 | Yamoyden, a tale of the wars of King Philip : in six cantos |  |
CANTO FIFTH.
With sound like ocean's roaring, wild and deep,
And in yon gloomy pines strange music makes,
Like symphonies unearthly, heard in sleep;
The sobbing waters dash their waves and weep;
Where moans the blast its dreary path along,
The bending firs a mournful cadence keep;
And mountain rocks re-echo to the song,
As fitful raves the storm, the hills and woods among.
I.
What wanderer finds his way to-night,Amid the forest's depth of gloom,
Where gleams no ray of lingering light
The horrid darkness to illume;
Save where the lightning's dazzling stream
Descends with momentary gleam?
The thick and heavy drops were shed;
While round there fell upon his ear
Many a sound for doubt and fear;
The wolf's fierce howl at distance heard;
The screaming of each startled bird;
At times the falling forest's crash,
Scattered by the rending flash,
Mingled with the tempest's wrath,
Around that lonely wanderer's path.
II.
Across the strait, whose heaving wave,When rising gusts impetuous rave,
And gales are sweeping on their way,
From isle to isle and bay to bay,
Wakes, lashed to foam, with fury strong,
To join the chorus of their song,
Yamoyden sought the island shore,
Despite of all the billowy roar;
And onward through the tangled path,
Sped, heedless of the tempest's wrath.
When near, his Nora's bower he knew.
A gleam prolonged of lightning showed
The limit of his darksome road;
Pale, but distinct, its lustre played,
Lambent along the narrow glade:—
Where yon old elm its arm extends,
“They also fancy another spirit which appears in the shape of a man, upon the trees near the lodge of a person deceased, whose property has not been interred with them. He is represented as bearing a gun in his hand, and it is believed that he does not return to his rest, until the property that has been withheld from the grave has been sacrificed to it.”—
McKenzie's Hist. of the Fur Trade, p. 74.That slowly o'er his pathway bends,
With solemn gesture, as if meant
To warn the wanderer of intent
Unknown, or danger near,—
Does fancy's mimic dread portray
Amid the boughs a spectre gray,
Or is it the boding vision seen,
Where murder's secret work has been,
Oft by the Indian seer?
Ha! points it to the cottage now?
Fled from his heart the rising glow,
And gushing stood upon his brow,
The damps of awful fear.
III.
That moment ceased the tempest's sound,As if its spirits hovering round,
Listening the wanderer's tread,
Awhile withheld their deafening yell;
And a hushed pause about him fell,
The silence of the dead.
The thunder was no longer heard;
No breath the dripping forest stirred:
There only murmured far away,
Solemnly the moaning bay;—
The faint sigh of the sinking breeze
Rustled amid the farthest trees;
The rain drops from the loaded spray
With sullen plash around him sunk;—
Then paused the wanderer on his way;
Bowed to foreboding terror's sway
His soul within him shrunk.
IV.
The cottage of his hope is near;But came no sound upon his ear;
To tell of vigils kept for him.
Perchance she sleeps; he onward past;
The humble roof is gained at last;
He paused awhile to listen there,—
'Twas still and solemn as despair;
He called,—none answered to his call,—
He entered,—it was darkness all.
It struck to his heart with a deadly chill,
That horrid darkness, deep and still;
Stunned was his brain, as with a blow;
And still he seemed not yet to know
The fearful certainty of wo.
V.
As one not heeding why or where,He staggered back, in the chilly air.
Again the tempest's spirits spoke,
Again the deep-voiced thunder woke,
In lengthening volleys peal on peal,
Whereat earth's fabric seemed to reel;
Down the o'erwhelming deluge came.
Died on his ear, unheard, the roar;
He had not recked although before
His step the earth had yawned;
Though all the imagined shapes and forms
That drive to battle blackening storms,
In stern array his path had crost;—
In grief's thick darkness he was lost,
On which no daybeam dawned.
VI.
“There is no hope,” he murmured, “none!I journey homeless and alone.
The forest eagle's secret nest
Has seen, at last, the spoiler's quest.
O'er life's remaining wastes of wo,
Alone, and desperate, forth I go.
Fool that I was, who vainly thought,
When ruin's work was round me wrought,
Amid a people's funeral cry,
Still to secure that only tie,—
From danger's topmost steep I bore;
And fostered, in a desert land,
Amid the gaunt wolves' raving band,
Amid the whirlwind's ceaseless roar.
