirit down to my aid, + or the friend of the White Chief will perish." +Then a smile on her wan features played, + and she lifted her pale face and chanted + + "E-ye-he-kta! E-ye-he-kta! + He-kta-ce; e-ye-ce-quon. + Mi-Wamdee-ska, he-he-kta, + He-kta-ce, e-ye-ce-quon, + Mi-Wamdee-ska." + + [TRANSLATON] + + He will come; he will come; + He will come, for he promised. + My White Eagle, he will come; + He will come, for he promised---- + My White Eagle. + +Thus sadly she chanted, and lo-- + allured by her sorrowful accents-- +From the dark covert crept a red roe + and wonderingly gazed on Winona. +Then swift caught the huntress her bow; + from her trembling hand hummed the keen arrow. +Up-leaped the red roebuck and fled, + but the white snow was sprinkled with scarlet, +And he fell in the oak thicket dead. + On the trail ran the eager Winona. +Half-famished the raw flesh she ate. + To the hungry maid sweet was her supper +Then swift through the night ran her feet, + and she trailed the sleek roebuck behind her; +And the guide of her steps was a star-- + the cold-glinting star of _Waziya_[BO]-- +Over meadow and hilltop afar, on the way + to the lodge of her father. +But hark! on the keen frosty air + wind the shrill hunger-howls of the gray-wolves! +And nearer,--still nearer!--the blood + of the deer have they scented and follow; +Through the thicket, the meadow, the wood, + dash the pack on the trail of Winona. +Swift she speeds with her burden, + but swift on her track fly the minions of famine; +Now they yell on the view from the drift, + in the reeds at the marge of the meadow; +Red gleam their wild, ravenous eyes, + for they see on the hill-side their supper; +The dark forest echoes their cries, + but her heart is the heart of a warrior. +From its sheath snatched Winona her knife, + and a leg from the roebuck she severed; +With the carcass she ran for her life,-- + to a low-branching oak ran the maiden; +Round the deer's neck her head-strap[BP] was tied; + swiftly she sprang to the arms of the oak-tree; +Quick her burden she drew to her side, + and higher she clomb on the branches, +While the maddened wolves battled and bled, + dealing death o'er the leg to each other; +Their keen fangs devouring the dead,-- + yea, devouring the flesh of the living, +They raved and they gnashed and they growled, + like the fiends in the regions infernal; +The wide night re-echoing howled, + and the hoarse North-wind laughed o'er the slaughter. +But their ravenous maws unappeased + by the blood and the flesh of their fellows, +To the cold wind their muzzles they raised, + and the trail to the oak-tree they followed. +Round and round it they howled for the prey, + madly leaping and snarling and snapping; +But the brave maiden's keen arrows slay, + till the dead number more than the living. +All the long, dreary night-time, at bay, + in the oak sat the shivering Winona; +But the sun gleamed at last, and away + skulked the gray cowards[BQ] down through the forest. +Then down dropped the deer and the maid. + Ere the sun reached the midst of his journey, +Her red, welcome burden she laid + at the feet of her famishing father. +_Waziya's_ wild wrath was appeased, + and homeward he turned to his _teepee_,[3] +O'er the plains and the forest-land breezed + from the Islands of Summer the South-wind. +From their dens came the coon and the bear; + o'er the snow through the woodlands they wandered; +On her snow-shoes with stout bow and spear + on their trails ran the huntress Winona. +The coon to his den in the tree, + and the bear to his burrow she followed; +A brave, skillful hunter was she, + and Ta-te-psin's lodge laughed with abundance. + +[BO] _Waziya's_ Star is the North-star. + +[Illustration] + +[BP] A strap used in carrying burdens. + +[BQ] Wolves sometimes attack people at night, but rarely, if ever, in +the day time. If they have followed a hunter all night, and "treed" him, +they will skulk away as soon as the sun rises. + + +DEATH OF TA-TE-PSIN. + +The long winter wanes. On the wings + of the spring come the geese and the mallards; +On the bare oak the red-robin sings, + and the crocus peeps up on the prairies, +And the bobolink pipes, but he brings + of the blue-eyed, brave White Chief no tidings. +With the waning of winter, alas, + waned the life of the aged Ta-te-psin; +Ere the wild pansies peeped from the grass, + to the Land of the Spirits he journeyed; +Like a babe in its slumber he passed, + or the snow from the hill-tops of April; +And the dark-eyed Winona, at last, + stood alone by the graves of her kindred. +When their myriad mouths opened the trees + to the sweet dew of heaven and the raindrops, +And the April showers fell on the leas, + on his mound fell the tears of Winona. +Round her drooping form gathered the years + and the spirits unseen of her kindred, +As low, in the midst of her tears, + at the grave of her father she chanted + + E-yo-tan-han e-yay-wah-ke-yay! + E-yo-tan-han e-yay-wah-ke-yay! + E-yo-tan-han e-yay-wah-ke-yay! + Ma-kah kin hay-chay-dan tay-han wan-kay. + Tu-way ne ktay snee e-yay-chen e-wah chay. + E-yo-tan-han e-yay-wah-ke-yay! + E-yo-tan-han e-yay-wah-ke-yay! +Ma-kah kin hay-chay-dan tay-han wan-kay. + +[TRANSLATION]. + + Sore is my sorrow! + Sore is my sorrow! + Sore is my sorrow! + The earth alone lasts. + I speak as one dying; + Sore is my sorrow! + Sore is my sorrow! + The earth alone lasts. + +Still hope, like a star in the night + gleaming oft through the broken clouds somber, +Cheered the heart of Winona, and bright + on her dreams beamed the face of the Frenchman. +As the thought of a loved one and lost, + sad and sweet were her thoughts of the White Chief; +In the moon's mellow light, like a ghost, + walked Winona alone by the _Ha-Ha_, +Ever wrapped in a dream. Far away-- + to the land of the sunrise--she wandered; +On the blue-rolling _Tanka-Mede_[BR] + in the midst of her dreams, she beheld him-- +In his white-winged canoe, like a bird, + to the land of Dakotas returning, + +[BR] Lake Superior,--The Gitchee Gumee of the Chippewas. + +And often in fancy she heard + the dip of his oars on the river. +On the dark waters glimmered the moon, + but she saw not the boat of the Frenchman. +On the somber night bugled the loon, + but she heard not the song of the boatmen. +The moon waxed and waned, but the star + of her hope never waned to the setting; +Through her tears she beheld it afar, + like a torch on the eastern horizon. +"He will come,--he is coming," she said; + "he will come, for my White Eagle promised," +And low to the bare earth the maid + bent her ear for the sound of his footsteps, +"He is gone, but his voice in my ear + still remains like the voice of the robin; +He is far, but his footsteps I hear; + he is coming; my White Chief is coming!" +But the moon waxed and waned. Nevermore + will the eyes of Winona behold him. +Far away on the dark, rugged shore + of the blue _Gitchee Gumee_ he lingers. +No tidings the rising sun brings; + no tidings the star of the evening; +But morning and evening she sings, + like a turtle-dove widowed and waiting: + + Ake u, ake u, ake u; + Ma cante maseeca. + Ake u, ake u, ake u; + Ma cante maseca. + + Come again, come again, come again; + For my heart is sad. + Come again, come again, come again; + For my heart is sad. + + + +DEATH OF WINONA. + +Down the broad _Ha-Ha Wak-pa_[BS] + the band took their way to the Games at _Keoza_[8] +While the swift-footed hunters by land + ran the shores for the elk and the bison. +Like _magas_[BT] ride the birchen canoes + on the breast of the dark, winding river, +By the willow-fringed island they cruise, + by the grassy hills green to their summits; +By the lofty bluffs hooded with oaks + that darken the deep with their shadows; +And bright in the sun gleam the strokes + of the oars in the hands of the women. +With the band went Winona. + The oar plied the maid with the skill of a hunter. +They tarried a time on the shore of _Remnica_-- + the Lake of the Mountains.[BU] +There the fleet hunters followed the deer, + and the thorny pahin[BV] for the women +From the tees rose the smoke of good cheer, + curling blue through the tops of the maples, +Near the foot of a cliff that arose, + like the battle-scarred walls of a castle, +Up-towering, in rugged repose, + to a dizzy height over the waters. + +[BS] The Dakota name for the Mississippi, see note 76 in Appendix. + +[BT] Wild Geese. + +[BU] Lake Pepin, by Hennepin called Lake of Tears--Called by the Dakotas +_Remnee-chah-Mday_--Lake of the Mountains. + +[BV] Pah-hin--the porcupine--the quills of which are greatly prized for +ornamental work. + +But the man-wolf still followed his prey, + and the step-mother ruled in the teepee; +Her will must Winona obey, + by the custom and law of Dakotas. +The gifts to the teepee were brought-- + the blankets and beads of the White men, +And Winona, the orphaned, was bought + by the crafty, relentless Tamdoka. +In the Spring-time of life, in the flush + of the gladsome mid-May days of Summer, +When the bobolink sang and the thrush, + and the red robin chirped in the branches, +To the tent of the brave must she go; + she must kindle the fire in his _teepee_; +She must sit in the lodge of her foe, + as a slave at the feet of her master. +Alas for her waiting! the wings + of the East-wind have brought her no tidings; +On the meadow the meadow-lark sings, + but sad is her song to Winona, +For the glad warbler's melody brings + but the memory of voices departed. +The Day-Spirit walked in the west + to his lodge in the land of the shadows; +His shining face gleamed on the crest + of the oak-hooded hills and the mountains, +And the meadow-lark hied to her nest, + and the mottled owl peeped from her cover. +But hark! from the _teepees_ a cry! + Hear the shouts of the hurrying warriors! +Are the feet of the enemy nigh,-- + of the crafty and cruel Ojibways? +Nay; look!--on the dizzy cliff high-- + on the brink of the cliff stands Winona! +Her sad face up-turned to the sky. + Hark! I hear the wild wail of her death-song: + + "My Father's Spirit, look down, look down-- + From your hunting grounds in the shining skies; + Behold, for the light of my heart is gone; + The light is gone and Winona dies. + + I looked to the East, but I saw no star; + The face of my White Chief was turned away. + I harked for his footsteps in vain; afar + His bark sailed over the Sunrise-sea. + + Long have I watched till my heart is cold; + In my breast it is heavy and cold as a stone. + No more shall Winona his face behold, + And the robin that sang in her heart is gone. + + Shall I sit at the feet of the treacherous brave? + On his hateful couch shall Winona lie? + Shall she kindle his fire like a coward slave? + No!--a warrior's daughter can bravely die. + + My Father's Spirit, look down, look down-- + From your hunting-grounds in the shining skies; + Behold, for the light in my heart is gone; + The light is gone and Winona dies." + +[Illustration: DOWN WHIRLING AND FLUTTERING SHE FELL, +AND HEADLONG PLUNGED INTO THE WATERS.] + +Swift the strong hunters climbed as she sang, + and the foremost of all was Tamdoka; +From crag to crag upward he sprang; + like a panther he leaped to the summit. +Too late!--on the brave as he crept + turned the maid in her scorn and defiance; +Then swift from the dizzy height leaped. + Like a brant arrow-pierced in mid-heaven. +Down whirling and fluttering she fell, + and headlong plunged into the waters. +Forever she sank mid the wail, + and the wild lamentation of women. +Her lone spirit evermore dwells + in the depths of the Lake of the Mountains, +And the lofty cliff evermore tells + to the years as they pass her sad story.[BW] + +In the silence of sorrow the night + o'er the earth spread her wide, sable pinions; +And the stars[18] hid their faces; and light + on the lake fell the tears of the spirits. +As her sad sisters watched on the shore + for her spirit to rise from the waters, +They heard the swift dip of an oar, + and a boat they beheld like a shadow, +Gliding down through the night in the gray, + gloaming mists on the face of the waters. +'Twas the bark of DuLuth on his way + from the Falls to the Games at _Keoza_. + +[BW] The Dakotas say that the spirit of Winona forever haunts the lake. +They say that it was many, many winters ago when Winona leaped from the +rock,--that the rock was then perpendicular to the water's edge and she +leaped into the lake, but now the rock has partly crumbled down and the +waters have also receded, so that they do not now reach, the foot of the +perpendicular rock as of old. + + + + +SPRING + +_Et nunc omnis ager, mine omms parturit arbos; +Nunc frondent sylvae, nunc formostssimus annus. +--Virgil._ + +Delightful harbinger of joys to come, + Of summer's verdure and a fruitful year, +Who bids thee o'er our northern snow-fields roam, + And make all gladness in thy bright career? +Lo from the Indian Isle thou dost appear, + And dost a thousand pleasures with thee bring: +But why to us art thou so ever dear? + Bearest thou the hope--upon thy radiant wing-- +Of Immortality, O soft, celestial Spring? + +Yea, buds and flowers that fade not, they are thine, + And youth-renewing balms; the sear and old +Are young and gladsome at thy touch divine. + Thou breath'st upon the frozen earth--behold, +Meadows and vales of grass and floral gold, + Green-covered hills and leafy mountains grand: +Young life leaps up where all was dumb and cold, + As smoldering embers into flame are fanned, +Or the dead came back to life at the touch of the Savior's hand. + +The snow-clouds fly the canopy of heaven; + The rivulets ripple with the merry tone +Of wanton waters, and the breezes given + To fan the budding hills are all thine own. +Returning songsters from the tropic zone + Their vernal love-songs in the tree tops sing, +And talk and twitter in a tongue unknown + Of joys that journey on thy golden wing, +And God who sends thee forth to wake the world, O Spring! + +[ILLUSTRATION: SPRING ADA MARY HUNTLY WILLIE] + + Emblem of youth--enchanting goddess, Spring; +Lo now the happy rustic wends his way + O'er meadows decked with violets from thy wing, +And laboring to the rhythm of song all day, + Performs the task the harvest shall repay + An hundredfold into the reaper's hand. +What recks the tiller of his toil in May? + What cares he if his cheeks are tinged and tanned +By thy warm sunshine-kiss and by thy breezes bland? + +Hark to the tinkling bells of grazing kine! + The lambkins bleating on the mountain-side! +The red squirrel chippering in the proud old pine! + The pigeon-cock cooing to his vernal bride! +O'er all the land and o'er the peaceful tide, + Singing and praising every living thing, +Till one sweet anthem, echoed far and wide, + Makes all the broad blue bent of ether ring +With welcomings to thee, God-given, supernal Spring. + + + + +TO MOLLIE + +O Mollie, I would I possessed such a heart; + It enchants me--so gentle and true; +I would I possessed all its magical art, + Then, Mollie, I would enchant you. + +Those dear, rosy lips--tho' I never caressed them(?)-- + Are as sweet as the wild honey-dew; +Your cheeks--all the angels in Heaven have blessed them, + But not one is as lovely as you. + +Then give me that heart,--O that innocent heart! + For mine own is cold and _perdu_; +It enchants me, but give me its magical art, + Then, Mollie, I will enchant you. + +1855. + + + + +TO SYLVA + +I know thou art true, and I know thou art fair + As the rose-bud that blooms in thy beautiful hair; +Thou art far, but I feel the warm throb of thy heart; + Thou art far, but I love thee wherever thou art. + +Wherever at noontide my spirit may be, + At evening it silently wanders to thee; +It seeks thee, my dear one, for comfort and rest, + As the weary-winged dove seeks at night-fall her nest. + +Through the battle of life--through its sorrow and care-- + Till the mortal sink down with its load of despair,-- +Till we meet at the feet of the Father and Son, + I'll love thee and cherish thee, beautiful one. + +1859. + + + + +THANKSGIVING. + +[Nov. 26, 1857, during the great financial depression.] + + +Father, our thanks are due to thee + For many a blessing given, +By thy paternal love and care, + From the bounty-horn of heaven. + +We know that still that horn is filled + With blessings for our race, +And we calmly look thro' winter's storm + To thy benignant face. + +Father, we raise our thanks to Thee,-- + Who seldom thanked before; +And seldom bent the stubborn knee + Thy goodness to adore: + +But Father, thou hast blessings poured + On all our wayward days +And now thy mercies manifold + Have filled our hearts with praise + +The winter-storm may rack and roar; + We do not fear its blast; +And we'll bear with faith and fortitude + The lot that thou hast cast. + +But Father,--Father,--O look down + On the poor and homeless head +And feed the hungry thousands + That cry to thee for bread. + +Thou givest us our daily bread; + We would not ask for more; +But, Father, give their daily bread + To the multitudes of poor. + +In all the cities of the land + The naked and hungry are; +O feed them with thy manna, Lord, + And clothe them with thy care. + +Thou dost not give a serpent, Lord, + We will not give a stone; +For the bread and meat thou givest us + Are not for us alone. + +And while a loaf is given to us + From thy all-bounteous horn +We'll cheerfully divide that loaf + With the hungry and forlorn. + + + + +CHARITY + +Frail are the best of us, brothers-- + God's charity cover us all-- +Yet we ask for perfection in others, + And scoff when they stumble and fall. +Shall we give him a fish--or a serpent-- + Who stretches his hand in his need? +Let the proud give a stone, but the manly + Will give him a hand full of bread. + +Let us search our own hearts and behavior + Ere we cast at a brother a stone, +And remember the words of the Savior + To the frail and unfortunate one; +Remember when others displease us + The Nazarene's holy command, +For the only word written by Jesus + Was charity--writ in the sand. + + + + +CHARITY + +[Written in a friend's book of autographs, 1876.] + +Bear and forbear, I counsel thee, + Forgive and be forgiven, +For Charity is the golden key + That opens the gate of heaven. + + + + +SAILOR-BOY'S SONG + +Away, away, o'er the bounding sea + My spirit flies like a gull; +For I know my Mary is watching for me, + And the moon is bright and full. + +She sits on the rock by the sounding shore, + And gazes over the sea; +And she sighs, "Will my sailor-boy come no more? + Will he never come back to me?" + +The moonbeams play in her raven hair; + And the soft breeze kisses her brow; +But if your sailor-boy, love, were there, + He would kiss your sweet lips I trow. + +And mother--she sits in the cottage-door; + But her heart is out on the sea; +And she sighs, "Will my sailor-boy come no more? + Will he never come back to me?" + +Ye winds that over the billows roam + With a low and sullen moan, +O swiftly come to waft me home; + O bear me back to my own. + +For long have I been on the billowy deep, + On the boundless waste of sea; +And while I sleep there are two who weep, + And watch and pray for me. + +When the mad storm roars till the stoutest fear + And the thunders roll over the sea, +I think of you, Mary and mother dear, + For I know you are thinking of me. + +Then blow, ye winds, for my swift return; + Let the tempest roar o'er the main; +Let the billows yearn and the lightning burn; + They will hasten me home again. + + + +MY DEAD + +Last night in my feverish dreams I heard +A voice like the moan of an autumn sea, +Or the low, sad wail of a widowed bird, +And it said--"My darling, come home to me." + +Then a hand was laid on my throbbing head-- +As cold as clay, but it soothed my pain: +I wakened and knew from among the dead +My darling stood by my coach again. + + + +DUST TO DUST + + Dust to dust: +Fall and perish love and lust: + Life is one brief autumn day; + Sin and sorrow haunt the way + To the narrow house of clay, +Clutching at the good and just: + Dust to dust. + +Dust to dust: +Still we strive and toil and trust, + From the cradle to the grave: + Vainly crying, "Jesus, save!" + Fall the coward and the brave, +Fall the felon and the just: + Dust to dust. + + Dust to dust: +Hark, I hear the wintry gust; + Yet the roses bloom to-day, + Blushing to the kiss of May, + While the north winds sigh and say: +"Lo we bring the cruel frost-- + Dust to dust." + + Dust to dust: +Yet we live and love and trust, + Lifting burning brow and eye + To the mountain peaks on high: + From the peaks the ages cry, +Strewing ashes, rime and rust: + "Dust to dust!" + + Dust to dust: +What is gained when all is lost? + Gaily for a day we tread-- + Proudly with averted head + O'er the ashes of the dead-- +Blind with pride and mad with lust: + Dust to dust. + + Hope and trust: +All life springs from out the dust: + Ah, we measure God by man, +Looking forward but a span + On His wondrous, boundless plan; +All His ways are wise and just; + Hope and trust. + + Hope and trust: +Hope will blossom from the dust; + Love is queen: God's throne is hers; + His great heart with loving force + Throbs throughout the universe; +We are His and He is just; + Hope and trust. + + + + +O LET ME DREAM THE DREAMS OF LONG AGO + +Call me not back, O cold and crafty world: +I scorn your thankless thanks and hollow praise. +Wiser than seer or scientist--content +To tread no paths beyond these bleating hills, +Here let me lie beneath this dear old elm, +Among the blossoms of the clover-fields, +And listen to the humming of the bees. +Here in those far-off, happy, boyhood years, +When all my world was bounded by these hills, +I dreamed my first dreams underneath this elm. +Dreamed? Aye, and builded castles in the clouds; +Dreamed, and made glad a fond, proud mother's heart, +Now moldering into clay on yonder hill; +Dreamed till my day-dreams paved the world with gold; +Dreamed till my mad dreams made one desolate; +Dreamed--O my soul, and was it all a dream? + +As I lay dreaming under this old elm, +Building my castles in the sunny clouds, +Her soft eyes peeping from the copse of pine, +Looked tenderly on me and my glad heart leaped +Following her footsteps. O the dream--the dream! +O fawn-eyed, lotus-lipped, white-bosomed Flore! +I hide my bronzed face in your golden hair: +Thou wilt not heed the dew-drops on my beard; +Thou wilt not heed the wrinkles on my brow; +Thou wilt not chide me for my long delay. + +Here we stood heart to heart and eye to eye, +And I looked down into her inmost soul, +The while she drank my promise like sweet wine +O let me dream the dreams of long ago! +Soft are the tender eyes of maiden love; +Sweet are the dew-drops of a dear girl's lips +When love's red roses blush in sudden bloom: +O let me dream the dreams of long ago! +Hum soft and low, O bee-bent clover-fields; +Blink, blue-eyed violets, from the dewy grass; +Break into bloom, my golden dandelions; +Break into bloom, my dear old apple-trees. +I hear the robins cherup on the hedge, +I hear the warbling of the meadow-larks; +I hear the silver-fluted whippowil; +I hear the harps that moan among the pines +Touched by the ghostly fingers of the dead. +Hush!--let me dream the dreams of long ago. + +And wherefore left I these fair, flowery fields, +Where her fond eyes and ever gladsome voice +Made all the year one joyous, warbling June, +To chase my castles in the passing clouds-- +False as the mirage of some Indian isle +To shipwrecked sailors famished on the brine? +Wherefore?--Look out upon the babbling world-- +Fools clamoring at the heels of clamorous fools! +I hungered for the sapless husks of fame. +Dreaming I saw, beyond my native hills, +The sunshine shimmer on the laurel trees. +Ah tenderly plead her fond eyes brimmed with tears; +But lightly laughing at her fears I turned, +Eager to clutch my crown of laurel leaves, +Strong-souled and bold to front all winds of heaven-- +A lamb and lion molded into one-- +And burst away to tread the hollow world. +Ah nut-brown boys that tend the lowing kine, +Ah blithesome plowmen whistling on the glebe, +Ah merry mowers singing in the swaths, +Sweet, simple souls, contented not to know, +Wiser are ye and ye may teach the wise. + +Years trode upon the heels of flying years, +And still my _Ignis Fatuus_ flew before; +On thorny paths my eager feet pursued, +Till she whose fond heart doted on my dreams +Passed painless to the pure eternal peace. +Years trode upon the heels of flying years +And touched my brown beard with their silver wands, +And still my _Ignis Fatuus_ flew before; +Through thorns and mire my torn feet followed still, +Till she, my darling, unforgotten Flore, +Nursing her one hope all those weary years +Waiting my tardy coming, drooped and died. +I hear her low, sweet voice among the pines: +O let me dream the dreams of long ago: +I see her fond eyes peeping from the pines: +O let me dream the dreams of long ago +And hide my bronzed face in her golden hair. + +Is this the Indian summer of my days-- +Wealth without care and love without desire? +O misty, cheerless moon of falling leaves! +Is this the fruitage promised by the spring? +O blighted clusters withering on the vine! +O promised lips of love to one who dreams +And wakens holding but the hollow air! + +Let me dream on lest, dead unto my dead, +False to the true and true unto the false, +Maddened by thoughts of that which might have been, +And weary of the chains of that which is, +I slake my heart-thirst at forbidden springs. +I hear the voices of the moaning pines; +I hear the low, hushed whispers of the dead, +And one wan face looks in upon my dreams +And wounds me with her sad, imploring eyes. + +The dead sun sinks beyond the misty hills; +The chill winds whistle in the leafless elms; +The cold rain patters on the fallen leaves. +Where pipes the silver-fluted whippowil? +I hear no hum of bees among the bloom; +I hear no robin cherup on the hedge: +One dumb, lone lark sits shivering in the rain. +I hear the voices of the Autumn wind; +I hear the cold rain dripping on the leaves; +I hear the moaning of the mournful pines; +I hear the hollow voices of the dead. +O let me dream the dreams of long ago +And dreaming pass into the dreamless sleep-- +Beyond the voices of the autumn winds, +Beyond the patter of the dreary rain, +Beyond compassion and all vain regret +Beyond all waking and all weariness: +O let me dream the dreams of long ago. + + + + +THE PIONEER + +[MINNESOTA--1860-1875] + +When Mollie and I were married from the dear old cottage-home, + In the vale between the hills of fir and pine, +I parted with a sigh in a stranger-land to roam, + And to seek a western home for me and mine. + +By a grove-encircled lake in the wild and prairied West, + As the sun was sinking down one summer day, +I laid my knapsack down and my weary limbs to rest, + And resolved to build a cottage-home and stay. + +I staked and marked my "corners," and I "filed" upon my claim, + And I built a cottage-home of "logs and shakes;" +And then I wrote a letter, and Mollie and baby came + Out to bless me and to bake my johnny-cakes. + +When Mollie saw my "cottage" and the way that I had "bached", + She smiled, but I could see that she was "blue;" +Then she found my "Sunday-clothes" all soiled and torn and patched, + And she hid her face and shed a tear or two. + +But she went to work in earnest and the cabin fairly shone, + And her dinners were so savory and so nice +That I felt it was "not good that the man should be alone"-- + Even in this lovely land of Paradise. + +Well, the neighbors they were few and were many miles apart, + And you couldn't hear the locomotive scream; +But I was young and hardy, and my Mollie gave me heart, + And my "steers" they made a fast and fancy team. + +And the way I broke the sod was a marvel, you can bet, + For I fed my "steers" before the dawn of day; +And when the sun went under I was plowing prairie yet, + Till my Mollie blew the old tin horn for tea. + +And the lazy, lousy "Injuns" came a-loafing round the lake, + And a-begging for a bone or bit of bread; +And the sneaking thieves would steal whatever they could take-- + From the very house where they were kindly fed. + +O the eastern preachers preach, and the long-haired poets sing + Of the "noble braves" and "dusky maidens fair;" +But if they had pioneered 'twould have been another thing + When the "Injuns" got a-hankering for their "hair." + +Often when we lay in bed in the middle of the night, + How the prairie-wolves would howl their jubilee! +Then Mollie she would waken in a shiver and a fright, + Clasp our baby-pet and snuggle up to me. + +There were hardships you may guess, and enough of weary toil + For the first few years, but then it was so grand +To see the corn and wheat waving o'er the virgin soil, + And two stout and loving hearts went hand in hand. + +But Mollie took the fever when our second babe was born, + And she lay upon the bed as white as snow; +And my idle cultivator lay a rusting in the corn; + And the doctor said poor Mollie she must go. + +Now I never prayed before, but I fell upon my knees, + And I prayed as never any preacher prayed; +And Mollie always said that it broke the fell disease; + And I truly think the Lord He sent us aid: + +For the fever it was broken, and she took a bit of food, + And O then I went upon my knees again; +And I never cried before,--and I never thought I could,-- + But my tears they fell upon her hand like rain. + +And I think the Lord has blessed us ever since I prayed the prayer, + For my crops have never wanted rain or dew: +And Mollie often said in the days of debt and care, + "Don't you worry, John, the Lord will help us through." + +For the "pesky," painted Sioux, in the fall of 'sixty-two, + Came a-whooping on their ponies o'er the plain, +And they killed my pigs and cattle, and I tell you it looked "blue," + When they danced around my blazing stacks of grain. + +And the settlers mostly fled, but I didn't have a chance, + So I caught my hunting-rifle long and true, +And Mollie poured the powder while I made the devils dance, + To a tune that made 'em jump and tumble, too. + +And they fired upon the cabin; 'twas as good as any fort, + But the "beauties" wouldn't give us any rest; +For they skulked and blazed away, and I didn't call it sport, + For I had to do my very "level best." + +Now they don't call _me_ a coward, but my Mollie she's a "brick;" + For she chucked the children down the cellar-way, +And she never flinched a hair tho' the bullets pattered thick, + And we held the "painted beauties" well at bay. + +But once when I was aiming, a bullet grazed my head, + And it cut the scalp and made the air look blue; +Then Mollie straightened up like a soldier and she said: + "Never mind it, John, the Lord will help us through." + +And you bet it raised my "grit," and I never flinched a bit, + And my nerves they got as strong as steel or brass; +And when I fired again I was sure that I had hit, + For I saw the skulking devil "claw the grass." + +Well, the fight was long and hot, and I got a charge of shot + In the shoulder, but it never broke a bone; +And I never stopped to think whether I was hit or not + Till we found our ammunition almost gone. + +But the "Rangers" came at last--just as we were out of lead,-- + And I thanked the Lord, and Mollie thanked Him, too; +Then she put her arms around my neck and sobbed and cried and said: + "Bless the Lord!