Oliver Newman :: :: University of Virginia Library

The summer sun is riding high
Amid a bright and cloudless sky;
Beneath whose deep o'er-arching blue
The circle of the Atlantic sea,
Reflecting back a deeper hue,
Is heaving peacefully.
The winds are still, the ship with idle motion
Rocks gently on the gentle ocean;
Loose hang her sails, awaiting when the breeze
Again shall wake to waft her on her way.
Glancing beside, the dolphins, as they play,
Their gorgeous tints suffused with gold display;
And gay bonitos in their beauty glide:
With arrowy speed, in close pursuit,
They through the azure waters shoot;

A feebler shoal before them in affright
Spring from the wave, and in short flight,
On wet and plumeless wing essay
The aërial element:
The greedy followers, on the chase intent,
Dart forward still with keen and upturn'd sight,
And, to their proper danger blind the while,
Heed not the sharks, which have for many a day
Hover'd behind the ship, presentient of their prey.

So fair a season might persuade
Yon crowd to try the fisher's trade;
Yet from the stern no line is hung,
Nor bait by eager sea-boy flung;
Nor doth the watchful sailor stand
Alert to strike, harpoon in hand.
Upon the deck assembled, old and young,
Bareheaded all in reverence, see them there;
Behold where, hoisted half-mast high,
The English flag hangs mournfully;
And hark! what solemn sounds are these
Heard in the silence of the seas?

“Man that is born of woman, short his time,
And full of woe! he springeth like a flower,
Or like the grass, that, green at morning prime,
Is cut and withereth ere the evening hour;
Never doth he continue in one stay,
But like a shadow doth he pass away.”
It was that awful strain, which saith
How in the midst of life we are in death:

“Yet not for ever, O Lord God most High!
Saviour! yet not for ever shall we die!”

Ne'er from a voice more eloquent did prayer
Arise, with fervent piety sincere.
To every heart, of all the listening crew,
It made its way, and drew
Even from the hardy seaman's eyes a tear.
“God,” he pursued, “hath taken to himself
The soul of our departed sister dear;
We then commit her body to the deep;”
He paused, and, at the word,
The coffin's plunge was heard.

A female voice of anguish then brake forth
With sobs convulsive of a heart opprest.
It was a daughter's agonising cry:
But soon hath she represt
The fit of passionate grief,
And listening patiently,
In that religious effort gain'd relief.
Beside the grey-hair'd captain doth she stand;
One arm is linked in his; the other hand
Hid with the handkerchief her face, and prest
Her eyes, whence burning tears continuous flow.
Down hung her head upon her breast,
And thus the maiden stood in silent woe.

Again was heard the preacher's earnest voice:
It bade the righteous in their faith rejoice,
Their sure and certain hope in Christ; for blest
In Him are they, who from their labours rest.

It rose into a high thanksgiving strain,
And praised the Lord, who from a world of pain
Had now been pleased to set his servant free;
Hasten thy kingdom, Lord, that all may rest in thee!

In manhood's fairest prime was he who pray'd,
Even in the flower and beauty of his youth.
These holy words and fervent tones portray'd
The feelings of his inmost soul sincere;
For scarce two months had fill'd their short career
Since from the grave of her who gave him birth
That sound had struck upon his ear;
When to the doleful words of “Earth to earth”
Its dead response the senseless coffin gave:—
Oh! who can e'er forget that echo of the grave!

Now in the grace of God dismiss'd,
They separate as they may,
To narrow limits of the ship confined:
Nor did the impression lightly pass away,
Even from the unreflecting sailor's mind.
They pitied that sweet maiden, all bereft,
Alone on shipboard among strangers left.
They spake of that young preacher, day by day
How while the fever held its fatal course,
He minister'd at the patient sufferer's side,
Holding of faith and hope his high discourse;
And how, when all had join'd in humble prayer,
She solemnly confided to his care,
Till to her father's hands she could be given,
Her child forlorn,—and blest him ere she died.

They call'd to mind, how peaceful, how serene,
Like one who seem'd already half in heaven,
After that act she yielded up her breath;
And sure they wish'd their end like her's, I ween,
And for a comforter like him in death.

II. THE VOYAGE.

The maiden on her narrow bed
To needful solitude hath fled;
He who perform'd the funeral prayer
Leans o'er the vessel's head, and there
Contemplating the sea and sky,
He muses of eternity.
The captain paces to and fro
The deck with steady step and slow,
And at his side a passenger,
Conversing as they go.
Their talk was of that maid forlorn,
The mournful service of the morn,
And the young man, whose voice of heartfelt faith
Breathed hope and comfort o'er the bed of death.
“Captain,” quoth Randolph, “you have borne,
Ere this, I ween, to Boston's shore,
Saints by the dozen, and the score:
But if he preach as he can pray,
The Boston men will bless the day
On which you brought this treasure o'er:
A youth like him they well may call
A son of thunder, or a second Paul.”

Thereat the captain smiled, and said,
“Oh hang the broad face and round head,
Hard as iron, and heavy as lead!
I have whistled for a wind ere now,
And thought it cheap to crack a sail,
If it sent the canting breed below.
Jonah was three days in the whale,
But I have had fellows here, I trow,
With lungs of brazen power,
Who would not fail to preach a whale
Dead sick in half an hour.
One Sunday, when on the banks we lay,
These Roundheads, think ye, what did they?
Because, they said, 'twas the sabbath day,
And hallowed by the Lord,
They took the fish, which their servants caught,
And threw them overboard.
Newman is made of different clay;
He walks in his own quiet way:
And yet beneath that sober mien
Gleams of a spirit may be seen,
Which show what temper lies supprest
Within his meek and unambitious breast:
He seemeth surely one of gentle seed,
Whose sires for many an age were wont to lead
In courts and councils, and in camps to bleed.”

Randolph replied, “He rules his tongue too well
Ever of those from whom he sprung to tell:
Whatever rank they once possessed
In camps and councils, is, I ween, suppress'd

In prudent silence. Little love that pair
Could to the royal Martyr bear,
Be sure, who named their offspring Oliver.
You have mark'd that volume, over which he seems
To pore and meditate, like one who dreams,
Pondering upon the page with thought intense,
That nought, which passes round him, can from thence
His fix'd attention move:
He carries it about his person still,
Nor lays it from him for a moment's time.
At my request, one day, with no good will,
He lent it me: what, think ye, did it prove?
A rigmarole of verses without rhyme,
About the apple, and the cause of sin,
By the blind old traitor Milton! and within,
Upon the cover, he had written thus,
As if some saintly relic it had been,
Which the fond owner gloried in possessing:
‘Given me by my most venerable friend,
The author, with his blessing!’”

CAPTAIN.
Sits the wind there!

RANDOLPH.
Returning him the book,
I told him I was sorry he could find
None who deserved his veneration more
Than one who, in the blackest deed of guilt

That blots our annals, stands participant,
A volunteer in that worst infamy,
Stain'd to the core with blessed Charles his blood,
Although by some capricious mercy spared,
Strangely, as if by miracle, he still
Lived to disparage justice.

CAPTAIN.
And how brook'd he
Your reprehension?

RANDOLPH.
With his wonted air
Of self-possession, and a mind subdued:
And yet it moved him; for, though looks and words
By the strong mastery of his practised will
Were overruled, the mounting blood betray'd
An impulse in its secret spring too deep
For his control. But taking up my speech,
He answer'd with a simulated smile:
“Sir, you say well; by miracle indeed
The life so fairly forfeited seems spared;
And it was worth the special care of Heaven;
Else had the hangman and the insensate axe
Cut off this toil divine.” With that his eyes
Flash'd, and a warmer feeling flush'd his cheek:
“Time will bring down the pyramids,” he cried,
“Eldest of human works, and wear away
The dreadful Alps, coeval with himself:
But while yon sun shall hold his place assign'd,
This ocean ebb and flow, and the round earth,

Obedient to the Almighty Mover, fill
Her silent revolutions, Milton's mind
Shall dwell with us, an influence and a power;
And this great monument, which he hath built,
Outliving empires, pyramids, and Alps,
Endure, the lasting wonder of mankind.”

CAPTAIN.
This is stark madness.

RANDOLPH.
Or stark poetry,
Two things as near as Grub Street and Moorfields
But he came bravely off; for, softening soon
To his habitual suavity, he said,
Far was it from his thought to vindicate
Ill deeds of treason and of blood. The wise
Had sometimes err'd, the virtuous gone astray:
Too surely in ourselves we felt the seed
“Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world and all our woe:”
His friend, like other men, had drawn a part
Of that sad heritage; he loved in him
His wisdom and his virtue, not his faults.

CAPTAIN.
Well said, and manfully, like one who speaks
The honest truth.

RANDOLPH.
Why, so it sounds, and seems.

CAPTAIN.
And we must needs admit, he hath not left
His native country in that piggish mood
Which neither will be led nor driven, but grunts
And strives with stubborn neck and groundling snout,
Struggling through mire and brake, to right and left,
No matter where, so it can only take
The way it should not go. One of that herd,
Rather than read the service, would have seen
The dead thrown overboard without a prayer.

RANDOLPH.
Yet he hath freaks and follies of opinion;
The bubbles of a yeasty mind, that works
As it would crack its vessel.

CAPTAIN.
They are ever
The sweetest nuts in which the maggot breeds.

RANDOLPH.
But, once fly-stricken, what avails their sweetness?
Only to feed a pamper'd grub, that leaves
Nothing but dirt and hollowness behind it.
Tainted the young man is, and deeply too,
I fear, by birth and breeding: I perceive it

With sorrow, seeing on how fair a stock
The unlucky graft is set.

CAPTAIN.
Why then, alas
For that poor Annabel! if she must have
This farther cause to rue our baneful factions.
The wretched strife already hath entail'd
Upon her luckless family the loss
Of fair possessions, friends, and native land!
And now a chance hath offered, which to her,
I trow, might largely make amends for all:
It would be hard indeed, when all things seem
To square so well—youth, opportunity,
Their fortunes one, the natural dower of each
So equal, and so bountifully given,
A dying mother's blessing to crown all—
It would be hard indeed, should loyalty
Forbid the banns.