And yet it grew, mid doubt and fear,
And desolation round, more dear;
And still was every care it brought,
Affection's agony of thought,
That tore the heart, and racked the brain,
Blest in the sacred source of pain.
Like some lone bird, whose pinions hover,
M. de Champlain remarked, among the fishes in the Lake which bears his name, one called by the savages Chaousarou which is termed by Charlevoix “Le Poisson Armé.” “Il a le corps à peu près de la figure d'un Brochet; mais il est couvert d'une Ecaille à l'épreuve du Poignard: sa couleur est d'un gris argenté, et il lui sorte de dessous la Gueule une Arête platte, dentelée, creuse et percée par le bout, &c. Un tel Animal est un vrai Pirate parmi les Habitans des Eaux; mais on n'imagineroit peutêtre pas qu'il fait aussi la Guerre aux Habitans des Airs; il la fait néanmoins, et en habile Chasseur; voici comment. Il se cache dans les Roseaux, de telle sorte qu'on ne peut voir que son Arme, qu'il tient élevée perpendiculairement au-dessus de l'Eau. Les Oiseaux, qui viennent pour se reposer, prennent cette Arme pour un Roseau sec, ou un morceau de Bois, et se perchent dessus. Ils n'y sont pas plûtôt, que la Poisson ouvre la Gueule, et fait si subitement le mouvement nécessaire pour ravir sa Proye, que rarement elle lui échape, &c.”—
Charlevoix, p. 153.Flapping and tired, as on she hies,
The lake's far gleaming surface over,
Who now a seeming reed espies,
Where, mid the waters, she may rest
Her drooping head and weary breast,
Then trusting to that guileful stay,
Becomes the lurking monster's prey,
Her heart by fangs relentless torn
Even from that dearly welcomed bourne;
On love's confiding bosom lain;
To find, when all the rest had past,
Thence come the deadliest wound at last,
And that fond shelter vain.
Vain! shall I seek her father's hall,
Where she must pine in dreary thrall,
Reproach her portion sad in life,
Who dared to be the Indian's wife?
Shall I forsake our brethren left,
Of power, of kin, of home bereft;
Even the vile fox's part essay,
And point the ruffians to their prey?
Idle the dastard treachery were,
They would not yield her to my prayer.
O Nora! if one beam of hope
Could through unfathomed darkness grope,
For thee, thy child, thy God, I dare
All but a traitor's name to bear;
All the proud heart must bend to brook,
Soothed by thy one atoning look.
Thy father's wrath, thy kinsmen's scorn,
Their pledge of peace they tear away,
And vengeance hath its debt to pay.
VII.
“Roar on ye winds! your voice must beSweet as the bridal chant to me.
Widowed in love, with hate I wed,
Espoused within her gory bed.
The storm of heaven will soon be past,
And all be bright and calm at last;
But man in cruelty and wrong
The tempest's fury will prolong,
And pause not in his fell career
Save o'er my brethren's general bier.
Then come my foes! your work is done!
I cannot weep, I will not groan.
My fathers winced not at the stake,
Nor gave revenge, with torture rife,
One drop its burning thirst to slake,
To the last ebbing drop of life.
I shall not struggle long with fate.
Had I a mortal foe, and were
His form to rise upon me here,
There is no power within my soul,
My arm or weapon to control;—
Sunken and cold! but it will rise,
With my lost tribe's last battle cries;
And death will come, like the last play
Of lightning on a stormy day!”
VIII.
So mused the chieftain as he strodeBackward upon his cheerless road.
The shore is nigh; the storm again
Had hushed its mad and clamorous strain;
There was a roar along the surge,
Which howling winds had ceased to urge;
The dark gray clouds above were spread,
In softening aspect, overhead;
The lightning faint at distance played,
And low the thunders die.
Of murmuring winds and waters round;
And sadly showed the tempest's path,
Where yet the signals of its wrath
Were hung in grandeur high.
Dark flowed the rapid waves beneath,
Save where the levin's lessening wreath
Yet trembled in the sky;
Painted the feathery surge upon,
Its flash in dying glory shone,
And vanished fitfully.
It was an hour for one to mourn,
In life, in love, in hope forlorn;
When all above, and all below,
Pour their deep thrill on heart of wo,
Lone sorrow's luxury;—
As oft there gleams a transient glow,
Above the headlong torrent's flow,
To sooth and cheer the eye;
With its half lost and filmy ray,
Lingering upon the restless spray,
As fleets the current by.
