 | The poetical works of William H. C. Hosmer |  |
CANTO FOURTH.
THE BOWER.
And gleams of lightning round its edges play;
But tameless sons of Liberty go forth,
In thicket seldom visited by day,
To meet the vaunting spoilers on their way:—
Back, Yonnondio!—ere your knightly crest
Is shorn of half its glory in the fray:
The lords, from whom your monarch fain would wrest
With iron hand a realm, are Romans of the West.
I.
Their march no glad spectator cheered;No helmet shone, no war-horse reared,
Nor martial instrument was heard,
Nor banner by the breeze was stirred:
Their feet so lightly touched the ground
That not an echo woke to sound;
And, glittering not with vain display,
They moved like shadows on their way,
Or misty shapes that fleetly glide
When winds disturb the mountain-side.
Sad non-combatants, left behind,
Gazed while a trace could be defined
Erect of port, and lithe of limb;
And when they vanished through
The dusky portals of the wood,
In groups the young and helpless stood
Some form beloved to view.
II.
The devious way on which they marched,By braided boughs was overarched;
And, right and left, spread far away
Fens, only lit by fire-fly's ray,
Dark with a tangled growth of vine,
Black ash, huge water-oak and pine,
Mixed with red cedar, mossed and old,
Set firmly in the watery mould.
Here, covered with a slime of green,
Stagnant and turbid pools were seen
Edged round with wild, aquatic weeds,
Long-bladed flag and clustering reeds.
Pond-lilies, oily-leaved and pale,
Red willow and the alder frail:
There, skeletons of groves gone by,
Sad objects to poetic eye!
Like monarchs by the battle-blast
Assailed and overthrown at last,
Wasted and torn in bough and stem,
And robbed of leaf-wrought diadem,
Lay rotting in their barky mail,
Indifferent to sun and gale.
Deep hollows in the miry clay,
Marked where their roots once spread away,
Now mixed with many a rugged mound
Formed when their fastenings were unbound,
Or wrenched, like gossamer, in twain,
By the wild, rushing hurricane.
III.
A stranger, though in woodcraft taught,Would find that skill availed him naught
In that dark thicket, if astray
By hunted quarry lured away,—
Though well each haunt and covert lone
To the brown forest-child was known.
Extending to its far-off bound,
A war-path, through the centre, wound,
So blind that practiced eye in vain,
For mark to guide the foot, would strain.
Now, all impression of the route,
In gurgling runnel, was washed out:
Anon, where deeper grew the shade
By intertwisted branches made,
Its crooked, winding course from sight
Was curtained by primeval night.
IV.
When the dark chieftain and his band,Emerging from the swampy land,
Reached the dim borders of the grove
That glooms around the “Haunted Cove,”
The tempered glow of weary day,
Proclaiming the approach of night,
To gold transmuted leaf and spray
On upland-swell and wooded height;
And, calmly in the western sky,
Resplendent emblems of repose!
Grouped clouds more delicate of dye
Than tintings of the half-blown rose.
A moment, in the mellow light,
Shone beaded belt and hatchet bright;
A moment, from the yellow beam,
Ring, band, and bracelet caught a gleam;
Then the dark wood of boughs inweaved,
Within its depths the troop received.
V.
Beneath tall beeches, gray with eld,Their labyrinthine course they held,
While well the hindmost of the line
From view concealed betraying sign;
The wonderful sagacity of the North American savage on a march, or pursuit of a foe through a forest, is too well known to require much comment. On emergency, they put the hinder part of their snow shoes forward, so that if their footsteps should happen to be observed by a vigilant enemy, it might be supposed they had taken a contrary direction. “Sometimes they fix the broad hoofs of buffaloes or bears' paws upon their feet, to deceive the foe; and for miles together, they will make all the customary windings of those animals in the woods. The warrior who brings up the rear, lifts to a natural position the broad grass, and ‘they march, one man behind the other, treading carefully in each other's steps, so that their number may not be ascertained by the prints of their feet.’”—
Heckewelder.Sending keen glances in the rear,
Lifting bowed herb and grassy spear,
Or doubling, when the oozy ground
Yielded beneath the lightest foot,—
Like hunted foxes, when the hound
And hunter are in hot pursuit.
The red-breast, perched in arbor green,
Sad minstrel of the quiet scene—
While hymning, for the dying sun,
Strains like a broken-hearted one,
Raised not her mottled wing to fly
As swept those silent warriors by.
