 | Ouâbi : or the virtues of nature |  |
CANTO IV.
And frozen Huron chills the shorten'd day,
'Till the young spring restor'd the blossom'd year,
Rack'd by disease the patient sachem lay.
Celario binds the health-restoring leaf,
And guards his slumbers from surrounding harm,
With all the silent eloquence of grief.
Revive each nerve, each weaken'd fibre brace,
And ev'ry charm, that health and youth impart,
Glows in his veins, and brightens in his face.
Full oft he mourns her life-oppressing woe,
'Till great Ouâbi all his soul discerns,
And views the source, from whence his sorrows flow.
While for his native home they bend their way,
Light as the air each hurried step proceeds,
Thro' the slow moments of the ling'ring day:
To his own plains the matchless chief restores;
Around his neck the wild Azâkia clings,
Now weeps, now joys, now blesses, now deplores.
Where the great hero chid her long delay,
While all her tortur'd breast, to death resign'd,
Reproach'd the European's faithless stay.
Tho' mark'd with wounds, and sear'd with many a scar,
Yet manly charms adorn his open face,
Still form'd to lead and guide the glorious war.
While down his cheek the tears of rapture flow,
His melting bosom heaves the breathing sigh,
And rising cares contract his polish'd brow.
Nor yet in vain the tears of fondness roll,
With soften'd look the gen'rous sachem bends,
While heav'nly music speaks his yielding soul.
OUÂBI.
In freedom born, to glory bred,Yet like a dastard captive led,
When sunk in blest oblivious night,
Rais'd to the sorrows of the light,
And dar'd to claim me as a slave,
To threat me with the darts of pain,
Tho born o'er glorious chiefs to reign;
But, taught Ouâbi's soul to know,
They sought to bend that soul with woe,
By vari'd tortures vainly strove
This heav'n-directed eye to move,
When like a God Celario came,
And snatch'd me from the piercing flame.
From thee this arm its strength receives,
By thee this form in freedom lives;
By thee was bright Azâkia's breath,
Twice rescu'd from the blast of death;
Each time a greater blessing gave
Than twice Ouâbi's life to save;
As he alone her love deserves,
Whose pow'r her matchless charms preserves,
That love, those charms, I now resign,
With ev'ry bliss, that once was mine.
Since all her mind thy worth approves,
And all thy soul her beauty loves,
This grateful heart that hand bestows,
Which not to shun a life of woes,
To save me from the Hurons' flame,
Would this fond bleeding breast resign,
Or yield to any worth but thine.
Ouâbi does not simply mean to compliment Azâkia in this expression, but alludes to a custom of his country, which in most cases admits the payment of a fine, as an expiation for murder. If the deceased be a woman, the fine is double; and the reason they give for this partiality for that sex, is, that they are capable of bringing warriors to the nation.
See Wm. Penn's Letters.This law of expiating murder by pecuniary compensation has, I believe, been observed by every uncivilized nation upon earth.
CELARIO.
His bright beams in the red'ning wave,
The Pleiades shall forsake their sphere,
And midst the blaze of noon appear,
Or cold Böotes' car shall roll
In sultry splendor round the pole,
Ere thy Celario hails the day,
In which he tears thy soul away.
And own my black'ning crimes to thee.
When torn by woes, by cares oppress'd,
You clasp'd me to that shelt'ring breast,
Forbade my exil'd steps to roam,
And led me to this gen'rous home:
Regardless of thy sacred fame,
I dar'd to urge my guilty flame;
Tho' to that arm my life was due,
And ev'ry bliss deriv'd from you,
To win the bright Azâkia's love,
With ceaseless passion sought to gain
Her heav'nly charms—but sought in vain.
Yet will the wand'ring traitor go
To distant plains, to realms of woe,
'Till absence from his breast remove
The tortures of his impious love,
'Till time with healing on his wing
Shall peace and soft oblivion bring.
Celario will not be considered as addressing the savage in too philosophical language, when it is remembered that people in a hunting state are necessarily acquainted with the different stars and planets, to aid their course in their excursions from, and returns to, their places of residence. As no images can with propriety be taken from culture or civil society in the dialogues, I am under the necessity of frequently repeating the most striking objects of nature.
OUÂBI.
The crimes which still thy realms disgrace;
But my Celario, yet I find
Each native worth adorns thy mind;
For heav'nly beaming TRUTH is there,
Of open brow and heart sincere!
Azâkia's unpolluted soul.
Born amidst virtue's favor'd race,
Her mind as faultless as her face,
Vain must each daring effort prove,
That uncorrupted breast to move;
For on the pure translucid stream
In vain the midnight lightnings beam,
It lifts its bosom to the day,
Unsullied as the solar ray.
And by this cloud-envelop'd wood,
Ne'er in these war-devoted arms
To clasp again her matchless charms,
Nor yet these eyes to sleep resign,
'Till all those matchless charms are thine.
Will ev'ry rising grief beguile.
The shivers from the lofty tree,
The gentle maid will break with me:
In time her rip'ning form and face
Will bloom with all Azâkia's grace.
I scorn the peace-encircled shade:
Revenge recals me to the plain,
To meet the Huron foe again.
No friendly calumet shall glow,
No snow-white plume pass o'er the brow,
'Till in one blaze of ruin hurl'd,
I sink them to the nether world:
Revenge shall every torment ease,
And e'en the parted soul appease.
Their mode of making peace is, previous to smoking the friendly calumet, for the sachem or head-warrior to advance with a white plume, in the form of a fan, towards the ambassadors of the rival nation, and to draw it lightly over their foreheads; meaning to indicate, that from that moment all former animosities are wiped away, and all passed injuries consigned to oblivion. The whiteness of the plume being emblematical of the purity of their intentions in the treaty they are forming.