IX.
Once more his bark is on the wave,To join the desperate and the brave;
On through the heaving bay it flew,
As his strong arm behind him threw
The crested wave; unheedful still,
While strength exerts its wonted skill,
He only felt, his heart around,
A girth that all its pulses bound;
And all of memory, fear or hope,
Was wound within its anguished scope;
As when the fated victim feels
The Carcajou about him dart;
“This creature, which is of the cat kind, is a terrible enemy to the deer, elk, moose, carraboo, &c. He either comes upon them from some concealment unperceived, or climbs up into a tree, and waits till one of them, driven by an extreme of heat or cold, takes shelter under it; when he fastens upon his neck, and opening the jugular vein, soon brings his prey to the ground. This he is enabled to do by his long tail, with which he encircles the body of his adversary; and the only means they have to shun their fate, is by flying immediately to the water; by this method, as the Carcajou has a great dislike to that element, he is sometimes got rid of before he can effect his purpose.”—
Carver.And staggering thro' the forest reels,
While still the foe insidious steals
His mortal pressure round the heart,—
Until the wound his mercy deals,
That lets the struggling soul depart.
X.
Meantime within his trusted holdThe dauntless outlaw lay;
As in his victor day.
The bear mid northern winter's gloom,
In some old oak's sequestered womb,
Lethargic lives, nor tastes of food,
Till from his cheerless solitude,
The exulting voice of balmy spring,
The sullen hermit forth shall bring;
But can the soul, that slumbers never,
Live on, when hope has fled for ever;—
When homage, royalty and power
Have past, the pageant of an hour;—
Live on, through exile, want and chains,
When neither friend nor slave remains;—
Live on, the mark and theme of hate,
To bide the smile of frowning fate,—
The single chance,—not yet to fall,
As vulgar souls resign their breath;—
And bear, with gloomy patience, all,
One trophy to erect in death;
One stab, with dying hand, to give,
And know one foeman shall not live?
XI.
Thou, of the ocean rock! what eyeThy secret mind shall scan?
No conqueror now, no monarch high;
A lone, a captive man!
Thine was the chance, in regal sway,
Amid thy panoplied array,
And gallant pomp around,
To meet thy last, decisive day,
When war, along the kindling fray,
With dazzling horrors frowned;
While myriad swords around thee moved,
Flashing afar the blaze beloved;
And with thy name their battle cry,
The charging squadrons rushed to die.
But here, in Haup's inglorious swamp,
In subterrene, unwarlike camp,
The stones his pillow, and the reeds
The only couch he asks or needs,
A hero lay, whose sleepless soul
Was given, the spirits to control
As thine, spoiled favourite of fate!
And he was wise, as bold and true,
To use the simple craft he knew;
His skill from nature came;
A different clime, a different age,
Had scrolled his deeds in glory's page;
And proud as thine his wreath had been!
But if unlike thy closing scene,
How more unlike thy fame!
Thy strife was for another's throne,
For realms and subjects not thine own,
And for a conqueror's name:
He fought, because he would not yield
His birthright, and his fathers' field;
Would vindicate the deep disgrace,
The wrongs, the ruin of his race;—
He slew, that well avenged in death,
His kindred spirits pleased might be;—
Died, for his people and his faith,
His sceptre, and his liberty!
XII.
And on this night, whose parting shadesShall see the avengers lift their blades,
And bring relentless fury, fraught
With many an insult's goading thought,
The outlaw Sachem slept;
The while his scanty band around,
Low in the swamp's unequal ground,
Their mournful vigils kept.
Tall trees o'erthrown their bulwark made,
While rude, luxuriant vines o'erspread,
Concealed their lurking place;
There, now to feeble numbers worn,
In strength o'erspent, in hope forlorn,
Shrunk, trembling for the coming morn,
The Wampanoag race.
XIII.
Mothers and widows sad, were thenHidden within that gloomy fen;
Left for a space, by war, to mourn
Each sacred bond asunder torn.
Departed, to return no more;
How, when the hunter's toil was o'er,
And dressed his frugal meal had been,
His children clustered round his knee,
To hear the tales of former days,
And learn what men should strive to be,
While listening to the warrior's praise:
And she, thrice happy parent! sate,
Well pleased, beside her honoured mate;
What time gray eve its welcome hue
O'er distant hills and forests threw:
Nor idle then, with dexterous hand,
She wrought the glittering wampum band;
Or loved the silken grass to braid;
Or through the deer-skin, smooth and strong,
Weaving the many-coloured thong,
Her hunter's comely sandals made.