--I knew that He would help us through." + +And yonder on the hooks hangs that same old trusty gun, + And above it--I am sorry they're so few-- +Hang the black and braided trophies[BX] yet that I and Mollie won + In that same old bloody battle with the Sioux. + +[BX] Scalp-locks. + +Fifteen years have rolled away since I laid my knapsack down, + And my prairie claim is now one field of grain; +And yonder down the lake loom the steeples of a town, + And my flocks are feeding out upon the plain. + +The old log-house is standing filled with bins of corn and wheat, + And the cars they whistle past our cottage-home; +But my span of spanking trotters they are "just about" as fleet, + And I wouldn't give my farm to rule in Rome. + +For Mollie and I are young yet, and monarchs, too, are we-- + Of a "section" just as good as lies out-doors; +And the children are so happy (and Mollie and I have three) + And we think that we can "lie upon our oars." + +[Illustration: THE PIONEER] + +So this summer we went back to the old home by the hill: + O the hills they were so rugged and so tall! +And the lofty pines were gone but the rocks were all there still, + And the valleys looked so crowded and so small; + +And the dear familiar faces that I longed so much to see, + Looked so strangely unfamiliar and so old, +That the land of hills and valleys was no more a home to me, + And the river seemed a rivulet as it rolled. + +So I gladly hastened back to the prairies of the West-- + To the boundless fields of waving grass and corn; +And I love the lake-gemmed land where the wild-goose builds her nest, + Far better than the land where I was born. + +And I mean to lay my bones over yonder by the lake-- + By and by when I have nothing else to do-- +And I'll give the "chicks" the farm, and I know for Mollie's sake, + That the good and gracious Lord will help 'em through. + + + + +NIGHT THOUGHTS + +"_Le notte e madre dipensien_." + +I tumble and toss on my pillow, + As a ship without rudder or spars +Is tumbled and tossed on the billow, + 'Neath the glint and the glory of stars. +'Tis midnight and moonlight, and slumber + Has hushed every heart but my own; +O why are these thoughts without number + Sent to me by the man in the moon? + +Thoughts of the Here and Hereafter,-- + Thoughts all unbidden to come,-- +Thoughts that are echoes of laughter-- + Thoughts that are ghosts from the tomb,-- +Thoughts that are sweet as wild honey,-- + Thoughts that are bitter as gall,-- +Thoughts to be coined into money,-- + Thoughts of no value at all. + +Dreams that are tangled like wild-wood, + A hint creeping in like a hare; +Visions of innocent childhood,-- + Glimpses of pleasure and care; +Brave thoughts that flash like a saber,-- + Cowards that crouch as they come,-- +Thoughts of sweet love and sweet labor + In the fields at the old cottage-home. + +Visions of maize and of meadow, + Songs of the birds and the brooks, +Glimpses of sunshine and shadow, + Of hills and the vine-covered nooks; +Dreams that were dreams of a lover,-- + A face like the blushing of morn,-- +Hum of bees and the sweet scent of clover + And a bare-headed girl in the corn. + +Hopes that went down in the battle, + Apples that crumbled to dust,-- +Manna for rogues, and the rattle + Of hail-storms that fall on the just. +The "shoddy" that lolls in her chariot,-- + Maud Muller at work in the grass: +Here a silver-bribed Judas Iscariot,-- + There--Leonidas dead in the pass. + +Commingled the good and the evil; + Sown together the wheat and the tares; +In the heart of the wheat is the weevil; + There is joy in the midst of our cares. +The past,--shall we stop to regret it? + What is,--shall we falter and fall? +If the envious wrong thee, forget it; + Let thy charity cover them all. + +The cock hails the morn, and the rumble + Of wheels is abroad in the streets, +Still I tumble and mumble and grumble + At the fleas in my ears and--the sheets; +Mumble and grumble and tumble + Till the buzz of the bees is no more; +In a jumble I mumble and drumble + And tumble off--into a snore. + + + + +DANIEL + +[Written at the grave of an old friend.] + +Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,--down into the darkness at last; +Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,--sleeping the dreamless sleep,-- +Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn--the pure and the perfect rest: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew? + +Joy was there in the spring-time and hope like a blossoming rose, +When the wine-blood of youth ran tingling and throbbing in every vein; +Chirrup of robin and blue-bird in the white-blossomed apple and pear; +Carpets of green on the meadows spangled with dandelions; +Lowing of kine in the valleys, bleating of lambs on the hills; +Babble of brooks and the prattle of fountains that flashed in the sun; +Glad, merry voices, ripples of laughter, snatches of music and song, +And blue-eyed girls in the gardens that blushed like the roses they wore. + +And life was a pleasure unvexed, unmingled with sorrow and pain? +A round of delight from the blink of morn + till the moon rose laughing at night? +Nay, there were cares and cankers--envy and hunger and hate; +Death and disease in the pith of the limbs, + in the root and the bud and the branch; +Dry-rot, alas, at the heart, and a canker-worm gnawing therein. + +The summer of life came on with its heat and its struggle and toil, +Sweat of the brow and the soul, throbbing of muscle and brain, +Toil and moil and grapple with Fortune clutched as she flew-- +Only a shred of her robe, and a brave heart baffled and bowed! +Stern-visaged Fate with a hand of iron uplifted to fell; +The secret stab of a friend that stung like the sting of an asp, +Wringing red drops from the soul and a stifled moan of despair; +The loose lips of gossip and then--a storm of slander and lies, +Till Justice was blind as a bat and deaf to the cries of the just, +And Mercy, wrapped up in her robe, stood by like a statue in stone. + +Sear autumn followed the summer with frost and the falling of leaves +And red-ripe apples that blushed on the hills in the orchard of peace: +Red-ripe apples, alas, with worms writhing down to the core, +Apples of ashes and fungus that fell into rot at a touch; +Clusters of grapes in the garden blighted and sour on the vines; +Wheat-fields that waved in the valley and promised a harvest of gold, +Thrashing but chaff and weevil or cockle and shriveled cheat. +Fair was the promise of spring-time; the harvest a harvest of lies: +Fair was the promise of summer with Fortune clutched by the robe; +Fair was the promise of autumn--a hollow harlot in red, +A withered rose at her girdle and the thorns of the rose in her hand. + +Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,--down into the darkness at last; +Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel, sleeping the dreamless sleep-- +Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn--the pure and the perfect rest: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew? +Dead Ashes, what do you care if it storm, if it shine, if it shower? +Hail-storm, tornado or tempest, or the blinding blizzard of snow, +Or the mid-May showers on the blossoms with the glad sun blinking between, +Dead Ashes, what do you care?--they break not the sleep of the dead. + +Proud stands the ship to the sea, fair breezes belly her sails; +Strong masted, stanch in her shrouds, stanch in her beams and her bones; +Bound for Hesperian isles--for the isles of the plantain and palm, +Hope walks her deck with a smile and Confidence stands at the helm; +Proudly she turns to the sea and walks like a queen on the waves. +Caught in the grasp of the tempest, lashed by the fiends of the storm, +Torn into shreds are her sails, tumbled her masts to the main; +Rudderless, rolling she drives and groans in the grasp of the sea; +Harbor or hope there is none; she goes to her grave in the brine: +Dead in the fathomless slime lie the bones of the ship and her crew. +Such was the promise of life; so is the promise fulfilled. + +Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,--down into the darkness at last; +Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,--sleeping the dreamless sleep,-- +Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn--the pure and the perfect rest: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better, if only the dead soul knew? +Over your grave the tempest may roar or the zephyr sigh; +Over your grave the blue-bells may blink or the snow-drifts whirl,-- +Dead Ashes, what do you care?--they break not the sleep of the dead. +They that were friends may mourn, they that were friends may praise; +They that knew you and yet--knew you never--may cavil and blame; +They that were foes in disguise may strike at you down in the grave; +Slander, the scavenger-buzzard--may vomit her lies on you there; +Dead Ashes, what do you care?--they break not the sleep of the dead. + +The hoarse, low voice of the years croaks on forever-and-aye: +_Change! Change! Change_! and the winters wax and wane. +The old oak dies in the forest; the acorn sprouts at its feet; +The sea gnaws on at the land; the continent crowds on the sea. +Bound to the Ixion wheel with brazen fetters of fate +Man rises up from the dust and falls to the dust again. +God washes our eyes with tears, and still they are blinded with dust: +We grope in the dark and marvel, and pray to the Power unknown-- +Crying for help to the desert: not even an echo replies. +Doomed unto death like the moon, like the midget that men call man, +Wrinkled with age and agony the old Earth rolls her rounds; +Shrinking and shuddering she rolls--an atom in God's great sea-- +Only an atom of dust in the infinite ocean of space. +What to him are the years who sleeps in her bosom there? +What to him is the cry wrung out of the souls of men? +_Change, Change, Change_, and the sea gnaws on at the land: +Dead Ashes, what do you care?--it breaks not the sleep of the dead. + +Down into the darkness at last, Daniel,--down into the darkness at last; +Laid in the lap of our Mother, Daniel,--sleeping the dreamless sleep,-- +Sleeping the sleep of the babe unborn--the pure and the perfect rest: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better if only the dead soul knew? + +Up--out of the darkness at last, Daniel,--out of the darkness at last; +Into the light of the life eternal--into the sunlight of God, +Singing the song of the soul immortal freed from the fetters of flesh: +Aye, and is it not better than this fitful fever and pain? +Aye, and is it not better than sleeping the dreamless sleep? +Hark! from the reel of the spheres eternal + the freed soul answereth "_Aye_." +Aye--Aye--Aye--it is better, brothers, + if it be but the dream of the famished soul. + + +MINNETONKA[BY] + +[BY] The Dakota name for this beautiful lake is _We-ne-a-tan-ka_--Broad +Water. By dropping the "a" before "tanka" we have changed the name to +_Big Water_. + + +I sit once more on breezy shore, at sunset in this glorious June, +I hear the dip of gleaming oar, I list the singers' merry tune. +Beneath my feet the waters beat, and ripple on the polished stones, +The squirrel chatters from his seat; the bag-pipe beetle hums and drones. +The pink and gold in blooming wold,--the green hills mirrored in the lake! +The deep, blue waters, zephyr-rolled, along the murmuring pebbles break. +The maples screen the ferns, and lean the leafy lindens o'er the deep; +The sapphire, set in emerald green, lies like an Orient gem asleep. +The crimson west glows + like the breast of _Rhuddin_[CA] when he pipes in May, +As downward droops the sun to rest, and shadows gather on the bay. +In amber sky the swallows fly and sail and circle o'er the deep; +The light-winged night-hawks whir and cry; the silver pike and salmon leap. +The rising moon, o'er isle and dune, looks laughing down on lake and lea; +Weird o'er the waters shrills the loon; the high stars twinkle in the sea. +From bank and hill the whippowil sends piping forth his flute-like notes, +And clear and shrill the answers trill from leafy isles and silver throats. +The twinkling light on cape and height; the hum of voices on the shores; +The merry laughter on the night; the dip and plash of frolic oars,-- +These tell the tale. On hill and dale the cities pour their gay and fair; +Along the sapphire lake they sail, and quaff like wine the balmy air. +'Tis well. Of yore from isle and shore + the smoke of Indian _teepees_[CB] rose; +The hunter plied the silent oar; the forest lay in still repose. +The moon-faced maid, in leafy glade, her warrior waited from the chase; +The nut-brown, naked children played, and chased the gopher on the grass. +The dappled fawn on wooded lawn, peeped out upon the birch canoe, +Swift-gliding in the gray of dawn along the silent waters blue. +In yonder tree the great Wanm-dee[CC] securely built her spacious nest; +The blast that swept the landlocked sea[CD] + but rocked her clamorous babes to rest. +By grassy mere the elk and deer gazed on the hunter as he came; +Nor fled with fear from bow or spear;-- + "so wild were they that they were tame." +Ah, birch canoe, and hunter, too, have long forsaken lake and shore; +He bade his fathers' bones adieu and turned away forevermore. +But still, methinks, on dusky brinks the spirit of the warrior moves; +At crystal springs the hunter drinks, and nightly haunts the spot he loves. +For oft at night I see the light of lodge-fires on the shadowy shores, +And hear the wail some maiden's sprite above her slaughtered warrior pours. +I hear the sob, on Spirit Knob,[BZ] of Indian mother o'er her child; +And on the midnight waters throb her low _yun-he-he's_[CE] weird and wild: +And sometimes, too, the light canoe glides like a shadow o'er the deep +At midnight when the moon is low, and all the shores are hushed in sleep. +Alas,--Alas!--for all things pass; and we shall vanish too, as they; +We build our monuments of brass, and granite, but they waste away. + +[BZ] Spirit-Knob was a small hill upon a point in the lake in full view +from Wayzata. It is now washed away by the waves. The spirit of a Dakota +mother, whose only child was drowned in the lake during a storm many +years ago, often wailed at midnight (so the Dakotas said), on this hill. +So they called it _Wa-na-gee Pa-zo-dan_--Spirit-Knob. (Literally--little +hill of the spirit.) + +[CA] The Welsh name for the robin. + +[Illustration: CRYSTAL BAY LAKE MINNETONKA] + +[CB] Lodges. + +[CC] Wanm-dee--the war-eagle of the Dakotas. + +[CD] Lake Superior. + +[CE] Pronounced _Yoon-hay-hay_--the exclamation used by Dakota women in +their lament for the dead, and equivalent to "woe-is-me." + + + +BEYOND + + +White-haired and hoary-bearded, who art thou +That speedest on, albeit bent with age, +Even as a youth that followeth after dreams? +Whence are thy feet, and whither trends thy way? + +Stayed not his hurried steps, but as he passed +His low, hoarse answer fell upon the wind: +"Go thou and question yonder mountain-peaks; +Go thou and ask the hoary-heaving main;-- +Nay, if thou wilt, the great, globed, silent stars +That sail innumerable the shoreless sea, +And let the eldest answer if he may. +Lo the unnumbered myriad, myriad worlds +Rolling around innumerable suns, +Through all the boundless, bottomless abyss, +Are but as grains of sand upwhirled and flung +By roaring winds and scattered on the sea. +I have beheld them and my hand hath sown. + +"Far-twinkling faint through dim, immeasured depths, +Behold Alcyone--a grander sun. +Round him thy solar orb with all his brood +Glimmering revolves. Lo from yon mightier sphere +Light, flying faster than the thoughts of men, +Swift as the lightnings cleave the glowering storm, +Shot on and on through dim, ethereal space, +Ere yet it touched thy little orb of Earth, +Five hundred cycles of thy world and more. +Round him thy Sun, obedient to his power, +Thrice tenfold swifter than the swiftest wing, +His aeon-orbit, million-yeared and vast, +Wheels through the void. Him flaming I beheld +When first he flashed from out his central fire-- +A mightier orb beyond thine utmost ken. +Round upon round innumerable hath swung +Thy sun upon his circuit; grander still +His vaster orbit far Alcyone +Wheels and obeys the mightier orb unseen. + +"Seest thou yon star-paved pathway like an arch +Athwart thy welkin?--wondrous zone of stars, +Dim in the distance circling one huge sun, +To whom thy sun is but a spark of fire-- +To whom thine Earth is but a grain of dust: +Glimmering around him myriad suns revolve +And worlds innumerable as sea-beach sands. +Ere on yon _Via Lactea_ rolled one star +Lo I was there and trode the mighty round; +Yea, ere the central orb was fired and hung +A lamp to light the chaos. Star on star, +System on system, myriad worlds on worlds, +Beyond the utmost reach of mortal ken, +Beyond the utmost flight of mortal dream, +Yet have mine eyes beheld the birth of all. +But whence I am I know not. We are three-- +Known, yet unknown--unfathomable to man, +Time, Space, and Matter pregnant with all life, +Immortals older than the oldest orb. +We were and are forever: out of us +Are all things--suns and satellites, midge and man. +Worlds wax and wane, suns flame and glow and die; +Through shoreless space their scattered ashes float, +Unite, cohere, and wax to worlds again, +Changing, yet changless--new, but ever old-- +No atom lost and not one atom gained, +Though fire to vapor melt the adamant, +Or feldspar fall in drops of summer rain. +And in the atoms sleep the germs of life, +Myriad and multiform and marvelous, +Throughout all vast, immeasurable space, +In every grain of dust, in every drop +Of water, waiting but the thermal touch. +Yea, in the womb of nature slumber still +Wonders undreamed and forms beyond compare, +Minds that will cleave the chaos and unwind +The web of fate, and from the atom trace +The worlds, the suns, the universal law: +And from the law, the Master; yea, and read +On yon grand starry scroll the Master's will." + +Yea, but what Master? Lift the veil, O Time! +Where lie the bounds of Space and whither dwells +The Power unseen--the infinite Unknown? +Faint from afar the solemn answer fell: + +"AEon on aeon, cycles myriad-yeared, +Swifter than light out-flashing from the suns, +My flying feet have sought the bounds of space +And found not, nor the infinite Unknown. +I see the Master only in his work: +I see the Ruler only in his law: +Time hath not touched the great All-father's throne, +Whose voice unheard the Universe obeys, +Who breathes upon the deep and worlds are born. +Worlds wax and wane, suns crumble into dust, +But matter pregnant with immortal life, +Since erst the white-haired centuries wheeled the vast, +Hath lost nor gained. Who made it, and who made +The Maker? Out of nothing, nothing. Lo +The worm that crawls from out the sun-touched sand, +What knows he of the huge, round, rolling Earth? +Yet more than thou of all the vast Beyond, +Or ever wilt. Content thee; let it be: +Know only this--there is a Power unknown-- +Master of life and Maker of the worlds." + + + +LINES + +On the death of Captain Hiram A. Coats, my old schoolmate and friend. + +Dead? or is it a dream-- +Only the voice of a dream? +Dead in the prime of his years, +And laid in the lap of the dust; +Only a handful of ashes +Moldering down into dust. + +Strong and manly was he, +Strong and tender and true; +Proud in the prime of his years; +Strong in the strength of the just: +A heart that was half a lion's, +And half the heart of a girl; +Tender to all that was tender, +And true to all that was true; +Bold in the battle of life, +And bold on the bloody field; +First at the call of his country, +First in the front of the foe. +Hope of the years was his-- +The golden and garnered sheaves; +Fair on the hills of autumn +Reddened the apples of peace. + +Dead? or is it a dream? +Dead in the prime of his years, +And laid in the lap of the dust. + +Aye, it _is_ but a dream; +For the life of man is a dream: +Dead in the prime of his years +And laid in the lap of the dust; +Only a handful of ashes +Moldering down into dust. + +Only a handful of ashes +Moldering down into dust? +Aye, but what of the breath +Blown out of the bosom of God? +What of the spirit that breathed +And burned in the temple of clay? +Dust unto dust returns; +The dew-drop returns to the sea; +The flash from the flint and the steel +Returns to its source in the sun. +Change cometh forever-and-aye, +But forever nothing is lost-- +The dew-drop that sinks in the sand, +Nor the sunbeam that falls in the sea. +Ah, life is only a link +In the endless chain of change. +Death giveth the dust to the dust +And the soul to the infinite soul: +For aye since the morning of man-- + +Since the human rose up from the brute-- +Hath Hope, like a beacon of light, +Like a star in the rift of the storm, +Been writ by the finger of God +On the longing hearts of men. +O follow no goblin fear; +O cringe to no cruel creed; +Nor chase the shadow of doubt +Till the brain runs mad with despair. +Stretch forth thy hand, O man, +To the winds and the quaking earth-- +To the heaving and falling sea-- +To the ultimate stars and feel +The throb of the spirit of God-- +The pulse of the Universe. + + +MAULEY + +THE BRAVE FERRY-MAN + +[NOTE.--The great Sioux massacre in Minnesota commenced at the Agency +village, on the Minnesota River, early in the morning of the 16th day of +August, 1862, precipitated, doubtless, by the murders at Acton on the +day previous. The massacre and the Indian war that followed developed +many brave men, but no truer hero than Mauley, an obscure Frenchman, the +ferry-man at the Agency. Continually under fire, he resolutely ran his +ferry-boat back and forth across the river, affording the +terror-stricken people the only chance for escape. He was shot down on +his boat just as he had landed on the opposite shore the last of those +who fled from the burning village to the ferry-landing. The Indians +disemboweled his dead body, cut off the head, hands and feet and thrust +them into the cavity. See _Heard's Hist. Sioux War_, p 67.] + + +Crouching in the early morning, +Came the swarth and naked "Sioux;"[CF] +On the village, without warning, +Fell the sudden, savage blow. +Horrid yell and crack of rifle +Mingle as the flames arise;-- +With the tomahawk they stifle +Mothers' wails and children's cries. +Men and women to the ferry +Fly from many a blazing cot;-- +Brave and ready--grim and steady, +Mauley mans the ferry-boat. + +Can they cross the ambushed river? +'Tis for life the only chance; +Only this may some deliver +From the scalping-knife and lance. +Through the throng of wailing women +Frantic men in terror burst;-- +"Back, ye cowards!" thundered Mauley,-- +"I will take the women first!" +Then with brawny arms and lever +Back the craven men he smote. +Brave and ready--grim and steady, +Mauley mans the ferry-boat. + +To and fro across the river +Plies the little mercy-craft, +While from ambushed gun and quiver +On it falls the fatal shaft. +Trembling from the burning village, +Still the terror-stricken fly, +For the Indians' love of pillage +Stays the bloody tragedy. +At the windlass-bar bare-headed-- +Bare his brawny arms and throat-- +Brave and ready--grim and steady, +Mauley mans the ferry-boat. + +Hark!--a sudden burst of war-whoops! +They are bent on murder now; +Down the ferry-road they rally, +Led by furious Little Crow. +Frantic mothers clasp their children, +And the help of God implore; +Frantic men leap in the river +Ere the boat can reach the shore. +Mauley helps the weak and wounded +Till the last soul is afloat;-- +Brave and ready--grim and steady, +Mauley mans the ferry-boat. + +Speed the craft!--The fierce Dakotas +Whoop and hasten to the shore, +And a shower of shot and arrows +On the crowded boat they pour. +Fast it floats across the river, +Managed by the master hand, +Laden with a freight so precious,-- +God be thanked!