RANDOLPH.
I know her father's temper,
True as his own Toledo to the cause
Wherein they both were tried. Nor will neglect,
Ingratitude of courts, and banishment,
(For a grant in the American wilderness
Only calls exile by a fairer name,)
Subdue his high-wrought virtue. Satisfied
At last, by years of painful proof,
That loyalty must find in its own proud sense

Its own reward, that pride he will bequeath
His children as their best inheritance,
A single heir-loom rescued from the wreck,
And worth whate'er was lost.

CAPTAIN.
'Tis well the youth
Thinks less of earth than heaven, and hath his heart
More with the angels than on human love:
But if such thoughts and hopes have enter'd it,
As would some forty years ago have found
Quick entrance, and warm welcome too, in mine,
His ugly baptism may mar all, and make him
Breathe maledictions on his godfathers,
Though old Nol himself were one.

RANDOLPH.
Howbeit 't will win him
Worship and friends in the city of the saints;
And, to the ears of sober Boston men,
Oliver will be a name more savoury
Than Tribulation, or Stand-fast-in-the-Lord,
Increase or Nathan, Gershom, Ichabod,
Praise-God, or any of the Barebones breed.
They rise upon the oak-holyday with faces
A full inch longer than they took to bed:
Experienced nurses feed their babes that day
With spoons, because the mother's milk is sour;
And when they mourn upon the Martyrdom,
'Tis for the expiation, not the crime.
Oh they love dearly one of the precious seed!

Tyburn, since Sixty, in their secret hearts
Holds place of Calvary. For saints and martyrs,
None like their own Hugh Peters, and the heads
On the Hall your only relics! Fifteen years
They have hid among them the two regicides,
Shifting from den to cover, as we found
Where the scent lay. But earth them as they will,
I shall unkennel them, and from their holes
Drag them to light and justice.

CAPTAIN.
There hath been
Much wholesome sickness thrown away, Sir Randolph
On your strong stomach! Two sea voyages
Have not sufficed to clear the bile wherewith
You left New England!

RANDOLPH.
Nay, it rises in me
As I draw near their shores.

CAPTAIN.
Why then, look shortly
For a sharp fit; for, if the sky tell true,
Anon we shall have wind, and to our wish.

So spake the Captain, for his eye,
Versed in all signs and weathers,
Discerned faint traces in the eastern sky,
Such as a lion's paw might leave

Upon the desert, when the sands are dry.
The dog-vane now blows out with its light feathers;
And lo! the ship, which like a log hath lain,
Heavily rolling on the long slow swell,
Stirs with her proper impulse now, and gathers
A power like life beneath the helmsman's will.
Her head lies right; the rising breeze
Astern comes rippling o'er the seas;
A tramp of feet! a sound of busy voices!
The cordage rattles, and the topsails fill;
All hands are active, every heart rejoices.

Blest with fair seas, and favourable skies,
Right for her promised land
The gallant vessel flies;
Far, far behind her now
The foamy furrow lies;
Like dust around her prow
The ocean spray is driven.

O thou fair creature of the human hand!
Thou, who wert palsied late,
When the dead calm lay heavy on the deep,
Again hast thou received the breath of heaven,
And, waking from thy sleep,
As strength again to those broad wings is given,
Thou puttest forth thy beauty and thy state!
Hold on with happy winds thy prosperous way,
And may no storm that goodly pride abate,
Nor baffling airs thy destined course delay,
Nor the sea-rover seize thee for his prey;
But minist'ring angels wait

To watch for thee, against all ill event,
From man, or from the reckless element.
Thou hast a richer freight
Than ever vessel bore from Ophir old,
Or spicey India sent,
Or Lisbon welcomed to her joyful quay
From her Brazilian land of gems and gold:
Thou carriest pious hope, and pure desires,
Such as approving angels might behold;
A heart of finest mould,
A spirit that aspires
To heaven, and draws its flame from heavenly fires;
Genius, Devotion, Faith,
Stronger than Time or Death,
A temper of the high heroic mood,
By that strong faith exalted, and subdued
To a magnanimous fortitude.
The blossom of all virtues dost thou bear,
The seed of noble actions! Go thy way
Rejoicingly, from fear and evil free:
These shall be thy defence,
Beneath the all-present arm of Providence,
Against all perils of the treacherous sea.

III. CAPE COD.

Days pass, winds veer, and favouring skies
Change like the face of fortune; storms arise;
Safely, but not within her port desired,
The good ship lies.
Where the long sandy Cape
Bends and embraces round,
As with a lover's arm, the shelter'd sea,
A haven she hath found
From adverse gales and boisterous billows free.

Now strike your sails,
Ye toilworn mariners, and take your rest
Long as the fierce north-west
In that wild fit prevails,
Tossing the waves uptorn with frantic sway.
Keep ye within the bay,
Contented to delay
Your course till the elemental madness cease,
And heaven and ocean are again at peace.

How gladly there,
Sick of the uncomfortable ocean,
The impatient passengers approach the shore;

Escaping from the sense of endless motion,
To feel firm earth beneath their feet once more,
To breathe again the air
With taint of bilge and cordage undefiled,
And drink of living springs, if there they may,
And with fresh fruits and wholesome food repair
Their spirits, weary of the watery way.

And oh! how beautiful
The things of earth appear
To eyes that far and near
For many a week have seen
Only the oircle of the restless sea!
With what a fresh delight
They gaze again on fields and forests green,
Hovel, or whatsoe'er
May bear the trace of man's industrious hand;
How grateful to their sight
The shore of shelving sand,
As the light boat moves joyfully to land!

Woods they beheld, and huts, and piles of wood,
And many a trace of toil,
But not green fields or pastures. 'T was a land
Of pines and sand;
Dark pines, that from the loose and sparkling soil
Rose in their strength aspiring: far and wide
They sent their searching roots on every side,
And thus, by depth and long extension, found
Firm hold and grasp within that treacherous ground:
So had they risen and flourish'd; till the earth,
Unstable as its neighbouring ocean there,

Like an unnatural mother, heap'd around
Their trunks its wavy furrows white and high;
And stifled thus the living things it bore.
Half buried thus they stand,
Their summits sere and dry,
Marking, like monuments, the funeral mound;
As when the masts of some tall vessel show
Where, on the fatal shoals, the wreck lies whelm'd below.

Such was the ungenial earth; nor was the air
Fresh and delightful there:
A noisome taint upon the breath it bore;
For they who dwelt upon that sandy shore,
Of meadows and of gardens took no care;
They sowed not, neither did they reap:
The ocean was their field, their flocks and herds
The myriad-moving armies of the deep;
The whale their mighty chase, whose bones bestrew'd
The sandy margin of that ample bay,
And all about, in many a loathly heap,
The offal and the reeking refuse lay,
Left there for dogs obscene and carrion birds a prey.

Oliver, as they approach'd, said thoughtfully;
“It was within this bay
That they, into the wilderness who bore
The seeds of English faith and liberty,
First set their feet upon the shore.
Here they put in, escaping from the rage
Of tempests, and by treacherous pilotage

Led, as it seem'd to fallible men, astray:
But God was with them; and the Providence
Which errs not, had design'd his people's way.”

“A blessed day for England had it been,”
Randolph exclaim'd, “had Providence thought good,
If the whole stern round-headed brotherhood
Had follow'd, man and woman, great and small;
New England might have prosper'd with the brood,
Or seas and sharks been welcome to them all.”

“Alas, how many a broken family
Hath felt that bitter wish!” the youth replied;
And, as he spake, he breathed a silent sigh.
“The wounded heart is prone to entertain
Presumptuous thoughts and feelings, which arraign
The appointed course of things. But what are we,
Short-sighted creatures of an hour,
That we should judge? In part alone we see,
And this but dimly. He, who ordereth all,
Beholdeth all, at once, and to the end:
Upon His wisdom and His power,
His mercy and His boundless love, we rest;
And resting thus in humble faith, we know,
Whether the present be for weal or woe,
For us whatever is must needs be best.”

Thus, while he spake, the boat had reach'd the land;
And, grating gently, rested on the sand.
They step ashore; the dwellers gather nigh:
“Whence comes the vessel? whither is she bound?”
Then for Old England's welfare they inquire;—

Eager alike for question and reply,
With open lips and ears attending round;—
What news of war, and plague, and plots, and fire?
Till satisfied of these, with cheerful care
The board and bowl they hasten to prepare;
Each active in his way,
Glad of some lawful business, that may break
The tedium of an idle Sabbath-day.

But, from the stir of that loquacious crew,
Oliver meantime apart from all withdrew.
Beyond the bare and sapless pines, which stood
Half-overwhelm'd with sand,
He pass'd, and entering in the wood,
Indulged his burthen'd heart in solitude.
“Thou Earth! receive me, from my native land
An unoffending exile! Hear my claim!
In search of wealth I have not sought thy shore,
Nor covetous of fame,
Nor treading in the ambitious steps of power;
But hiding from the world a hapless name,
And sacrificing all
At holiest duty's call,
Thou barbarous Land, of thee I only crave—
For those I love—concealment and a grave.”

Thus he relieved his breast; yet did not dare
Allow himself full utterance, even there:
To part he gave a voice; and then, in fear,
Shaped with his lips, inaudibly, the rest:
With that the very air
Might not be trusted; and he look'd around,

Alarm'd, lest human ear
Had caught the unfinish'd sound.
Some tears stole down his cheek, now not repress'd,
And, kneeling on the earth, he kiss'd the ground.

Unbidden thoughts then took their course, and drew
The future and the past before his view:
The haunts, the friendships, and the hopes of youth—
All, all forsaken;—no dear voice,
Ever again to bid his heart rejoice!
Familiar scenes and faces
Only in dreams should he behold again;
But, in their places,
The wilderness, wild beasts, and savage men!