This they recalled; and marvelled they,
When bounteous earth is wide and free,
Why man, whose life is for a day,
So much in love with wo should be!
XIV.
He slept, yet not the spirit slept;Her feverish vigil memory kept;
In motley visions on her eye,
The phantom host of dreams past by.
Tradition, meet for vulgar faith,
Philip was said to have seen the devil, in a dream, the night before he was killed. Hubbard merely notices it in a parenthesis. “Whether the devil appeared to him in a dream that night as he did unto Saul, foreboding his tragical end, it matters not.” Increase Mather says,“It seemeth that night Philip (like the man in the Host of Midian) dreamed that he was fallen into the hands of the English, and just as he was saying to those that were with him, that they must fly for their lives that day, lest the Indian that was gone from him should discover where he was, Our Souldiers came upon him,” &c. Cotton Mather borrows the account from his namesake. “That very night Philip (like the Man in the Army of Midian) had been dreaming that he was fall'n into the hands of the English,” &c. Connecting the story of the dream, with what Mather says Philip's Powaws had told him,—with the visions said to be revealed during the ceremony of Huskanawing,—and the belief in Destiny, which the Indians are said by Adair to entertain,—I have endeavoured to make some poetical use of those several superstitions; and to give some unity to that part of the plot, which is taken from history. I have made Ahauton shoot Philip; though that exploit is said, by Increase Mather, to have been performed by a Pocasset Indian, named Alderman by the English.
There was a tradition, that Philip and the Devil used to amuse themselves, during their nocturnal interviews, by pitching quoits, from the top of Mount Hope to Popasquash neck. I have understood, that some large flat stones are still to be seen, at the latter place, which are singularly situated; and that the mark of a large foot is visible somewhere on the rocks, in the vicinity of Mount Hope, which was once attributed to the impress of the Devil.
Has told of threats of coming skaith,
Spoke by the Evil One, who came,
This eve, his destined prey to claim,
In form, as when at noon of night,
He met him on the mountain's height;
O'er the gray rock the fiend outspread
His sable pinions as he fled,
And ere the sounding air he cleft,
His foot gigantic impress left.
Such superstition's idle tale,
But let the minstrel's lore prevail.
XV.
He saw the world of souls; and there,Brave men and beauteous women were:
Reposing in their arbours green,
Supplied the spicy bowls they quaffed,
And round them danced, and joyous laughed;
While aye the warriors smiled to see
Those lovely creatures in their glee;
And pledged them in the sparkling cup;
Or breathed their fragrant incense up;
Grateful and pure, 'twas seen to flow
From calumets
Carver says he knows not why the Pipe of Peace was so termed by the French. La Hontan, in his explanatory Table, says,—“Calumet in general signifies a Pipe, being a Norman Word, deriv'd from Chalumeau. The Savages do not understand this Word. The Pipe of Peace is called in the Iroquese Language Ganondaoë, and by the other SAvage Nations Poagem.”
Apart reclined in kingly state,
The ancient Massasoiet sate,
And earnest with Uncompoen old,
Speech grave, but pleasant, seemed to hold;
Uncompoën, slain in recent fight,
Contending for his nephew's right.
Just from the woods, like hunter dight,
The gallant Ouamsutta came;
Bearing behind his plenteous game,
In order moved the warrior's train;
Joyous his bearing was, and free,
In that blest world could never be;
His buskins trapped with glittering gold,
His floating mantle's graceful fold
Clasped with a sparkling gem;
Dazzling his cincture's radiance gleamed,
Woven from the heavenly bow it seemed,
And like the sunrays danced and streamed
His feathery diadem.
A spear with silver tipt he bore;
The gaily-tinkling rings before,—
The quiver rattling on his back,
His buoyant frame and kindling eye,
The thrilling pulse of transport high,
The sense of power and pleasure spake.
And one and all the Sachem knew,
When near their blissful bower he drew;
And clapped their hands with joy to see
The hero join their company.
And strains of softest music round,
From flutes and tabors, with the sound
To greet the entering guest were heard.
“Welcome,” they sung, “thy toils are done,
Thy battles fought, thy rest is won;
And welcome to the world thou art,
Where kindred souls shall never part;
Honour on earth shall valour have,
And joy with us attends the brave.”