--it reaches land. +Where is Mauley--grim and steady, +Shall his brave deed be forgot? +Grasping still the windlass-lever, +Dead he lies upon the boat. + +[CF] Pronounced Soo; a name given to the Dakotas in early days by the +French traders. + +[Illustration: MAULEY THE BRAVE FERRY-MAN] + + + + +MEN + +Man is a creature of a thousand whims; +The slave of hope and fear and circumstance. +Through toil and martyrdom a million years +Struggling and groping upward from the brute, +And ever dragging still the brutish chains, +And ever slipping backward to the brute. +Shall he not break the galling, brazen bonds +That bind him writhing on the wheel of fate? +Long ages groveling with his brother brutes, +He plucked the tree of knowledge and uprose +And walked erect--a god; but died the death: +For knowledge brings but sadness and unrest +Forever, insatiate longing and regret. +Behold the brute's unerring instinct guides +True as the pole-star, while man's reason leads +How oft to quicksands and the hidden reefs! +Contented brute, his daily wants how few! +And these by Nature's mother-hand supplied. +Man's wants unnumbered and unsatisfied, +And multiplied at every onward step-- +Insatiate as the cavernous maw of time. +His real wants how simple and how few! +Behold the kine in yonder pasture-field +Cropping the clover, or in rest reclined, +Chewing meek-eyed the cud of sweet content. +Ambition plagues them not, nor hope, nor fear; +No demons fright them and no cruel creeds; +No pangs of disappointment or remorse. +See man the picture of perpetual want, +The prototype of all disquietude; +Full of trouble, yet ever seeking more; +Between the upper and the nether stone +Ground and forever in the mill of fate. +Nature and art combine to clothe his form, +To feed his fancy and to fill his maw; +And yet the more they give the more he craves. +Give him the gold of Ophir, still he delves; +Give him the land, and he demands the sea; +Give him the earth--he reaches for the stars. +Doomed by his fate to scorn the good he has +And grasp at fancied good beyond his reach, +He seeks for silver in the distant hills +While in the sand gold glitters at his feet. + +O man, thy wisdom is but folly still; +Wiser the brute and full of sweet content. +The wit and wisdom of five thousand years--What +are they but the husks we feed upon, +While beast and bird devour the golden grain? +Lo for the brutes dame Nature sows and tills; +For them the Tuba-tree of Paradise +Bends with its bounties free and manifold; +For them the fabled fountain Salsabil, +Gushes pure wine that sparkles as it runs, +And fair Al Cawthar flows with creamy milk. +But man, forever doomed to toil and sweat, +Digs the hard earth and casts his seeds therein, +And hopes the harvest;--how oft he hopes in vain! +Weeds choke, winds blast, and myriad pests devour, +The hot sun withers and the floods destroy. +Unceasing labor, vigilance and care +Reward him here and there with bounteous store. +Had man the blessed wisdom of content, +Happy were he--as wise Horatius sung-- +To whom God gives enough with sparing hand. +Of all the crops by sighing mortals sown, +And watered with man's sweat and woman's tears, +There is but only one that never fails +In drouth or flood, on fat or flinty soil, +On Nilus' banks or Scandia's stony hills-- +The plenteous, never-stinted crop of fools. +So hath it been since erst aspiring man +Broke from the brute and plucked the fatal tree, +And will be till eternity grows gray. + +Princes and parasites comprise mankind: +To one wise prince a million parasites; +The most uncommon thing is common-sense; +A truly wise man is a freak of nature. +The herd are parasites of parasites +That blindly follow priest or demagogue, +Himself blind leader of the blind. The wise +Weigh words, but by the yard fools measure them. +The wise beginneth at the end; the fool +Ends at the beginning, or begins anew: +Aye, every ditch is full of after-wit. +Folly sows broad cast; Wisdom gathers in, +And so the wise man fattens on the fool, +And from the follies of the foolish learns +Wisdom to guide himself and bridle them. +"To-morrow I made my fortune," cries the fool, +"To-day I'll spend it." Thus will Folly eat +His chicken ere the hen hath laid the egg. +So Folly blossoms with promises all the year-- +Promises that bud and blossom but to blast. +"All men are fools," said Socrates, the wise, +And in the broader sense I grant it true, +For even Socrates had his Xanthipp'. +Whose head is wise oft hath a foolish heart; +The wisest has more follies than he needs; +Wisdom and madness, too, are near akin. +The marrow-maddening canker-worm of love +Feeds on the brains of wise men as on fools'. + +The wise man gathers wisdom from all men +As bees their honey hive from plant and weed. +Yea, from the varied history of the world, +From the experience of all times, all men, +The wise man learneth wisdom. Folly learns +From his own bruises if he learns at all. +The fool--born wise--what need hath he to learn? +He needs but gabble wisdom to the world: +Grill him on a gridiron and he gabbles still. + +Wise men there are--wise in the eyes of men-- +Who cram their hollow heads with ancient wit +Cackled in Carthage, babbled in Babylon, +Gabbled in Greece and riddled in old Rome, +And never coin a farthing of their own. +Wise men there are--for owls are counted wise-- +Who love to leave the lamp-lit paths behind, +And chase the shapeless shadow of a doubt. +Too wise to learn, too wise to see the truth, +E'en though it glow and sparkle like a gem +On God's outstretched forefinger for all time. +These have one argument, and only one, +For good or evil, earth or jeweled heaven-- +The olden, owlish argument of doubt. +Ah, he alone is wise who ever stands +Armed _cap-a-pie_ with God's eternal truth. +Where _Grex_ is _Rex_ God help the hapless land. +The yelping curs that bay the rising moon +Are not more clamorous, and the fitful winds +Not more inconstant. List the croaking frogs +That raise their heads in fen or stagnant pool, +Shouting at eve their wisdom from the mud. +Beside the braying, bleating, bellowing mob, +Their jarring discords are sweet harmony. +The headless herd are but a noise of wind; +Sometimes, alas, the wild tornado's roar. +As full of freaks as curs are full of fleas, +Like gnats they swarm, like flies they buzz and breed. +Thought works in silence: Wisdom stops to think. +No ass so obstinate as ignorance. +Oft as they seize the ship of state, behold-- +Overboard goes all ballast and they crowd +To blast or breeze or hurricane full sail, +Each dunce a pilot and a captain too. +How often cross-eyed Justice hits amiss! +Doomed by Athenian mobs to banishment, +See Aristides leave the land he saved: +Wisdom his fault and justice his offense. +See Caesar crowned a god and Tully slain; +See Paris red with riot and noble blood, +A king beheaded and a monster throned,-- +King Drone, flat fool that weather-cocked all winds, +Gulped gall and vinegar and smacked it wine, +Wig-wagged his way from gilded _Oeil de Boeuf_ +Through mob and maelstrom to the guillotine. +Chateaus up-blazing torch the doom of France, +While human wolves howl ruin round their walls. +Contention hisses from a million mouths, +And from ten thousand muttering craters smokes +The smell of sulphur. Gaul becomes a ghoul; +While _Parlez-Tous_ in hot palaver holds +Hubbub _ad_ Bedlam--Pandemonium thriced. +There, voices drowning voice with frantic cries, +Discord demented flaps her ruffled wings +And shrieks delirium to her screeching brood. +Sneer-lipped, hawk-eyed, wolf-tongued oraculars-- +Wise-wigs, Girondins, frothing Jacobins-- +Reason to madness run, tongues venom-tanged-- +Howl chaos all with one united throat. +Maelstrom of madness, lazar-howled, hag-shrilled! +Quack quackles quack; all doctors disagree, +While Doctor Guillotine's huge scalpel heads +Hell-dogs beheading helpless innocents. +The very babes bark rabies. Journalism, +Moon-mad, green-eyed, hound-scented, _lupus_-tongued +On howls the pack and smells her bread in blood. + +_O Tempus ferax insanorum, Heu!_ +Physicked with metaphysics, pamphleteered +Into paroxysms, bruited into brutes. +And metamorphosed into murder, lo +Men lapse to savagery and turn to beasts. +Hell-broth hag-boiled: a mad Theroigne is queen-- +Mounts to the brazen throne of Harlotdom, +Queen of the cursed, and flares her cannon-torch. +Watch-wolves, lean-jawed, fore-smelling feast of blood, +In packs on Paris howl from farthest France. +Discord demented bursts the bounds of _Dis_; +Mad Murder raves and Horror holds her hell. +Hades up-heaves her whelps. In human forms +Up-flare the Furies, serpent-haired and grin +Horrid with bloody jaws. Scaled reptiles crawl +From slum and sewer, slimy, coil on coil-- +Danton, dark beast, that builded for himself +A monument of quicksand limed with blood; +Horse-leech Marat, blear-eyed, vile vulture born; +Fair Charlotte's dagger robbed the guillotine! +Black-biled, green-visaged, traitorous Robespierre, +That buzzard-beaked, hawk-taloned octopus +Who played with pale poltroonery of men, +And drank the cup of flattery till he reeled; +Hell's pope uncrowned, immortal for a day. +Tinville, relentless dog of murder-plot-- +Doom-judge whose trembling victims were foredoomed; +Maillard who sucked his milk from Murder's dugs, +Twin-whelp to Theroigne, captain of the hags; +Jourdan, red-grizzled mule-son blotched with blood, +Headsman forever "famous-infamous;" +Keen, hag-whelped journalist Camille Desmoulins, +Who with a hundred other of his ilk +Hissed on the hounds and smeared his bread with blood; +Lebon, man-fiend, that vampire-ghoul who drank +Hot blood of headless victims, and compelled +Mothers to view the murder of their babes; +At whose red guillotine, in Arras raised, +The pipe and fiddle played at every fall +Of ghastly head the ribald "_Ca Ira_;" +And fiends unnamed and nameless brutes untaled. + +Petticoat-patriots _sans bas_, and _Sans-culottes_, +Rampant in rags and hunger-toothed uproar +Paris the proud. With Jacobin clubs they club +The head of France till all her brains are out. +Hired murder hunts in packs. Men murder-mad +Slay for the love of murder. Gloomy night, +Hiding her stars lest they in pity fall, +Beholds a thousand guiltless, trembling souls-- +Men, women, children--forth from prisons flung +In flare of torch and glare of demon eyes, +Among the howling wolves and lazar-hags, +Crying for mercy where no mercy is, +Hewed down in heaps by bloody ax and pike. +From their grim battlements the imps of hell +Indignant hissed and damped their fires with tears; +And Manhood from the watch-towers of the world +Cried in the name of Human Nature--"Hold!" +As well the drifting snail might strive to still +The volcan-heaved, storm-struck, moon-maddened sea. +Blood-frenzied beasts demand their feast of blood. +_"Liberty--Equality--Fraternity!"_--the cry +Of blood-hounds baying on the track of babes. +Queen innocent beheaded--mother-queen! +And queenly Roland--Nature's queenly queen! +Aye, at the foot of bloody guillotine +She stood a heroine: before her loomed +The Goddess of Liberty--in statue-stone. +Queen Roland saw, and spake the words that ring +Along the centuries--_"O Liberty! +What crimes are committed in thy name!"_--and died. +And when the headsman raised her severed head +To hell-dogs shouting _"Vive la Liberte,"_ +Godlike disdain still sparkled in her eyes. +Grim Hell herself in pity stood aghast, +Clanged shut her doors and stopped her ears with pitch. + +See the wise ruler--father of Brazil, +Who struck the shackles from a million slaves, +Whose reign was peace and love and gentleness, +Despoiled and driven from the land he loves. +See jealous Labor strike the hand that feeds, +And burn the mills that grind his daily bread; +Yea, in blind rage denounce the very laws +That shield his home from Europe's pauperdom. +See the grieved farmer raise his horny hand +And splutter garlic. Hear the demagogues +Fist-maul the wind and weather-cock the crowd, +With brazen foreheads full of empty noise +Out-bellowing the bulls of Bashan; and behold +Shrill, wrinkled Amazons in high harangue +Stamp their flat feet and gnash their toothless gums, +And flaunt their petticoat-flag of "Liberty." +Hear the old bandogs of the Daily Press, +Chained to their party posts, or fetter-free +And running amuck against old party creeds, +On-howl their packs and glory in the fight. +See mangy curs, whose editorial ears +Prick to all winds to catch the popular breeze, +Slang-whanging yelp, and froth and snap and snarl, +And sniff the gutters for their daily food. +And these--are they our prophets and our priests? +Hurra!--Hurra!--Hurra!--for "Liberty!" +Flaunt the red flag and flutter the petticoat; +Ran-tan the drums and let the bugles bray, +The eagle scream and sixty million throats +Sing Yankee-doodle--Yankee-doodle-doo. + +The state is sick and every fool a quack +Running with pills and plasters and sure-cures, +And every pill and package labelled _Ism_. +See Liberty run mad, and Anarchy, +Bearing the torch, the dagger and the bomb +Red-mouthed run riot in her sacred name +Hear mobs of idlers cry--_"Equality! +Let all men share alike: divide, divide!"_ +Butting their heads against the granite rocks +Of Nature and the eternal laws of God. +Pull down the toiler, lift the idler up! +Despoil the frugal, crown the negligent! +Offer rewards to idleness and crime! +And pay a premium for improvidence! +Fools, can your wolfish cries repeal the laws +Of God engraven on the granite hills, +Written in every Wrinkle of the earth, +On every plain, on every mountain-top,-- +Nay, blazened o'er all the boundless Universe +On every jewel that sparkles on God's throne? +And can ye rectify God's mighty plan? +O pygmies, can ye measure God himself? +Aye, would ye measure God's almighty power, +Go--crack Earth's bones and heave the granite hills; +Measure the ocean in a drinking-cup; +Measure Eternity by the town-clock; +Nay, with a yard-stick measure the Universe: +Measure for measure. Measure God by man! +"Fools to the midmost marrow of your bones!" +O buzzing flies and gnats! Ye cannot strike +One little atom from God's Universe, +Or warp the laws of Nature by a hair! + +His loving eye sees through all evil good. +Man's life is but a breath; but lo with Him +To-day, to-morrow, yesterday, are one +One in the cycle of eternal time +That hath beginning none, nor any end. +The Earth revolving round her sire, the Sun, +Measures the flying year of mortal man, +But who shall measure God's eternal year? +The unbegotten, everlasting God; +Unmade, eternal, all-pervading power; +Center and source of all things, high and low, +Maker and master of the Universe-- +Ah, nay, the mighty Universe itself! +All things in nature bear God's signature +So plainly writ that he who runs may read. +We know not what life is; how may we know +Death--what it is, or what may lie beyond? +Whoso forgets his God forgets himself. + +Let me not blindly judge my brother man: +There is but one just judge; there is but one +Who knows the hearts of men. Him let us praise-- +Not with blind prayer, or idle, sounding psalms-- +But let us daily in our daily works, +Praise God by righteous deeds and brother-love. +Go forth into the forest and observe-- +For men believe their eyes and doubt their ears-- +The creeping vine, the shrub, the lowly bush, +The dwarfed and stunted trees, the bent and bowed, +And here and there a lordly oak or elm, +And o'er them all a tall and princely pine. +All struggle upward, but the many fail; +The low dwarfed by the shadows of the great, +The stronger basking in the genial sun. +Observe the myriad fishes of the seas-- +The mammoths and the minnows of the deep. +Behold the eagle and the little wren, +The condor on his cliff, the pigeon-hawk, +The teal, the coot, the broad-winged albatross. +Turn to the beasts in forest and in field-- +The lion, the lynx, the mammoth and the mouse, +The sheep, the goat, the bullock and the horse, +The fierce gorillas and the chattering apes-- +Progenitors and prototypes of man. +Not only differences in genera find, +But grades in every kind and every class. + +I would not doom to serfdom or to toil +One race, one caste, one class, or any man: +Give every honest man an honest chance; +Protect alike the rich man and the poor; +Let not the toiler live upon a crust +While Croesus' bread is buttered on both sides. + +O people's king and shepherd, throned Law, +Strike down the monsters of Monopoly. +Lift up thy club, O mighty Hercules! +Behold thy "Labors" yet unfinished are: +Tear off thy Nessus shirt and bare thine arms. +The Numean lion fattens on our flocks; +The Lernean Hydra coils around our farms, +Our towns, our mills, our mines, our factories; +The triple monster Geryon lives again, +Grown quadruple, and over all our plains +And thousand hills his fattening oxen feed. +Stymphalean buzzards ravage round our fields; +The Augean stables reeking stench the land; +The hundred-headed monster Cerberus, +That throttled Greece and ravaged hapless France, +Hath broke from hell and howls for human blood. +Lift up thy knotted club, O Hercules! +Strike swift and sure: crush down the Hydra's heads; +Throttle the Numean lion: strike! nor spare +The monster Geryon or the buzzard-beaks. +Clean the Augean stables if thou can'st; +But hurl the hundred-headed monster down +Headlong to Hades: chain him; make thee sure +He shall not burst the bonds of hell again. + +To you, O chosen makers of the laws, +The nation looks--and shall it look in vain? +Will ye sit idle, or in idle wind +Blow out your zeal, and crack your party whips, +Or drivel dotage, while the crisis cries-- +While all around the dark horizon loom +Clouds thunder-capped that bode a hurricane? +Sleep ye as slept the "Notables" of France, +While under them an hundred AEtnas hissed +And spluttered sulphur, gathering for the shock? +Be ye our Hercules--and Lynceus-eyed: +Still ye the storm or ere the storm begin-- +Ere "Liberty" take Justice by the throat, +And run moon-mad a Malay murder-muck, +Throttle the "Trusts", and crush the coils combined +That crack our bones and fatten on our fields. +Strike down the hissing heads of Anarchy: +Strike swift and hard, nor parley with the fiend +Mothered of hell and father of all fiends-- +Fell monster with an hundred bloody mouths, +And every mouth an hundred hissing tongues, +And every tongue drips venom from his fangs. + +Protect the toiling millions by just laws; +Let honest labor find its sure reward; +Let willing hands find work and honest bread. +So frame the laws that every honest man +May find his home protected and his craft. +Let Liberty and Order walk hand in hand +With Justice: happy Trio! let them rule. +Put up the bars: bar out the pauper swarms +Alike from Asia's huts and Europe's hives. +Let charity begin at home. In vain +Will we bar out the swarms from Europe's hives +And Asia's countless lepers, if our ports +Are free to all the products of their hands. +Put up the bars: bar out the pauper hordes; +Bar out their products that compete with ours: +Give honest toil at home an honest chance: +Build up our own and keep our coin at home. +In vain our mines pour forth their wealth of gold +And silver, if by every ship it sail +For London, Paris, Birmingham or Berlin. + +We have been prodigal. The days are past +When virgin acres wanted willing hands, +When fertile empires lay in wilderness +Waiting the teeming millions of the world. +Lo where the Indian and the bison roamed--Lords +of the prairies boundless as the sea--But +twenty years ago, behold the change! +Homesteads and hamlets, flocks and lowing herds, +Railways and cities, miles of rustling corn, +And leagues on leagues of waving fields of gold. + +Let wise men teach and honest men proclaim +The mutual dependence of the rich and poor; +For if the wealthy profit by the poor, +The poor man profits ever by the rich. +Wealth builds our churches and our colleges; +Wealth builds the mills that grind the million's bread; +Wealth builds the factories that clothe the poor; +Wealth builds the railways and the million ride. +God hath so willed the toiling millions reap +The golden harvest that the rich have sown. +Six feet of earth make all men even; lo +The toilers are the rich man's heirs at last. +But there be men would grumble at their lot, +Even if it were a corner-lot on Broadway. +We stand upon the shoulders of the past. +Who knoweth not the past how may he know +The folly or the wisdom of to-day? +For by comparison we weigh the good, +And by comparison all evil weigh. +"What can we reason, but from what we know?" +Let honest men look back an hundred years-- +Nay, fifty, and behold the wondrous change. +Where wooden tubs like sluggards sailed the sea, +Steam-ships of steel like greyhounds course the main; +Where lumbering coach and wain and wagon toiled +Through mud and mire and rut and rugged way, +The cushioned train a mile a minute flies. +Then by slow coach the message went and came, +But now by lightning bridled to man's use +We flash our silent thoughts from sea to sea; +Nay, under ocean's depths from shore to shore; +And talk by telephone to distant ears. +The dreams of yesterday are deeds to-day. +Our frugal mothers spun with tedious toil, +And wove the homespun cloth for all their fold; +Their needles plied by weary fingers sewed. +Behold, the humming factory spins and weaves, +The singing "Singer" sews with lightning speed. +Our fathers sowed their little fields by hand, +And reaped with bended sickles and bent backs; +By hand they bound the sheaves of wheat and rye; +With flails they threshed and winnowed in the wind. +Now by machines we sow and reap and bind; +By steam we thresh and sack the bounteous grain. +These are but few of all the million ways +Whereby man's toil is lightened and he hath gained +Tenfold in comfort, luxury and ease. +For these and more the millions that enjoy +May thank the wise and wealthy few who gave. +If the rich are richer the poor are richer too. +A narrow demagogue I count the man +Who cries to-day--_"Progress and Poverty"_; +As if a thousand added comforts made +The poor man poorer and his lot the worse. +'Tis but a new toot on the same old horn +That brayed in ancient Greece and Babylon, +And now amid the ruined walls of Rome +Lies buried fathoms deep in dead men's dust. + +_"Progress and Poverty!"_ Man, hast thou traced +The blood that throbs commingled in thy veins? +Over thy shoulder hast thou cast a glance +On thine old Celtic-Saxon-Norman sires-- +Huddled in squalid huts on beds of straw? +Barefooted churls swine-herding in the fens, +Bare-legged cowherds in their cow-skin coats, +Wearing the collars of their Thane or Eorl, +His serfs, his slaves, even as thy dog is thine; +Harried by hunger, pillaged, ravaged, slain, +By Viking robbers and the warring Jarls; +Oft glad like hunted swine to fill their maws +With herbs and acorns. _"Progress and Poverty!"_ +The humblest laborer in our mills or mines +Is royal Thane beside those slavish churls; +The frugal farmer in our land to-day +Lives better than their kings--himself a king. + +Lo every age refutes old errors still, +And still begets new errors for the next; +But all the creeds of politics or priests +Can't make one error truth, one truth a lie. +There is no religion higher than the truth; +Men make the creeds, but God ordains the law. + + +Above all cant, all arguments of men, +Above all superstitions, old or new, +Above all creeds of every age and clime, +Stands the eternal truth--the creed of creeds. + +Sweet is the lute to him who hath not heard +The prattle of his children at his knees: +Ah, he is rich indeed whose humble home +Contains a frugal wife and sweet content. + + + + +HELOISE + +I saw a light on yester-night-- + A low light on the misty lea; +The stars were dim and silence grim + Sat brooding on the sullen sea. + +From out the silence came a voice-- + A voice that thrilled me through and through, +And said, "Alas, is this your choice? + For he is false and I was true." + +And in my ears the passing years + Will sadly whisper words of rue: +Forget--and yet--can I forget + That one was false and one was true? + + + + +CHANGE + +Change is the order of the universe. +Worlds wax and wane; suns die and stars are born. +Two atoms of cosmic dust unite, cohere-- +And lo the building of a world begun. +On all things--high or low, or great or small-- +Earth, ocean, mountain, mammoth, midge and man, +On mind and matter--lo perpetual change-- +God's fiat--stamped! The very bones of man +Change as he grows from infancy to age. +His loves, his hates, his tastes, his fancies, change. +His blood and brawn demand a change of food; +His mind as well: the sweetest harp of heaven +Were hateful if it played the selfsame tune +Forever, and the fairest flower that gems +The garden, if it bloomed throughout the year, +Would blush unsought. The most delicious fruits +Pall on our palate if we taste too oft, +And Hyblan honey turns to bitter gall. +Perpetual winter is a reign of gloom; +Perpetual summer hardly pleases more. +Behold the Esquimau--the Hottentot: +This doomed to regions of perpetual ice, +And that to constant summer's heat and glow: +Inferior both, both gloomy and unblessed. +The home of happiness and plenty lies +Where autumn follows summer and the breath +Of spring melts into rills the winter's snows. +How gladly, after summer's blazing suns, +We hail the autumn frosts and autumn fruits: +How blithesome seems the fall of feathery snow +When winter comes with merry clang of bells: +And after winter's reign of ice and storm +How glad we hail the robins of the spring. +For God hath planted in the hearts of men +The love of change, and sown the seeds of change +In earth and air and sea and shoreless space. +Day follows night and night the dying day, +And every day--and every hour--is change; +From when on dewy hills the rising dawn +Sprinkles her mists of silver in the east, +Till in the west the golden dust up-wheels +Behind the chariot of the setting sun; +From when above the hills the evening star +Sparkles a diamond 'mong the grains of gold, +Until her last faint flicker on the sea. +The voices of the hoar and hurrying years +Cry from the silence--"Change!