The wood-cock, in his moist retreat,
Heard not the falling of their feet;
On his dark roost the gray owl slept;
Time with his drum the partridge kept,
Nor left the deer his watering-place,
So hushed, so noiseless was their pace.
Soon, partly veiled by bank and tree,
They scann'd the rolling Genesee,
Catching, within his channel'd bed,
Deep blushes from the sunset red,
And, stealing onward, reached a bay
Where light pirogues of white-wood lay,
Fashioned and hollowed out alone
By eating fire and gouge of stone.
Their canoes were of two kinds: one was made of a large log excavated, the inside burned and wrought by a stone gouge, and the outside shaped by their stone axe. The second kind was made of birchen bark. “The pirogues or war canoes of the Indians are constructed by hollowing the trunks of large trees with much labor and patience; and, notwithstanding their bulk and gravity, they are moved dexterously through the water. The pirogue is often large enough to contain fifty persons; and in most instances, the workmanship is so neat, and the ornaments so splendid, as to be thought utterly beyond the execution of savages ignorant of the harder metals. The trunk of a tree which they have cut down, and which they design to form into a canoe, often begins to rot before their labor is at an end. Their chisel was of stone, sharpened to an edge. Ignorant of iron, their hatchets and axes were made of stone. Their use dictated a similar shape to ours. A young sapling was split near the ground, the head of the axe thrust into it, and a handle formed with inconsiderable labor.” See Gumilla, Lafitan, Mœurs ii. 213, and Indian Wars.
Impelled by dip of tapering oar,
Sharp prows receded from the shore,
And, darting through the flashing waves
Afloat with full five hundred braves,
Soon rocked beneath the willows dank
That fringed the green, opposing bank.
VI.
Their leader breathed a low command,And, guarding against hostile eye,
Their war-canoes were drawn to land,
And hidden in a thicket nigh;
Then, patiently, each warrior plumed,
With cautious tread, the march resumed.
VII.
Changed are the hills that overbrowThe vale in which those heroes trod,
And, rudely, hind and younker now
Look on their ashes, while the plough
Disturbs the burial-clod;
And, where those knights of bow and quiver
Paddled across the Pleasant River,
Burning to check in bold advance
The serried chivalry of France,
Over the deep and hurrying tide
Yon red bridge flings its arch of pride.
The forest, many-toned and wide,
Hath vanished from the river-side—
Gone are green roof and leafy screen
Like vapor yester-morning seen;
Fierce wasting flame and crashing steel
Rang, long ago, its funeral-peal.
Where browsed the elk in other days,
Fat herds in thymy meadows graze;
Where the fanged cougar, hating day,
Crouched by the deer-lick for his prey,
Heard is the tinkling bell of flocks,
And Ceres binds her wheaten shocks.
VIII.
From waves, once clear as mountain rill,Where pike and bass the red man speared,
And home his bark by torchlight steered,
Scared by the clacking mill;
And, proudly, on the ruined homes
Of perished tribes, stand lordly domes:
But why the light and shade contrast
Of present hour, and clouded past,
While notes of war are on the gale,
And the plot thickens of my tale?
IX.
The fires of day were fading fast—A deeper shade the forest cast,
While, through the hallowed place of graves,
Moved a long line of belted braves.
The hand of reverence and love
Had broken the green cope above;
For the red forest tribes believe,
When comes the radiant sunset-time,
The hillocks of the dead receive
Bright visits from the Better Clime.
Round each old tomb the paling rude,
From year to year, had been renewed,
And Indian girls had trained the vine,
Amid the pointed stakes, to twine,
And decked each space inclosed with flowers
Culled from the fairest woodland bowers.
Pale, velvet mosses over-crept
Tombs in which maid and mother slept,
And fragile infancy reposed,
A wilding flower untimely closed.
X.
There, mindless of the coming years,Lay old and venerated seers,
Carved amulets of mystic sway
Commingling with their wasted clay.
The mighty hunter mouldered there,
His favorite hound of courage tried,
And weapons buried by his side.
“They bury with the dead, food, bows and arrows, pipes and whatsoever pleased them while living, or might be necessary in the country of souls. They believe in the immortality of the soul, without the aid of metaphysics. The Chicung, the shadow, that which survives the body, they grossly imagine, will, at death, go into some unknown but curious place.”