XVI.
That ravishing dream was rapt away,Vanished the forms, the music died;
And changeful fancy's wayward sway
Visions of darker hue supplied.
O'er frozen plains he seemed to go,
Mid driving sleet, and bluiding snow.
Then Assawomsett's lake he knew,
And dim descried, the tempest through,
Apostate Sausaman arise;
Stiff were his gory locks with ice,
And mangled was his form;
Fierce shone the fury of his eyes,
Like lightning through the storm.
He cried, “My spirit hath no home!
A weary, wandering ghost, I roam.
This night the avengers lift the blade,
And my foul murder shall be paid!”
XVII.
Then thought the Sachem that his wayThrough Metapoiset's forest
“August 6. Twenty Souldiers marched out of Taunton, and took all those Indians, in number thirty and six, only the Square-Sachem of Pocassel, who was next unto Philip, in respect of the mischief that hath been done, and the blood that hath been shed in this Warr, escaped alone; but not long after some of Taunton finding an Indian Squaw in Metapoiset newly dead, cut off her head, and it hapned to be Weetamoo, i. e. Squaw Sachem her head. When it was set upon a pole in Taunton, the Indians who were prisoners there, knew it presently, and made a most horrid and diabolical Lamentation, crying out that it was their Queen's head. Now here it is to be observed, that God himself, by his own hand, brought this enemy to destruction. For in that place, where, the last year, she furnished Philip with Canooes for his men, she herself could not meet with a Canoo, but venturing over the River upon a Raft, that brake under her, so that she was drowned, just before the English found her. Surely Philip's turn will be next.”—
Increase Mather, pp. 45, 46.Mid the thick shadows of the grove,
A form was rushing seen;
He saw with wildered paces rove
Pocasset's warrior queen.
As from the water's depths she came,
With dripping locks and bloated frame.
Wild her discoloured arms she threw
To grasp him; and as swift he flew,
Her hollow scream he heard behind,
Come mingling with the howling wind.
Bearing the war-axe on thy side!”
XVIII.
Now in a gloomy glade he stood;Along the sward, the tracks of blood
Led, where in death a couguar lay;
Fast ebbed the crimson stream away;
But fiercely rolled his balls of fire,
And flashed their unextinguished ire
Toward the forest; where the chief
An armëd Indian could descry,
Who, less in anger than in grief,
Seemed to behold his victim die,
Though lost his features were in gloom.
But Philip knew his hour was come,
And death from Indian hand was nigh.
For the red tiger oft had been,
In earlier dreams prophetic, seen.
It was the emblem of his soul,
The shade that still his life attended;
He knew its visioned being ended.
XIX.
He woke, and from his covert sprung;O'er the dark fen deep silence hung;
The moon had burst her sable shroud,
And from a silver-skirted cloud
Emerging, radiant but serene,
Looked forth upon the varying scene.
Now verging to the opening west,
Her beams obliquely fell;
O'er the broad hill's rock-girdled breast,
O'er thicket, glade and dell;
Scattered the bay's blue waters o'er,
And lit Pocasset's shelving shore.
'Twas as if now, when fate was near,
Awhile she brushed away her tear;
That, the last time, the Sachem's eye,
His native regions might descry,—
So lovely in that trembling beam,
That well his soul entranced might deem,
Had not a realm so fair as this.
XX.
If sorrow hath its feeling high,And sadness its sublimity,
'Tis when the hero on his fate,
With thought composed, can meditate;
Throw o'er the past a steady eye,
And bid an ingrate world good-by!
Long and intently gazed the chief,
Till found his thoughts in speech relief.
“Like thee, fair Sun of night! have I,
Through mountain clouds of destiny,
Struggling, and darkened oft, been driven;
But fixed, as is thy course in heaven,
Nor brethren's fear, nor foeman's wrath,
Hath turned me from my purposed path.
My hour is come; my light is lost,
By never-bursting blackness crost;
While unrevenged my kindred lie,
My nation's ghosts indignant cry;
Must captive pass to stranger hands.
But thou, in thine immortal march
Renewed, wilt span the eternal arch:
Here wilt thou pour thy mellow flood,
When other sandals press the sod:
Thou, eye of even! on yonder hill
Wilt look, serene and beauteous still,
When the last echo shall have died,
That spoke my tribe's expiring pride;
Thy quenchless font diminished not,
When Metacom shall be forgot.
XXI.