Soon from that poignant thought
His soul upon the wings of hope took flight;
And strong imagination brought
Visions of joy before his inward sight.
Of regions yet by Englishmen unsought,
And ancient woods, was that delightful dream,—
The broad savannah, and the silver stream.
Fair bowers were there, and gardens smiled,
And harvests flourish'd in the wild;
And, while he made Redeeming Love his theme,—
Savage no longer now—
The Indians stood around,
And drank salvation with the sound.
One Christian grave was there,
Turf'd well, and weeded by his pious care,
And redolent of many a fragrant flower
And herb profusely planted all about.

Within his bower
An old man sate, in patience and in peace,
While the low sands of life ran out,
Awaiting his release.
That old man laid his hand upon his head,
And blest him daily, when the day was done;
And Heaven was open to him, and he saw
His mother's spirit smile, and bless her son.

Thus to the voluntary dream resign'd
He lay, while blended sounds of air and sea
Lull'd his unconscious mind
With their wild symphony.
The wind was in the pines, awakening there
A sea-like sound continuous, and a swell
At fitful intervals, that mingled well
With ocean's louder roar,
When the long curling waves,
Reach after reach in regular rising, fell
Upon the sandy shore.
Long might he there have lain, but that, in tones
Which seem'd of haste to tell,
Once, twice, and thrice pronounced he heard his name:
Too sweetly to his ears the accents came,
Breathed from the gentle lips of Annabel.

With hurried pace she comes, and flush'd in face,
And with a look, half-pity, half-affright,
Which, while she spake, enlarged her timid eyes:
“O, sir! I have seen a piteous sight!”
The shuddering maiden cries;
“A poor wild woman. Woe is me! among

What worse than heathen people are we thrown?
Beasts, in our England, are not treated thus,—
Our very stones would rise
Against such cruelties!
But you, perhaps, can reach the stony heart,—
Oh come, then, and perform your Christian part.”

She led him hastily toward a shed,
Where, fetter'd to the door-post, on the ground
An Indian woman sate. Her hands were bound,
Her shoulders and her back were waled and scored
With recent stripes. A boy stood by,
Some seven years old, who with a piteous eye
Beheld his suffering mother, and deplored
Her injuries with a cry,
Deep, but not loud,—an utterance that express'd
The mingled feelings swelling in his breast,—
Instinctive love intense, the burning sense
Of wrong, intolerable grief of heart,
And rage, to think his arm could not fulfil
The pious vengeance of his passionate will.
His sister by the door
Lay basking in the sun: too young was she
To feel the burthen of their misery;
Reckless of all that pass'd, her little hand
Play'd idly with the soft and glittering sand.

At this abhorred sight,
Had there been place for aught
But pity, half-relieved by indignation,
They would have seen that Indian woman's face
Not with surprise alone, but admiration:

With such severe composure, such an air
Of stern endurance, did she bear
Her lot of absolute despair.
You rather might have deem'd,
So fix'd and hard the strong bronze features seem'd,
That they were of some molten statue part,
Than the live sentient index of a heart
Suffering and struggling with extremest wrong:
But that the coarse jet hair upon her back
Hung loose, and lank, and long,
And that sometimes she moved her large black eye,
And look'd upon the boy who there stood weeping by.

Oliver in vain attempted to assuage,
With gentle tones and looks compassionate,
The bitterness of that young Indian's rage.
The boy drew back abhorrent from his hand,
Eyed him with fierce disdain, and breathed
In inarticulate sounds his deadly hate.
Not so the mother; she could understand
His thoughtful pity, and the tears which fell
Copiously down the cheeks of Annabel.
Touch'd by that unaccustom'd sympathy
Her countenance relax'd: she moved her head
As if to thank them both;
Then frowning, as she raised her mournful eye,—
“Bad Christian-man! bad English-man!” she said:
And Oliver a sudden sense of shame
Felt for the English and the Christian name.

IV. THE CAPTIVES RANSOMED.

OLIVER.
I pray you, sir, who owns the Indian woman
That is chain'd in yonder hut?

CAPE'S-MAN.
What you have seen them,
The she-wolf and her whelps?

OLIVER.
She hath indeed
A strange wild aspect, and the boy appears
Of a fierce nature. I should think her owner
Would find her an unprofitable slave.

CAPE'S-MAN.
Why, sir, you reckon rightly; and, methinks,
Without a conjuror's skill you well may think so:
Those fetters, and the marks upon her skin,
Speak her deserts. On week-days with the whip
We keep her tightly to her work; but thus
Her Sabbath must be spent, or she would put

The wilderness between her and her owner.
An honest dealer never paid good money
For a worse piece: and for that boy of hers,
He is a true-bred savage, blood and bone,
To the marrow and heart's core.

RANDOLPH.
I warrant him!
No mother like your squaw to train a child
In the way she would have him go; she makes him subtler
Than the sly snake, untameable as bear
Or buffalo, fierce as a famish'd wolf,
And crueller than French judges, Spanish friars,
Or Dutchmen in the East. His earliest plaything
Is a green scalp, and then, for lollipop,
The toasted finger of an Englishman!
Young as he is, I dare be sworn he knows
Where is the liveliest part to stick a skewer
Into a prisoner's flesh, and where to scoop
The tenderest mouthful. If the Devil himself
Would learn devices to afflict the damn'd
With sharper torments, he might go to school
To a New England savage.

CAPE'S-MAN.
I perceive, sir,
You know them well. Perhaps you may have heard
Of this young deviling's father;—he was noted
For a most bloody savage in his day:
They called him Kawnacom.

RANDOLPH.
What! Kawnacom,
The Narhaganset Sagamore?

CAPE'S-MAN.
The same;
A sort of captain, or of prince, among them.

RANDOLPH.
A most notorious villain! But I left him
At peace with the English?

CAPE'S-MAN.
And you find him so,—
Under the only bail he would not break;
A bullet through the heart is surety for him.
You have not learnt, I guess, what dreadful work
There is in the back country?—Families
Burnt in their houses; stragglers tomahawk'd
And scalp'd, or dragg'd away that they may die
By piecemeal murder, to make mockery
For these incarnate devils at the stake.
Farms are forsaken; towns are insecure;
Men sleep with one eye open, and the gun
By their bed-side. And, what is worst, they know not
How far the league extends, nor whom to trust
Among these treacherous tribes. Old people say
That things were not so bad in the Pequod war.

RANDOLPH.
What then, have we been idle?

CAPE'S-MAN.
Hitherto
But little has been done. The evil found us
Lapp'd in security, and unprepared:
Nor know we where to strike, nor whom, so darkly
The mischief hath been laid.

RANDOLPH.
Strike where we will,
So we strike hard, we cannot err. The blow
That rids us of an Indian does good service.

OLIVER.
That were a better service which should win
The savage to your friendship.

CAPE'S-MAN.
You are young, sir,
And, I perceive, a stranger in the land;
Or you would know how bootless is the attempt
To tame and civilise these enemies,
Man-beasts, or man-fiends,—call them which you will,—
Their monstrous nature being half brute, half devil,
Nothing about them human but their form.

He, who expends his kindness on a savage
Thinking to win his friendship, might as wisely
Plant thorns and hope to gather grapes at vintage.

OLIVER.
Look but to Martha's vineyard, and behold
On your own shores the impossibility
Achieved—the standing miracle display'd
In public view, apparent to all eyes,
And famous through all countries wheresoe'er
The Gospel truth is known! Many are the hearts
In distant England which have overflow'd
With pious joy to read of Hiacoomes,
Whose prayerful house the pestilence past by;
And blind Wawompek,—he, within whose doors
The glad thanksgiving strain of choral praise
Fails not, at morn and eve, from year to year;
And the Sachem, who rejoiced because the time
Of light was come, and now his countrymen,
Erring and lost, no longer should go down
In ignorance and darkness to the grave;
And poor old Lazarus, that rich poor man,
The child of poverty, but rich in faith
And his assured inheritance in heaven.

RANDOLPH.
Young sir, it is with stories as with men;
That credit oftentimes they gain abroad,
Which, either for misluck or misdesert,
They fail to find at home.

OLIVER.
Are these things false, then?
Is there no truth in Mayhew's life of love?
Hath not the impatient Welshman's zeal, that blazed
Even like a burning and consuming fire,
Refined itself into a steady light
Among the Indians?—and the name of Williams,
The signal once for strife where'er he went,
Become a passport and a word of peace
Through savage nations? Or is this a tale
Set forth to mock our weak credulity;
And all that holy Eliot hath perform'd
Only a fable cunningly devised?

CAPE'S-MAN.
He comes out qualified to lecture us
Upon our own affairs!

RANDOLPH.
The things you talk of
Serve but with us to comfort our old women,
Furnish an elder with some choice discourse
For a dull synod, and sometimes help out
Sir Spintext at a pinch, when he would think it
A sin did he dismiss his hungry flock
Before the second glass be fairly spent.
Much have you read, and have believed as largely;
And yet one week's abode in the colony
Will teach you more than all your English reading.

OLIVER.
Sir, I am easy of belief, for that way
My temper leads me,—liable to err;
And yet, I hope, not obstinate in error;
But ready still to thank the riper judgment
That may correct my inexperienced years.
You paint the Indians to the life, I doubt not:
Children of sin, and therefore heirs of wrath,
The likeness of their Heavenly Sire in them
Seems utterly defaced; and in its stead,
Almost, it might be thought, the Evil Power
Had set his stamp and image. This should move us
The more to deep compassion; men ourselves,
In whom the accident of birth alone
Makes all this awful difference! And remembering,
That from our common parent we derive
Our nature's common malady innate,
For which our common Saviour offers us
The only cure,—oh! ought we not to feel
How good and merciful a deed it were
To bring these poor lost sheep within his fold!

RANDOLPH.
Sheep call you them, forsooth! When you can gather
Bears, wolves, and tigers in a fold, hope then
To tame such sheep as these.

OLIVER.
What is there, sir,
That may not by assiduous care be won
To do our will? Give me a lion's cub,
Torn from the teat, and I will so train up
The noble beast, that he shall fondle me,
And lay his placid head upon my knees,
And lick my hand, and couch my bed-side,
And guard me with a dog's fidelity.