--perpetual Change!" +Man's heart responding throbs--"Perpetual Change," +And grinds like a mill-stone: wanting grists of change +It grinds and grinds upon its troubled self. + +Behold the flowers that spring and bloom and fade. +Behold the blooming maid: the song of larks +Is in her warbling throat; the blue of heaven +Is in her eyes; her loosened tresses fall +A shower of gold on shoulders tinged with rose; +Her form a seraph's and her gladsome face +A benediction. Lo beneath her feet +The loving crocus bursts in sudden bloom. +Fawn-eyed and full of gentleness she moves-- +A sunbeam on the lawn. The hearts of men +Follow her footsteps. He whose sinewy arms +Might burst through bars of steel like bands of straw, +Caught in the net of her unloosened hair, +A helpless prisoner lies and loves his chains. +Blow, ye soft winds, from sandal-shaded isle, +And bring the _mogra's_ breath and orange-bloom. + +Fly, fleet-winged doves, to Ponce de Leon's spring, +And in your bills bring her the pearls of youth; +For lo the fingers of relentless Time +Weave threads of silver in among the gold, +And seam her face with pain and carking care, +Till, bent and bowed, the shriveled hands of Death +Reach from the welcome grave and draw her in. + + + + +FIDO + +Hark, the storm is raging high; + Beat the breakers on the coast, +And the wintry waters cry + Like the wailing of a ghost. + +On the rugged coast of Maine + Stands the frugal farmer's cot: +What if drive the sleet and rain? + John and Hannah heed it not. + +On the hills the mad winds roar, + And the tall pines toss and groan; +Round the headland--down the shore-- + Stormy spirits shriek and moan. + +Inky darkness wraps the sky; + Not a glimpse of moon or star; +And the stormy-petrels cry + Out along the harbor-bar. + +Seated by their blazing hearth-- + John and Hannah--snug and warm-- +What if darkness wrap the earth? + Drive the sleet and howl the storm! + +Let the stormy-petrels fly! + Let the moaning breakers beat! +Hark! I hear an infant cry + And the patter of baby-feet: + +And Hannah listened as she spoke, + But only heard the driving rain, +As on the cottage-roof it broke + And pattered on the window-pane. + +And she sat knitting by the fire + While pussy frolicked at her feet; +And ever roared the tempest higher, + And ever harder the hailstones beat. + +"Hark! the cry--it comes again!" + "Nay, it is the winds that wail, +And the patter on the pane + Of the driving sleet and hail" + +Replied the farmer as he piled + The crackling hemlock on the coals, +And lit his corn-cob pipe and smiled + The smile of sweet contented souls. + +Aye, let the storm rave o'er the earth; + Their kine are snug in barn and byre; +The apples sputter on the hearth, + The cider simmers on the fire. + +But once again at midnight high, + She heard in dreams, through wind and sleet, +An infant moan, an infant cry, + And the patter of baby-feet. + +Half-waking from her dreams she turned + And heard the driving wind and rain; +Still on the hearth the fagots burned, + And hail beat on the window-pane. + +John rose as wont, at dawn of day; + The earth was white with frozen sleet; +And lo his faithful Fido lay + Dead on the door-stone at his feet. + + + + +THE REIGN OF REASON + +The day of truth is dawning. I behold +O'er darksome hills the trailing robes of gold +And silent footsteps of the gladsome dawn. +The morning breaks by sages long foretold; +Truth comes to set upon the world her throne. +Men lift their foreheads to the rising sun, +And lo the reign of Reason is begun. +Fantastic phantasms fly before the light-- +Pale, gibbering ghosts and ghouls and goblin fears: +Man who hath walked in sleep--what thousands years? +Groping among the shadows of the night, +Moon-struck and in a weird somnambulism, +Mumbling some cunning cant or catechism, +Thrilled by the electric magic of the skies-- +Sun-touched by Truth--awakes and rubs his eyes. + +Old Superstition, mother of cruel creeds, +O'er all the earth hath sown her dragon-teeth. +Lo centuries on centuries the seeds +Grew rank, and from them all the haggard breeds +Of Hate and Fear and Hell and cruel Death. +And still her sunken eyes glare on mankind; +Her livid lips grin horrible; her hands, +Shriveled to bone and sinew, clutch all lands +And with blind fear lead on or drive the blind. +Ah ignorance and fear go hand in hand, +Twin-born, and broadcast scatter hate and thorns, +They people earth with ghosts and hell with horns, +And sear the eyes of truth with burning brand. + +Behold, the serried ranks of Truth advance, +And stubborn Science shakes her shining lance +Full in the face of stolid Ignorance. +But Superstition is a monster still-- +An Hydra we may scotch but hardly kill; +For if with sword of Truth we lop a head, +How soon another groweth in its stead! +All men are slaves. Yea, some are slave to wine +And some to women, some to shining gold, +But all to habit and to customs old. +Around our stunted souls old tenets twine +And it is hard to straighten in the oak +The crook that in the sapling had its start: +The callous neck is glad to wear the yoke; +Nor reason rules the head, but aye the heart: +The head is weak, the throbbing heart is strong; +But where the heart is right the head is not far wrong. + +Men have been learning error age on age, +And superstition is their heritage +Bequeathed from age to age and sire to son +Since the dim history of the world begun. +Trust paves the way for treachery to tread; +Under the cloak of virtue vices creep; +Fools chew the chaff while cunning eats the bread, +And wolves become the shepherds of the sheep. +The mindless herd are but the cunning's tools; +For ages have the learned of the schools +Furnished pack-saddles for the backs of fools. +Pale Superstition loves the gloom of night; +Truth, like a diamond, ever loves the light. +But still 'twere wrong to speak but in abuse, +For priests and popes have had, and have, their use. +Yea, Superstition since the world began +Hath been an instrument to govern man: +For men were brutes, and brutal fear was given +To chain the brute till Reason came from heaven. +Aye, men were beasts for lo how many ages! +And only fear held them in chains and cages. + +Wise men were priests, and gladly I accord +They were the priests and prophets of the Lord; +For love was lust and o'er all earth's arena +Hell-fire alone could tame the wild hyena. +All history is the register, we find, +Of the crimes and lusts and sufferings of mankind; +And there are still dark lands where it is well +That Superstition wear the horns of hell, +And hold her torches o'er the brutal head, +And fright the beast with fire and goblin dread +Till Reason come the darkness to dispel. + +How hard it is for mortals to unlearn +Beliefs bred in the marrow of their bones! +How hard it is for mortals to discern +The truth that preaches from the silent stones, +The silent hills, the silent universe, +While Error cries in sanctimonious tones +That all the light of life and God is hers! +Lo in the midst we stand: we cannot see +Either the dark beginning or the end, +Or where our tottering footsteps turn or trend +In the vast orbit of Eternity. +Let Reason be our light--the only light +That God hath given unto benighted man, +Wherewith to see a glimpse of his vast plan +And stars of hope that glimmer on our night. +Lo all-pervading Unity is His; +Lo all-pervading Unity is He: +One mighty heart throbs in the earth and sea, +In every star through heaven's immensity, +And God in all things breathes, in all things is. +God's perfect order rules the vast expanse, +And Love is queen and all the realms are hers; +But strike one planet from the Universe +And all is chaos and unbridled chance. + +And is there life beyond this life below? +Aye, is death death?--or but a happy change +From night to light--on angel wings to range, +And sing the songs of seraphs as we go? +Alas, the more we know the less we know we know. + +God hath laid down the limits we cannot pass; +And it is well he giveth us no glass +Wherewith to see beyond the present glance, +Else we might die a thousand deaths perchance +Before we lay our bones beneath the grass. +What is the soul, and whither will it fly? +We only know that matter cannot die, +But lives and lived through all eternity, +And ever turns from hoary age to youth. +And is the soul not worthier than the dust? +So in His providence we put our trust; +And so we humbly hope, for God is just-- +Father all-wise, unmoved by wrath or ruth: +What then is certain--what eternal? Truth, +Almighty God, Time, Space and Cosmic Dust. + + + + +LOVE WILL FIND + + +Seek ye the fairest lily of the field, + The fairest lotus that in lakelet lies, +The fairest rose that ever morn revealed, +And Love will find--from other eyes concealed-- + A fairer flower in some fair woman's eyes. + +List ye the lark that warbles to the morn, + The sweetest note that linnet ever sung, +Or trembling lute in tune with silver horn, +And Love will list--and laugh your lute to scorn-- + A sweeter lute in some fair woman's tongue. + +Seek ye the dewy perfume seaward blown + From flowering orange-groves to passing ships; +Nay, sip the nectared dew of Helicon, +And Love will find--and claim it all his own-- + A sweeter dew on some fair woman's lips. + +Seek ye a couch of softest eider-down, + The silken floss that baby birdling warms, +Or shaded moss with blushing roses strown, +And Love will find--when they are all alone-- + A softer couch in some fair woman's arms. + + + + +AN OLD ENGLISH OAK + + +Silence is the voice of mighty things. +In silence dropped the acorn in the rain; +In silence slept till sun-touched. Wondrous life +Peeped from the mold and oped its eyes on morn. +Up-grew in silence through a thousand years +The Titan-armed, gnarl-jointed, rugged oak, +Rock-rooted. Through his beard and shaggy locks +Soft breezes sung and tempests roared: the rain +A thousand summers trickled down his beard; +A thousand winters whitened on his head; +Yet spake he not. He, from his coigne of hills, +Beheld the rise and fall of empire, saw +The pageantry and perjury of kings, +The feudal barons and the slavish churls, +The peace of peasants; heard the merry song +Of mowers singing to the swing of scythes, +The solemn-voiced, low-wailing funeral dirge +Winding slow-paced with death to humble graves; +And heard the requiem sung for coffined kings. +Saw castles rise and castles crumble down, +Abbeys up-loom and clang their solemn bells, +And heard the owl hoot ruin on their walls: +Beheld a score of battle fields corpse-strewn-- +Blood-fertiled with ten thousand flattered fools +Who, but to please the vanity of one, +Marched on hurrahing to the doom of death-- +And spake not, neither sighed nor made a moan. +Saw from the blood of heroes roses spring, +And where the clangor of steel-sinewed War +Roared o'er embattled rage, heard gentle Peace +To bleating hills and vales of rustling gold +Flute her glad notes from morn till even-tide. +Grim with the grime of a thousand years he stood-- +Grand in his silence, mighty in his years. +Under his shade the maid and lover wooed; +Under his arms their children's children played +And lambkins gamboled; at his feet by night +The heart-sick wanderer laid him down and died, +And he looked on in silence. + +Silent hours +In ghostly pantomime on tip-toe tripped +The stately minuet of the passing years, +Until the horologe of Time struck _One_. +Black Thunder growled and from his throne of gloom +Fire-flashed the night with hissing bolt, and lo, +Heart-split, the giant of a thousand years +Uttered one voice and like a Titan fell, +Crashing one hammer-clang, and passed away. + + + + +THE LEGEND OF THE FALLS[CG] + +[CG] _An-pe-tu Sa-pa_--Clouded Day--was the name of the Dakota mother +who committed suicide, as related in this legend, by plunging over the +Falls of St. Anthony. Schoolcraft calls her "_Ampata Sapa_." _Ampata_ is +not Dakota. There are several versions of this legend, all agreeing in +the main points. + +[Read at the Celebration of the Old Settlers of Hennepin County, at the +Academy of Music, Minneapolis, July 4, 1879.] + +[_The Numerals refer to Notes in Appendix._] + + +On the Spirit-Island [CH] sitting under midnight's misty moon, +Lo I see the spirits flitting o'er the waters one by one! +Slumber wraps the silent city, and the droning mills are dumb; +One lone whippowil's shrill ditty calls her mate that ne'er will come. +Sadly moans the mighty river, foaming down the fettered falls, +Where of old he thundered ever o'er abrupt and lofty walls. +Great _Unktehee_--god of waters--lifts no more his mighty head; +Fled he with the timid otters?--lies he in the cavern dead? +Hark!--the waters hush their sighing and the whippowil her call, +Through the moon-lit mists are flying dusky shadows silent all. +Lo from out the waters foaming--from the cavern deep and dread-- +Through the glamour and the gloaming comes a spirit of the dead. +Sad she seems; her tresses raven on her tawny shoulders rest; +Sorrow on her brow is graven, in her arms a babe is pressed. +Hark!--she chants the solemn story--sings the legend sad and old, +And the river wrapt in glory listens while the tale is told. +Would you hear the legend olden hearken while I tell the tale-- +Shorn, alas, of many a golden, weird Dakota chant and wail. + +[CH] The small island of rock a few rods below the Falls, was called by +the Dakotas _Wanagee We-ta_--Spirit-Island. They say the spirit of +_Anpetu Sapa_ sits upon that island at night and pours forth her sorrow +in song. They also say that from time out of mind, war-eagles nested on +that island, until the advent of white men frightened them away. This +seems to be true. See _Carver's Travels_ (London, 1778), p. 71. + + + + +THE LEGEND + + +Tall was young Wanata, stronger than _Heyoka's_ [16] giant form,-- +Laughed at flood and fire and hunger, faced the fiercest winter storm. +When _Wakinyan_ [32] flashed and thundered, when Unktehee raved and roared, +All but brave _Wanata_ wondered, and the gods with fear implored. +When the war-whoop shrill resounded, calling friends to meet the foe, +From the _teepee_ swift he bounded, armed with polished lance and bow. +In the battle's din and clangor fast his fatal arrows flew, +Flashed his fiery eyes with anger,--many a stealthy foe he slew. +Hunter swift was he and cunning, caught the beaver, slew the bear, +Overtook the roebuck running, dragged the panther from his lair. +Loved was he by many a maiden; many a dark eye glanced in vain; +Many a heart with sighs was laden for the love it could not gain. +So they called the brave "_Ska Capa_;"[CI] but the fairest of the band-- +Moon-faced, meek Anpetu-Sapa--won the hunter's heart and hand. + +[CI] Or _Capa Ska_--White beaver. White beavers are very rare, very +cunning and hard to catch. + +From the wars with triumph burning, from the chase of bison fleet, +To his lodge the brave returning, spread his trophies at her feet. +Love and joy sat in the _teepee_; him a black-eyed boy she bore; +But alas, she lived to weep a love she lost forevermore. +For the warriors chose Wanata first _Itancan_[CJ] of the band. +At the council-fire he sat a leader brave, a chieftain grand. +Proud was fair Anpetu-Sapa, and her eyes were glad with joy; +Proud was she and very happy with her warrior and her boy. +But alas, the fatal honor that her brave Wanata won, +Brought a bitter woe upon her,--hid with clouds the summer sun. +For among the brave Dakotas wives bring honor to the chief. +On the vine-clad Minnesota's banks he met the Scarlet Leaf. + +[CJ] _E-tan-can_--Chief. + +Young and fair was Ape-duta[CK]--full of craft and very fair; +Proud she walked a queen of beauty with her dark, abundant hair. +In her net of hair she caught him--caught Wanata with her wiles; +All in vain his wife besought him--begged in vain his wonted smiles. +Ape-duta ruled the _teepee_--all Wanata's smiles were hers; +When the lodge was wrapped in sleep a star[CL] beheld the mother's tears. +Long she strove to do her duty for the black-eyed babe she bore; +But the proud, imperious beauty made her sad forevermore. +Still she dressed the skins of beaver, bore the burdens, spread the fare; +Patient ever, murmuring never, though her cheeks were creased with care. +In the moon _Maga-o kada_, [71] twice an hundred years ago-- +Ere the "Black Robe's"[CM] sacred shadow + stalked the prairies' pathless snow-- +Down the swollen, rushing river, in the sunset's golden hues, +From the hunt of bear and beaver came the band in swift canoes. +On the queen of fairy islands, on the _Wita Waste's_ [CN] shore +Camped Wanata, on the highlands just above the cataract's roar. +Many braves were with Wanata; Ape-duta, too, was there, +And the sad Anpetu-sapa spread the lodge with wonted care. +Then above the leafless prairie leaped the fat-faced, laughing moon, +And the stars--the spirits fairy--walked the welkin one by one. +Swift and silent in the gloaming on the waste of waters blue, +Speeding downward to the foaming, shot Wanata's birch canoe. +In it stood Anpetu-sapa--in her arms her sleeping child; +Like a wailing Norse-land _drapa_ [CO] rose her death-song weird and wild: + +[CK] _A-pe_--leaf,--_duta_--Scarlet,--Scarlet leaf + +[CL] Stars, the Dakotas say, are the faces of the departed watching over +their friends and relatives on earth. + +[CM] The Dakotas called the Jesuit priests "Black Robes," from the color +of their vestments. + +[CN] _Wee-tah Wah-stay_--Beautiful Island,--the Dakota name for Nicollet +Island, just above the Falls. + +[CO] _Drapa_, a Norse funeral wail in which the virtues of the deceased +are recounted. + +[Illustration: ANPETU-SAPA] + + _Mihihna_,[CP] _Mihihna_, my heart is stone; + The light is gone from my longing eyes; + The wounded loon in the lake alone + Her death-song sings to the moon and dies. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, the path is long, + The burden is heavy and hard to bear; + I sink--I die, and my dying song + Is a song of joy to the false one's ear. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, my young heart flew + Far away with my brave to the bison-chase; + To the battle it went with my warrior true, + And never returned till I saw his face. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, my brave was glad + When he came from the chase of the roebuck fleet; + Sweet were the words that my hunter said + As his trophies he laid at Anpetu's feet. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, the boy I bore-- + When the robin sang and my brave was true, + I can bear to look on his face no more, + For he looks, _Mihihna_, so much like you. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, the Scarlet Leaf + Has robbed my boy of his father's love; + He sleeps in my arms--he will find no grief + In the star-lit lodge in the land above. + + _Mihihna, Mihihna_, my heart is stone; + The light is gone from my longing eyes; + The wounded loon in the lake alone + Her death-song sings to the moon and dies. + +[CP] _Mee-heen-yah_--My husband. + +Swiftly down the turbid torrent, as she sung her song she flew; +Like a swan upon the current, dancing rode the light canoe. +Hunters hurry in the gloaming; all in vain Wanata calls; +Singing through the surges foaming, lo she plunges o'er the Falls. + +Long they searched the sullen river--searched for leagues along the shore, +Bark or babe or mother never saw the sad Dakotas more; +But at night or misty morning oft the hunters heard her song, +Oft the maidens heard her warning in their mellow mother-tongue. +On the bluffs they sat enchanted till the blush of beamy dawn; +Spirit Isle, they say, is haunted, and they call the spot Wakan[CQ] +Many summers on the highland in the full moon's golden glow-- +In the woods on Fairy Island,[CR] walked a snow-white fawn and doe-- +Spirits of the babe and mother sadly seeking evermore +For a father's love another turned away with evil power. + +Sometimes still when moonbeams shimmer through the maples on the lawn, +In the gloaming and the glimmer walk the silent doe and fawn; +And on Spirit Isle or near it, under midnight's misty moon, +Oft is seen the mother's spirit, oft is heard her mournful tune. + +[CQ] Pronounced Walk-on,--Sacred, inhabited by a spirit. + +[CR] Fairy Island,--_Wita-Waste_--Nicollet Island. + + + + +CHICKADEE + + +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee! +That was the song that he sang to me--Sang +from his perch in the willow tree-- +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + My little brown bird, + The song that I heard +Was a happier song than the minstrels sing-- +A paean of joy and a carol of spring; +And my heart leaped throbbing and sang with thee +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + + My birdie looked wise + With his little black eyes, +As he peeked and peered from his perch at me +With a throbbing throat and a flutter of glee, + As if he would say-- + Sing trouble away, +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + + Only one note + From his silver throat; + Only one word + From my wise little bird; +But a sweeter note or a wiser word +From the tongue of mortal I never have heard, +Than my little philosopher sang to me +From his bending perch in the willow tree-- +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + + Come foul or fair, + Come trouble and care-- + No--never a sigh + Or a thought of despair! +For my little bird sings in my heart to me, +As he sang from his perch in the willow tree-- +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee dee: +Chickadee-dee, chickadee-dee; +Chickadee, chickadee, chickadee-dee. + + + + +ANTHEM + +[APRIL, 1861.] + + +Spirit of Liberty, + Wake in the Land! +Sons of our Forefathers, + Raise the strong hand! +Burn in each heart anew + Liberty's fires; +Wave the old Flag again, + Flag of our sires; +Glow all thy stars again, + Banner of Light! +Wave o'er us forever, + Emblem of might; +God for our Banner! + God for the Right! + +Minions of Tyranny, + Tremble and kneel! +The sons of the Pilgrims +Are sharpening their steel. +Pledge for our Land again + Honor and life; +Wave the old Flag again; + On to the strife! +Shades of our Forefathers, + Witness our fright! +Wave o'er us forever, + Emblem of might; +God for our Banner! + God for our Right! + + + + +HURRAH FOR THE VOLUNTEERS + +[May, 1861.] + + +Come then, brave men, from the Land of Lakes + With steady steps and cheers; +Our country calls, as the battle breaks, + On the Northwest Pioneers. +Let the eagle scream, and the bayonet gleam! + Hurrah for the Volunteers! + + + + +CHARGE OF "THE BLACK-HORSE" + +[First battle of Bull Run.] + + +Our columns are broken, defeated, and fled; +We are gathered, a few from the flying and dead, +Where the green flag is up and our wounded remain +Imploring for water and groaning in pain. +Lo the blood-spattered bosom, the shot-shattered limb, +The hand-clutch of fear as the vision grows dim, +The half-uttered prayer and the blood-fettered breath, +The cold marble brow and the calm face of death. +O proud were these forms at the dawning of morn, +When they sprang to the call of the shrill bugle-horn: +There are mothers and wives that await them afar; +God help them!--Is this then the glory of war? +But hark!--hear the cries from the field of despair; +"The Black-Horse" are charging the fugitives there; +They gallop the field o'er the dying and dead, +And their blades with the blood of their victims are red. +The cries of the fallen and flying are vain; +They saber the wounded and trample the slain; +And the plumes of the riders wave red in the sun, +As they stoop for the stroke and the murder goes on. +They halt for a moment--they form and they stand; +Then with sabers aloft they ride down on our band +Like the samiel that sweeps o'er Arabia's sand. +"Halt!--down with your sabers!--the dying are here! +Let the foeman respect while the friend sheds a tear." +Nay; the merciless butchers were thirsting for blood, +And mad for the murder still onward they rode. +"_Stand firm and be ready_!"--Our brave, gallant few +Have faced to the foe, and our rifles are true; +Fire!--a score of grim riders go down in a breath +At the flash of our guns--in the tempest of death! +They wheel, and they clutch in despair at the mane! +They reel in their saddles and fall to the plain! + +The riderless steeds, wild with wounds and with fear, +Dash away o'er the field in unbridled career; +Their stirrups swing loose and their manes are all gore +From the mad cavaliers that shall ride them no more. +Of the hundred so bold that rode down on us there +But few rode away with the tale of despair; +Their proud, plumed comrades so reckless, alas, +Slept their long, dreamless sleep on the blood-spattered grass. + + + + +ONLY A PRIVATE KILLED + +[The soldier was Louis Mitchell, of Co. 1, 1st Minn. Vols., killed in a +skirmish, near Ball's Bluff, October 22, 1861.] + + +"We've had a brush," the Captain said, + "And Rebel blood we've spilled; +We came off victors with the loss + Of only a _private_ killed." +"Ah," said the orderly--"it was hot,"-- + Then he breathed a heavy breath-- +"Poor fellow!--he was badly shot, + Then bayoneted to death." + +And now was hushed the martial din; + The saucy foe had fled; +They brought the private's body in; + I went to see the dead; +For I could not think our Rebel foes-- + So valiant in the van-- +So boastful of their chivalry-- + Could kill a wounded man. + +A musket ball had pierced his thigh-- + A frightful, crushing wound-- +And then with savage bayonets + They pinned him to the ground. +One deadly thrust drove through the heart, + Another through the head; +Three times they stabbed his pulseless breast + When he lay cold and dead. + +His hair was matted with his gore, + His hands were clinched with might, +As if he still his musket bore + So firmly in the fight. +He had grasped the foemen's bayonets + Their murderous thrusts to fend: +They raised the coat-cape from his face, + And lo--it was my friend! + +Think what a shudder chilled my heart! + 'Twas but the day before +We laughed together merrily, + As we talked of days of yore. +"How happy we shall be," he said, + "When the war is o'er, and when +With victory's song and victory's tread + We all march home again." + +Ah little he dreamed--that soldier brave + So near his journey's goal-- +How soon a heavenly messenger + Would claim his Christian soul. +But he fell like a hero--fighting, + And hearts with grief are filled; +And honor is his,--tho' the Captain says + "Only a _private_ killed." + +I knew him well,--he was my friend; + He loved our land and laws, +And he fell a blessed martyr + To our Country's holy cause; +And I know a cottage in the West + Where eyes with tears are filled +As they read the careless telegram-- + "Only a _private_ killed." + +Comrades, bury him under the oak, + Wrapped in his army-blue; +He is done with the battle's din and smoke, + With drill and the proud review. +And the time will come ere long, perchance, + When our blood will thus be spilled, +And what care we if the Captain say-- + "Only a _private_ killed." + +For the glorious Old Flag beckons. + We have pledged her heart and hand, +And we'll brave even death to rescue + Our dear old Fatherland. +We ask not praise--nor honors, + Then--as each grave is filled-- +What care we if the Captain say-- + "Only a _private_ killed." + + + + +DO THEY THINK OF US? + +[October, 1861, after the Battle of Ball's Bluff.] + + +Do they think of us, say--in the far distant West-- +On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest? +On the long dusty march when the suntide is hot, +O say, are their sons and their brothers forgot? +Are our names on their lips, is our comfort their care +When they kneel to the God of our fathers in prayer? +When at night on their warm, downy pillows they lie, +Wrapped in comfort and ease, do they think of us, say? +When the rain patters down on the roof overhead, +Do they think of the camps without shelter or bed? +Ah many a night on the cold ground we've lain-- +Chilled, chilled to the heart by the merciless rain, +And yet there stole o'er us the peace of the blest, +For our spirits went back to our homes in the West. +O we think of them, and it sharpens our steel, +When the battle-smoke rolls and the grim cannon peal, +When forward we rush at the shrill bugle's call +To the hail-storm of conflict where many must fall. + +When night settles down on the slaughter-piled plain, +And the dead are at rest and the wounded in pain, +Do they think of us, say, in the far distant West-- +On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest? +Aye, comrades, we know that our darlings are there +With their hearts full of hope and their souls full of prayer, +And it steadies our rifles--it steels every breast-- +The thought of our loved ones at home in the West-- +On the Prairies of Peace, in the Valleys of Rest. + + + + +CHARGE OF FREMONT'S BODY-GUARD + + +On they ride--on they ride-- +Only three hundred,-- +Ride the brave Body-Guard, +From the "Prairie Scouts" sundered: +Two thousand riflemen, +Ambushed on either side, +The signal of slaughter bide: +Ho! has the farmer-guide +Led them astray and lied? +How can they pass the wood? +On they ride--on they ride-- + Fearlessly, readily, + Silently, steadily +Ride the brave Body-Guard + Led by Zagonyi. + +Up leap the Southrons there; +Loud breaks the battle-blare; +Now swings his hat in air; +Flashes his saber bare: +"_Draw sabers;--follow me_!" +Shouts the brave Captain: +"_Union and Liberty_!" +Thunders the Captain. +Three hundred sabers flash; +Three hundred Guardsmen dash +On to the fierce attack; +Into the _cul-de-sac_ + Plunge the Three Hundred. +Yell the mad ambushed pack-- +Two thousand rifles crack + At the Three Hundred. + +Dire is the death they deal, +Gleams the steel--volleys peal-- +Horses plunge--riders reel; +Sabers and bayonets clash; +Guns in their faces flash; +Blue coats are spattered red-- +Fifty brave Guards are dead-- +Zagonyi is still ahead, +Swinging his hat in air, + Flashing his saber: +"Steady men;--steady there; + Forward--Battalion!" + +On they plunge--on they dash +Thro' the dread gantlet; +Death gurgles in the gash +Of furious-dealt saber-slash; +Over them the volleys crash +Thro' the trees like a whirlwind. +They pass through the fire of death; +Pant riders and steeds for breath; + "_Halt!_" cried the Captain +Then he looked up the hill; +There on the summit still + The "Third Company" paltered. +Right through the fire of hell, +Where fifty brave Guardsmen fell, +Zagonyi had ridden well; +Foley had faltered. + +Flashed like a flame of fire-- +Flashed with a menace dire-- +Flashed with a yell of ire + The sword of the Captain. +Kennedy saw the flash, +And ordered the "Third" to dash + Gallantly forward: +"Come on, Boys, for Liberty! +Forward, and follow me! + Remember Kentucky!" +Into the hell they broke-- +Into the fire and smoke-- +Dealing swift saber-stroke-- + The gallant Kentuckians. + Horses plunge, + Riders lunge + Heavily forward; +Over the fallen they ride +Down to Zagonyi's side, +Mowing a swath of death +Either side,--right and left + Piling the slaughtered! + +Under the storm of lead, +Still hissing overhead, +They re-formed the battle-line; +Then the brave Captain said: +"Guardsmen: avenge our dead! +_Charge_!"--Up the hill they go,-- +Right into the swarming foe! +Woe to the foemen--woe! +See mad Zagonyi there; +Streams on the wind his hair, +Flashes his saber bare; + On they go--on they go; + Volleys flash, + Sabers clash, +On they plunge, on they dash, +Following Zagonyi + Into the hell again. + +Hand to hand fight and die + Infantry, cavalry; +Grappled and mixed they lie-- + Infantry, cavalry: +Hurra!--the Rebels fly! +Bravo!