Indian Wars.They give the first place in the land of spirits to the courageous warrior who has put to death the greatest number of his enemies, and to the hunter who has distinguished himself the most in the exertions of the chase; and it is their practice to bury the hatchet and the bow of a leader in the same grave with his body, that he may not be destitute of arms when he enters upon the future world. They likewise deposit in his tomb the skins and stuffs of which their garments are made, corn, venison, drugs, utensils, and animals of different kinds, and whatever else they hold to be necessary or convenient in their simple estimate of life.”
De La Potherie and Colden, Five Nations, i. 17.“The Omaha Chief, Black-bird, after death, was placed erect on his war-horse, and, followed by the braves he had often led to battle, conveyed to his sepulchre on a high bluff overlooking the Missouri. The horse, alive, was forced into the grave with his dead rider, and thus inhumed.” Appendix to the Gazetteer of Missouri.
Some tribes erect a scaffold, by planting four large stakes in the ground, eight feet high, and five by three apart, across the tops of which are laid poles, on which the bark coffin, enclosing the body, rests. A correspondent of the New Yorker thus alludes to a scaffold of this description. “A few years since, a sarcophagus was erected on the west bank of Rock River, about two miles below the junction of the Pecatonic, wherein was laid an Indian girl. It remained till about a year since, when decay and the winds swept it away, and left nothing but the stakes on which it was reared, which are yet standing.”
There, in his mantle richly-furred,
The lord of nations lay interr'd,
Forgetful of his ancient reign,
Couched on proud trophies of the slain;
His name a rousing watchword still,
Weak arm to nerve, faint heart to thrill;
And there, his silver voice untuned,
Forever glazed his falcon eye,
The Cicero of wilds unpruned
Lay crumbling silently,
Lost on the wind, like chaunt of birds,
His passionate and burning words.
XI.
Magnificently robed and crownedOld oaken monarchs stood around,
And through their boughs, thick-leaved and wide,
The low wind, like a mourner, sighed.
Their gray and patriarchal boles
Consorted well with funeral-knolls
Where slept, in gloom that knows no morn,
The tameless and the forest-born.
XII.
Proud piles and monuments of stone,Reared in remembrance of the dead,
Befit the sepulchres alone
Of creatures in the city bred;
But when the child of nature dies,
Deep in the howling woodland waste,
The virgin-soil, in which he lies,
By other land-mark should be graced:
Let bark inclose his cold remains;
By warbling birds and pattering rains,
And the low zephyr that complains,
His soft melodious dirge be sung,
With trees about, unshorn and tall,
His columns of memorial.
XIII.
Nigh ashes of the lost and loved,Old Can-ne-hoot and party moved
With lingering gait and slow;
And deemed, in every rustling oak,
That voices of the mighty spoke
Of fleet, approaching foe:
Imploring them, in hollow tones,
From outrage to defend their bones;
Commanding them to keep unstained
The glory by their fathers gained;
And, deeply, in remembrance bear
That, after death, the brave repair
To happy homes and hunting grounds,
While cowards haunt, beyond the tomb,
A realm of black, unending gloom
Where bitter fruit abounds.
Oh, well did time and place conspire
To light proud souls in wild-wood bred
With sparks of pure, heroic fire
Fann'd from pale ashes of the dead;
And bring before the mental sight
Departed chiefs, once famed in fight,
With war-clubs, thickly notched, that told
How mighty were the men of old!
The Indian warrior cuts scalp-notches upon the handle of his hatchet, significant of
the number of the enemies that he has slain. “In order to commemorate great events
and preserve the chronology of them, the war-chief in each tribe keeps a war-post.
This post is a peeled stick of timber, ten or twelve feet high, that is erected in the
town. For a campaign, they make, or rather the chief makes, a perpendicular red
mark, about three inches long and half an inch wide; on the opposite side of this, for a
scalp, they make a red cross, thus †; on another side, for a prisoner taken alive, they
make a red cross, in this manner, ![illustration](https://iiif.lib.virginia.edu/iiif/uva-lib:440027/full/!1600,1600/0/default.jpg")
XIV.
Northward the forest grew more blind,And range of keenest glance confined:
Above, nor strip of welkin blue,
For twilight ray to glimmer through,
And cheer the hideous gloom, were seen.
The matted underwood below
Seemed haunt, alone, of reptile foe,
And brier-rose and bramble tall
Threw up a vegetable wall.
XV.