RANDOLPH.
Behold a litter ready to your wish!
Our friend, if I mistake not, will afford
An easy purchase, dam and cubs. What say you,
My lion-tamer?

CAPE'S-MAN.
You shall have them cheap, sir!
A bargain that may tempt you; come, for half
That they would fetch in the Barbadoes market.
I meant to ship them thither, but would rather
Sell at a loss than keep that woman longer.

Thus had the jeer grown serious, and it drew
Into the young man's cheek a deeper hue.
Moments there are in life,—alas, how few!—
When, casting cold prudential doubts aside,
We take a generous impulse for our guide,
And, following promptly what the heart thinks best,
Commit to Providence the rest,

Sure that no after-reckoning will arise,
Of shame, or sorrow, for the heart is wise.
And happy they who thus in faith obey
Their better nature: err sometimes they may,
And some sad thoughts lie heavy in the breast,
Such as by hope deceived are left behind;
But, like a shadow, these will pass away
From the pure sunshine of the peaceful mind.

Thus feeling, Oliver obey'd
His uncorrupted heart; nor paused, nor weigh'd
What hindrance, what displeasure might ensue;
But from his little store of worldly wealth,
Poor as it was, the ready ransom drew.
Half-earnest, half-sarcastic, Randolph now
Sought him from that rash purpose to dissuade;
While the hard Cape's-man, nothing nice,
Counted the money, glad to get his price.

V. THE PORTRAIT.

At length the adverse gales have ceased;
The breath of morn is from the east,
Where, burnishing with gold the restless sea,
Uprose the sun in radiant majesty.
Unfelt that breath upon the seas,
Unheard amid the silent trees,
It breathes so quietly:
Yet have the seamen, on their way intent,
Perceived the auspicious sign. The sails are bent,
The anchor raised; the swelling canvas now
Fills with the fresh'ning breeze; the Cape recedes,
Its sandhills and its pines
In distance fade away.
Steady she holds her course; and still the day
Is young, when lo! the haven is in sight;
And ere from his meridian height the sun
Declines, within that haven's gentle breast,
From the long labours of her weary way,
The vessel comes to rest.

Scatter'd within the peaceful bay
Many a fair isle and islet lay,
And rocks and banks which threaten'd there

No peril to the mariner.
The shores which bent around were gay
With maizals, and with pastures green,
And rails and hedge-row trees between,
And fields for harvest white,
And dwellings sprinkled up and down;
And round about the cluster'd town,
Which rose in sunshine bright,
Was many a shelter'd garden spot,
And many a sunny orchard plot,
And bowers which might invite
The studious man to take his seat
Within their quiet, cool retreat,
When noon was at its height.
No heart that was at ease, I ween,
Could gaze on that surrounding scene
Without a calm delight.

Behold upon the quay a press
Of business and of idleness,
Where these new-comers land.
Kinsfolk with anxious questions meet;
And friends and light acquaintance greet
With jocund shake of hand:
The idlers ask the crew of what
Upon their way befell;
And all, and more than all they know,
The wondering sailors tell.
From tongue to tongue the tidings ran;
The lady's death,—the strange young man;
His moody ways, his gift of prayer,
The maid committed to his care,

His destined bride they nothing doubting deem'd;
And how, by sudden fit of pity moved,
From slavery he redeem'd
The children and the wife of Kawnacom,
(An act that all admired, but none approved,)
And to their savage tribe, they fear'd,
Reckless of counsel, would conduct them home.
All marvell'd at the tale; the many jeer'd:
“Mad as the Quakers!” some exclaim'd; and some
Pray'd that his rash and unenlighten'd will
Might cause no after-troubles in a state
Pester'd with errors and new fancies still.
Some shook their heads; the more compassionate
Observed, that where so kind a heart was found,
Pity it was the wits should not be sound.

“It is a madness which the world will cure,”
Leverett, the Governor, said, “too soon, be sure.”
Randolph had risen to leave him, when the youth
Enter'd the Governor's door. “Come, let me play,”
Quoth he, “the usher!” in his wonted way,
Mingling with sportive speech sarcastic truth.
“Your Excellency here beholds the Man!
The Quaker-Church of England-Puritan,
Knight-errant, preacher, and we know not what,
So many things he is, and he is not;
A hero, certes, if he would but fight;
A Solomon, if his notions were but right.
Should he into a lion's den be thrown,—
Look at those arms and eyes, and you might swear
That he would act the London 'Prentice there;
But trusting to the mind, forsooth, alone

He'd take the cubs, like lambkins, to his breast,
And, Daniel-like, by faith subdue the rest.
Then for the harder task of savage-quelling
He hath a talent which exceeds all telling.
Two full-bred devilings he has taught to greet him,
And kiss as lovingly as they would eat him;
And he hath bought their mother squaw, to teach
That pleasant lingo the six-nation speech;
Words, which would choke a Dutchman or a Jew,
Dumbfound old Nick, and which from me or you
Could not be forced by ipecacuanha,
Drop from his oratoric lips like manna.
So fine withal his temper proves, that it
Hath borne unhurt the file of my rough wit;
This to his honour I am bound to tell;
Would that he took true counsel half as well!
And now, sir, as your favour may befriend him,
To that in right good earnest I commend him!”

“A man of caustic speech!” the Governor said,
Following him with his eye, as forth he went:
“Yet hath this humour no unkind intent;
His commendation, sir, shall have its weight,
The rest we take as it is meant.”

The youth
To that urbane accoil, with grateful eye,
And gentle motion of the bending head,
Return'd a mute reply.
There was a troubled meaning in his look,
And o'er his brow an ashy paleness spread,
As forth he took
A little casket, and, with trembling hand

Presenting it to Leverett, said:
“Thus I discharge my mother's last command;
On her death-bed she told me I should need
No other friend with you in my behalf to plead.”

The Governor's countenance changed, as he received
That message from the dead;
And when he open'd and contemplated
The sad bequest,
Tears fill'd his eyes, which could not be represt.
It was a woman's picture, in her youth
And bloom portray'd, by Cooper's perfect skill.
The eyes, which death had quench'd,
Kept there their life and living lustre still;
The auburn locks, which sorrow's withering hand,
Forestalling time, had changed to early grey,
Disparting from the ivory forehead, fell
In ringlets which might tempt the breath of May;
The lips, now cold as clay,
Seem'd to breathe warmth and vernal fragrance there;
The cheeks were in their maiden freshness fair.
Thus had the limner's art divine preserved
A beauty which from earth had pass'd away;
And it had caught the mind which gave that face
Its surest charm, its own peculiar grace.
A modest mien,
A meek, submissive gentleness serene,
A heart on duty stay'd,
Simple, sincere, affectionate, sedate,
Were in that virgin countenance portray'd:

She was an angel now; and yet,
More beautiful than this fair counterfeit,
Even in heaven, her spirit scarce could be,
Nor seem from stain of ill, and evil thoughts, more free.
Time was, when Leverett had worn
That picture like a relic in his breast;
And duly, morn and night,
With Love's idolatry
Fix'd on its beauties his adoring sight,
And to his lips the precious crystal prest.
Time was, when, in the visions of his rest,
That image of delight
Came with sweet smiles, and musical voice, to bless
His sleep, and all his dreams were happiness.
And still, though course of time, and fatal force
Of circumstance, grave thoughts, and worldly cares
(Ah! how unlike the blissful hopes of youth,
From which it had been worse than death to part!)
Had fortified as well as heal'd his heart,
That vision, in her beauty and her truth,
Sometimes would visit him; and he,
With a confused but conscious faculty,
Knowing full well
That this, which seem'd, too surely could not be,
Struggled against the spell.
Unchanged and unimpair'd by thirty years,
Her image came, but only to distress
The heart she wont to bless,
Till from the painful unreality
He woke, disturb'd in spirit, and in tears.

But he was master of his waking soul,
And could control
All unbecoming passion, and all feeling
That needs repressing or concealing.
Howbeit he sought not to restrain
His deep emotion now, nor turn'd aside
His natural tears to hide, which freely fell;
But wiping them away a moment, eyed
Oliver's pale countenance and anxious brow,
Perusing there his mother's lineaments:
Then took his hand, and said, “Thou need'st not tell
Thy hapless name and perilous secret now,
I know them but too well.”

VI. FUTURE PROSPECTS.

LEVERETT.
Why hast thou ventured hither? With what hope
Or end hath natural piety betray'd thee
To this forlorn attempt? If to escape
Had offer'd chance enough to tempt despair,
The desperate effort had ere this been tried.
Besure, it hath been meditated oft,
And bravely; and, had life been all the stake,
Life had been cheaply set upon the die,
To lose it being gain.

OLIVER.
They must forego,
The dear desire of e'er revisiting
Their native land,—and in my mother's grave
That hope, I ween, will now be laid at rest:
Nor could they safely seek a resting-place
In Europe, even if we reach'd a ship,
And left these shores behind us. Oft and well
Have I perpended this, devising ways
For flight, and schemes of plausible disguise,
Such thoughts in disappointment ending alway;
Till having offer'd up in fervent faith
A disciplined and humbled heart to Heaven,

A better hope arose. The wilderness
Is open to us! Thither will we go,
Far in the wilds, where foot of Englishman
Hath never trod. The equal elements
Will not deny our portion: Mother Earth
In unappropriated freedom, there
Holds forth her liberal lap; her springs, her fruits,
Her creatures of the land and air and stream,
To her free children freely offering.
Hid from the world, a double duty there
May I perform, to God and man discharged,
Serving my human and my Heavenly Sire;
There, treading in your saintly Eliot's path,
Guide the poor Indian in the way to Heaven!
And, in the foretaste of its joys assured,
Receive mine own exceeding great reward.

LEVERETT.
Oh pitiable lot
Of poor humanity,
When virtue thus can wrong the heroic heart,
And blind the noble intellect! Thou dreamest
Of peopling some Arcadian solitude
With human angels,—ignorant, alas!
Of time, place, circumstance, and men, and things,—
The Indians, and thy father, and thyself!