--Three Hundred! +"Forward and follow me!" + Shouted the Captain; +"Union and Liberty!" + All the Guards thundered. +With mad hearts and sabers stout +Into the Rebel-rout + Gallop the Guardsmen, +Thundering their cry again, +Cleaving their foes in twain, +Piling the heaps of slain + Sabered and sundered. +Three hundred foes they slayed, +Glorious the charge they made, +Victorious the charge they made-- + The gallant Three Hundred! +Let the Crown-Poet paid +Sing of the "Light Brigade" +And "The wild charge they made" + When "Some one had blundered;" +Following the British Bard, +I sing of the Body-Guard-- +The Heroes that fought so hard-- + Where nobody blundered. +Hail, brave Zagonyi--hail! +All hail, the Body-Guard!-- + The glorious-- + The victorious-- +The invincible Three Hundred. + + + + +A MILLION MORE + +[AUGUST, 1862.] + + +The nation calls aloud again, +For Freedom wounded writhes in pain. +Gird on your armor, Northern men; +Drop scythe and sickle, square and pen; +A million bayonets gleam and flash; +A thousand cannon peal and crash; +Brothers and sons have gone before; +A million more!--a million more! + +Fire and sword!--aye, sword and fire! +Let war be fierce and grim and dire; +Your path be marked by flame and smoke, +And tyrant's bones and fetters broke: +Stay not for foe's uplifted hand; +Sheathe not the sword; quench not the brand +Till Freedom reign from shore to shore, +Or might 'mid ashes smoke and gore. + +If leader stay the vengeance-rod, +Let him beware the wrath of God; +The maddened millions long his trust +Will crush his puny bones to dust, +And all the law to guide their ire +Will be the law of blood and fire. +Come, then--the shattered ranks implore-- +A million more--a million more! + +Form and file and file and form; +This war is but God's thunder-storm +To purify our cankered land +And strike the fetter from the hand. +Forced by grim fate our Chief at last +Shall blow dear Freedom's bugle-blast; +And then shall rise from shore to shore +Four millions more--four millions more.[CS] + +[CS] There were four millions of slaves in the South when the war began. + + + + + +ON READING PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S LETTER + +To Horace Greeley, of date Aug. 22, 1862--"If I could save the Union +without freeing any slave, I would do it," etc. + +Perish the power that, bowed to dust, +Still wields a tyrant's rod-- +That dares not even then be just, +And leave the rest with God. + + + + + +THE DYING VETERAN + +All-day-long the crash of cannon + Shook the battle-covered plain; +All-day-long the frenzied foemen + Dashed against our lines in vain; +All the field was piled with slaughter; + Now the lurid setting sun +Saw our foes in wild disorder, + And the bloody day was won. + +Foremost on our line of battle + All-day-long a veteran stood-- +Stalwart, brawny, grim and steady, + Black with powder, smeared with blood; +Never flinched and never faltered + In the deadliest storm of lead, +And before his steady rifle + Lay a score of foemen dead. + +Never flinched and never faltered + Till our shout of victory rose, +Till he saw defeat, disaster, + Overwhelmed our flying foes; +Then he trembled, then he tottered, + Gasped for breath and dropped his gun, +Staggered from the ranks and prostrate + Fell to the earth. His work was done. + +Silent comrades gathered round him, + And his Captain sadly came, +Bathed his quivering lips with water, + Took his hand and spoke his name; +And his fellow soldiers softly + On his knapsack laid his head; +Then his eyes were lit with luster, + And he raised his hand and said: + +"Good-bye, comrades; farewell, Captain! + I am glad the day is won; +I am mustered out, I reckon-- + Never mind-my part is done. +We have marched and fought together + Till you seem like brothers all, +But I hope again to meet you + At the final bugle-call. + +"Captain, write and tell my mother + That she must not mourn and cry, +For I never flinched in battle, + And I do not fear to die. +You may add a word for Mary; + Tell her I was ever true. +Mary took a miff one Sunday, + And so I put on the "blue." + +"And I know she has repented, + But I never let her see +How it cut--her crusty answer-- + When she turned away from me. +I was never good at coaxing, + So I didn't even try; +But you tell her I forgive her, + And she must not mourn and cry," + +Then he closed his eyes in slumber, + And his spirit passed away, +And his comrades spread a blanket + O'er his cold and silent clay. +At dawn of morn they buried him, + Wrapped in his army-blue. +On the bloody field of Fair Oaks + Sleeps the soldier tried and true. + + + + +GRIERSON'S RAID + +Mount to horse--mount to horse; + Forward, Battalion! +Gallop the gallant force; + Down with Rebellion! +Over hill, creek and plain + Clatter the fearless-- +Dash away--splash away-- + Led by the Peerless. + +Carbines crack--foemen fly + Hither and thither; +Under the death-fire + They falter and wither. +Burn the bridge--tear the track-- + Down with Rebellion! +Cut the wires--cut the wires! + Forward, Battalion! +Day and night--night and day, + Gallop the fearless-- +Swimming the rivers' floods-- + Led by the Peerless; +Depots and powder-trains + Blazing and thundering +Masters and dusky slaves + Gazing and wondering. +Eight hundred miles they ride-- + Dauntless Battalion-- +Down through the Southern Land + Mad with Rebellion. +Into our lines they dash-- + Brave Cavaliers-- +Greeting our flag with + A thunder of cheers. + + + + + +THE OLD FLAG + +[Written July 4, 1863.] + +Have ye heard of Fort Donelson's desperate fight, +Where the giant Northwest bared his arm for the right, +Where thousands so bravely went down in the slaughter, +And the blood of the West ran as freely as water; +Where the Rebel Flag fell and our banner arose +O'er an army of captured and suppliant foes? +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + +Heard ye of Shiloh, where fierce Beauregard +O'erwhelmed us with numbers and pressed us so hard, +Till our veteran supporters came up to our aid +And the tide of defeat and disaster was staid-- +Where like grain-sheaves the slaughtered were piled on the plain +And the brave rebel Johnston went down with the slain? +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + +Heard ye the cannon-roar down by Stone River? +Saw ye the bleeding braves stagger and quiver? +Heard ye the shout and the roar and the rattle? +And saw ye the desperate surging of battle? +Volley on volley and steel upon steel-- +Breast unto breast--how they lunge and they reel! +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + +Heard ye of Vicksburg--the Southern Gibraltar, +Where the hands of our foemen built tyranny's altar, +Where their hosts are walled in by a cordon of braves, +And the pits they have dug for defense are their graves, +Where the red bombs are bursting and hissing the shot, +Where the nine thunders death and the charge follows hot? +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + +Heard ye from Gettysburg?--Glory to God! +Bare your heads, O ye Freemen, and kneel on the sod! +Praise the Lord!--praise the Lord!--it is done!--it is done! +The battle is fought and the victory won! +They first took the sword, and they fall by the sword; +They are scattered and crushed by the hand of the Lord! +Lo--torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder, +The Old Flag is waving there prouder and prouder. + + + + +GETTYSBURG: CHARGE OF THE FIRST MINNESOTA + +[Written for and read at the Camp Fire of the G.A.R. Department of +Minnesota, National Encampment of the Grand Army of the Republic, at +Minneapolis, June 22, 1884.] + + +Ready and ripe for the harvest lay the acres of golden grain +Waving on hillock and hillside and bending along the plain. +Ready and ripe for the harvest two veteran armies lay +Waiting the signal of battle on the Gettysburg hills that day. +Sharp rang the blast of the bugles calling the foe to the fray, +And shrill from the enemy's cannon the demon shells shrieked as they flew; +Crashed and rumbled and roared our batteries ranged on the hill, +Rumbled and roared at the front the bellowing guns of the foe +Swelling the chorus of hell ever louder and deadlier still, +And shrill o'er the roar of the cannon rose the yell of the rebels below, +As they charged on our Third Corps advanced + and crushed in the lines at a blow. +Leading his clamorous legions, flashing his saber in air, +Forward rode furious Longstreet charging on Round Top there-- +Key to our left and center--key to the fate of the field-- +Leading his wild-mad Southrons on to the lions' lair. + +Red with the blood of our legions--red with the blood of our best, +Waiting the fate of the battle the lurid sun stood in the west. +Hid by the crest of the hills we lay at the right concealed, +Prone on the earth that shuddered under us there as we lay. +Thunder of cheers on the left!--dashing down on his stalwart bay, +Spurring his gallant charger till his foaming flanks ran blood, +Hancock, the star of our legions, rode down where our officers stood: +"_By the left flank, double-quick, march!_"-- + We sprang to our feet and away, +Like a fierce pack of hunger-mad wolves that pant + for the blood of the prey. +"_Halt!_"--on our battery's flank we stood like a hedge-row of steel-- +Bearing the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day. + +Down at the marge of the valley our broken ranks stagger and reel, +Grimy with dust and with powder, wearied and panting for breath, +Flinging their arms in panic, flying the hail-storm of death. +Rumble of volley on volley of the enemy hard on the rear, +Yelling their wild, mad triumph, thundering cheer upon cheer, +Dotting the slope with slaughter and sweeping the field with fear. +Drowned is the blare of the bugle, lost is the bray of the drum, +Yelling, defiant, victorious, column on column they come. +Only a handful are we, thrown into the gap of our lines, +Holding the perilous breach where the fate of the battle inclines, +Only a handful are we--column on column they come. + +Roared like the voice of a lion brave Hancock fierce for the fray: +"Hurry the reserve battalions; bring every banner and gun: +Charge on the enemy, Colvill, stay the advance of his lines: +Here--by the God of our Fathers!--here shall the battle be won, +Or we'll die for the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills today." +Shrill rang the voice of our Colonel, the bravest and best of the brave: +"_Forward, the First Minnesota! Forward, and follow me, men!_" +Gallantly forward he strode, the bravest and best of the brave. + +Two hundred and fifty and two--all that were left of us then-- +Two hundred and fifty and two fearless, unfaltering men +Dashed at a run for the enemy, sprang to the charge with a yell. +On us their batteries thundered solid shot, grape shot and shell; +Never a man of us faltered, but many a comrade fell. +"_Forward, the First Minnesota!_"--like tigers we sprang at our foes; +Grim gaps of death in our ranks, but ever the brave ranks close: +Down went our sergeant and colors--defiant our colors arose! +"_Fire_!" At the flash of our rifles--grim gaps in the ranks of our foes! + +"_Forward, the First Minnesota!_" our brave Colonel cried as he fell +Gashed and shattered and mangled--"_Forward_!" he cried as he fell. +Over him mangled and bleeding frenzied we sprang to the fight, +Over him mangled and bleeding we sprang to the jaws of hell. +Flashed in our faces their rifles, roared on the left and the right, +Swarming around us by thousands we fought them with desperate might. +Five times our banner went down--five times our banner arose, +Tattered and torn but defiant, and flapped in the face of our foes. +Hold them? We held them at bay, as a bear holds the hounds on his track, +Knee to knee, shoulder to shoulder, we met them and staggered them back. + +Desperate, frenzied, bewildered, blindly they fired on their own; +Like reeds in the whirl of the cyclone columns and colors went down. +Banner of stars on the right! Hurrah! gallant Gibbon is come! +Thunder of guns on the left! Hurrah! 'tis our cannon that boom! +Solid-shot, grape-shot and canister crash like the cracking of doom. +Baffled, bewildered and broken the ranks of the enemy yield; +Panic-struck, routed and shattered they fly from the fate of the field. +Hold them? We held them at bay, as a bear holds the hounds on his track; +Knee to knee, shoulder to shoulder, we met them and staggered them back; +Two hundred and fifty and two, we held their mad thousands at bay, +Met them and baffled and broke them, turning the tide of the day; +Two hundred and fifty and two when the sun hung low in heaven, +But ah! when the stars rode over we numbered but forty-seven: +Dead on the field or wounded the rest of our regiment lay; +Never a man of us faltered or flinched in the fire of the fray, +For we bore the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day. + +Tears for our fallen comrades--cover their graves with flowers, +For they fought and fell like Spartans for this glorious land of ours. +They fell, but they fell victorious, for the Rebel ranks were riven, +And over our land united--one nation from sea to sea, +Over the grave of Treason, over millions of men made free, +Triumphant the flag of our fathers waves in the winds of heaven-- +Striped with the blood of her heroes she waves in the winds of heaven. +Tears for our fallen comrades--cover their graves with flowers, +For they fought and fell like Spartans for this glorious land of ours; +And oft shall our children's children garland their graves and say: +"They bore the banner of Freedom on the Gettysburg hills that day." + + + + +ADDRESS TO THE FLAG + +[After the Battle of Gettysburg.] + +Float in the winds of heaven, O tattered Flag! +Emblem of hope to all the misruled world: +Thy field of golden stars is rent and red-- +Dyed in the blood of brothers madly spilled +By brother-hands upon the mother-soil. +O fatal Upas of the savage Nile,[CT] +Transplanted hither--rooted--multiplied-- +Watered with bitter tears and sending forth +Thy venom-vapors till the land is mad, +Thy day is done. A million blades are swung +To lay thy jungles open to the sun; +A million torches fire thy blasted boles; +A million hands shall drag thy fibers out +And feed the fires till every root and branch +Lie in dead ashes. From the blackened soil, +Enriched and moistened with fraternal blood, +Beside the palm shall spring the olive-tree, +And every breeze shall waft the happy song +Of Freedom crowned with olive-twigs and flowers. + +Yea, Patriot-Flag of our old patriot-sires, +Honored--victorious on an hundred fields +Where side by side for Freedom's mother-land +Her Southern sons and Northern fighting fell, +And side by side in glorious graves repose, + +[CT] African slavery. + +I see the dawn of glory grander still, +When hand in hand upon this battle-field +The blue-eyed maidens of the Merrimac +With dewy roses from the Granite Hills, +And dark-eyed daughters from the land of palms +With orange-blossoms from the broad St. Johns, +In solemn concert singing as they go, +Shall strew the graves of these fraternal dead. +The day of triumph comes, O blood-stained Flag! +Washed clean and lustrous in the morning light +Of a new era, thou shalt float again +In more than pristine glory o'er the land +Peace-blest and re-united. On the seas +Thou shalt be honored to the farthest isle. +The oppressed of foreign lands shall flock the shores +To look upon and bless thee. Mothers shall lift +Their infants to behold thee as a star +New-born in heaven to light the darksome world. +The children weeping round the desolate, +Sore-stricken mother in the saddened home +Whereto the father shall no more return, +In future years will proudly boast the blood +Of him who bravely fell defending thee. +And these misguided brothers who would tear +Thy starry field asunder and would trail +Their own proud flag and history in the dust, +Ere many years will bless thee, dear old Flag, +That thou didst triumph even over them. +Aye, even they with proudly swelling hearts +Will see the glory thou shalt shortly wear, +And new-born stars swing in upon thy field +In lustrous clusters. Come, O glorious day +Of Freedom crowned with Peace. God's will be done! +God's will is peace on earth--good-will to men. +The chains all broken and the bond all free, +O may this nation learn to war no more; +Yea, into plow-shares may these brothers beat +Their swords and into pruning-hooks their spears, +Clasp hands again, and plant these battle-fields +With golden corn and purple-clustered vines, +And side by side re-build the broken walls-- +Joined and cemented as one solid stone +With patriot-love and Christ's sweet charity. + + + + + +NEW-YEARS ADDRESS--JANUARY 1, 1866 + +[Written for the St. Paul Pioneer.] + +Good morning--good morning--a happy new year! +We greet you, kind friends of the old _Pioneer_; +Hope your coffee is good and your steak is well done, +And you're happy as clams in the sand and the sun. +The old year's a shadow--a shade of the past; +It is gone with its toils and its triumphs so vast-- +With its joys and its tears--with its pleasure and pain-- +With its shouts of the brave and its heaps of the slain-- +Gone--and it cometh--no, never again. +And as we look forth on the future so fair +Let us brush from the picture the visage of care; +The error, the folly, the frown and the tear-- +Drop them all at the grave of the silent old year. +Has the heart been oppressed with a burden of woe? +Has the spirit been cowed by a merciless blow? +Has the tongue of the brave or the voice of the fair +Prayed to God and received no response to its prayer? +Look up!--'twas a shadow--the morning is here: +A Happy New Year!--O, a Happy New Year! +Yet stay for a moment. We cannot forget +The fields where the true and the traitor have met; +When the old year came in we were trembling with fear +Lest Freedom should fall in her glorious career; +And the roar of the conflict was loud o'er the land +Where the traitor-flag waved in a rebel's red hand; +But the God of the Just led the hosts of the Free, +And Victory marched from the north to the sea. +Behold--where the conflict was doubtful and dire-- +There--on house-top and hill-top, on fortress and spire-- +The Old Banner waves again higher and prouder, +Though torn by the shot and begrimed by the powder. + +God bless the brave soldiers that followed that flag +Through river and swamp, over mountain and crag-- +On the wild charge triumphant--the sullen retreat-- +On fields spread with victory or piled with defeat; +God bless their true hearts for they stood like a wall, +And saved us our Country and saved us our all. +But many a mother and many a daughter +Weep, alas, o'er the brave that went down in the slaughter. +Pile the monuments high--not on hill-top and plain-- +To the glorious sons 'neath the old banner slain-- +But over the land from the sea to the sea-- +Pile their monuments high in the hearts of the Free. +Heaven bless the brave souls that are spared to return +Where the "lamp in the window" ceased never to burn-- +Where the vacant chair stood at the desolate hearth +Since the son shouldered arms or the father went forth. +"Peace!--Peace!"--was the shout;--at the jubilant word +Wives and mothers went down on their knees to the Lord! + +Methinks I can see, through the vista of years-- +From the memories of old such a vision appears-- +A gray-haired old veteran in arm-chair at ease, +With his grandchildren clustered intent at his knees, +Recounting his deeds with an eloquent tongue, +And a fire that enkindles the hearts of the young; +How he followed the Flag from the first to the last-- +On the long, weary march, in the battle's hot blast; +How he marched under Sherman from center to sea, +Or fought under Grant in his battles with Lee; +And the old fire comes back to his eye as of yore, +And his iron hand clutches his musket once more, +As of old on the battle-field ghastly and red, +When he sprang to the charge o'er the dying and dead; +And the eyes of his listeners are gleaming with fire, +As he points to that Flag floating high on the spire. + +[Illustration: AND THE EYES OF HIS LISTENERS ARE GLEAMING WITH FIRE +AS HE POINTS TO THAT FLAG FLOATING HIGH ON THE SPIRE.] + +Heaven bless the new year that is just ushered in; +May the Rebels repent of their folly and sin, +Depart from their idols, extend the right hand, +And pledge that the Union forever shall stand. +May they see that the rending of fetter and chain +Is _their_ triumph as well--their unspeakable gain; +That the Union dissevered and weltering in blood +Could yield them no profit and bode them no good. +'Tis human to err and divine to forgive; +Let us walk after Christ--bid the poor sinners live, +And come back to the fold of the Union once more, +And we'll do as the prodigal's father of yore-- +Kill the well-fatted calf--(but we'll not do it twice) +And invite them to dinner--and give them a slice. + +There's old Johnny Bull--what a terrible groan +Escapes when he thinks of his big "Rebel Loan"-- +How the money went out with a nod and a grin, +But the cotton--the cotton--it didn't come in. +Then he thinks of diplomacy--Mason-Slidell, +And he wishes that both had been warming in hell, +For he got such a rap from our little Bill Seward +That the red nose he blows is right hard to be cured; +And then the steam pirates he built and equipped, +And boasted, you know, that they couldn't be whipped; +But alas for his boast--Johnny Bull "caught a Tartar," +And now like a calf he is bawling for quarter. +Yes, bluff Johnny Bull will be tame as a yearling, +Beg pardon and humbly "come down" with his sterling. + +There's Monsieur _l'Escamoteur_[CU] over in France; +He has had a clear field and a gay country dance +Down there in Mexico--playing his tricks +While we had a family "discussion wid sticks"; +But the game is played out; don't you see it's so handy +For Grant and his boys to march over the Grande. +He twists his waxed moustache and looks very blue, +And he says to himself, (what he wouldn't to you) +"Py tam--dair's mon poor leetle chappie--Dutch Max! +_Cornes du Diable_[CV]--'e'll 'ave to make tracks +Or ve'll 'ave all dem tam Yankee poys on our packs." + +Monsieur l'Empereur, if your Max can get out +With the hair of his head on--he'd better, no doubt. +If you'll not take it hard, here's a bit of advice-- +It is dangerous for big pigs to dance on the ice; +They sometimes slip up and they sometimes fall in, +And the ice you are on is exceedingly thin. +You're _au fait_, I'll admit, at a sharp game of chance, +But the Devil himself couldn't always beat France. +Remember the fate of your uncle of yore, +Tread lightly, and keep very close to the shore. + +The Giant Republic--its future how vast! +Now, freed from the follies and sins of the past, + +[CU] The Juggler. + +[CV] Horns of the Devil!--equivalent to the exclamation--The Devil! + +It will tower to the zenith; the ice-covered sea +And Darien shall bound-mark the Land of the Free. +Behold how the landless, the poor and oppressed, +Flock in on our shores from the East and the West! +Let them come--bid them come--we have plenty of room; +Our forests shall echo, our prairies shall bloom; +The iron horse, puffing his cloud-breath of steam, +Shall course every valley and leap every stream; +New cities shall rise with a magic untold, +While our mines yield their treasures of silver and gold, +And prosperous, united and happy, we'll climb +Up the mountain of Fame till the end of Old Time-- +Which, as I figure up, is a century hence: +Then we'll all go abroad without any expense; +We'll capture a comet--the smart Yankee race +Will ride on his tail through the kingdom of Space, +Tack their telegraph wires to Uranus and Mars; +Yea, carry their arts to the ultimate stars, +And flaunt the Old Flag at the suns as they pass, +And astonish the Devil himself with--their brass. + +And now, "Gentle Readers," I'll bid you farewell; +I hope this fine poem will please you--and _sell_. +You'll ne'er lack a friend if you ne'er lack a dime; +May you never grow old till the end of Old Time; +May you never be cursed with an itching for rhyme; +For in spite of your physic, in spite of your plaster, +The rash will break out till you go to disaster-- +Which you plainly can see is the case with my Muse, +For she scratches away though she's said her adieus. + +Dear Ladies, though last to receive my oblation, +And last in the list of Mosaic creation, +The last is the best, and the last shall be first. +Through Eve, sayeth Moses, old Adam was cursed; +But I cannot agree with you, Moses, that Adam +Sinned and fell through the gentle persuasion of madam. +The victim, no doubt, of Egyptian flirtation, +You mistook your chagrin for divine inspiration, +And condemned all the sex without proof or probation, +As we rhymsters mistake the moonbeams that elate us +For flashes of wit or the holy afflatus, +And imagine we hear the applause of a nation,-- +But all honest men who are married and blest +Will agree that the last work of God is the best. + +And now to you all--whether married or single-- +Whether sheltered by slate, or by "shake," or by shingle-- +God bless you with peace and with bountiful cheer, +Happy houses, happy hearts--and a happy New Year! + +P.S.--If you wish all these blessings, 'tis clear +You should send in your "stamps" for the old _Pioneer_. + + * * * * * + +MY FATHER-LAND + +[From the German of Theodor Korner.] + +Where is the minstrel's Father-land? + Where the sparks of noble spirits flew, + Where flowery wreaths for beauty grew, + Where strong hearts glowed so glad and true + For all things sacred, good and grand: +There was my Father-land. + +How named the minstrel's Father-land? + O'er slaughtered son--'neath tyrants' yokes, + She weepeth now--and foreign strokes; + They called her once the Land of Oaks-- + Land of the Free--the German Land: +Thus was called my Father-land. +Why weeps the minstrel's Father-land? + Because while tyrant's tempest hailed + The people's chosen princes quailed, + And all their sacred pledges failed; + Because she could no ear command, +Alas must weep my Father-land. + +Whom calls the minstrel's Father-land? + She calls on heaven with wild alarm-- + With desperation's thunder-storm-- + On Liberty to bare her arm, + On Retribution's vengeful hand: +On these she calls--my Father-land. + +What would the minstrel's Father-land? + She would strike the base slaves to the ground + Chase from her soil the tyrant hound, + And free her sons in shackles bound, + Or lay them free beneath her sand: +That would my Father-land. + +And hopes the minstrel's Father-land? + She hopes for holy Freedom's sake, + Hopes that her true sons will awake, + Hopes that just God will vengeance take, + And ne'er mistakes the Avenger's hand: +Thereon relies my Father-land. + + + + +MY HEART'S ON THE RHINE + +[From the German of Wolfgang Muller.] + +My heart's on the Rhine--in the old Father-land; +Where my cradle was rocked by a dear mother's hand, +My youth and my friends--they are there yet, I know, +And my love dreams of me with her cheeks all aglow; +O there where I reveled in song and in wine! +Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine. + +I hail thee, thou broad-breasted, golden-green stream; +Ye cities and churches and castles that gleam; +Ye grain-fields of gold in the valley so blue; +Ye vineyards that glow in the sun-shimmered dew; +Ye forests and caverns and cliffs that were mine! +Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine. + +I hail thee, O life of the soul-stirring song, +Of waltz and of wine, with a yearning so strong, +Hail, ye stout race of heroes, so brave and so true. +Ye blue-eyed, gay maidens, a greeting to you! +Your life and your aims and your efforts be mine; +Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine. + +My heart's on the Rhine--in the old Father-land, +Where my cradle was rocked by a dear mother's hand; +My youth and my friends--they are there yet, I know, +And my love dreams of me with her cheeks all aglow: +Be thou ever the same to me, Land of the Vine! +Wherever I wander my heart's on the Rhine. + + + + +THE MINSTREL + +[From the German of Goethe] + +[_Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship, Book 2, Chap. 2._] + +"What hear I at the gateway ringing? +What bard upon the drawbridge singing? +Go bid him to repeat his song +Here, in the hall amid the throng," +The monarch cried; +The little page hied; +As back he sped, +The monarch said-- +"Bring in the gray-haired minstrel." + +"I greet you, noble lords and peers; +I greet you, lovely dames. +O heaven begemmed with golden spheres! +Who knows your noble names? +In hall of splendor so sublime, +Close ye, mine eyes--'tis not the time +To gaze in idle wonder." + +The gray-haired minstrel closed his eyes; +He struck his wildest air; +Brave faces glowed like sunset skies; +Cast down their eyes the fair. +The king well pleased with the minstrel's song, +Sent the little page through the wondering throng +A chain of gold to bear him. + +"O give not me the chain of gold; +Award it to thy braves, +Before whose faces fierce and bold +Quail foes when battle raves; +Or give it thy chancellor of state, +And let him wear its golden weight +With his official burdens. + +"I sing, I sing as the wild birds sing +That in the forest dwell; +The songs that from my bosom spring +Alone reward me well: +But may I ask that page of thine +To bring me one good cup of wine +In golden goblet sparkling?" + +He took the cup; he drank it all: +"O soothing nectar thine! +Thrice bless'd the highly favored hall +Where flows such glorious wine: +If thou farest well, then think of me, +And thank thy God, as I thank thee +For this inspiring goblet." + + + + +HOPE + +[From the German of Schiller.] + +Men talk and dream of better days-- + Of a golden time to come; +Toward a happy and shining goal + They run with a ceaseless hum. +The world grows old and grows young again, +Still hope of the better is bright to men. + +Hope leads us in at the gate of life; + She crowns the boyish head; +Her bright lamp lures the stalwart youth, + Nor burns out with the gray-haired dead; +For the grave closes over his trouble and care, +But see--on the grave--Hope is planted there! + +'Tis not an empty and flattering deceit, + Begot in a foolish brain; +For the heart speaks loud with its ceaseless throbs, + "We are not born in vain"; +And the words that out of the heart-throbs roll, +They cannot deceive the hoping soul. + + + + +MRS. MCNAIR + +_Misce stultitiam consiliis brevem.