Long, sylvan colonnades around,Ranged dimly on the forest-floor,
By capitals of umbrage crowned,
A mighty canopy upbore;
And vines, that arched from tree to tree,
Increased the dread obscurity.
There often, in the mid-day light,
Would hoot the feathered anchorite,
And the dull bat, his neighbor meet,
Air with thin, volant membrane beat:
There, though effulgent morning reigned,
The little katy-did complained,
And the lone muk-a-wiss was heard,
That solemn and prophetic bird,
The Indian name for the whippowil, says Carver, is “muckawiss.” “As soon as night comes on, these birds will place themselves on the fences, stumps or stones that lie near some house, and repeat their melancholy notes without any variation, till midnight. The Indians and some of the inhabitants of the back settlements think if this bird perches upon any house, that it betokens some mishap to the inhabitants of it.”
Carver.Outpouring a melodious hymn
Beneath the shade of leaf and limb.
XVI.
It was a place by nature formedFor the brown Indian to abide,
With heart by love of country warmed,
The billows of the battle-tide;
And there, beneath a dun arcade,
Halt by the Senecas was made.
Picked men were sent to watch the course,
And movements of the hostile force;
And by their chieftain charged to wile,
From glade and thinly wooded plain,
And with them artfully, the while,
A rapid, running fight maintain,
Till their close ranks, too late to pause,
And their lost vantage ground regain,
Were trapp'd in grim Destruction's jaws!
XVII.
Posts, by the leader, were assignedTo the main body left behind:
Their practiced ears the signal caught,
And gliding, noiseless as the snake,
Each savage form a cover sought
In brambly copse and tufted brake,
Save the hawk-eyed and nimble spy,
Who, stationed in a tree-top high
That towered above the grove profound,
Was charged to mock the wolf's long howl
If aught, like foe, was seen to prowl
Their hiding place around.
XVIII.
The muster at war's savage callOf Senecas in Council Hall;
Dismaying scene, and martial rite
Mingled with voices of affright;
Mad circling dance, 'mid shriek and yell,
As if Arch-Fiend was working spell;
Mock strife in which fierce howls of rage
Were loud as roar when hosts engage;
The march, in long and ordered line,
Of warriors watching leader's sign;
And craft wherewith, in thicket dread,
Snare for invading feet is spread—
Too long, from Blanche and Wun-nut-hay,
Have errant bard detained away.
XIX.
Romantic was the leafy bower,Impervious to sun and shower,
By the young exile for his bride
Wove deftly near his cabin-side.
The roving linnet, for a perch
Screened from the noontide glare, in search,
Or butterfly, on gaudy wing,
Fatigued with restless wandering,
Above could not an entrance find,
So closely were the branches twined.
Detached by winds, that murmured through
The lattice-work impearled with dew,
Fell blossoms, whiter far than snow,
On the green, mossy floor below,
From thorn and wild plum, for the feet
Of the sweet minstrel carpet meet,
Whose voice, attuned to mournful key,
Filled the bright haunt with melody.
XX.
HYMN.
1.
Father!—with pale hands uplifted,Hear thy wandering child implore
That the cloud of woe be rifted,
And the light poured in once more!
On Life's rose the wasting canker
Early hath impressed its mark;
Where, oh where can safely anchor
Sorrow's frail and shattered bark?
2.
Once, around my pillow brightly,From thy throne fell radiant gleams—
Fill with misery my dreams.
While I start and tremble, fearing
That Hope's star will never dawn,
In mine ear a voice of cheering
Whispers—‘bear and struggle on!’”
3.
“Child!—though dark affliction everWakes a serpent in thy breast,
And thy foot, aweary, never
Finds on earth a home of rest,
Robed in loveliness supernal,
Filled with joy's undying song,
Mansions, many and eternal,
To thy Father's house belong!”
XXI.
No melancholy voice, nor sound,Breathing of anguish and despair,
From sunny forest-aisles around,
On passing wind, was wafted there.
The cascade, darting down the hill,
And prattle of the vagrant rill;
Exhilarating chaunt of bird,
And squirrel's gleesome bark were heard,
While vocal leaf and waving spray
Joined in a summer roundelay.
XXII.
The clear, bright azure of the sky,Dappled with cloudy bars of white—
Groves tossing their green plumes on high,
And flowers of deep, but varied dye,
Unfolding in the golden light,
And luring, from their waxen cells,
Bees to their nectar'd cups and bells,
Rebuking discontent and sadness:
But mindless of sweet sights and sounds—
Refreshing balm of bud and flower,
Sate Blanche within the leafy bounds
Of her romantic bower,
And by her side the forest maid
Enjoyed the cool and grateful shade.