“Fair sun of night! thou movest alone;Compeer or friend thou ne'er hast known,
Mid all the swarms in yonder plain,
That sparkle only in thy wane.
And lone as thine, my course has been,
Amid the multitudes of men.
Through all the crowds that hemmed me round,
My soul no kindred spirit found.
The wary, bold and strong and fleet;
But that, whereby men's spirits sway
The herds that fly them, or obey,
I could not waken to my will
Or touch to one responsive thrill;
The nobler powers of men unite,
In hopes, in council, or in fight.
Else, conquering ever, I had met
The foe I reverence, while I hate;
And to their ocean hurled agen
The intruders proud, who are but men.
XXII.
The belief in a metempsychosis, which Philip is here made to
express, is not unwarranted.—“I once took great pains to dissuade
from these notions a very sensible Indian. He asserted very
strange things of his own supernatural knowledge, which he had
obtained not only at the time of his initiation, but at other times,
even before he was born. He said he knew he had lived through
two generations; that he had died twice and was born a third
time, to live out the then present race, after which he was to die,
and never more to come to this country again. He well remembered
what the women had predicted, while he was yet in his
mother's womb,” &c. &c.—
Heckewelder, p. 240.
“The Indians call this Altar by the Name of Powcorance, from
whence proceeds the great Reverence they have for a small Bird
that uses the Woods, and in their Note continually sound that
Name. They say this is the Soul of one of their Princes; and on
that score, they would not hurt it for the World.”—History of Virginia,
p. 185.—“The Chepewyans have some faint notion of the
transmigration of the soul, so that if a child be born with teeth,
they instantly imagine, from its premature appearance, that it
bears a resemblance to some person who had lived to an advanced
period, and that he has assumed a renovated life, with these extraordinary
tokens of maturity.”—
McKensie. History of the Fur Trade, 24.
“They brought me word that some new married Women were
running to receive the Soul of an old Fellow that lay a dying.
From thence I concluded, that the People were Pythagoreans; and
upon that Apprehension, ask'd 'em how they came to eat Animals,
into which their Souls might be transfus'd: But they made answer,
that the Transmigration of Souls is always confin'd to the respective
Species, so that the Soul of a Man cannot enter into a Fowl,
or that of a Fowl cannot be lodged in a quadruped, and so on.”
La Hontan, I. 120.
“D'autres reconnoissent dans tous les Hommes deux Ames; ils
attribuent à l'une tout ce que je viens de dire, ils prétendent que
l'autre ne quitte jamais le corps, si ce n'est pour passer dans un
autre; ce qui n'arrive pourtant guéres, disent-ils, qu'aux Ames
des Enfans, lesquelles ayant peu joui de la vie, obtiennent d'en
recommencer une nouvelle,” &c.—
Charlevoix, p. 351.
“I can believe what seers of old,The belief in a metempsychosis, which Philip is here made to express, is not unwarranted.—“I once took great pains to dissuade from these notions a very sensible Indian. He asserted very strange things of his own supernatural knowledge, which he had obtained not only at the time of his initiation, but at other times, even before he was born. He said he knew he had lived through two generations; that he had died twice and was born a third time, to live out the then present race, after which he was to die, and never more to come to this country again. He well remembered what the women had predicted, while he was yet in his mother's womb,” &c. &c.—
Heckewelder, p. 240.“The Indians call this Altar by the Name of Powcorance, from whence proceeds the great Reverence they have for a small Bird that uses the Woods, and in their Note continually sound that Name. They say this is the Soul of one of their Princes; and on that score, they would not hurt it for the World.”—History of Virginia, p. 185.—“The Chepewyans have some faint notion of the transmigration of the soul, so that if a child be born with teeth, they instantly imagine, from its premature appearance, that it bears a resemblance to some person who had lived to an advanced period, and that he has assumed a renovated life, with these extraordinary tokens of maturity.”—
McKensie. History of the Fur Trade, 24.“They brought me word that some new married Women were running to receive the Soul of an old Fellow that lay a dying. From thence I concluded, that the People were Pythagoreans; and upon that Apprehension, ask'd 'em how they came to eat Animals, into which their Souls might be transfus'd: But they made answer, that the Transmigration of Souls is always confin'd to the respective Species, so that the Soul of a Man cannot enter into a Fowl, or that of a Fowl cannot be lodged in a quadruped, and so on.”
