 | A gift book of stories and poems for children |  |
23
FLIGHT OF THE MUSKOGEE INDIAN.
On the shore of Carolina an Indian warrior stood,
A captive of the Shawnees, and reddened with their blood;
Strange arts of varied torture his conquerors tried in vain;
Like a rock that stands the billows, he dashed them off again.
A captive of the Shawnees, and reddened with their blood;
Strange arts of varied torture his conquerors tried in vain;
Like a rock that stands the billows, he dashed them off again.
He shouted, and the echo shrill returned the lengthened shriek,
“I have rent you as the eagle rends the dove within his beak;
And ye give me women's tortures; see, I lightly cast them by,
As the Spirit of the storm-cloud throws the vapour from the sky.”
“I have rent you as the eagle rends the dove within his beak;
And ye give me women's tortures; see, I lightly cast them by,
As the Spirit of the storm-cloud throws the vapour from the sky.”
24
“Ye are women!” the wild echo came wilder on the air—
“I will show a worthy trial for a Muskogee to bear;
Let me grasp a heated gun in this raw and bloody hand,
And ye shall not see an eyelash move to shame my father-land.”
“I will show a worthy trial for a Muskogee to bear;
Let me grasp a heated gun in this raw and bloody hand,
And ye shall not see an eyelash move to shame my father-land.”
They gave the glowing steel. He took it with a smile,
And held it as a plaything;—they stood in awe the while;
Then, springing like an antelope, he brandished it around,
And toward the beetling eminence upstarted with a bound.
And held it as a plaything;—they stood in awe the while;
Then, springing like an antelope, he brandished it around,
And toward the beetling eminence upstarted with a bound.
One leap, and he is over! fierce, dashing through the stream,
And his massy form lies floating 'neath the clear and sunny beam;
A hundred arrows sped at once, but missed that warrior bold,
And his mangled arms, ere set of sun, his little ones enfold.
And his massy form lies floating 'neath the clear and sunny beam;
A hundred arrows sped at once, but missed that warrior bold,
And his mangled arms, ere set of sun, his little ones enfold.
| A gift book of stories and poems for children | |