XXIII.
“While the Great Spirit, from above,Looks down upon the world in love,
And golden skies o'er all things bend,
Why, daughter of the distant land!”
Said Wun-nut-hay, her dusky friend,
“Press on thy brow that lily-hand?
Why is thy heart the home of sighs,
Of briny drops thy mournful eyes?
List!—while heroic tale of old,
To wean thee from sad thought, is told!”
XXIV.
ON-NO-LEE.
[A LEGEND OF THE CANADICE.]
A beautiful lake is the Canadice,And wild fowl dream on its breast unscared;
Thy golden brooch, of costly price,
Is dim with its radiant wave compared.
Edged by a broad and silvery belt
Of pebbles bright, and glittering sand,
The waters into music melt
When breaking on the strand;
And its glimmering sheet of azure lies
Unvexed by loud and warring blast;
For green old hills, that round it rise,
Fence this fair mirror of the skies
From storms that journey past
XXV.
A beautiful lake is the Canadice,And warblings from its bosom clear
Go up by moonlight, and entice,
The hunter to pause and hear.
Oh! mournful are the tones and low,
Like the mystic voice of the whip-po-wil,
When evening winds through the forest blow,
And other birds are still.
Ear never heard a sadder strain,
In the time of frost and falling leaves,
When brown and naked woods complain,
And the brook, late fed by summer rain,
For perished verdure grieves.
XXVI.
A beautiful lake is the Canadice,And tribesmen dwelt on its banks of yore,
But an hundred years have vanished thrice
Since hearth-stones smoked upon the shore:
The Munsee dreamed not of a foe;
Unstrung were the warrior's arm and bow:
And, couched on skins, he little thought
The fall of his nation was at hand:
His ear no rattle of serpent caught,
No gliding ghost a warning brought
While came the Mengwe band.
Too late—too late to fight or fly
Was rang the knell of his ancient power;
His lip pealed forth no rallying cry,
From slumber he only woke to die
At the solemn midnight hour.
In gore his household-gods were drenched,
His altar-fires in gore were quenched;
The wail of babe in blood was choked,
In blood his burial-place was soaked,
To flame were the huts of his people given.
XXVII.
Though tall oaks fell in their kingly pride,The conqueror saved a trembling leaf;
Of that little clan all darkly died
Save On-no-lee, the cherished bride
Of their brave but luckless chief.
Morn dawned upon a frightful scene—
The Canadice in sunshine lay;
But blood was on its margin green—
A tribe was swept away.
On the blackened site of a town destroyed,
The raven a goodly meal enjoyed,
And the wolf called forth her whelps, to share
That banquet red, from her gloomy lair.
XXVIII.
Morn dawned—and on their homeward trackThe Mengwe, flushed with conquest, sped,
And, a far-famed leader, Mic-ki-nac,
That band of spoilers led.
To the red belt, his waist around,
The hapless On-no-lee was bound;
Spared from the death-doom of her race,
The pomp of his return to grace,
And live the slave of one who bore
The scalp of her fallen sagamore.
XXIX.
At noon, to snatch a light repast,The party halted in the shade;
But On-no-lee broke not her fast,
And in the dust, with loathing cast
The food before her laid.
Feels fire flash up that mocks control,
When the ruthless fiend, to whom she owes
The fearful sum of her blasting woes,
Is yielded up her prey by fate,
And the dagger is nigh to second hate!
XXX.
Mic-ki-nac sat on a fallen tree,And of smoke-dried venison partook,
“We retain some Indian modes of cookery. Their green corn, when either roasted or boiled, is excellent. Their hommony consists of corn bruised and soaked or boiled Their nokchike is parched corn pounded. Suckatash, a mixture of green corn and beans, is become a very common dish. Upaquontop is the head of a bass boiled, and the broth thickened with hommony, which is one of their richest delicacies.”
Indian Wars.And by his side was On-no-lee,
Survivor of the butchery,
Who eyed his knife with an eager look.
Round the haft her fingers lightly wreathed,
The glittering weapon she unsheathed—
One well-aimed blow, and she was free!
Another,—and the purple tide
Gushed from her savage captor's side,
Who leaped like a wounded stag, and died.
XXXI.