La Hontan, I. 120.“D'autres reconnoissent dans tous les Hommes deux Ames; ils attribuent à l'une tout ce que je viens de dire, ils prétendent que l'autre ne quitte jamais le corps, si ce n'est pour passer dans un autre; ce qui n'arrive pourtant guéres, disent-ils, qu'aux Ames des Enfans, lesquelles ayant peu joui de la vie, obtiennent d'en recommencer une nouvelle,” &c.—
Charlevoix, p. 351.And earlier dreams have dimly told,—
With memory's casual beams, that play,
To mock with ineffectual ray,—
With those wild thoughts and fancies vain,
That idly cross the waking brain;—
I can believe some souls, that quit
Their fleshy forms, again are sent,—
Of their forsaken tenement,—
By wisdom's lore to sway the host,
Or glow within a warrior's frame;
As thou, O moon! though sometimes lost,
Returnest, another, yet the same.
If thus it be,—or if the soul,
Escaped, shall wing its viewless flight,
Amid the clouds that o'er us roll,
To track the eagle's realms delight,
And swell the tempest's martial voice,
When spirits bold in fight rejoice;—
Or seek those far off western climes,
Whence came our sires, in distant times,
For ever with their shades to dwell;—
Where'er the spirit's course may be,
My last good-night I give to thee;
Since thou no more shalt beam on me,
Moon of my fathers! fare thee well!”
XXIII.
He heard soft steps advancing fast;Long shades o'er the rough fen were cast;
Yamoyden stands before the chief.
“Brother, well met; if firm thou art,
With me to stand or bleed;
If not, even as thou camest, depart,
No doubtful aid we need.
For treacherous dogs have sought the foe,
And soon our secret haunt will show;
Uncertain to remain or fly,
Our hope is but like men to die.”
“Sachem, no doubtful faith is mine;
My heart, my hand, my friends are thine.
To life to bind me there is nought;
Like thine, my kindred all have sought
The world where spirits go;
Like thine, a captive led, my wife
Leaves me a beggared half of life,
Hopeless to struggle with the strife
Of roaring waves of wo.
No wingëd sorcerer,
“The Fish Hawk skims over the lakes and rivers, and sometimes seems to lie expanded on the water, as he hovers so close to it, and having, by some attractive power, drawn the fish within its reach, darts suddenly upon them. The charm it makes use of is supposed to be an oil contained in a small bag in the body,” &c.—
Carver.Where they lie fathoms deep, and dead,
My perished hopes can bring;
My cherished treasure's secret vein;
And no sweet songster's welcome voice
Can bid this widowed heart rejoice,
Or tell of budding spring.
My tongue with thee hath known no wile;
I liked thee not when stained with guile,
And helpless innocence thy spoil:
And yet if thine the serpent stroke,
And thine the serpent sting,
Thy foes did first each deed provoke,
And rattling indignation spoke
Swift vengeance on the wing.
Nor e'er shall Indian say that I
Stood calm, in recreant baseness nigh,
To see the foul and senseless beast
On generous valour coldly feast;
“However remarkable it may appear, it is certain, that though the venom of the rattle-snake affects, in a greater or less degree, all animated nature, the hog is an exception to the rule, as that animal will readily destroy them, without dreading their poisonous fangs, and fatten on their flesh.”—
Carver.Gorge on, with no remorseless pang,
Nor feel the venom, nor the fang.”
XXIV.
“Brother, enough; our wrongs the same,One be our fate, and one our fame!”
For conscience smote him as he spoke.
In that high moment of despair,
When kindred valour swore to share
The hour of peril and of death,
The secret wrong lay hid beneath;
The deadly wrong, unthought, untold,—
And all was hollow, false and cold!
“Rise, warriors rise!” the chieftain cried;
“Even here, on Haup's majestic side,
Yet be the white man's power defied!
Once more our native holds shall see
The Wampanoägs' martial glee;
Once more their echoes shall prolong
Our ancient, sacred, warrior song!”
XXV.
Emerging from the chequered sod,From moving tree, from parting clod,
A hundred Indians rise;
As if a wizard's power had bade
The graves in throes give up their dead,
At which the pale moon overhead
Shrunk fading from the skies!
Around the expecting warriors ran;
His martial dance the chief began;
With ponderous club the earth he stroke,
And thus his death-song wildly woke.
Philip's Death-Song. XXVI.
1.
“Heard ye, among the murmuring trees,The spirits' whispering in the breeze?
Mark! where along the moonlight glade,
Flits the wandering hero's shade!