OLIVER.
Myself at least I know, prepared to act
Or suffer, with a soul for all events
Resign'd.

LEVERETT.
To suffer, rightly thou may'st say;
Easily we screw our courage to that point,
The issue being remote, and hope and chance
Between us and the event.
But how prepared to act? Ere thou couldst hold
With these Red tribes the commonest discourse
Of needful things and every-day concerns,
Years of laborious pupilage must pass,
Unless the cloven flame upon thy head
Should light, and loose thy speech by miracle.
But wherefore with the show of difficulties
Should I dissuade thee from an enterprise
Impossible to attempt?

OLIVER.
A Poet, sir,
In whose dark sayings deeper wisdom lies
Than ancient oracles enounced, or statesmen
Appear to reach in these ignoble times,
Hath taught me to believe, “impossible
Is but the faith of fear.”

LEVERETT.
Are poets, then,
Thy teachers? O, young man, their flattering lore
But ill prepares the spirit for the uses
Of ordinary life!

OLIVER.
They best prepare it,
Who warn the heart against its own illusions;
And, strengthening it with patient hope and faith,
Arm it against all issues. To such teachers
My inexperienced youth by Providence
Was mercifully led. Penn hath allow'd me
To call him friend, in no sectarian use
Of words; and I have sate at Milton's feet
A reverential listener.

LEVERETT.
Milton's friendship
Will neither hurt nor help thee in a land,
Where they, who stiffliest hold his errors, lift not
Their thoughts above the earth to follow him,
When his strong spirit mounts upon the wing,
Beyond their grovelling vision. But well is it
Thou hast not from Penn's dangerous fellowship
Learnt his sectarian speech, and other follies
Wherewith that formal informality
Provokes the law. New England writes her statutes
In blood against the Quakers. Thou hast 'scaped
Their clownish and uncivil usages;
But if there be an inner taint, take heed
To keep it hidden: openly I must not
Allow the violation of our laws.

OLIVER.
Oh we have trespass'd largely on your goodness;
Generous beyond example, as thou art,

Too largely have we tax'd it; and the cause,
The dreadful cause alone, can palliate
Conduct like ours towards thee. Not for worlds
Would I do aught that might displeasure thee,
Best earthly friend! whom my dear mother never
Named without tears, and holiest gratitude,
Such as will surely bring upon thy head
The blessing that it pray'd for. I come here,
Not wilfully and madly to provoke
Intolerant laws, nor farther to presume
Upon thy noble nature; but to thank thee,
In her dear name, for all which thou hast done;
To tell thee, as she charged me, that in death
She bless'd thee for thy goodness; and, performing
Her latest wish and will, to take the burthen
Of our unhappy fortunes on myself.

LEVERETT.
Her latest wish and will!

OLIVER.
It was a thought
Which added to her griefs, that you should stand
In jeopardy for us; howbeit, she said,
She hoped and felt and trusted that you knew
Her inmost mind, and Heaven would recompense
A true affection, too severely tried.

LEVERETT.
Thus it was ever with her gentle heart,
By some strange fortune fated still to prove

That in her strength alone the root
Of her sole weakness lay.
Poor heart! a victim always at the call
Of fancied duty; only then unjust,
Only then obstinate, when offering up
Itself a bleeding sacrifice! I know,
And understand, in what devoted mood
Her acquiescence to thy dreams was given
Such as aspiring saints desire, and martyrs
Reach in their triumph, when they clasp the stake.

OLIVER.
'Twas in no height of feverish exaltation,
In no delusion of the heated mind,
That her consent was given: but mutually
Our hearts received, as I believe, from Heaven
The impulse. By the test of prayer we tried,
And in the balance of the sanctuary
Weighed it; and having taken our resolve,
Partook that inward peace, wherewith the Spirit
Doth set the seal to its authentic acts.
Shake not thy head thus mournfully, nor thus
In disapproval knit the incredulous brow!
The purpose, which at first was entertain'd
With doubtfulness and fear, increased in strength,
While long infirmity and wasting pain
Consumed her mortal mould; and at that hour,
When it is no illusion to believe
That the departing soul hath sight of heaven
Opening before its happy flight, and feels
The expansion of diviner faculties

Than this gross earth unfolds, her looks and tokens
Confirm'd the injunction of her latest voice,
And bless'd, and for obedience strengthen'd me,
Betide what may.

LEVERETT.
For me, then, it remains
Only to show what obstacles impede
The perilous course from which I must not farther
Essay to turn thee. Thou, who art not less
In mind than lineaments thy mother's image,
Judge for thyself if they be superable.
Thy grandsire lives, indeed,—if it be life,
When the poor flesh, surviving, doth entomb
The reasonable soul defunct. Below
The reach of grief and danger he hath sunk.
The tale of his dear daughter's death to him
Will be like baptism to a chrysome babe,
Something that means he knows and recks not what.
Safely in court might he hold up the hand,
Now trembling and unconscious, which subscribed
The fatal warrant: even the sword of law
Would, in his pitiable estate, acknowledge
The visitation of a higher Power,
And turn away its edge. But as thou canst not,
Encumber'd with a twichild man, pursue
Thy purpose, it must of necessity
Be laid aside, at least till death remove
The impediment, not else removeable.

OLIVER.
So be it. We must patiently await
The hour of his release. With time and death
Sure reckoning may be made.

LEVERETT.
That hour in truth
Cannot be long delay'd. But what shall make
Thy father to thy dreams defer his own?
If in his corporal uses man becomes
The slave of habit, stronger are the chains
In which the mind is bound, a willing thrall.

OLIVER.
I understand you not!

LEVERETT.
You do not know
Your father.

OLIVER.
Only by report, alas!
As England in his years of fortune knew him;
Religious, faithful, excellently skill'd
In war, and in his single person brave
To all men's admiration.

LEVERETT.
Yet I think
Enthusiast as thou art, thou needest not

Learn with how much alloy the richest vein
Of virtues is too often found combined.
'Tis the condition of humanity,
Frail and infirm at best; and they who boast
Sinless perfection for their privilege,
By the proud folly of the claim, confute
Their own insane pretension.

OLIVER.
Surely, sir,
My father had not in the school of Christ
So poorly profited, nor lived so long
A stranger to himself and his own heart,
That he should hold this error.

LEVERETT.
Glad I am
Thou seest it erroneous. Other notions
He holds too near akin to it, the breed
Of those pestiferous and portentous times
Wherein his lot had fallen. Even yet he thinks
The kingdom of the saints shall be in strength
Establish'd; finds in whatsoe'er occurs
The accomplishment of some dark prophecy;
Interprets, and expounds, and calculates
That soon he shall be call'd to bear his part
In setting up again the broken work
Left incomplete by chosen Oliver.
Thus he in one continuous dream of hope
Beguiles the tedious years.

OLIVER.
Herein I see not
What should impede my purpose. In the forest,
The sense of freedom and security,
Healing a wounded spirit, may restore
To health his mind diseased.

LEVERETT.
But if the patient
Reject the means of cure? He will not leave
A place of refuge which the Lord prepared
For him in his distress; and where full surely
He trusts the call will reach him, to come forth
And fight the battles of the good old cause,
For which he doth endure contentedly
This living martyrdom. Thy father thus
Would answer thee; the malady is rooted
In him so deeply now. It is become
Essential in his being: long success,
Beyond the most audacious of his thoughts,
Fed and inflamed it first; long suffering since
Hath as it were annealed it in his soul
With stubborn fortitude, bewilder'd faith,
Love, hatred, indignation, all strong passions,
The bitterest feelings, and the tenderest thoughts,
Yea, all his earthly, all his heavenly hopes.
And Russel—for such sympathy alone
Could influence him to harbour long such guests—
Fosters the old delusion which he shares,
And ministers to it, even in his prayers.

OLIVER.
My father will not be persuaded then,
You think?

LEVERETT.
I know he will not. There are minds,
The course of which, as of some slow disease,
Known by its fatal frequency too well,
We see with helpless foresight, hopelessly.
But, if he listen'd to thy moving words,
What would it now avail? The wilderness
Affords no shelter while the Indians,
Fiercer than beasts, and wilier, are in arms.

OLIVER.
I have a passport for the wilderness
Safer than statesmen could accord, or states
Enforce with all their strength. The Indian woman,
Of whom Sir Randolph in his mockery told thee:
She and her children will be my protection
Among the wildest tribes.

LEVERETT.
And was this thought, then,
Thy motive for the act?

OLIVER.
I will not say
It had so much of forethought: but the ways
Of Providence open before me now.

The impulse, which appear'd like foolishness
To worldly censure, and which tremblingly
I follow'd, for this issue was design'd:
Oh doubt it not! And had I disobey'd
The inward and unerring monitor
That hour, infirm of faith, how had I then
Disherited myself of this fair hope!

LEVERETT.
A Narhaganset woman, is she not?
The widow of a Sagamore, who fell
In the outbreak of these troubles?

OLIVER.
So they told me;
A noted savage, Kawnacom his name.

LEVERETT.
Something, methinks, I see in this, wherein
Our purposes may square, and my straight path
Of policy with thy eccentric course
Fall in and meet at the end. But, understand me,
Rather would I for thine own sake dissuade thee,
And for the sake of that dear Saint in heaven,
From an adventure of remotest hope
And imminent peril: but if thy resolve
Be obstinate against all reason, blameless
Then may I, both in her sight and in thine,
Betide the issue how it will, promote
The purpose which in vain I disapprove.
One trust we have; all-able Providence

Will overrule our ways, and haply too,
Knowing the upright intention, rectify
Our erring judgments. Let the matter sleep
Till I have taken counsel with my pillow
And this night's waking thoughts. See me tomorrow
As early as you will, before the stir
Of business hath begun: and now farewell.