--Horace._ + + Mrs. McNair + Was tall and fair; + Mrs. McNair was slim; +She had flashing black eyes and raven hair; +But a very remarkably modest air; +And her only care was for Mr. McNair; + She was exceedingly fond of him. + + He sold "notions" and lace + With wonderful grace, +And kept everything neatly displayed in its place: +The red, curly hair on his head and his face + He always persisted + Should be oiled and twisted; +He was the sleekest young husband that ever existed. + + Precisely at four + He would leave his store; +And Mr. McNair with his modest bride +Seated snugly and lovingly by his side, + On the rural Broadway, + Every pleasant day, +In his spick-span carriage would rattle away. + + Though it must be allowed + The lady was proud, +She'd have no maid about her the dear lady vowed: + So for Mr. McNair + The wear and the fare +She made it a care of her own to prepare. +I think I may guess, being married myself, +That the cause was not solely the saving of pelf. + + As for her, I'll declare, + Though raven her hair, +Though her eyes were so dark and her body so slim, +She hadn't a thought for a man but him. + + From three to nine, + Invited to dine, +Oft met at the house of the pair divine: +Her husband--and who, by the way, was well able-- +Did all the "agreeable" done at the table; +While she--most remarkably loving bride-- +Sat snugly and modestly down by his side. + And when they went out + It was whispered about, +"She's the lovingest wife in the town beyond doubt;" +And every one swore, from pastor to clown, +They were the most affectionate couple in town. + + Yes; Mrs McNair + Was modest and fair; +She never fell into a pout or a fret; + And Mr. McNair + Was her only care + And indeed her only pet. +The few short hours he spent at his store +She spent sewing or reading the romancers' lore; + And whoever came + It was always the same +With the modest lady that opened the door. + +But there came to town + One Captain Brown + To spend a month or more. + Now this same Captain Brown + Was a man of renown, +And a dashing blue coat he wore; + And a bright, brass star. + And a visible scar +On his brow--that he said he had got in the war + As he led the van: + (He never ran!) +In short, he was the "General's" right-hand man, +And had written his name on the pages of fame. + He was smooth as an eel, + And rode so genteel +That in less than a week every old maid and dame +Was constantly lisping the bold Captain's name. + + Now Mr. McNair, + As well as the fair, +Had a "bump of reverence" as big as a pear, + And whoever like Brown + Had a little renown, +And happened to visit that rural town, +Was invited of course by McNair--to "go down." + + So merely by chance, + The son of the lance +Became the bold hero of quite a romance: +For Mrs. McNair thought him wonderful fair, +And that none but her husband could with him compare. +Half her timidity vanished in air +The first time he dined with herself and McNair. + Now the Captain was arch + In whiskers and starch +And preferred, now and then, a gay waltz to a march. +A man, too, he was of uncommon good taste; +Always "at home" and never in haste, +And his manners and speech were remarkably chaste. + To tell you in short + His daily resort +He made at the house of "his good friend McNair," +Who ('twas really too bad) was so frequently out +When the Captain called in "just to see _him_" (no doubt) +But Mrs. McNair was so lonely--too bad; +So he chatted and chattered and made her look glad. + And many a view + Of his coat of blue, +All studded with buttons gilt, spangled and new, + The dear lady took + Half askance from her book, +As she modestly sat in the opposite nook. + Familiarly he + And modestly she +Talked nonsense and sense so strangely commingled, +That the dear lady's heart was delighted and tingled. + A man of sobriety + Renown and variety +It could not be wrong to enjoy his society: + O was it a sin + For him to "drop in," +And sometimes to pat her in sport on the chin? + + Dear Ladies, beware; + Dear Ladies, take care-- +How you play with a lion asleep in his lair: +"Mere trifling flirtations"--these arts you employ? +Flirtations once led to the siege of old Troy; + And a woman was in +For the sorrow and sin +And slaughter that fell when the Greeks tumbled in; +Nor is there a doubt, my dears, under the sun, +But they've led to the sack of more cities than one. + I would we were all + As pure as Saint Paul +That we touched not the goblet whose lees are but gall; +But if so we must know where a flirtation leads; +Beware of the fair and look out for our heads. + Remember the odious, + Frail woman, Herodias +Sent old Baptist John to a place incommodious, +And prevailed on her husband to cut off his head +For an indiscreet thing the old Nazarite said. + + Day in and day out + The blue coat was about; +And the dear little lady was glad when he came +And began to be talkative, tender and tame. +Then he gave her a ring, begged a curl of her hair, +And smilingly whispered her--"don't tell McNair." + She dropped her dark eyes + And with two little sighs +Sent the bold Captain's heart fluttering up to the skies. + + Then alas-- + What a pass! +He fell at the feet of the lady so sweet, +And swore that he loved her beyond his control-- +With all his humanity--body and soul! + The lady so frail + Turned suddenly pale, +Then--sighed that his love was of little avail; +For alas, the dear Captain--he must have forgot-- +She was tied to McNair with a conjugal knot. + But indeed + She agreed-- +Were she only a maid he alone could succeed; +But she prayed him by all that is sacred and fair, +Not to rouse the suspicion of Mr. McNair. + + 'Twas really too bad, + For the lady was sad: +And a terrible night o't the poor lady had, +While Mr. McNair wondered what was the matter, +And endeavored to coax, to console and to flatter. + Many tears she shed + That night while in bed +For she had such a terrible pain in her head! +"My dear little pet, where's the camphor?" he said; +"I'll go for the doctor--you'll have to be bled; +I declare, my dear wife, you are just about dead." + + "O no, my dear; + I pray you don't fear, +Though the pain, I'll admit, is exceeding severe. +I know what it is--I have had it before-- +It's only neuralgia: please go to the store +And bring me a bottle of 'Davis's Pain- +Killer,' and I shall be better again." + He sprang out of bed + And away he sped +In his gown for the cordial to cure her head, +Not dreaming that Cupid had played her a trick-- +The blind little rogue with a sharpened stick. + I confess on my knees + I have had the disease; +It is worse than the bites of a thousand fleas; +And the only cure I have found for these ills +Is a double dose of "Purgative Pills." + He rubbed her head-- + And eased it, she said; +And he shrugged and shivered and got into bed. +He slept and he snored, but the poor lady's pain, +When her lord slept soundly, came on again. + It wore away + However by day +And when Brown called again she was smiling and gay; +But alas, he must say--to the lady's dismay-- +In the town of his heart he had staid out his stay, +And must leave for his regiment with little delay. + + Now Mrs. McNair + Was tall and fair, +Mrs. McNair was slim, +But the like of Brown was so wonderful rare + That she could not part with him. +Indeed you can see it was truly a pity, +For her husband was just going down to the city, + And Captain Brown-- + The man of renown-- +Could console her indeed were he only in town. +So McNair to the city the next Monday hied, +And left bold Captain Brown with his modest young bride. + + As the serpent did Eve + Most sorely deceive-- +Causing old father Adam to sorrow and grieve, +And us, his frail children, tho' punished and chidden, +To hanker for things that are sweet but forbidden-- + The Captain so fair, + With his genius so rare, +Wound the web of enchantment round Mrs. McNair; +And alas, fickle Helen, ere three days were over, +She had sworn to elope with her brass-buttoned lover. + Like Helen, the Greek, + She was modest and meek, +And as fair as a rose, but a trifle too weak. +When a maid she had suitors as proud as Ulysses, +But she ne'er bent her neck to their arms or their kisses, + Till McNair he came in + With a brush on his chin-- +It was love at first sight--but a trifle too thin; +For, married, the dreams of her girlhood fell short all, +And she found that her husband was only a mortal. + + Dear ladies, betray us-- + Fast and loose play us-- +We'll follow you still like bereaved Menelaus, +Till the little blind god with his cruel shafts slay us. + Cold-blooded as I am, + If a son of old Priam +Should break the Mosaic commands and defy 'em, +And elope with my "pet," and moreover my riches, +I would follow the rogue if I went upon crutches +To the plains of old Troy without jacket or breeches. + But then I'm so funny + If he'd give up the money, +He might go to the dogs with himself and his "Honey." + + The lovers agreed + That the hazardous deed +Should be done in the dark and with very great speed, +For Mr. McNair--when the fellow came back-- +Might go crazy and foolishly follow their track. + So at midnight should wait + At her garden-gate +A carriage to carry the dear, precious freight +Of Mrs. McNair who should meet Captain Brown +At the Globe Hotel in a neighboring town. + A man should be hired + To convey the admired. +And keep mum as a mouse, and do what was desired. + +Wearily, wearily half the night + The lady watched away; +At times in a spirit of sadness quite, +But fully resolved on her amorous flight, + She longed to be under way; +Yet with sad heaving heart and a tear, I declare, +As she sorrowfully thought of poor Mr. McNair. + + "Poor fellow," she sighed, + "I wish he had died +Last spring when he had his complaint in the side +For I know--I am sure--it will terribly grieve him +To have me elope with the Captain and leave him. + But the Captain--dear me! + I hardly can see +Why I love the brave Captain to such a degree: +But see--there's the carriage, I vow, at the gate! +I must go--'tis the law of inveterate fate." + So a parting look + At her home she took, +While a terrible conflict her timid soul shook; +Then turned to the carriage heart-stricken and sore, +Stepped hastily in and closed up the door. + "Crack!" went the whip; + She bit her white lip, +And away she flew on her desperate trip. +She thought of dear Brown; and poor Mr. McNair-- +She knew he would hang himself straight in despair. + +She sighed + And she cried + All during the ride, +And endeavored--alas, but she could not decide. + Three times she prayed; + Three times she essayed +To call to the driver for pity and aid-- + To drive her straight + To her garden-gate, +And break the spell of her terrible fate. + But her tongue was tied-- + She couldn't decide, +And she only moaned at a wonderful rate. + + No mortal can tell + "What might have befell," +Had it been a mile more to the Globe Hotel; +But as they approached it she broke from her spell. + A single hair + For Mr. McNair +She vowed to herself that she did not care; + But the Captain so true + In his coat of blue-- +To his loving arms in her fancy she flew. + In a moment or more + They drove up to the door, +And she felt that her trials and troubles were o'er. +The landlord came hastily out in his slippers, +For late he had sat with some smokers and sippers. + As the lady stepped down + With a fret and a frown, +She sighed half aloud, "Where is dear Captain Brown?" +"This way, my dear madam," politely he said, +And straightway to the parlor the lady he led. + +Now the light was dim + Where she followed him, +And the dingy old parlor looked gloomy and grim. +As she entered, behold, in contemplative mood, +In the farther corner the bold Captain stood + In his coat of blue: + To his arms she flew; +She buried her face in his bosom so true: +"Dear Captain!--my Darling!" sighed Mrs. McNair; +Then she raised her dark eyes and--Good Heavens' + I declare!--- +Instead of the Captain 'twas--_Mr. McNair!_ +She threw up her arms--she screamed--and she fainted; +Such a scene!--Ah the like of it never was painted. + +Of repentance and pardon I need not tell; +Her vows I will not relate, +For every man must guess them well +Who knows much of the "married state." +Of the sad mischance suffice it to say +That McNair had suspected the Captain's "foul play;" + So he laid a snare + For the bold and the fair, +But he captured, alas, only Mrs. McNair; +And the brass-buttoned lover--bold Captain Brown-- +Was nevermore seen in that rural town. + + Mrs. McNair + Is tall and fair; + Mrs. McNair is slim; +And her husband again is her only care-- +She is wonderfully fond of him; +For now he is all the dear lady can wish--he +Is a captain himself--in the State militia. + + 1859. + + + + +THE DRAFT + +[January, 1865.] + +Old Father Abe has issued his "Call" + For Three Hundred Thousand more! +By Jupiter, boys, he is after you all-- +Lamed and maimed--tall and small-- +With his drag-net spread for a general haul + Of the "suckers" uncaught before. + +I am sorry to see such a woeful change + In the health of the hardiest; +It is wonderful odd--it is "passing strange"-- +As over the country you travel and range, +To behold such a sudden, lamentable change + All over the East and the West. + +"Blades" tough and hearty a week ago, + Who tippled and danced and laughed, +Are "suddenly taken," and some quite low +With an epidemical illness, you know: +"What!--Zounds!--the cholera?" you quiz;--no--no-- + The doctors call it the "Draft." + +What a blessed thing it were to be old-- + A little past "forty-five;" +'Twere better indeed than a purse of gold +At a premium yet unwritten, untold, +For what poor devil that's now "enrolled" + Expects to get off alive? + +There's a miracle wrought in the Democrats; + They swore it was murder and sin +To put in the "Niggers," like Kilkenny cats, +To clear the ship of the rebel rats, +But now I notice they swing their hats + And shout to the "Niggers"--"_Go in!_" + + + + +THE DEVIL AND THE MONK + +Once Satan and a monk went on a "drunk," +And Satan struck a bargain with the monk, +Whereby the Devil's crew was much increased +By penceless poor and now and then a priest +Who, lacking cunning or good common sense, +Got caught _in flagrante_ and out of pence. +Then in high glee the Devil filled a cup +And drank a brimming bumper to the pope: +Then--"Here's to you," he said, "sober or drunk, +In cowl or corsets, every monk's a punk. +Whate'er they preach unto the common breed, +At heart the priests and I are well agreed. +Justice is blind we see, and deaf and old, +But in her scales can hear the clink of gold. +The convent is a harem in disguise, +And virtue is a fig-leaf for the wise +To hide the naked truth of lust and lecheries. + +"And still the toilers feed the pious breed, +And pin their faith upon the bishop's sleeve; +Hungry for hope they gulp a moldy creed +And dine on faith. 'Tis easier to believe +An old-time fiction than to wear a tooth +In gnawing bones to reach the marrow truth. +Priests murder Truth and with her gory ghost +They frighten fools and give the rogues a roast +Until without or pounds or pence or price-- +Free as the fabled wine of paradise-- +They furnish priestly plates with buttered toast. +Your priests of superstition stalk the land +With Jacob's winning voice and Esau's hand; +Sinners to hell and saints to heaven they call, +And eat the fattest fodder in the stall. +They, versed in dead rituals in dead language deep, +Talk Greek to th' _grex_ and Latin to their sheep, +And feed their flocks a flood of cant and college +For every drop of sense or useful knowledge." + +"I beg your pardon," softly said the monk, +"I fear your Majesty is raving drunk. +I would be courteous." + But the Devil laughed +And slyly winked and sagely shook his head. +"My fawning dog," the sage satanic said, +"Wags not his tail for me but for my bread. +Brains rule to day as they have ruled for aye, +And craft grown craftier in this modern day +Still rides the fools, but in a craftier way; +And priestcraft lingers and survives its use; +What was a blessing once is now abuse: +Grown fat and arrogant on power and pelf, +The old-time shepherd has become a wolf +And only feeds his flocks to feast himself. +To clink of coin the pious juggler jumps, +For still he thinks, as in the days of old, +The key to holy heaven is made of gold, +That in the game of mortals money is trumps, +That golden darts will pierce e'en Virtue's shield, +And by the salve of gold all sins are healed. +So old Saint Peter stands outside the fence +With hand outstretched for toll of Peter-pence, +And sinners' souls must groan in Purgatory +Until they pay the admission-fee to glory. + +"There was an honest poet once on earth +Who beat all other bardies at a canter; +Rob' Burns his mother called him at his birth. +Though handicapped by rum and much a ranter, +He won the madcap race in _Tam O'Shanter_. +He drove a spanking span from Scottish heather, +Strong-limbed, but light of foot as flea or feather-- +Rhyme and Reason, matched and yoked together, +And reined them with light hand and limber leather. +He wrote to me once on a time--I mind it-- +A bold epistle and the poet signed it. +He thought to cheat "Auld Nickie" of his dues, +But who outruns the Devil casts his shoes; +And so at last from frolicking and drinkin', +'Some luckless hour' sent him to Hell 'alinkin'![CW] +Times had been rather dull in my dominion, +And all my imps like lubbers lay a snoring, +But Burns began to rhyme us his opinion, +And in ten minutes had all Hell aroaring. +Then Robbie pulled his book of poems out +And read us sundry satires from the book; +'_Death and Doctor Hornbook_' raised a shout +Till all the roof-tin on the rafters shook; +And when his '_Unco Guid_' the bardie read +The crew all clapped their hands and yelled like mad; +But '_Holy Willie's Prayer_' 'brought down the house'. +So I was glad to give the bard a pass +And a few pence for toll at Peter's gate; +For if the roof of Hell were made of brass +Bob Burns would shake it off as sure as fate. +I mind it well--that poem on a louse! +'O wad some pow'r the giftie gie us,' Monk, +'To see oursels as others see us'--drunk; +'It wad frae monie a blunder free us'--list!-- +'And foolish notion.' Abbot, bishop, priest, +'What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e' you all, +'And ev'n devotion.' Cowls and robes would fall, +And sometimes leave a bishop but a beast, +And show a leper sore where erst they made a priest." + +[CW] Tripping. See Burns' "_Address to the Deil_" + +Not to be beat the jolly monk filled up +His silver mug with rare old Burgundy; +"Here's to your health," he said, "your Majesty"-- +And drained the brimming goblet at a gulp-- +"'For when the Devil was sick the Devil a monk would be; +But when the Devil got well a devil a monk was he.' +_In vino veritas_ is true, no doubt-- +When wine goes in teetotal truth comes out. +To shake a little Shakespeare in the wine: +'Some rise by sin and some by virtue fall'; +But in the realm of Fate, as I opine, +A devil a virtue is or sin at all. +'The Devil be damned' is what we preach, you know it-- +At mass and vespers, holy-bread and dinner: +From priest to pope, from pedagogue to poet, +We sanctify the sin and damn the sinner. +This poet Shakespeare, whom I read with pleasure, +Wrote once--I think, in taking his own 'Measure':-- +'They say best men are molded out of faults, +And, for the most, become much more the better +For being a little bad.' The reason halts: +If read between the lines--not by the letter-- +'Tis plain enough that Shakespeare was atrimmin' +His own unruly ship and furling sail +To meet a British tempest or a gale, +And keep cold water from his wine and women. +Now I'll admit, when he's a little mellow, +The Devil himself's a devilish clever fellow, +And, though his cheeks and paunch are somewhat shrunk, +He only lacks a cowl to make a monk. +Time is the mother of twins _et hic et nunc;_ +Come, hood your horns and fill the mug abrimmin', +For we are cheek by jowl on wit and wine and women." + +And so the monk and Devil filled the mug, +And quaffed and chaffed and laughed the night away; +And when the "wee sma" hours of night had come, +The monk slipped out and stole the abbot's rum; +And when the abbot came at break of day, +There cheek by jowl--horns, hoofs, and hood--they lay, +With open missal and an empty jug, +And broken beads and badly battered mug-- +In fond embrace--dead drunk upon the rug. + +Think not, wise reader, that the bard hath drunk +The wine that fumed these vagaries from the monk; +Nor, in the devil ethics thou hast read, +There spake the poet in the Devil's stead. +Let Virtue be our helmet and our shield, +And Truth our weapon--weapon sharp and strong +And deadly to all error and all wrong. +Yea, armed with Truth, though rogues and rascals throng +The citadel of Virtue shall not yield, +For God's right arm of Truth prevails in every field. + +[Illustration: THE DEVIL AND THE MONK] + + + + +THE TARIFF ON TIN + +Monarch of Hannah's rocking-chair, +With unclipped beard and unkempt hair, +Sitting at ease by the kitchen fire, + Nor heeding the wind and the driving sleet, +Jo Lumpkin perused the _Daily Liar_-- + A leading and stanch Democratic sheet, +While Hannah, his wife, in her calico, +Sat knitting a pair of mittens for Jo. + +"Hanner," he said, and he raised his eyes +And looked exceedingly grave and wise, +"The kentry's agoin, I guess, tu the dogs: +Them durned Republikins, they air hogs: +A dev'lish purty fix we air in; +They've gone un riz the teriff on tin." + +"How's thet?" said Hannah, and turned her eyes +With a look of wonder and vague surprise. + +"Why them confoundered Congriss chaps +Hez knocked the prices out uv our craps: +We can't sell butter ner beans no more +Tu enny furren ship er shore, +Becuz them durned Republikins +Hez gone un riz the teriff on tins." + +Hannah dropped her knitting-work on her knees, +And looked very solemn and ill-at-ease: + She gazed profoundly into the fire, +Then hitched her chair a little bit nigher, + And said as she glanced at the _Daily Liar_ +With a sad, wan look in her buttermilk eyes: +"I vum thet's a tax on punkin-pies, +Fer they know we allers bakes 'em in +Pans un platters un plates uv tin." + +"I wouldn't agrumbled a bit," said Jo, +"Et a tax on sugar un salt un sich; + But I swow it's a morul political sin +Tu drive the farmer intu the ditch + With thet pesky teriff on tin. +Ef they'd a put a teriff on irn un coal + Un hides un taller un hemlock bark, +Why thet might a helped us out uv a hole + By buildin uv mills un givin uv work, +Un gladd'nin many a farmer's soul + By raisin the price of pertaters un pork: +But durn their eyes, it's a morul sin-- +They've gone un riz the teriff on tin. +I wouldn't wonder a bit ef Blaine +Hed diskivered a tin mine over in Maine; +Er else he hez foundered a combinashin +Tu gobble the tin uv the hull creashin. +I'll bet Jay Gould is intu the'trust,' +Un they've gone in tergether tu make er bust; +Un tu keep the British frum crowdin in +They've gone un riz the teriff on tin. +What'll we du fer pans un pails +When the cow comes in un the old uns fails? +Tu borrer a word frum Scripter, Hanner, +Un du it, tu, in pious manner, +You'll hev tu go down in yer sock fer a ducat, +Er milk old Roan in a wooden bucket: +Fer them Republikins--durn their skin-- +Hez riz sich a turrible teriff on tin. +Tu cents a pound on British tin-plate! +Why, Hanner, you see, at thet air rate, +Accordin tu this ere newspaper-print-- +Un it mus be so er it wouldn't' be in't-- +It's a dollar un a half on one tin pan, +Un about six shillin on a coffee-can, +Un ten shillin, Hanner, on a dinner-pail! +Gol! won't it make the workin men squeal-- +Thet durned Republikin tax un steal! +They call it Protecshin, but blast my skin +Ef it aint a morul political sin-- +Thet durned Republikin teriff on tin. + +"Un then they hev put a teriff on silk +Un satin un velvit un thet air ilk, +Un broadcloth un brandy un Havanny cigars, +Un them slick silk hats thet our preacher wears; +Un he'll hev tu wear humspun un drink skim milk. +Un, Hanner, you see we'll hev tu be savin, +Un whittle our store-bill down tu a shavin; +You can't go tu meetin in silks; I vum +You'll hev tu wear ging-um er stay tu hum." +But Hannah said sharply--"I won't though, I swum!" +And Hannah gazed wistfully on her Jo +As he rocked himself mournfully to and fro, +And then she looked thoughtfully into the fire, +While the sleet fell faster and the wind blew higher, +And Jo took a turn at the _Daily Liar_. + +1890. + +[Illustration: "THE KENTRY'S AGOIN', I GUESS, TO THE DOGS"] + + + + +PAT AND THE PIG + +Old Deutchland's the country for sauerkraut and beer, +Old England's the land of roast beef and good cheer, +Auld Scotland's the mother of gristle and grit, +But Ireland, my boy, is the mother of wit. +Once Pat was indicted for stealing a pig, +And brought into court to the man in the wig. +The indictment was long and so lumbered with Latin +That Pat hardly knew what a pickle was Pat in; +But at last it was read to the end, and the wig +Said: "Pat, are you guilty of stealing the pig?" +Pat looked very wise, though a trifle forlorn, +And he asked of milord that the witness be sworn. +"Bless yer sowl," stammered Pat, "an' the day ye was born! +Faith how in the divil d'ye think Oi can tell +Till Oi hear the ividince?" + Pat reckoned well; +For the witness was sworn and the facts he revealed-- +How Pat stole the piggy and how the pig squealed, +Whose piggy the pig was and what he was worth, +And the slits in his ears and his tail and--so forth; +But he never once said, 'in the county of Meath,'[CX] +So Pat he escaped by the skin of his teeth. + +[CX] In criminal cases it is necessary to prove that the crime was +committed in the county where the venue is laid. + + + + +NOTES + +[1] Called in the Dakota tongue "_Hok-see-win-na-pee +Wo-han-pee_"--Virgins' Dance (or Feast). + +[2] One of the favorite and most exciting games of the Dakotas is +ball-playing. A smooth place on the prairie, or in winter, on a frozen +lake or river, is chosen. Each player has a sort of bat, called +"_Ta-kee-cha-pse-cha_," about thirty-two inches long, with a hoop at the +lower end four or five inches in diameter, interlaced with thongs of +deer-skin, forming a sort of pocket. With these bats they catch and +throw the ball. Stakes are set as bounds at a considerable distance from +the center on either side. Two parties are then formed and each