Old and sage Oosamequen!
Seekest thou thy people's groves agen?
Wise and ancient Sagamore!
Warily his wrongs he bore;
But still his spirit o'er its hate
Brooding did deeply meditate;
Dying, curst the white men's gods!
2.
See ye not a frowning ghost?Valiant son of valiant sire!
Alas! that thine was not the boast,
Ouamsutta! to expire,
As warriors love their life to yield,
With blood-stained arms, on battle field!
The stately beech is green in vain,
When dies at top its vital part;
Wrought in thy brain the victor's chain,
And withered all thy manly heart.
But let thy foemen, from thy hearse,
Hear, and dread thy dying curse!
3.
Along the mist-clad mountain's browCarver, (page 265,) gives a beautifully characteristic account of the conduct of an Indian woman, on the successive deaths of her son and husband. The third verse, in the death-song of Philip, is taken from her Lament. “If thou hadst continued with us, my dear Son, how well would the bow have become thy hand, and how fatal would thine arrows have proved to the enemies of our band. Thou wouldst often have drank their blood, and eaten their flesh, and numerous slaves would have rewarded thy toils. With a nervous arm wouldst thou have seized the wounded buffaloe, or have combatted the fury of the enraged bear. Thou wouldst have overtaken the flying elk, and have kept pace on the mountain's brow with the fleetest deer,” &c.
The deer may course in transport now;
O'er his plains may bounding go,
Bold, the shaggy buffalo;
Now the gray moose may fearless fly;
For cold the valiant hunters lie!
Swift as the deer's their wingëd feet:
How oft in desperate conflict low
They laid the madly struggling foe;
How oft their grasp, with sinewy might,
Has staid the elk, in wildest flight!
4.
Say, have I left ye, champions brave,“The bones of our deceased countrymen lie uncovered; they call out to us to revenge their wrongs, and we must satisfy their request. Their spirits cry out against us. They must be appeased. Sit, therefore, no longer inactive; give way to the impulse of your natural valour, anoint your hair, paint your faces, fill your quivers; let the forests resound with your songs; console the spirits of the dead, and tell them they shall be revenged.”—
Carver, p. 195.Forgot, dishonoured in your grave?
Say, did your spirits call in vain,
On one unmindful of the slain?
Brothers, have I idly stood,
When rung your war-cry in the wood;
When crimson battle stains ye took,
Your quivers filled, and war-clubs shook?
Ye for my long remembrance speak,
Midnight fire, and midnight shriek!
Scalps, that my deadly vows made good!
Fields, where I quaffed the bowl of blood!”
XXVII.
Tiask, or Tiash, Tespiquin, Totoson, and others, were Philip's chief counsellors. Those mentioned in the text were with him in the swamp. They were all caught and killed soon after. Annawan, or Annawon, was also a chief captain and counsellor, and seems to have been an intelligent and high-minded warrior. He was taken by Captain Church, soon after his escape from the swamp, where Philip was killed; and behaved with great composure and magnanimity, after his capture. “He was put to death, as he justly had deserved,” says Mr. Hubbard.
But here no more our song must dwell,Tiask, or Tiash, Tespiquin, Totoson, and others, were Philip's chief counsellors. Those mentioned in the text were with him in the swamp. They were all caught and killed soon after. Annawan, or Annawon, was also a chief captain and counsellor, and seems to have been an intelligent and high-minded warrior. He was taken by Captain Church, soon after his escape from the swamp, where Philip was killed; and behaved with great composure and magnanimity, after his capture. “He was put to death, as he justly had deserved,” says Mr. Hubbard.
While other chiefs look up the tale
Of their forefathers' deeds;
Tiask and Tespiquin began,
And through their sanguine annals ran,
The feuds and wars of many a clan,
Lost to the storied race of man,
Nor of them memory heeds:
Then, doomed to fall by guileful plan,
Long spoke the generous Annawan.
Meantime Yamoyden stood aloof;
He heard a solemn, still reproof,
Demanding why the song of blood,
Ascending to the Christian's God,
To his late vows succeeds?
These Indian metaphors, it is well known, are not to be taken literally. They mean no more than killing their enemies, simply; though several stories are related of the literal execution of their threats, “that they would suck the blood of their enemies.” Uncas is said to have eaten a piece of Miantonimo. But the authority is very questionable.
| Yamoyden, a tale of the wars of King Philip : in six cantos | |