VII. THE INDIAN WAR.

With many an anxious thought opprest,
From busy sleep more wearying than unrest,
Hath Oliver arisen;
And from his bed of feverish care,
Glad to respire the cool fresh morning air,
Gone forth as from a prison.
The wakeful Governor received his guest;
And ere the morning board was placed,
They to and fro the garden paced
In earnest talk, while Leverett told
How mutual injuries of old,
And mutual fears, the envenom'd will,
Suspicions still conceal'd but festering still,
And policy that shrunk from nothing ill,
(Savage or civilised — oh shame
To man's perverted power !— in this the same,)
Youth's fiery courage, and eld's rooted hate,
Had brought the danger on, which now assail'd the state.

The times were fearful; wheresoe'er around
Among the Indian tribes he turn'd his view,
False friends, or open enemies, were found.
How wide their league he rather fear'd than knew.

But this was understood,
That feuds deliver'd down for many an age,
From sire to son in sacred heritage,
Wherewith their very nature seem'd imbued,
Had been with dread solemnities foresworn
And secret rites accurst, in fell intent
That they should root the English from the land,
And the last white man's blood
Be of their bond the seal and sacrament.

In truth they were a formidable foe;
Compared with ours, their numbers made them so;
Crafty, deceitful, murderous, merciless:
Yet with heroic qualities endued:
Contempt of death, surpassing fortitude,
Patience through all privations, self-control
Even such as saints and sages scarce attain,
And a sustain'd serenity of soul,
Which Fortune might assault or tempt in vain,
Not to be moved by pleasure or by pain.

OLIVER.
Alas to think they have not long ere this
Been link'd with you in Christian fellowship!

LEVERETT.
Look at divided Christendom!—at England;
Her wounds, inflicted by sectarian rage,
Open and festering,—never to be heal'd!
Look at thy father's house; a threefold cord
Of brotherhood trebly disparted there;

Then tell me, where may Christian fellowship
In this wide world be found? Alas, my friend,
I see it only in the Promised Land.
From Pisgah's summit, through the glass of Faith,
Far in the regions of futurity.
Yet something we have done, which—though I own it
Far short of what true policy requires,
And in the scale of national duty weighing
Lighter than dust—may show we are not wholly
The slaves of Mammon. Fretted as we have been
By schisms, by rampant heresies disturb'd,
And by that spiritual pride possess'd, whose touch,
With influence lethal as an aspic's tooth,
Numbs the life-blood of charity, this England
Hath sons, whose names, if there be any praise,
Shall have their place with saints of primitive times
Enroll'd, true heroes of humanity.

OLIVER.
Oh doubt not that their virtue and their prayers
Will in this time of trial speed you more
Than all your carnal strength!

LEVERETT.
That faith might better
Beseem thine uncle of the seminary,
The Oratorian, than thy father's son.
A monk may put his trust in beads and sackcloth;
But Oliver's saints wore buff, and their right hands

Wrought for themselves the miracles they ask'd for.
Think not, young man, that I disparage prayer,
Because I hold that he, who calls on Heaven
For help against his temporal enemies,
Then with most cause and surest hope prefers
His supplication, when he best exerts
The prudence and the strength which God hath given him.

OLIVER.
There is a strength in patience which exceedeth
All other power; a prudence in the Gospel
Passing, as needs it must, all human wisdom.
That Gospel teaches passiveness and peace.

LEVERETT.

Patience he needs, Heaven knows! who hath to deal
With one enamour'd of a young opinion,
And like a giddy amorist pursuing
The passionate folly, reckless where it leads him.
Remember that you come not here to teach:
Remember too, that something like respect
Is due to years, and something to experience;
Some deference to our station; some attention—
And this at least will be allow'd—to one
Who at all hazards has approved himself
Thy mother's friend, and would no less be thine.

Abash'd at that reproof severe
Stood Oliver, unable to abate

The rising glow of shame that fired his cheek,
Or check the starting tear.
But then the Governor's eye compassionate
Even in reproof,—the pause he interposed,—
The low relenting tone wherein he closed
His stern though fit authoritive strain,
Temper'd the needful pain.

“O best and kindest friend,
O friend revered, I feel and own,
Whether I spake in error or in truth,
That thy rebuke is just,” replied the youth:
“Forgive me! and no more will I offend;
But listen, and in all things, that I may,
Humbly and zealously obey.”

LEVERETT.

Hear then, and patiently, while I instruct thee
Of things as yet unchronicled in books,
But bearing on this crisis, and the knowledge
Whereof in thine adventure will be found
Specially needful. When the English laid
The poor foundations of our colony,
(For poor indeed they seem'd; and yet I ween
In happy hour a corner stone was placed
That ne'er shall be removed!) they found the land
Contested sometimes, and sometimes possess'd
In captious peace, between three powerful nations,
Or rather families of tribes. Omitting
The minor distributions (which are many
And barbarous all), suffice it to name these

In the order of their strength: the Pequods first;
The Narhagansets, unto whom belong
Thy ransom'd captives; lastly, the Moheagans,
Who occupied the immediate territory
Whereon our sad adventurers set foot.
With Massasoyt, chief Sachem of the latter,
A league was made, of mutual benefit;
For, under Providence, his only friendship,
In the first hardships of the settlement,
Saved them alive; and their alliance proved
A shield against his enemies. This being
The end to which he look'd, who was a man
Advanced in years, far-sighted, honourable
And of a spirit, which, if he had sway'd
An European sceptre, might have blest
The people over whom its rule extended,
The league was faithfully on both sides observed;
And ere his death the old man solemnly
Renew'd it for his sons, who for themselves
In their own persons ratified the engagement.

But men and times were changed, when the elder youth
Succeeded to his sire; for the Colonists,
Now well acquainted with these Indian neighbours,
Loath'd their unseemly usages, abhorr'd
Their most incredible cruelty, despised
Their easy ignorance,—and practised on it.
I seek not to conceal our own offences:
Compared with other nations,—even with England,
Such as corrupted England long hath been,—
We are a sober, yea, a righteous people:

But Trade, which in the mother-land is one
Of many wheels, bearing a part alone,
And that too but subordinate, in the movements
Of a complicate and wonderful machine,
Is in our simple order the main-spring
That governs all. And where Trade rules, alas!
Whatever name be worshipp'd in the temples,
Mammon receives the heart's idolatry,
And is the god of the land.

Our Indian friends
Too soon had reason to abate their friendship;
And politic interests, which had held them to us,
Were loosen'd, when they saw their ancient foes,
The dreaded Pequods, by our arms pursued
In vigorous war, and rooted from the land,
Till the name alone remain'd, with none to own it.
This Alexander, so the youth was called,
Finding that check removed, and being also
By his father's death set free from all control,
Plotted against the English, in resentment
Partly, no doubt, because strict pains in teaching
(Less wise than well-intended) had been spent
On his indocile and unwilling spirit;
But having injuries also to provoke
A haughty courage. Ere his schemes were ripe
He was, on sure intelligence, arrested;
And disappointed malice, joined with anger,
Raising a fever in his heart and brain,
Deliver'd him from our restraint by death.
He left a brother, who inherited

His rights and wrongs,—that Philip who is now
The scourge and terror of the colony.

Think not that these were names imposed in baptism:
Upon that point the heart of Massasoyt
Was harden'd; and his sons, like him, regarded
With mingled hatred and contempt a faith
They fail'd to understand. But it is held
A mark of honour to bestow, a pledge
Of friendship to receive, new appellations;
Which here too, among savages, import
Something of peerage, of deserved esteem,
Or of imputed worth, the commonalty
(Strange as such custom may appear) being nameless.
My predecessor, with too true presage,
Fix'd on these names, less for the Christian sound
Which use hath given them, than because he saw
In the one youth an enterprising temper,
Ambitious of command; and in the other,
More to be fear'd, a deep dissembling spirit,
Which, if the time required, could brook its wrongs,
And in all outward patience chew the while
The cud of bitter thoughts. He being yet young,
The station, which his sire had fill'd, devolved
Upon a chief, who was alike approved
In council and in war; the right remaining
For Philip to succeed in course of years,
If years should validate the acknowledged claim
Of birthright; for that claim, among the Indians,
Is held defeasible by ill-desert.

During this lapse of time, old rivalries
Revived between the two remaining tribes;
Whom ere the Pequods' power was crush'd, the sense
Of danger from that common enemy
Restrain'd in peace. Not to prolong my tale
With details not required for thy instruction,
The sum was this, that, as by treaty pledged
And justice bound, (for the right cause was theirs,
And interest also led us to uphold
The weaker side,) we aided the Moheagans,
Our first allies; and, when they took in battle
The hostile leader Miantonnimo,
He suffer'd death, by our advice and sanction;
Being however, at our instance, spared
From all those customary cruelties,
Which make the Indians odious in the sight
Of God and man. Seem I to speak severely,
Beyond what truth or Christian charity
May warrant? Soon, my friend, thou wilt have cause
To give that sentence thy convinced assent;
God in his mercy grant thou may'st not buy
The sad conviction dearly!

For awhile
The hatred which this left between those nations
Was our security; albeit we knew
That, in the offended party, the desire
Of vengeance would outlive the gratitude
Due for our help, from those whom we had succour'd.
The sense of injury in the human mind
Is like a drug upon the offended palate,

Clinging when bitterest most abidingly:
The benefits, which men receive, they take
Like wholesome food, that leaves no tang behind it.

We found it thus: for now these Tribes, foregoing
Their mutual hatred, as of lesser moment,
Have leagued against us. Philip is the head
Of the confederacy: his crafty brain
Combines, provides, prepares and plans the mischief.
And yet his venomous will and strong desire
Draw him to this, against his better judgment,
Possess'd not more with wise prudential fear
Than with a strange religious awe, so weighty
That, politic as he is, he hath not sought
Even from his own people to conceal
Its dark forebodings. What he wants in hope
His new ally the Narhaganset Sachem
Supplies but all too well: for this Canonchet,
Son of that Miantonnimo whose death
He charges on our counsels, is the heart
Of the league. Insidious, resolute, inhuman;
Brave, both in passive and in active courage,
Almost beyond belief; implacable
In malice; wily as a snake to wind
His silent way unseen, when time requires
Concealment; furious as a hungry wolf,
When opportunity allows the indulgence
Of his fierce hatred,—this man is accomplish'd
To the height of savage virtue.