Thunder, without a cloud in sight,Or whisper of warning on the gale,
Could not have roused more wild affright,
Amid his braves, than deed of might
Wrought by a hand so frail!
Ere they recovered from the shock
Fled On-no-lee like hunted deer;
Glen, stream, and interposing rock
Barred not her swift career:
A vigor never felt before,
The form of the fugitive upbore,
And to her active foot gave wing,
Though fleet were the blood-hounds following.
XXXII.
In vain the foremost runner strained,And arrows launched from his twanging bow,
A cliff, beyond the reach of foe,
That beetled over the lake below.
Last of her race, with desperate eye—
On the ruined home of her tribe she gazed;
Waved her avenging arm on high,—
Taunted her baffled enemy,
And a ringing scream of triumph raised—
“Base, worrying curs!—go back, go back,
My scalp is saved from Mengwe smoke!
Go hence, and look for Mic-ki-nac—
“The first principle which is instilled into the breast of a savage, is revenge. Time cannot efface the remembrance of an injury; it is cherished and kept alive with the most studious care; like the hereditary feuds of Scottish clans, it even goes down from one generation to another, with all its associated feelings, and with these feelings in all their exercise. The blood of the offender can alone expiate the transgression. If the domain appropriated to hunting be invaded, or if an individual of a tribe be cut off, the desire of vengeance swells in every breast with instinctive emotion, and instantly kindles into rage. It sparkles in every eye, and gives activity to every limb. Months and years roll away, and the purpose of vengeance continues deep in the heart, and it shows itself in tremendous execution when it is least expected or feared. The Indian fights, not less to satiate his revenge, than to conquer his enemies; and that destructive passion is not gratified till he has glutted himself with the blood of the hostile tribe, and rejoiced in the extinction of its name. Even the women seem to be animated with this destructive and restless principle.”
Edinburg Encyclopedia, vol. i. p. 591.The famished crow, and the raven black
A dirge above him croak!”
Regardless of the whizzing storm
Of missiles raining round her form,
Imploring eye she then upcast,
And a low, mournful death-hymn sang:
On hill and forest looked her last,
One glance upon the water cast,
And from that high rock sprang.
XXXIII.
Away three hundred years have flownSince the Munsee found a watery grave;
But when old Night is on her throne,
And stars troop forth her sway to own,
Rise warblings from the wave:
And a shadowy face of mournful mien,
With locks all draggled by the surge,
Belated wanderers have seen
From the glittering lake emerge—
One moment float in moonlight fair,
Then mix with the waters, or vanish in air.”
XXXIV.
Ere Blanche could Wun-nut-hay rewardWith one approving smile or word,
And sound of parting boughs she heard:
Upspringing, with a joyous cry,
She deemed her gallant husband nigh;
An instant more,—and in her mien
Fear's paralyzing power was seen;
All color vanished from her cheek,
Her lips were locked, and could not speak:
Back was her head in horror thrown—
Her form all motionless like stone:
Whence came the spell that bound her frame,
And hushed, half-breathed, a loved one's name?
What saw she?—
Through the flowery wall
Of her vine-woven forest hall,
A dark, vindictive visage peered,
With paint, denoting war, besmeared.
Not well could eloquence have framed
The language by that look proclaimed:
It told of prize, long sought, at last
In hard, unyielding clutches fast—
Of pleasure such as panthers feel,
Though longing for a bloody meal,
When hunted down their prey;
For glared keen eye-balls with a joy
That would caress, and then destroy,
Though hunger chid delay.
XXXV.
A something in that hideous face,Could Blanche of one remembered trace;
For the clear outlines, full and bold,
Less of the red, than white man told;
And its fixed look of glad surprise,
Despite of barbarous disguise,
Announced that she was known full well,
Plainly as word could syllable.
XXXVI.
As howls the wood-wolf to his packWhen some fair doe rewards his search,
And the far hills give answer back,
Scaring the wild bird from her perch—
So did that man of evil eye
Out-pour one long, loud signal-cry,
To which the groves replied in tone
As fierce and startling as his own.
Roused was the lady by the sound,
And Wun-nut-hay looked wildly round
For outlet of escape in vain:
Dark forms, in Huron garb bedight,
Like serpents glided into sight,
And bound with thongs the twain.
The party, with their scowling chief,
Held hurried conference and brief
In harsh and guttural tone;
Then left the violated bower,
Like men, in dread of hostile power,
Who trust to speed alone.
| The poetical works of William H. C. Hosmer | |