chooses +a leader or chief. The ball (_Tapa_) is then thrown up half way between +the bounds, and the game begins, the contestants contending with their +bats for the ball as it falls. When one succeeds in getting it fairly +into the pocket of his bat he swings it aloft and throws it as far as he +can toward the bound to which his party is working, taking care to send +it if possible where some of his own side will take it up. Thus the ball +is thrown and contended for till one party succeeds in casting it beyond +the bounds of the opposite party. A hundred players on a side are +sometimes engaged in this exciting game. Betting on the result often +runs high. Moccasins, pipes, knives, hatchets, blankets, robes and guns +are hung on the prize-pole. Not unfrequently horses are staked on the +issue and sometimes even women. Old men and mothers are among the +spectators, praising their swift-footed sons, and young wives and +maidens are there to stimulate their husbands and lovers. This game is +not confined to the warriors but is also a favorite amusement of the +Dakota maidens, who generally play for prizes offered by the chief or +warriors. (See _Neill's Hist. Minn._, pp 74-5; _Riggs' Takoo Wakan_, pp +44-5, and _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, p 55.) + +[3] Pronounced _Wah-zee-yah_--the god of the North, or Winter. A fabled +spirit who dwells in the frozen North, in a great _teepee_ of ice and +snow. From his mouth and nostrils he blows the cold blasts of winter. He +and _I-to-ka-ga Wi cas-ta_--the spirit or god of the South (literally +the "South Man") are inveterate enemies, and always on the war-path +against each other. In winter _Wa-zi-ya_ advances southward and drives +_I-to-ka-ga Wi-cas-ta_ before him to the Summer-Islands. But in spring +the god of the South having renewed his youth and strength in the "Happy +Hunting Grounds," is able to drive _Wa-zi-ya_ back again to his icy +wigwam in the North. Some Dakotas say that the numerous granite +boulders scattered over the prairies of Minnesota and Dakota, were +hurled in battle by _Wa-zi-ya_ from his home in the North at _I-to-ka-ga +Wi-cas-ta_. The _Wa-zi-ya_ of the Dakotas is substantially the same as +"_Ka be-bon-ik-ka_"--the "Winter-maker" of the Ojibways. + +[4] Mendota--(meeting of the waters) at the confluence of the Mississippi +and Minnesota rivers. The true Dakota word is _Mdo-te_--applied to the +mouth of a river flowing into another, also to the outlet of a lake. + +[5] Pronounced _Wee-wah-stay_; literally--a beautiful virgin or woman. + +[6] _Cetan-wa-ka-wa-mani_--"He who shoots pigeon-hawks walking"--was the +full Dakota name of the grandfather of the celebrated "Little Crow" +(_Ta-o-ya-te-du-ta_--His Red People) who led his warriors in the +terrible outbreak in Minnesota in 1862-3. The Chippeways called the +grandfather _Ka-ka-ge_--crow or raven--from his war-badge, a crow-skin; +and hence the French traders and _courriers du bois_ called him "_Petit +Corbeau_"--Little Crow. This sobriquet, of which he was proud, descended +to his son, _Wakinyan Tanka_--Big Thunder, who succeeded him as chief; +and from Big Thunder to his son _Ta-o-ya-te-du-ta_, who became chief on +the death of _Wakinyan Tanka_. These several "Little Crows" were +successively Chiefs of the Light-foot, or _Kapoza_ band of Dakotas. +_Kapoza_, the principal village of this band, was originally located on +the east bank of the Mississippi near the site of the city of St. Paul. +_Col. Minn. Hist. Soc._, 1864, p. 29. It was in later years moved to the +west bank. The grandfather whom I, for short, call _Wakawa_, died the +death of a brave in battle against the Ojibways (commonly called +Chippeways)--the hereditary enemies of the Dakotas. _Wakinyan +Tanka_--Big Thunder, was killed by the accidental discharge of his own +gun. They were both buried with their kindred near the "_Wakan Teepee_," +the sacred Cave--(Carver's Cave). _Ta-o-ya-te-du-ta_, the last of the +Little Crows, was killed July 3, 1863, during the outbreak, near +Hutchinson, Minnesota, by the Lampsons--father and son, and his bones +were duly "done up" for the Historical Society of Minnesota. See +_Heard's Hist. Sioux War_, and _Neill's Hist. Minnesota_, Third Edition. + +[Illustration: LITTLE CROW. _From an original photograph in the author's +possession_] + +Little Crow's sixteen-year-old son, _Wa-wi-na-pe_--(One who appears +--like the spirit of his forefather) was with him at the time he was +killed; but escaped, and after much hardship and suffering, was at last +captured at _Mini Wakan_ (Devil's Lake, in North Dakota). From him +personally I obtained much information in regard to Little Crow's +participation in the "Sioux War," and minutely the speech that Little +Crow made to his braves when he finally consented to lead them on the +war-path against the whites. A literal translation of that speech will +be found further on in this note. + +I knew _Ta-o-ya-te-du-ta_, and from his own lips, in 1859-60 and 61, +obtained much interesting information in regard to the history, +tradition, customs, superstitions and habits of the Dakotas, of whom he +was the recognized Head-Chief. He was a remarkable Indian--a philosopher +and a brave and generous man. "Untutored savage" that he was, he was a +prince among his own people, and the peer in natural ability of the +ablest white men in the Northwest in his time. He had largely adopted +the dress and habits of civilized man, and he urged his people to +abandon their savage ways, build houses, cultivate fields, and learn to +live like the white people. He clearly forsaw the ultimate extinction of +his people as a distinct race. He well knew and realized the numbers and +power of the whites then rapidly taking possession of the +hunting-grounds of the Dakotas, and the folly of armed opposition on the +part of his people. He said to me once: "No more Dakotas by and by; +Indians all white men. No more buffaloes by and by; all cows, all oxen." +But his braves were restless. They smarted under years of wrong and +robbery, to which, indeed, the most stinging insults were often added by +the traders and officials among them. If the true, unvarnished history +of the cause and inception of the "Sioux Outbreak" in Minnesota is ever +written and published, it will bring the blush of shame to the cheeks of +every honest man who reads it. + +Against his judgment and repeated protests, Little Crow was at last, +after the depredations had begun, forced into the war on the whites by +his hot-headed and uncontrollable "young men." + +Goaded to desperation, a party of Little Crow's young "bucks," in +August, 1862, began their depredations and spilled white blood at Acton. +Returning to their chief's camp near the agency, they told their fellow +braves what they had done. The hot-headed young warriors immediately +demanded of Little Crow that he put on the "war-paint" and lead them +against the white men. The chief severely rebuked the "young men" who +had committed the murders, blackened his face (a sign of mourning), +retired to his _teepee_ and covered his head in sorrow. + +His braves surrounded his tent and cut it into strips with their knives. +They threatened to depose him from the chiefship unless he immediately +put on the "war-paint" and led them against the whites. They knew that +the Civil War was then in progress, that the white men were fighting +among themselves, and they declared that now was the time to regain +their lost hunting-grounds; that now was the time to avenge the thievery +and insults of the Agents who had for years systematically cheated them +out of the greater part of their promised annuities, for which they had +been induced to part with their lands; that now was the time to avenge +the debauchery of their wives and daughters by the dissolute hangers-on +who, as employees of the Indian Agents and licensed traders, had for +years hovered around them like buzzards around the carcasses of +slaughtered buffaloes. + +But Little Crow was unmoved by the appeals and threats of his warriors. +It is said that once for a moment he uncovered his head; that his face +was haggard and great beads of sweat stood out on his forehead. But at +last one of his enraged braves, bolder than the rest, cried out: + +"_Ta-o-ya-te-du-ta_ is a coward!" + +Instantly Little Crow sprang from his _teepee_, snatched the +eagle-feathers from the head of his insulter and flung them on the +ground. Then, stretching himself to his full height, his eyes flashing +fire, and in a voice tremulous with rage, he exclaimed: + +"_Ta-o-ya-te-du-ta_ is not a coward, and he is not a fool! When did he +run away from his enemies? When did he leave his braves behind him on +the war-path and turn back to his _teepees_? When he ran away from your +enemies, he walked behind on your trail with his face to the Ojibways +and covered your backs as a she-bear covers her cubs! Is +_Ta-o-ya-te-du-ta_ without scalps? Look at his war-feathers! Behold the +scalp-locks of your enemies hanging there on his lodge-poles! Do they +call him a coward? _Ta-o-ya-te-du-ta_ is not a coward, and he is not a +fool. Braves, you are like little children; you know not what you are +doing. + +"You are full of the white man's _devil-water_" (rum). "You are like +dogs in the Hot Moon when they run mad and snap at their own shadows. We +are only little herds of buffaloes left scattered; the great herds that +once covered the prairies are no more. See!--the white men are like the +locusts when they fly so thick that the whole sky is a snow-storm. You +may kill one--two--ten; yes, as many as the leaves in the forest +yonder, and their brothers will not miss them. Kill one--two--ten, and +ten times ten will come to kill you. Count your fingers all day long and +white men with guns in their hands will come faster than you can count. + +"Yes; they fight among themselves--away off. Do you hear the thunder of +their big guns? No; it would take you two moons to run down to where +they are fighting, and all the way your path would be among white +soldiers as thick as tamaracks in the swamps of the Ojibways. Yes; they +fight among themselves, but if you strike at them they will all turn on +you and devour you and your women and little children just as the +locusts in their time fall on the trees and devour all the leaves in one +day. You are fools. You cannot see the face of your chief; your eyes are +full of smoke. You cannot hear his voice; your ears are full of roaring +waters. Braves, you are little children--you are fools. You will die +like the rabbits when the hungry wolves hunt them in the Hard Moon +(January). _Ta-o-ya-te du-ta_ is not a coward: he will die with you." + +[7] _Harps-te-nah_. The first-born daughter of a Dakota is called +_Winona_; the second, _Harpen_; the third, _Harpstina_; the fourth, +_Waska_; the fifth, _Weharka_. The first-born son is called _Chaske_; +the second, _Harpam_; the third, _Hapeda_; the fourth, _Chatun_; the +fifth, _Harka_. They retain these names till others are given them on +account of some action, peculiarity, etc. The females often retain their +child-names through life. + +[8] _Wah-pah-sah_ was the hereditary name of a long and illustrious line +of Dakota chiefs. Wabashaw is a corrupt pronunciation. The name is a +contraction of _Wa-pa-ha-sa_, which is from _Wa-ha-pa_, the standard or +pole used in the Dakota dances and upon which feathers of various colors +are tied, and not from _Wa-pa_--leaf, as has been generally supposed. +Therefore _Wapasa_ means the Standard--and not the "Leaf-Shaker," as +many writers have it. The principal village of these hereditary chiefs +was _Ke-uk-sa_, or _Ke-o-sa_,--where now stands the fair city of Winona. +_Ke-uk-sa_ signifies--The village of law-breakers; so called because +this band broke the law or custom of the Dakotas against marrying blood +relatives of any degree. I get this information from Rev. Stephen R. +Riggs, author of the Dakota Grammar and Dictionary, "_Takoo Wakan_," +etc. _Wapasa_, grandfather of the last chief of that name, and a +contemporary of _Cetan-Wa-ka-wa-mani_, was a noted chief, and a friend +of the British in the war of the Revolution. _Neill's Hist. Minn._, pp. +225-9. + +[9] _E-ho, E-to_--Exclamations of surprise and delight. + +[10] _Mah-gah_--The wild-goose. + +[11] _Tee-pee_--A lodge or wigwam, often contracted to "_tee_." + +[12] Pronounced _Mahr-pee-yah-doo-tah_--literally, Cloud Red. + +[13] Pronounced _Wahnmdee_--The War Eagle. Each feather worn by a warrior +represents an enemy slain or captured--man, woman or child; but the +Dakotas, before they became desperate under the cruel warfare of their +enemies, usually spared the lives of their captives, and never killed +women or infants, except in rare instances under the _lex talionis_. +_Neill's Hist. Minn._, p. 112. + +[14] _Mah-to_--The polar bear--_ursus maritimus_. The Dakotas say that in +olden times white bears were often found about Rainy Lake and the Lake +of the Woods in winter, and sometimes as far south as the mouth of the +Minnesota. They say one was once killed at White Bear Lake (but a few +miles from St. Paul and Minneapolis), and they therefore named the lake +Mede Mato--White Bear Lake, literally--Lake White Bear. + +[15] The _Ho-he_ (Ho-hay) are the Assiniboins or "Stone-roasters." Their +home is the region of the Assiniboin River in Manitoba. They speak the +Dakota tongue, and originally were a band of that nation. Tradition says +a Dakota "Helen" was the cause of the separation and a bloody feud that +lasted for many years. The _Hohes_ are called "Stone-roasters," because, +until recently at least, they used _wa-ta-pe_ kettles and vessels made +of birch bark in which they cooked their food. They boiled water in +these vessels by heating stones and putting them in the water. The +_wa-ta-pe_ kettle is made of the fibrous roots of the white cedar +interlaced and tightly woven. When the vessel is soaked it becomes +water-tight. [_Snelling's_] _Tales of the North-west_, p 21, +_Mackenzie's Travels._ + +[16] _Hey-o-ka_ is one of the principal Dakota deities. He is a giant, but +can change himself into a buffalo, a bear, a fish or a bird. He is +called the Anti-natural God or Spirit. In summer he shivers with cold, +in winter he suffers from heat; he cries when he laughs and he laughs +when he cries, etc. He is the reverse of nature in all things. _Heyoka_ +is universally feared and reverenced by the Dakotas, but so severe is +the ordeal that the _Heyoka Wacipee_ (the dance to _Heyoka_) is now +rarely celebrated. It is said that the "Medicine-men" use a secret +preparation which enables them to handle fire and dip their hands in +boiling water without injury and thereby gain great _eclat_ from the +uninitiated. The chiefs and the leading warriors usually belong to the +secret order of "Medicine-men" or "Sons of _Unktehee_"--the Spirit of +the Waters. + +[17] The Dakota name for the moon is _Han-ye-tu-wee_--literally, +Night-Sun. He is the twin brother of _An-pe-tu-wee_--the Day Sun. See +note 70. + +[18] The Dakotas believe that the stars are the spirits of their departed +friends. + +[19] _Tee_--Contracted from _teepee_, lodge or wigwam, and means the same. + +[20] For all their sacred feasts the Dakotas kindle a new fire called "The +Virgin Fire." This is done with flint and steel, or by rubbing together +pieces of wood till friction produces fire. It must be done by a virgin, +nor must any woman, except a virgin, ever touch the "sacred armor" of a +Dakota warrior. White cedar is "_Wakan_"--sacred. See note 50. _Riggs' +Tahkoo Wakan_, p. 84. + +[21] All Northern Indians consider the East a mysterious and sacred land +whence comes the sun. The Dakota name for the East is +_Wee-yo-hee-yan-pa_--the sunrise. The Ojibways call it _Waub-o-nong_ +--the white land or land of light, and they have many myths, legends and +traditions relating thereto. Barbarous peoples of all times have +regarded the East with superstitious reverence simply because the sun +rises in that quarter. + +[22] See _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, pp. 225-8, describing the feast to +_Heyoka_. + +[23] This stone from which the Dakotas have made their pipes for ages, is +esteemed _wakan_--sacred. They call it _I-yan-ska_, probably from _iya_, +to speak, and _ska_, white, truthful, peaceful,--hence, peace-pipe, +herald of peace, pledge of truth, etc. In the cabinet at Albany, N.Y., +there is a very ancient pipe of this material which the Iroquois +obtained from the Dakotas. Charlevoix speaks of this pipe-stone in his +_History of New France_. LeSueur refers to the Yanktons as the village +of the Dakotas at the Red-Stone Quarry. See _Neill's Hist. Minn._, p. +514. + +[24] "_Ho_" is an exclamation of approval--yea, yes, bravo. + +[25] Buying is the honorable way of taking a wife among the Dakotas. The +proposed husband usually gives a horse or its value in other articles to +the father or natural guardian of the woman selected--sometimes against +her will. See note 75. + +[26] The Dakotas believe that the _Aurora Borealis_ is an evil omen and +the threatening of an evil spirit (perhaps _Waziya_, the +Winter-god--some say a witch, or a very ugly old woman). When the lights +appear danger threatens, and the warriors shoot at, and often slay, the +evil spirit, but it rises from the dead again. + +[27] _Se-so-kah_--The Robin. + +[28] The spirit of _Anpetu-sapa_ that haunts the Falls of St. Anthony with +her dead babe in her arms. See the Legend in _Neill's Hist. Minn._, or +my _Legend of the Falls._ + +[29] _Mee-coonk-shee_--My daughter. + +[30] The Dakotas call the meteor, "_Wakan-denda_" (sacred fire) and +_Wakan-wohlpa_ (sacred gift). Meteors are messages from the Land of +Spirits warning of impending danger. It is a curious fact that the +"sacred stone" of the Mohammedans, in the Kaaba at Mecca, is a meteoric +stone, and obtains its sacred character from the fact that it fell from +heaven. + +[31] _Kah-no-te-dahn_,--the little, mysterious dweller in the woods. This +spirit lives in the forest, in hollow trees. _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, +Pre. Rem. xxxi. "The Dakota god of the woods--an unknown animal said to +resemble a man, which the Dakotas worship: perhaps, the +monkey."--_Riggs' Dakota Dic. Tit--Canotidan_. + +[32] The Dakotas believe that thunder is produced by the flapping of the +wings of an immense bird which they call _Wakinyan_--the Thunder-bird. +Near the source of the Minnesota River is a place called +"Thunder-Tracks" where the foot-prints of a "Thunder-bird" are seen on +the rocks twenty-five miles apart. _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, p. 71. +There are many Thunder-birds. The father of all the +Thunder-birds--"_Wakinyan Tanka_"--or "Big Thunder," has his _teepee_ on +a lofty mountain in the far West. His _teepee_ has four openings, at +each of which is a sentinel; at the east, a butterfly; at the west, a +bear; at the south, a red deer; at the north, a caribou. He has a bitter +enmity against _Unktehee_ (god of waters) and often shoots his fiery +arrows at him, and hits the earth, trees, rocks, and sometimes men. +_Wakinyan_ created wild-rice, the bow and arrow, the tomahawk and the +spear. He is a great war-spirit, and _Wanmdee_ (the war-eagle) is his +messenger. A Thunder-bird (say the Dakotas) was once killed near Kapoza +by the son of Cetan-Wakawa-mani and he thereupon took the name of +"_Wakinyan Tanka_"--"Big Thunder." + +[33] Pronounced _Tah-tahn-kah_--Bison or Buffalo. + +[34] _Enah_--An exclamation of wonder. _Eho_--Behold! see there! + +[35] The Crees are the Knisteneaux of Alexander Mackenzie. See his account +of them, _Mackenzie's Travels_, (London, 1801) p. xci to cvii. + +[36] Lake Superior. The only names the Dakotas have for Lake Superior are +_Mede Tanka_ or _Tanka Mede_--Great Lake, and _Me-ne-ya-ta_--literally, +_At-the-Water_. + +[37] April--Literally, the moon when the geese lay eggs. See note 71. + +[38] Carver's Cave at St. Paul was called by the Dakotas _Wakan_ +_Teepee_--sacred lodge. In the days that are no more they lighted their +council-fires in this cave and buried their dead near it. See _Neill's +Hist. Minn_., p. 207. Capt. Carver in his _Travels_, London, 1778, p. +63, et. seq., describes this cave as follows: "It is a remarkable cave +of an amazing depth. The Indians term it Wakonteebe, that is, the +Dwelling of the Great Spirit. The entrance into it is about ten feet +wide, the height of it five feet, the arch within is near fifteen feet +high and about thirty feet broad. The bottom of it consists of fine +clear sand. About twenty feet from the entrance begins a lake, the water +of which is transparent, and extends to an unsearchable distance; for +the darkness of the cave prevents all attempts to acquire a knowledge of +it. I threw a small pebble toward the interior parts of it with my +utmost strength. I could hear that it fell into the water, and +notwithstanding it was of so small a size it caused an astonishing and +horrible noise that reverberated through all those gloomy regions. I +found in this cave many Indian hieroglyphics which appeared very +ancient, for time had nearly covered them with moss so that it was with +difficulty I could trace them. They were cut in a rude manner upon the +inside of the walls, which were composed of a stone so extremely soft +that it might be easily penetrated with a knife: a stone everywhere to +be found near the Mississippi. This cave is only accessible by ascending +a narrow, steep passage that lies near the brink of the river. At a +little distance from this dreary cavern is the burying-place of several +bands of the Naudowessie (Dakota) Indians," Many years ago the roof fell +in but the cave has been partly restored and is now used as a beer +cellar. + +[39] _Wah-kahn-dee_--The lightning. + +[40] The Bloody River--the Red River was so called on account of the +numerous Indian battles that have been fought on its banks. The Ojibways +say that its waters were colored red by the blood of many warriors slain +on its banks in the fierce wars between themselves and the Dakotas. + +[41] _Tah_--The Moose. This is the root-word for all ruminating animals: +_Ta-tanka_, buffalo--Ta-toka, mountain antelope--Ta-hinca, the red +deer--Ta-mdoka, the buck-deer--Ta-hinca-ska, white deer (sheep). + +[42] _Hogahn_--Fish. Red Hogan, the trout. + +[43] _Tipsanna_ (often called _tipsinna_) is a wild prairie-turnip used +for food by the Dakotas. It grows on high, dry land, and increases from +year to year. It is eaten both cooked and raw. + +[44] _Rio Tajo_ (or Tagus), a river of Spain and Portugal. + +[45] + * * * * "Bees of Trebizond-- + Which from the sunniest flowers that glad + With their pure smile the gardens round, + Draw venom forth that drives men mad." + +_--Thomas Moore_. + +[46] _Skee-skah_--The Wood-duck. + +[47] The Crocus. I have seen the prairies in Minnesota spangled with these +beautiful flowers in various colors before the ground was free from +frost. The Dakotas call them "frost-flowers." + +[48] The "Sacred Ring" around the Feast of the Virgins is formed by armed +warriors sitting, and none but a virgin must enter this ring. The +warrior who knows is bound on honor, and by old and sacred custom, to +expose and publicly denounce any tarnished maiden who dares to enter +this ring, and his word cannot be questioned--even by the chief. See +_Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, p. 64. + +[49] Prairie's Pride.--This annual shrub, which abounds on many of the +sandy prairies in Minnesota, is sometimes called "tea-plant," +"sage-plant," and "red-root willow." I doubt if it has any botanic name. +Its long plumes of purple and gold are truly the "pride of the +prairies." + +[50] The Dakotas consider white cedar "_Wakan_," (sacred). They use +sprigs of it at their feasts, and often burn it to destroy the power of +evil spirits. _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_, p. 210. + +[51] _Tahkoo-skahng-skahng_. This deity is supposed to be invisible, yet +everywhere present; he is an avenger and a searcher of hearts. (_Neill's +Hist. Minn_., p. 57). I suspect he was the chief spirit of the Dakotas +before the missionaries imported "_Wakan-Tanka_" (Great Spirit). + +[52] The Dakotas believe in "were-wolves" as firmly as did our Saxon +ancestors, and for similar reasons--the howl of the wolf being often +imitated as a decoy or signal by their enemies the Ojibways. + +[53] _Shee-sho-kah_--The Robin. + +[54] The Dakotas call the Evening Star the "_Virgin Star_," and believe it +to be the spirit of the virgin wronged at the feast. + +[55] Mille Lacs. This lake was discovered by Du Luth, and by him named Lac +Buade in honor of Governor Frontenac of Canada, whose family name was +Buade. The Dakota name for it is _Mde Wakan_--Spirit Lake. + +[56] The Ojibways imitate the hoot of the owl and the howl of the wolf to +perfection, and often use these cries as signals to each other in war +and the chase. + +[57] The Dakotas called the Ojibways the "Snakes of the Forest" on account +of their lying in ambush for their enemies. + +[58] Strawberries. + +[59] _See-yo_--The prairie-hen. + +[60] _Mahgah_--The wild-goose. _Fox-pups_. I could never see the propriety +of calling the young of foxes _kits_ or _kittens_, which mean _little +cats_. The fox belongs to the _canis_ or dog family, and not the _felis_ +or cat family. If it is proper to call the young of dogs and wolves +_pups_, it is equally proper to so call the young of foxes. + +[61] When a Dakota is sick he thinks the spirit of an enemy or some animal +has entered into his body, and the principal business of the +"medicine-man"--_Wicasta Wakan_--is to cast out the "unclean spirit," +with incantations and charms. See _Neill's Hist. Minn_., pp. 66-8. The +Jews entertained a similar belief in the days of Jesus of Nazareth. + +[62] _Wah-zee-yah's_ star--The North-star. See note 3. + +[63] The Dakotas, like our forefathers and all other barbarians, believe +in witches and witchcraft. + +[64] The _Medo_ is a wild potato; it resembles the sweet-potato in top and +taste. It grows in bottom-lands, and is much prized by the Dakotas for +food. The "_Dakota Friend_," for December, 1850. (Minn. Hist. Col.) + +[65] The meteor--_Wakan-denda_--Sacred fire. + +[66] _Me-ta-win_--My bride. + +[68] The _Via Lactea_ or Milky Way. The Dakotas call it _Wanagee +Tach-anku_--The pathway of the spirits; and believe that over this path +the spirits of the dead pass to the Spirit-land. See _Riggs' Tah-koo +Wah-kan_, p. 101. + +[69] _Oonk-tay-he_. There are many _Unktehees_, children of the _Great +Unktehee_, who created the earth and man, and who formerly dwelt in a +vast cavern under the Falls of St. Anthony. The _Unktehee_ sometimes +reveals himself in the form of a huge buffalo-bull. From him proceed +invisible influences. The _Great Unktehee_ created the earth. +"Assembling in grand conclave all the aquatic tribes he ordered them to +bring up dirt from beneath the waters, and proclaimed death to the +disobedient. The beaver and otter forfeited their lives. At last the +muskrat went beneath the waters, and, after a long time, appeared at the +surface, nearly exhausted, with some dirt. From this _Unktehee_ +fashioned the earth into a large circular plain. The earth being +finished he took a deity, one of his own offspring, and, grinding him to +powder, sprinkled it upon the earth, and this produced many worms. The +worms were then collected and scattered again. They matured into infants +and these were then collected and scattered and became full-grown +Dakotas. The bones of the mastodon, the Dakotas think, are the bones of +_Unktehees_, and they preserve them with the greatest care in the +medicine-bag." _Neill's Hist. Minn_., p. 55. The _Unktehees_ and the +Thunder-birds are perpetually at war. There are various accounts of the +creation of man. Some say that at the bidding of the _Great Unktehee_, +men sprang full grown from the caverns of the earth. See _Riggs' "Tahkoo +Wahkan"_, and _Mrs. Eastman's Dacotah_. The _Great Unktehee_ and the +Great Thunder-bird had a terrible battle in the bowels of the earth to +determine which should be the ruler of the world. See description in +_Winona_. + +[70] Pronounced _Ahng-pay-too-wee_--The Sun; literally the Day-Sun, thus +distinguishing him from _Han-ye-tuwee_ (Hahng-yay-too-wee) the Night Sun +(the moon). They are twin brothers, but _Anpetuwee_ is the more +powerful. _Han-ye-tuwee_ receives his power from his brother and obeys +him. He watches over the earth while the sun sleeps. The Dakotas believe +the sun is the father of life. Unlike the most of their other gods, he +is beneficent and kind; yet they worshiped him (in the sun-dance) in the +most dreadful manner. See _Riggs' Tahkoo Wakan_, pp. 81-2, and Catlin's +_Okeepa_. The moon is worshiped as the representative of the sun; and in +the great Sun-dance, which is usually held in the full of the moon, when +the moon rises the dancers turn their eyes on her (or him). _Anpetuwee_ +issues every morning from the lodge of _Han-nan-na_ (the Morning) and +begins his journey over the sky to his lodge in the land of shadows. +Sometimes he walks over on the Bridge (or path) of the Spirits--_Wanage +Ta-chan-ku_,--and sometimes he sails over the sea of the skies in his +shining canoe; but _somehow_, and the Dakotas do not explain how, he +gets back again to the lodge of _Hannanna_ in time to take a nap and eat +his breakfast before starting anew on his journey. The Dakotas swear by +the sun, "_As Anpetuwee hears me, this is true!