Need I tell thee,
That, as in civil, so in barbarous states,

The course of action takes its bias less
From meditation, and the calm resolve
Of wisdom, than from accident and temper,
Private advantage at all costs pursued,
Private resentments recklessly indulged,
The humour, will, and pleasure, of the leaders,
The passions and the madness of the people.
Under all climes, and in all forms of rule,
Alike the one, the many, or the few,
Among all nations of whatever tint,
All languages, these govern everywhere;
The difference only is of less or more,
As chance, to use the common speech, may sway;
In wiser words, as Providence directs.
The bond wherein these hostile tribes are knit
Against us, policy cannot untie,
Nor the sword cut. No easy conquest ours,
Such as the Spaniards found in Mexico,
Or Eldorado's priestly monarchies,
Or the well-order'd Incas' rich domains;
They could cope there with multitudinous hosts
Drawn forth in open field, and kings whose will,
Even in captivity was through the realm
Religiously obey'd. But we must wage
Wars that will yield the soldier neither gold
Nor glory. In the forest and the swamp
Have we to seek our foes; and if the shield
Of the good Angel be not over us,
On all sides from safe cover with sure aim
The death-shots whiz. Would we then clear the land,
It is not to be done by victories;

But head by head must they be hunted down,
Like wolves; a work of danger and of time;
And in this region wild of endless woods,
Possible only to the inveterate hatred
Of tribe for tribe. We tried the extremity—
Inhuman as it is—against the Pequods;
And, with the ferine help of such allies,
Pursued it to the end. All whom the sword
Spared, or our mercy interposed to save
From torments, to the Sugar Isles were sold;
And in the daily death of bondage there
The race hath been consumed. But what hath been
The issue? Why, the tribes which aided us
To root them out, stand on the hostile part
Against us now the more audaciously,
Because they feel themselves in union strong,
And see us in the land without allies.
The hope thy hazardous adventure offers
Is this, that, if the die, whereon thy fate
For life or death is set, fall favourably,
And thou shouldst gain access among the elders,
The exasperate mood, which would too surely else
Repel our proffer'd terms of amnesty,
May toward thee be soften'd. For these people
Act sometimes upon impulse, like thyself;
A generous action wins them, whom no fear
Can touch, nor pity move; and they will trust,
Like dogs and children, to a countenance,
Wherein, as if instinctively, they read
Fair testimonials from the unerring hand
Of Nature, patent there. And if one tribe,
One chief, unto thy words of peace incline

A willing ear, the league in all its parts
Will feel its ill-compacted strength relax:
Once loosen'd, it dissolves.

The Governor
Paused then; and fixing on the youth a look
Benign though mournful, “Mark me, Oliver,”
He said; “I call upon thy mother's soul
To witness—if the spirits of the dead
Are cognizant of what is done below—
That I have sought in all sincerity
To turn thee from thy purpose! If the event
Be fatal, before thee, and her, and Heaven,
Shall I stand unreproved; and with my sorrow
No self-reproach will mingle. But if still
Thy purpose holdeth firm, God speed thee! Go
In hope! I would not that my words should prove
A load to weigh thy buoyant spirit down.
It may be thou may'st render to the state
Some eminent service in this time of need:
And thus—O son of an unhappy house,
Born to a sad inheritance!—it may be,
That in this other England, this new world,
Thou may'st recast thy fortunes; may'st acquire
Such honour as consists with peace of mind
In the end; and for thy children's children gain
In this good land a goodly heritage.

VIII. PARTING WORDS.

Son of a hapless house!
What were the thoughts which then within thy breast,
At thy true friend's concluding words, arose?
Doth that quick flush disclose
A feeling thou hast labour'd to control,
And hitherto represt
In singleness of heart and strength of soul?
A light, which like a sudden hope might seem,
Kindled his cheek, and brighten'd in his eye:
But it departed like a gleam,
That for a moment in the heavy sky
Is open'd when the storm is hurrying by;
And then his countenance resumed
Its meek serenity.

Nor did that sad composure change,
When of the gentle maiden Leverett spake,
Whom to his charge her mother's dying prayer
In Christian confidence consign'd.
And yet it was a theme which well might wake
Oppugnant feelings in his inmost mind;
For with a hope upon that mother's heart,

Implied, though not express'd, the solemn care
Was given; and therefore in the young man's heart
Uneasily it lay,
As if he were unjust,
And had received a trust
He could not, must not, did not dare—
And yet would fain—repay.

“That trust I could not choose but take,” he said;
“And all that I stand pledged for to the dead
Is soon discharged; it will not from my way
Detain me long, nor lead me far astray.”
“'Tis but the easy distance of a day
From Hadley,” quoth the Governor; and he spread
A map before them, rudely drawn, wherein
Wild forests stretching far and wide were seen,
Rivers whose inland course was unexplored,
And infant settlements, as yet ill-stored,
Few, and with dreary intervals between.
“Here in the vale of the Connecticut,”
Said Leverett, “Willoby's allotment lies:
A part from our immediate enemies
Remote, and, if reliance might be put
On distance, safe. From hence it bears due west
Some five days' travel through the woods; and now
The least frequented path will be the best,
That thou may'st leave behind thee on the left
The troubled country. Here thou see'st it, south,
About these creeks and inlets and the mouth
Of Providence river, and the region wide
Of lakes and swamps in woodland interspersed,

That darkens o'er the land on every side.
This then will be thy course, to render first
The damsel to her father's hands; then seek
Thy fortune with thine Indian company
In the Narhaganset lands. If it fall fair,
Thou wilt among their people leave them there,
And to that painful interview proceed,
Which of thy dearest hope, full well I know,
Must undeceive thee. It shall be my care
To the Connecticut thy way to speed;
From thence, alas! I can but follow thee
With anxious thoughts in spirit and in prayer.
But I will suffer no ill bodings now:
The Lord is merciful, and thy intent
Is righteous, and to Him we leave the event.”

Thus having ended, to the board he led
His guest: too full of care were they
For appetite or easy talk that day.
“This caution let me give thee,” Leverett said,
“That Willoby is a high old Cavalier!”
“Fear not lest I should jar upon his ear
With ill-attuned discourse,” the Youth replied.
“He bore a part, a brave one too, I hear,
In those unhappy times, and may look back
Upon the strife with passion and with pride:
My soul abhors the ill deeds on either side,
Even if it had not cost me all too dear.
Likelier it is that in my Father's sight
I may appear degenerate, and excite
Sorrow or sterner notions in a heart,
The which, albeit with piety imbued,

Is to a Christian temper unsubdued:
But this too I can bear. Oh what a strength
For sufferance to the patient soul is given
When, wholly humbled, it hath placed at length
Its only hope in Heaven.”

“Nay,” answer'd Leverett, “earth, I trust, hath yet
Good hope for thee in store,
One day with fair performance to be crown'd:
For one who doth so well discharge the debt
Of filial duty, will not Heaven fulfil
The eternal promise which it made of yore?
Happy, and long, I trust, thy days shall be,
Here, in the land which the Lord giveth thee.”
And then, as if with such discursive speech
To draw his mind from gloomy thoughts away,
Did Leverett reach
His lifted hand towards the town and bay,
Bright in the morning sunshine as they lay
Before them: “Is it not a goodly land,”
He cried. “where nought is wanting that may bless
The heart of man with wholesome happiness?
Summer subdues not here
To sloth the dissolute mind;
Nor doth the rigorous year
In long inaction bind
His ice-lock'd arm and torpid faculties.
But changeful skies
And varying seasons, in their due career,
Bring forth his powers; and in the vigorous frame
The human spirit thrives and ripens here!
Where might the sober mind,

Which Heaven with temperate desires hath blest,
A land of happier promise find?
Where might a good man fitlier fix his rest?
Where better might he choose a burial-place
For him and for his race?
Where wiselier plant the tree
Of his posterity?”

The smile wherewith the youth received his speech
Was cold and feeble,—one in which the heart
Too plainly had no part;
Constrain'd it came, and slowly past away.
“Truly thou say'st, O friend!”
He said; “and well are they
Who, far from plagues and plots, and from the rage
Of faction, for their children may prepare
A peaceful heritage.
For me, if other end
Await me, fall my fortune as it may,
A comfort and a strength it is to know
That, wheresoe'er I go,
There is the same Heaven over me on high,
Whereon in faith to fix the steady eye;
The same access for prayer;
The same God, always present, every where;
And if no home, yet every where the bed
Which Earth makes ready for the weary head.

“But wherefore should I talk of weariness
Thus early in the day,
And when the morning calls me on my way?
In brightness and in beauty hath it risen,

As if the eternal skies
Approved and smiled upon our enterprise!
Now then farewell! That we shall meet again,
True friend! we know; but whether among men
Or angels who can tell? It is not ours
To choose, or to foresee;
Such choice or foresight would but ill agree
With man's imperfect powers,
Enough for him, that what is best will be.”

IX. JOURNEY THROUGH THE FOREST.

They are on their way, and they have enter'd now
The forest that from earliest time hath stood,
By human culture unsubdued.
Strangelier assorted company
Than this, which through that ancient wood
Their solitary course pursued,
No errant knight might chance to see,
Wandering, in good King Arthur's days,
Through Faery or Loegria land,
Where most adventures were at hand.
Liken'd the gentle Annabel might be
To sweet Serena, ere the blatant mouth
And cankerous tooth
Had with their venom stain'd her harmless youth.
And he who paced beside her steed
Might seem, in form, and strength, and manly grace,
Like Calidore, when he had laid aside
His glorious thoughts and martial pride,
And, as a shepherd, in the sylvan shade,
Woo'd Pastorella for his bride,
Contented to forego for her the meed
Of high desert; and with true love
How largely for ambition overpaid!
Such Oliver might seem, and such the maid.