Now warm'd with hope, now chill'd with icy fear,
Nor dares to meet him with her swimming eye,
Her lab'ring breath, and soul-entrancing care.
The young Celario ev'ry passion mov'd;
E'en to his faults her doting heart inclin'd—
Ouâbi was too godlike to be lov'd.
In modest silence and in pleas'd surprise,
To the great sachem bends her willing knee
With grateful smiles, and rapture-glancing eyes.
No Illinois his sacred word recals;
'Tis fix'd—the young deliv'rer shall be blest—
The flames ascend—the branching cedar falls.
The broken shivers feed the hungry blaze;
While the new spires adorn the social green,
And the wild music joins the song of praise.
Thinks it a dream, some sweet delusive charm;
Wonder and joy his beating breast divide,
Dart from his eyes, and ev'ry accent warm.
While the throng'd city swells the full acclaim,
Forgets each bleeding friend, each ghastly scar,
And ev'ry breeze wafts pleasure, wealth and fame.
Betrays no grief, no soft, repentant sigh;
But like a parent guards the timid maid,
And claims her friendship with his asking eye.
Her locks no more in bright luxuriance flow,
From her smooth brow the maiden veil is drawn,
And glist'ning beads in rainbow-beauty glow.
The graceful feet in mazy circles rove,
While music warbles o'er the peopled green,
And wafts the fond impassion'd breath of love.
Short is the show'r, which bathes the summer day,
But swifter still gay pleasure's transient wing,
With fleeter haste contentment, glides away!
Thro' the wide plain the shrieks of fright arise;
The gentle Zisma swells the loud alarm,
Her great, her lov'd Ouâbi falls—he dies!
On ev'ry grief soft sympathy bestow,
Here turn thy blest, benignant, melting eye,
Here let the tears of full compassion flow!
Her pale Celario parts the pressing throng,
Th' immortal warrior lifts his darken'd eyes,
And the chok'd words fall quiv'ring from his tongue.
The music of the Indians, tho' of a wild and inharmonius kind, is introduced at all their public festivals and solemnities.
The unmarried women wear a kind of cap, or veil, on their heads, which is taken off at the marriage ceremony. [William Penn's Letters.] To this, it is said, succeeds a circle of beads of various colours.
OUÂBI.
Exempt from ills, and freed from pains,
Where this unconquer'd soul will shine,
And all the victor's prize be mine,
I go—nor vainly shed the tear,
Ouâbi has no glory here;
Unfit the Illinois to guide,
No more the dauntless warriors' pride—
Since as a hapless captive led,
Rack'd like a slave, he basely bled,
No haughty Huron e'er shall boast,
He deign'd to live, when fame was lost.
The chiefs expect thee on the plain.
Ah! ne'er in earth the hatchet lay,
'Till thou hast swept my foes away.
Hard, and with pain, the loit'ring blood retires;
Thus sinks the oak, when loud tornados storm,
The kingly lion with such pangs expires.
No heav'nly pow'rs the fleeting breath restrain,
No human aid his parted soul recals,
Whose life was VIRTUE, and whose fate was PAIN.
While to the tomb, where sleep his glorious race,
Erect, as when a subject tribe obey'd,
The mourn'd Ouâbi's sacred form they place.
Down at his feet the conq'ring hatchet stands,
O'er his high head the spreading bow extends,
The lustral coin adorns his lifeless hands!
His faithful tribe with annual care return
And, as the solemn obsequies are paid,
In pious love, and humble rev'rence mourn.
Will with the hero's fame his way beguile,
In fond devotion bend the suppliant eye,
And add one pillar to the sacred pile.
The GOOD, the BRAVE, diffuse a light divine,
Redoubled splendor gilds the brighten'd ray,
Which bids Ouâbi's NATIVE VIRTUES shine!
Their tombs, or rather cemetaries, are of great extent, and of curious construction, and to which the living pay the utmost veneration.
Governor Jefferson's Notes on Virginia.The posture in which they bury their dead is either sitting or standing upright, believing that when they rise, they must inhabit heaven in the same posture in which they are buried.
They not only believe in the immortality of the soul, but also of the bodies of men and animals, and even of their warlike arms, and other inanimate things; and for this reason it is a custom with them to bury with their chiefs, his hatchet at his feet, with the handle perpendicular, his bow unstrung over his head, and a coin (made, according to William Penn, of a fish's bone highly polished) in his hand.
They not only believe in the immortality of the soul, but also of the bodies of men and animals, and even of their warlike arms, and other inanimate things; and for this reason it is a custom with them to bury with their chiefs, his hatchet at his feet, with the handle perpendicular, his bow unstrung over his head, and a coin (made, according to William Penn, of a fish's bone highly polished) in his hand.
They not only believe in the immortality of the soul, but also of the bodies of men and animals, and even of their warlike arms, and other inanimate things; and for this reason it is a custom with them to bury with their chiefs, his hatchet at his feet, with the handle perpendicular, his bow unstrung over his head, and a coin (made, according to William Penn, of a fish's bone highly polished) in his hand.
At stated periods the Indians revisit the sepulchres or cemetaries of their chiefs, and perform certain rites and ceremonies not precisely known to the Anglo-Americans. Governor Jefferson, in his Notes, gives one instance of this custom.
These sepulchres or cemetaries are raised to a very great heighth above the surface of the earth, by immense piles of stones. [See Gov. Jefferson's Notes.] And to prevent their being levelled by time, it is a religious duty for every one of the same nation, who accidentally passes it, to add one stone in reverence to the pile. [See Mr. Noah Webster's Letters to the Rev. Ezra Stiles]—who says, “Rowland remarks that this custom exists among the vulgar Welsh to this day, the same kind of mounts being scattered over the west of England and Wales.”
| Ouâbi : or the virtues of nature | |