_" They call him Father +and pray to him--"_Wakan! Ate, on-she-ma-da_"--"Sacred Spirit,--Father, +have mercy on me." As the Sun is the father, so they believe the Earth +is the mother, of life. Truly there is much philosophy in the Dakota +mythology. The Algonkins call the earth "_Me-suk-kum-mik-o-kwa_"--the +great-grandmother of all. _Narrative of John Tanner_, p. 193. + +[71] The Dakotas reckon their months by _moons_. They name their moons +from natural circumstances. They correspond very nearly with our months, +as follows: + +January--_Wee-te-rhee_--The Hard Moon; i.e.--the cold moon. + +February--_Wee-ca-ta-wee_--The Coon Moon--(the moon when the coons come +out of their hollow trees). + +March--_Ista-wee-ca-ya-zang-wee_--the sore-eyes moon (from snow +blindness). + +April--Maga-oka-da-wee--the moon when the geese lay eggs; also called +Woka da-wee--egg-moon; and sometimes Wato-papee-wee, the canoe-moon, or +moon when the streams become free from ice. + +May--Wo-zu-pee-wee--the planting moon. + +June--Wazu-ste-ca-sa-wee--the strawberry moon. + +July--Wa-sun-pa-wee--the moon when the geese shed their feathers, also +called Chang-pa-sapa-wee--Choke-Cherry moon, and +sometimes--Mna-rcha-rcha-wee--"The moon of the red-blooming lilies," +literally, the red-lily moon. + +August--Wasu-ton-wee--the ripe moon, i.e., Harvest Moon. + +September--Psin-na-ke-tu-wee--the ripe rice moon. (When the wild rice is +ripe.) + +October--Wa-zu-pee-wee or Wee-wa-zu-pee--the moon when wild rice is +gathered and laid up for winter. + +November--Ta-kee-yu-hra-wee--the deer-rutting moon. + +December--Ta-he-cha-psung-wee--the moon when deer shed their horns. + +[72] Oonk-to-mee--is a bad spirit in the form of a monstrous black spider. +He inhabits fens and marshes and lies in wait for his prey. At night he +often lights a torch (evidently the ignis fatuus or Jack-o' lantern) and +swings it on the marshes to decoy the unwary into his toils. + +[73] The Dakotas have their stone-idol, or god, called Toon-kan--or Inyan. +This god dwells in stone or rocks and is, they say, the oldest god of +all--he is grandfather of all living things. I think, however, that the +stone is merely the symbol of the everlasting, all-pervading, invisible +Ta-ku Wa-kan--the essence of all life,--pervading all nature, animate +and inanimate. The Rev. S.R. Riggs, who for forty years has been a +student of Dakota customs, superstitions, etc., says, Tahkoo Wahkan, p. +55, et seq.: "The religious faith of the Dakota is not in his gods as +such. It is in an intangible, mysterious something of which they are +only the embodiment, and that in such measure and degree as may accord +with the individual fancy of the worshiper. Each one will worship some +of these divinities, and neglect or despise others, but the great object +of all their worship, whatever its chosen medium, is the _Ta-koo +Wa-kan_, which is the supernatural and mysterious. No one term can +express the full meaning of the Dakota's _Wakan_. It comprehends all +mystery, secret power and divinity. Awe and reverence are its due, and +it is as unlimited in manifestation as it is in idea. All life is +_Wakan_; so also is everything which exhibits power, whether in action, +as the winds and drifting clouds; or in passive endurance, as the +boulder by the wayside. For even the commonest sticks and stones have a +spiritual essence which must be reverenced as a manifestation of the +all-pervading, mysterious power that fills the universe." + +[74] _Wazi-kute_--Wah-ze-koo-tay; literally--Pine-shooter,--he that shoots +among the pines. When Father Hennepin was at Mille Lacs in 1679-80, +_Wazi-kute_ was the head chief (_Itancan_) of the band of Isantees. +Hennepin writes the name Ouasicoude, and translates it--the "Pierced +Pine." See Shea's _Hennepin_, p. 234, _Minn. Hist. Coll_. vol. i, p. +316. + +[75] When a Dakota brave wishes to "propose" to a "dusky maid," he visits +her _teepee_ at night after she has retired, or rather, laid down in her +robe to sleep. He lights a splinter of wood and holds it to her face. If +she blows out the light, he is accepted; if she covers her head and +leaves it burning he is rejected. The rejection however is not +considered final till it has been thrice repeated. Even then the maiden +is often bought of her parents or guardian, and forced to become the +wife of the rejected suitor. If she accepts the proposal, still the +suitor must buy her of her parents with suitable gifts. + +[76] The Dakotas called the falls of St. Anthony the _Ha-Ha_--the _loud +laughing_, or _roaring_. The Mississippi River they called _Ha-Ha +Wa-kpa_ River of the Falls. The Ojibway name for the Falls of St. +Anthony is _Ka-ka-bik-kung_. Minnehaha is a combination of two Dakota +words--_Mini_--water and _Ha-Ha_, Falls; but it is not the name by which +the Dakotas designated that cataract. Some authorities say they called +it _I-ha-ha_--pronounced E-rhah-rhah--lightly laughing. Rev. S.W. Pond, +whose long residence as a missionary among the Dakotas in this immediate +vicinity makes him an authority that can hardly be questioned, says they +called the Falls of Minnehaha "_Mini-i-hrpa-ya-dan_," and it had no +other name in Dakota. "It means Little Falls and nothing else." Letter +to the author. + +[77] The game of the Plum-stones is one of the favorite games of the +Dakotas. Hennepin was the first to describe this game, in his +_Description de la Louisiane_, Paris, 1683, and he describes it very +accurately. See Shea's translation p. 301. The Dakotas call this game +_Kan-soo Koo-tay-pe_--shooting plum-stones. Each stone is painted black +on one side and red on the other; on one side they grave certain figures +which make the stones _Wakan_. They are placed in a dish and thrown up +like dice. Indeed, the game is virtually a game of dice. Hennepin says: +"There are some so given to this game that they will gamble away even +their great coat. Those who conduct the game cry at the top of their +voices when they rattle the platter, and they strike their shoulders so +hard as to leave them all black with the blows." + +[78] _Wa-tanka_--contraction of _Wa-kan Tanka_--Great Spirit. The Dakotas +had no _Wakan Tanka_ or _Wakan-peta_--fire spirit--till white men +imported them. There being no name for the Supreme Being in the Dakota +tongue (except _Taku Skan-skan_.--See note 51)--and all their gods and +spirits being _Wakan_--the missionaries named God in Dakota--"_Wakan +Tanka_"--which means _Big Spirit_, or _The Big Mysterious_. + +[79] The Dakotas called Lake Calhoun, at Minneapolis, +Minn.--_Mde-mdo-za_--Loon Lake. They also called it _Re-ya-ta-mde_--the +lake back from the river. They called Lake Harriet--_Mde-unma_--the +other lake--or (perhaps) _Mde-uma_--Hazel-nut Lake. The lake nearest +Calhoun on the north--Lake of the Isles--they called _Wi-ta +Mde_--Island-Lake. Lake Minnetonka they called _Me-ne-a-tan-ka_--_Broad +Water_. + +[80] The animal called by the French _voyageurs_ the _cabri_ (the kid) is +found only on the prairies. It is of the goat kind, smaller than a deer +and so swift that neither horse nor dog can overtake it. (Snelling's +"_Tales of the Northwest_," p. 286, note 15.) It is the gazelle, or +prairie antelope, called by the Dakotas _Ta-toka-dan_--little antelope. +It is the _Pish-tah-te-koosh_ of the Algonkin tribes, "reckoned the +fleetest animal in the prairie country about the Assiniboin." _Captivity +and Adventures of John Tanner_, p. 301. + +[81] The _Wicastapi Wakanpi_ (literally, _men supernatural_) are the +"Medicine-men" or Magicians of the Dakotas. They call themselves the +sons or disciples of _Unktehee_. In their rites, ceremonies, tricks and +pretensions they closely resemble the _Dactyli, Idae_, and _Curetes_ of +the ancient Greeks and Romans, the _Magi_ of the Persians and the Druids +of Britain. Their pretended intercourse with spirits, their powers of +magic and divination, and their rites are substantially the same, and +point unmistakably to a common origin. The Dakota "Medicine-Man" can do +the "rope trick" of the Hindoo magician to perfection. The _teepee_ used +for the _Wakan Wacipee_--or Sacred Dance--is called the _Wakan +Teepee_--the Sacred Teepee. Carvers Cave at St. Paul was also called +_Wakan Teepee_ because the Medicine-men or magicians often held their +dances and feasts in it. For a full account of the rites, etc., see +Riggs' _Tahkoo Wahkan_, Chapter VI. The _Ta-sha-ke_--literally, +"Deer-hoofs"--is a rattle made by hanging the hard segments of +deer-hoofs to a wooden rod a foot long--about an inch in diameter at the +handle end, and tapering to a point at the other. The clashing of these +horny bits makes a sharp, shrill sound something like distant +sleigh-bells. In their incantations over the sick they sometimes use the +gourd shell rattle. + +The _Chan-che-ga_--is a drum or "Wooden Kettle." The hoop of the drum is +from a foot to eighteen inches in diameter, and from three to ten inches +deep. The skin covering is stretched over one end, making a drum with +one end only. The magical drum-sticks are ornamented with down, and +heads of birds or animals are carved on them. This makes them _Wakan_. + +The flute called _Cho-tanka_ (big pith) is of two varieties--one made of +sumac, the pith of which is punched out. The second variety is made of +the long bone of the wing or thigh of the swan or crane. They call the +first the _bubbling chotanka_ from the tremulous note it gives when +blown with all the holes stopped. Riggs' _Tahkoo Wahkan_, p. 476, et +seq. + +_E-ne-pee_--vapor-bath, is used as a purification preparatory to the +sacred feasts. The vapor-bath is taken in this way: "A number of poles, +the size of hoop-poles or less, are taken, and their larger ends being +set in the ground in a circle, the flexible tops are bent over and tied +in the center. This frame-work is then covered with robes and blankets, +a small hole being left on one side for an entrance. Before the door a +fire is built, and round stones about the size of a man's head, are +heated in it. When hot they are rolled within, and the door being closed +steam is made by pouring water on them. The devotee, stripped to the +skin, sits within this steam-tight dome, sweating profusely at every +pore, until he is nearly suffocated. Sometimes a number engage in it +together and unite their prayers and songs." _Tahkoo Wakan_, p. 83. +Father Hennepin was subjected to the vapor-bath at Mille Lacs by Chief +_Aqui-pa-que-tin_, two hundred years ago. After describing the method, +Hennepin says: "When he had made me sweat thus three times in a week, I +felt as strong as ever." Shea's Hennepin, p. 228. For a very full and +accurate account of the Medicine-men of the Dakotas, and their rites, +etc., see Chap. II, Neill's Hist. Minnesota. + +[82] The sacred _O-zu-ha_--or Medicine sack must be made of the skin of +the otter, the coon, the weasel, the squirrel, the loon, a certain kind +of fish or the skins of serpents. It must contain four kinds of medicine +(or magic) representing birds, beasts, herbs and trees, viz.: The down +of the female swan colored red, the roots of certain grasses, bark from +the roots of cedar trees, and hair of the buffalo. "From this +combination proceeds a Wakan influence so powerful that no human being, +unassisted, can resist it." Wonderful indeed must be the magic power of +these Dakota Druids to lead such a man as the Rev. S.R. Riggs to say of +them: "By great shrewdness, untiring industry, and more or less of +_actual demoniacal possession_, they convince great numbers of their +fellows, and in the process are convinced themselves of their sacred +character and office." _Tahkoo Wakan_, pp. 88-9. + +[83] _Gah-ma-na-tek-wahk--the river of many falls_--is the Ojibway name of +the river commonly called Kaministiguia, near the mouth of which is +situated Fort William. The view on Thunder-Bay is one of the grandest in +America. Thunder-Cap, with its sleeping stone-giant, looms up into the +heavens. Here _Ka-be-bon-ikka_--the Ojibway's god of storms--flaps his +huge wings and makes the Thunder. From this mountain he sends forth the +rain, the snow, the hail, the lightning and the tempest. A vast giant, +turned to stone by his magic, lies asleep at his feet. The island called +by the Ojibways the _Mak-i-nak_ (the turtle) from its tortoise-like +shape, lifts its huge form in the distance. Some "down-east Yankee" +called it "Pie-island," from its fancied resemblance to a pumpkin pie, +and the name, like all bad names, _sticks_. McKay's Mountain on the +mainland, a perpendicular rock more than a thousand feet high, upheaved +by the throes of some vast volcano, and numerous other bold and +precipitous headlands, and rock-built islands, around which roll the +sapphire-blue waters of the fathomless bay, present some of the most +magnificent views to be found on either continent. + +[84] The Mission of the Holy Ghost--at La Pointe, on the isle +_Wauga-ba-me_--(winding view) in the beautiful bay of Cha-quam-egon +--was founded by the Jesuits about the year 1660. Father Rene Menard was +probably the first priest at this point. After he was lost in the +wilderness, Father Glaude Allouez permanently established the mission in +1665. The famous Father Marquette, who took Allouez's place, Sept. 13, +1669, writing to his superior, thus describes the Dakotas: "The +Nadouessi are the Iroquois of this country, beyond La Pointe, _but less +faithless, and never attack till attacked._ Their language is entirely +different from the Huron and Algonquin. They have many villages but are +widely scattered. They have very extraordinary customs. They principally +use the calumet. They do not speak at great feasts, and when a stranger +arrives give him to eat of a wooden fork, as we would a child. All the +lake tribes make war on them, but with small success. They have false +oats (wild rice,) use little canoes, _and keep their word strictly_." +_Neill's Hist. Minn._, p. III. + +[85] _Michabo_ or _Manni-bozo_--the Good Spirit of the Algonkins. In +autumn, in the moon of the falling leaf, ere he composes himself to his +winter's sleep, he fills his great pipe and takes a god-like smoke. The +balmy clouds from his pipe float over the hills and woodland, filling +the air with the haze of "Indian Summer." _Brinton's Myths of the New +World_, p. 163. + +[86] Pronounced _Kah-thah-gah_--literally, _the place of waves and foam_. +This was the principal village of the _Isantee_ band of Dakotas two +hundred years ago, and was located at the Falls of St. Anthony, which +the Dakotas called the _Ha-ha_,--pronounced _Rhah-rhah_,--the +_loud-laughing waters_. The Dakotas believed that the Falls were in the +center of the earth. Here dwelt the _Great Unktehee_, the creator of the +earth and man: and from this place a path led to the Spirit-land. DuLuth +undoubtedly visited Kathaga in the year 1679. In his "Memoir" (Archives +of the Ministry of the Marine) addressed to Seignelay, 1685, he says: +"On the 2nd of July, 1679, I had the honor to plant his Majesty's arms +in the great village of the Nadouecioux called Izatys, where never had a +Frenchman been, etc." _Izatys_ is here used not as the name of the +village, but as the name of the band--the _Isantees_. _Nadouecioux_ was +a name given the Dakotas generally by the early French traders and the +Ojibways. See _Shea's Hennepin's Description of Louisiana_, pp. 203 and +375. The villages of the Dakotas were not permanent towns. They were +hardly more than camping grounds, occupied at intervals and for longer +or shorter periods, as suited the convenience of the hunters; yet there +were certain places, like Mille Lacs, the Falls of St. Anthony, _Kapoza_ +(near St. Paul), _Remnica_ (where the city of Red Wing now stands), and +_Keuxa_ (or _Keoza_) on the site of the city of Winona, so frequently +occupied by several of the bands as to be considered their chief +villages respectively. + +Mr. Neill, usually very accurate and painstaking, has fallen into an +error in his prefatory notes to the last edition of his valuable +_History of Minnesota_. Speaking of DuLuth, he says: + +"He appears to have entered Minnesota by way of the Pigeon or St. Louis +River, and to have explored where no Frenchman had been, and on July 2, +1679, was at _Kathio_ (_Kathaga_) perhaps on Red Lake or Lake of the +Woods, which was called 'the great village of the Wadouessioux,' one +hundred and twenty leagues from the _Songaskicons_ and _Houetepons_ who +were dwellers _in the Mille Lac region_." + +Now _Kathaga_ (Mr. Neill's _Kathio_) was located at the Falls of St. +Anthony on the Mississippi as the whole current of Dakota traditions +clearly shows and DuLuth's dispatches clearly indicate. Besides, the +_Songaskicons_ and _Houetepons_ were _not_ and never were "dwellers in +the Mille Lac region." The Songaskicons (Sissetons) were at that time +located on the Des Moines river (in Iowa), and the Houetabons +(Ouadebatons) at and around Big Stone Lake. The Isantees occupied the +region lying between the mouth of the Minnesota River and Spirit Lake +(Mille Lacs) with their principal village--_Kathaga_--where the city of +Minneapolis now stands. These facts account for the "one hundred and +twenty leagues" as distances were roughly reckoned by the early French +explorers. + +September 1, 1678, Daniel Greysolon DuLuth, a native of Lyons, France, +left Quebec to explore the country of the Dakotas. "The next year (1679) +on the 2nd day of July, he caused the king's arms to be planted in the +great village of the Nadouessioux (Dakotas) called Kathio" (_Kathaga_) +"where no Frenchman had ever been, also at the Songaskicons and +Houetabons, one hundred and twenty leagues distant from the former. * * +* * On this tour he visited Mille Lacs, which he called Lake Buade, the +family name of Frontenac, governor of Canada." _Neill''s History of +Minnesota_, p. 122. This is correct, except the name of the +village--_Kathio_, which is a misprint or perhaps an error of a copyist. +It should be _Kathaga_. DuLuth was again at the Falls of St. Anthony in +1680 and returned to Lake Superior via the Mississippi, Rum River and +Mille Lacs, according to his own dispatches. + +Franquelin's "_Carte de la Louisiane_" printed at Paris A.D. 1684, from +information derived from DuLuth, who visited France in 1682-3, and +conferred with the minister of the Colonies and the minister of +Marine--shows the inaccuracy, as to points of compass at least, of the +early French explorers. According to this map, Lake Buade (Mille Lacs) +lies north-west of Lake Superior and Lake Pepin lies due west of it. + +DuLuth was afterward appointed to the command of Fort Frontenac near +Niagara Falls, and died there in 1710. The official dispatch from the +Governor of Canada to the French Government is, as regards the great +explorer, brief and expressive--"Captain DuLuth is dead. He was an +honest man." + +To Daniel Greysolon DuLuth, and not to Father Hennepin, whom he rescued +from his captors at Mille Lacs, belongs the credit of the first +exploration of Minnesota by white men. + +Father Hennepin was a self-conceited and self-convicted liar. Daniel +Greysolon DuLuth "was an honest man." + + + + +NOTES TO THE SEA-GULL + + +[1] _Kay-oshk_ is the Ojibway name for the sea-gull. + +[2] _Gitchee_--great,--_Gumee_--sea or lake,--Lake Superior; also often +called _Ochipwe Gitchee Gumee_, Great lake (or sea) of the Ojibways. + +[3] _Ne-me-Shomis_--my grandfather. "In the days of my grandfather" is +the Ojibway's preface to all his traditions and legends. + +[4] _Waub_--white--_O-jeeg_--fisher, (a furred animal). White Fisher was +the name of a noted Ojibway chief who lived on the south shore of Lake +Superior many years ago. Schoolcraft married one of his descendants. + +[5] _Ma-kwa_ or _mush-kwa_--the bear. + +[6] The _Te-ke-nah-gun_ is a board upon one side of which a sort of basket +is fastened or woven with thongs of skin or strips of cloth. In this the +babe is placed and the mother carries it on her back. In the wigwam the +_tekenagun_ is often suspended by a cord to the lodge-poles and the +mother swings her babe in it. + +[7] _Wabose_ (or _Wabos_)-the rabbit. _Penay_, the pheasant. At certain +seasons the pheasant drums with his wings. + +[8] _Kaug_, the porcupine. _Kenew_, the war-eagle. + +[9] _Ka-be-bon-ik-ka_ is the god of storms, thunder, lightning, etc. His +home is on Thunder-Cap at Thunder-Bay, Lake Superior. By his magic the +giant that lies on the mountain was turned to stone. He always sends +warnings before he finally sends the severe cold of winter, in order to +give all creatures time to prepare for it. + +[10] _Kewaydin_ or _Kewaytin_, is the North wind or North-west wind. + +[11] _Algonkin_ is the general name applied to all tribes that speak the +Ojibway language or dialects of it. + +[12] This is the favorite "love-broth" of the Ojibway squaws. The warrior +who drinks it immediately falls desperately in love with the woman who +gives it to him. Various tricks are devised to conceal the nature of the +"medicine" and to induce the warrior to drink it; but when it is mixed +with a liberal quantity of "fire-water" it is considered irresistible. + +[13] Translation: + + Woe-is-me! Woe-is-me! + Great Spirit, behold me! + Look, Father; have pity upon me! + Woe-is-me! Woe-is-me! + +[14] Snow-storms from the North-west. + +[15] The Ojibways, like the Dakotas, call the _Via Lactea_ (Milky Way) the +Pathway of the Spirits. + +[16] _Shinge-bis_, the diver, is the only water-fowl that remains about +Lake Superior all winter. + +[17] _Waub-ese_--the white swan. + +[18] _Pe-boan_, Winter, is represented as an old man with long white hair +and beard. + +[19] _Segun_ is Spring (or Summer). This beautiful allegory has been "done +into verse" by Longfellow in _Hiawatha_. Longfellow evidently took his +version from Schoolcraft. I took mine originally from the lips of +_Pah-go-nay-gie-shiek_--"Hole-in-the-day"--(the elder) in his day +head-chief of the Ojibways. I afterward submitted it to _Gitche +Shabash-Konk_, head-chief of the _Misse-sah-ga-e-gun_--(Mille Lacs band +of Ojibways), who pronounced it correct. + +"Hole-in-the-day," although sanctioned by years of unchallenged use, is +a bad translation of _Pah-go-nay-gie-shiek_, which means a _clear spot +in the sky_. + +[Illustration: HOLE-IN-THE-DAY. _From an original photograph in the +author's possession._] + +He was a very intelligent man; had been in Washington several times on +business connected with his people, and was always shrewd enough to +look out for himself in all his treaties and transactions with the +Government. He stood six feet two inches in his moccasins, was +well-proportioned, and had a remarkably fine face. He had a +nickname--_Que-we-zanc_--(Little Boy) by which he was familiarly called +by his people. + +The Pillagers--_Nah-kand-tway-we-nin-ni-wak_--who live about Leech Lake +(_Kah-sah-gah-squah-g-me-cock_) were opposed to _Pa-go-nay-gie-shiek_, +but he compelled them through fear to recognize him as Head-Chief. At +the time of the "Sioux outbreak" in 1862 "Hole-in-the-day" for a time +apparently meditated an alliance with the _Po-ah-nuck_ (Dakotas) and war +upon the whites. The Pillagers and some other bands urged him strongly +to this course, and his supremacy as head-chief was threatened unless he +complied. Messengers from the Dakotas were undoubtedly received by him, +and he, for a time at least, led the Dakotas to believe that their +hereditary enemies, the Ojibways, would bury the hatchet and join them +in a war of extermination against the whites. "Hole-in-the-day," with a +band of his warriors, appeared opposite Fort Ripley (situated on the +west bank of the Mississippi River between Little Falls and Crow Wing), +and assumed a threatening attitude toward the fort, then garrisoned by +volunteer troops. The soldiers were drawn up on the right bank and +"Hole-in-the-day" and his warriors on the left. A little speech-making +settled the matter for the time being and very soon thereafter a new +treaty was made with "Hole-in-the-day" and his head men, by which their +friendship and allegiance were secured to the whites. It was claimed by +the Pillagers that "Hole-in-the-day" seized the occasion to profit +personally in his negotiations with the agents of the Government. + +In 1867 "Hole-in-the-day" took "another wife." He married Helen McCarty, +a white woman, in Washington, D.C., and took her to his home at Gull +Lake (_Ka-ga-ya-skunc-cock_) literally, _plenty of little gulls_. + +She bore him a son who is known as Joseph H. Woodbury, and now (1891) +resides in the city of Minneapolis. His marriage with a white woman +increased the hatred of the Pillagers, and they shot him from ambush and +killed him near _Ninge-ta-we-de-gua-yonk_--Crow Wing--on the 27th day of +June, 1868. + +At the time of his death, "Hole-in-the-day" was only thirty-seven years +old but had been recognized as Head-Chief for a long time. He could +speak some English, and was far above the average of white men in +native shrewdness and intelligence. He was thoroughly posted in the +traditions and legends of his people. + +The Ojibways have for many years been cursed by contact with the worst +elements of the whites, and seem to have adopted the vices rather than +the virtues of civilization. I once spoke of this to "Hole-in-the-day." +His reply was terse and truthful--"_Madge tche-mo-ko-mon, madge +a-nische-nabe: menoge tche-mo-ko-mon, meno a-nische-nabe_.--Bad white +men, bad Indians: good white men, good Indians." + +[20] _Nah_--look, see. _Nashke_--behold. + +[21] _Kee-zis_--the sun,--the father of life. _Waubunong_--or +_Waub-o-nong_--is the White Land or Land of Light,--the Sun-rise, the +East. + +[22] The Bridge of Stars spans the vast sea of the skies, and the sun and +moon walk over on it. + +[23] The _Miscodeed_ is a small white flower with a pink border. It is the +earliest blooming wild flower on the shores of Lake Superior, and +belongs to the crocus family. + +[24] The _Ne-be-naw-baigs_, are Water-spirits; they dwell in caverns in +the depths of the lake, and in some respects resemble the _Unktehee_ of +the Dakotas. + +[25] _Ogema_, Chief,--_Oge-ma-kwa_--female Chief. Among the Algonkin +tribes women are sometimes made chiefs. _Net-no-kwa_, who adopted Tanner +as her son, was _Oge-ma-kwa_ of a band of Ottawas. See _John Tanner's +Narrative_, p. 36. + +[26] The "Bridge of Souls" leads from the earth over dark and stormy +waters to the spirit-land. The "Dark River" seems to have been a part of +the superstitions of all nations. + +[27] The _Jossakeeds_ of the Ojibways are soothsayers who are able, by the +aid of spirits, to read the past as well as the future. + +FINIS + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Feast of the Virgins and Other +Poems, by H. L. Gordon + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE FEAST OF THE VIRGINS *** + +***** This file should be named 15205.txt or 15205.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/1/5/2/0/15205/ + +Produced by Eric Eldred, Susan Skinner and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. 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