But lighter hearts, I ween, of yore
The errant knights and damsels bore,
In ages when the shield and lance
Gave law through all the realms of Old Romance;
Who roam'd at hap, or on adventure bent,
Searching the seas, the isles, and continent;
When they, in bower, in hermitage, and hall,
Were welcomed every where by all,
Or underneath the greenwood tree
Took up their inn contentedly.

For in that pensive maiden's mien
Had recent sorrow left its trace,
And plainly too might there be seen
A present trouble in her face:
She fear'd the melancholy meeting,
When grief would mar her father's greeting;
And hardly less, I ween, the pain
With which she soon must part
From one whose image would remain
The inmate of her heart.
For wishes, from herself till now conceal'd—
Conceal'd, if not represt—
And thoughts, to which the will had not consented,
Forlornly as she felt them now reveal'd,
Her secret soul unwillingly confess'd,
Unwillingly repented:
And hopes, that had arisen she scarce knew how,
Were first acknowledged when they fail'd her now.

Think not that Oliver was free
The while from painful sympathy:

What more had he required his lot to bless,
Than in the depth of those clear eyes was seen—
The modest, meek, confiding gentleness,
That soften'd while it sanctified her mien;
Those looks, devoid of art,
Whose mild intelligence he loved to meet;
The voice, that, varying still, but always sweet,
Still found a chord responsive in his heart?
If ever at his fate he half repined,
If ever o'er his calm and constant mind
The doubt, the trouble, and the cloud, were brought,
'Twas at the thought,
That cruel circumstance two souls must sever,
Whom God, he surely felt, would else have join'd for ever.

Uneasy now became perforce
The inevitable intercourse,
Too grateful heretofore:
Each in the other could descry
The tone constrain'd, the alter'd eye.
They knew that each to each could seem
No longer as of yore;
And yet, while thus estranged, I deem,
Each loved the other more.
Her's was perhaps the saddest heart;
His the more forced and painful part:
A sense of proper maiden pride
To her the needful strength supplied.
Then first perhaps the Virgin thought
How large a dower of love and faithfulness
Her gentle spirit could have brought
A kindred heart to bless;

Herself then first she understood
With what capacities endued;
Then first, by undeserved neglect
Roused to a consciousness of self-respect,
Felt she was not more willing to be won
Than worthy to be woo'd.

Had they from such disturbant thoughts been free,
It had been sure for them
A gladsome sight to see
The Indian children, with what glee
They breathed their native air of liberty.
Food to the weary man with toil forespent
Not more refreshment brings,
Than did the forest breeze upon its wings
To these true younglings of the wilderness:
A happy sight, a sight of hearts content!
For blithe were they
As swallows, wheeling in the summer sky
At close of day;
As insects, when on high
Their mazy dance they thread
In myriads overhead,
Where sunbeams through the thinner foliage gleam,
Or spin in rapid circles as they play,
Where winds are still,
Upon the surface of the unrippled stream:
Yea, gamesome in their innocence were they
As lambs in fragrant pasture, at their will
The udder when to press
They run, for hunger less
Than joy, and very love and wantonness.

Nor less contentment had it brought
To see what change benevolence had wrought
In the wild Indian mother, whom they first
Had seen, her spirit strong
Madden'd by violence of wrong,
For vengeance in her inmost soul,
With natural but with ferine rage, athirst.
That soul unhoped-for kindness had subdued:
Her looks, and words, and actions, now combined,
Express'd, in that composure of the mind
Which uneffaceable sorrow had left behind,
A lively ever-watchful gratitude.
Oliver seem'd to her a creature
Less of this earth than of celestial nature;
And Annabel as well
Had won from her a love like veneration;
(So goodness on the grateful heart can gain;)
Though charms of European tint and feature
No beauty to an Indian eye convey,
Regarded with disdain,
As if they were the original stamp and stain
Of an inferior clay,
Proved in some earlier, inexpert creation,
And then, for degradation,
When the red man was fashion'd, put away.

Pamya was troubled now, for she had seen
Their alter'd mien:
Some change there was, she knew not what, nor why,
Some infelicity;
Which yet she might descry

Rose not from wrath nor alienated will;
For in their converse still
The tones were such as meet
The ear of love, and still
The smiles they interchanged, though sad, were sweet:
Yet plainly she could tell, all was not well.
They too could read in her observant eye
Its apprehension and its sympathy:
And surely she, had but her speech been free,
Had prest, how earnestly! for explanation,
And sought to bring about
The full and perfect reconciliation
Dearly desired by both, she did not doubt.
Their hearts were merciful and meek she knew,
And could not to each other but be true:
But on her tongue the curse of Babel hung,
And when the eager wish her breast was swelling,
Eye-speaking thoughts were all she could impart,
Intelligibly telling
The deep indwelling yearnings of the heart.

Four days they travell'd through the endless wood,
Measuring their journey still to reach at eve
Some settler's home, and sure of their receiving
Such hospitality, sincere, though rude,
As men who felt no want, and had no vice
Of chilling avarice,
In their plain kindness found a joy in giving.
The fifth morn rose, and with the morn rose they,
That they might reach that day
Their journey's end; and through the forest wide
Did they their weary way

Hold on from early dawn till eventide;
But ere the light of eve
Began to fade, their guide,
Accustomed to descry
With instantaneous eye
The slightest trace of man, a smoke espied,
Staining a little space of open sky:
“Yon is the place we seek!” he said; nor knew
What a cold feeling, at the words, ran through
The veins of Annabel, and Newman too.

X.

Oh, what a happy meeting had been here,
Willoby thought, in anguish, when he prest
His daughter to his widow'd breast;
If that dear hope which served so long to cheer
His patient labours in the wilderness
Had wholly been fulfill'd, as now in part;
After so many storms and troubles past,
Here had the faithful partner of his heart
Rejoiced to reach the quiet port at last.

MISCELLANEOUS POETICAL REMAINS.

FRAGMENTARY THOUGHTS OCCASIONED BY HIS SON'S DEATH.

Thy life was a day, and sum it well, life is but a week of such days,—with how much storm, and cold, and darkness! Thine was a sweet spring holy-day,—a vernal Sabbath, all sunshine, hope, and promise.

and that name
In sacred silence buried, which was still
At morn and eve the never-wearying theme
Of dear discourse.
playful thoughts
Turn'd now to gall and esel.

He to whom Heaven in mercy hath assign'd
Life's wholesome wormwood, fears no bitterness when
From th' hand of Death he drinks the Amreeta cup.
Beauties of Nature,—the passion of my youth,
Nursed up and ripen'd to a settled love,
Whereto my heart is wedded.

Feeling at Westminster, when summer evening sent a sadness to my heart, and I sate pining for green fields, and banks of flowers, and running streams,—or dreaming of Avon and her rocks and woods.

No more great attempts, only a few autumnal flowers, like second primroses, &c.

They who look for me in our Father's kingdom
Will look for Him also; inseparably
Shall we be so remember'd.
The Grave the house of Hope:
It is the haven whither we are bound
On the rough sea of life, and thence she lands
In her own country, on the immortal shore.

Come, then,
Pain and Infirmity—appointed guests,
My heart is ready.
My soul
Needed perhaps a longer discipline,
Or sorer penance, here.

A respite something like repose is gain'd
While I invoke them, and the troubled tide
Of feeling, for a while allay'd, obeys
A tranquillising influence, that might seem
By some benign intelligence dispensed,
Who lends an ear to man.

They are not, though,
Mere unrealities: rather, I ween,
The ancient Poets, in the graceful garb
Of fiction, have transmitted earliest truths,
Ill understood; adorning, as they deem'd,
With mythic tales things erringly received,
And mingling with primeval verities
Their own devices vain. For what to us
Scripture assures, by searching proof confirm'd,
And inward certainty of sober Faith,
Tradition unto them deliver'd down
Changed and corrupted in the course of time,
And haply also by delusive art
Of Evil Powers. —

Letter to Mr. W. Taylor, March, 1817. “I have begun a desultory poem in blank verse, pitched in a higher key than Cowper's, and in a wiser strain of philosophy than Young's; but as yet I have not recovered heart enough to proceed with it; nor is it likely that it will be published during my life.”

SHORT PASSAGES OF SCRIPTURE,

RHYTHMICALLY ARRANGED OR PARAPHRASED.

Jerem. vi. 4.

Woe unto us!
For the day goeth down,
For the shadows of evening
Are lengthen'd out.

Jer. ix. 23–4.

Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom,
Let not the rich man glory in his riches,
Let not the mighty glory in his might,
But in only this let him that glorieth, glory,
That he knoweth the Lord, the Lord of infinite mercy,
Who exerciseth on the earth
His loving-kindness and his righteousness.

Jer. xiii. 16.

Give glory to the Lord your God!
Lest, while ye look for light,
He bring the darkness on,
And the feet that advanced
With haughty step,
Marching astray in their pride,
Stumble and fail
In the shadow of death.

Jer. xlvii. 6, 7.

Sword of the Lord! how long
Ere thou be quiet? O thou sword, how long?
Put up thyself
Into thy scabbard,
Rest and be still.

Jer. xlix. 7.

From the prudent hath counsel departed?
Is wisdom no more in the land?
Hath it utterly perish'd?
Is it vanish'd and gone?

Jer. l. 25.

... the Lord
Open'd his armoury, and brought forth
The weapons of his wrath.

Jer. l. 15.

Ye nations, shout against her round about;
Take vengeance upon her.
It is the vengeance of the Lord,
As she hath done, do unto her.

Luke, iii. 5.

When every valley shall be filled,
And every mountain be brought low;
The crooked be made straight,
The rough ways smooth.

Lamentations, iii. 44.

The Lord
Cover'd himself with a cloud,
That the prayer should not pass through.

Hosea, x. 12, 13.

Break up your fallow-ground,
Sow to yourselves in righteousness, and reap
In mercy; it is time to seek the Lord.
Ye have plough'd wickedness, and ye have reap'd
Iniquity: the fruit of lies hath been
Your harvest and your food.

Daniel, ix. 7, 8, 9. 18.

To Thee belongeth righteousness, O Lord!
Confusion and shame to us;
To our kings and our princes,
Our priests and our rulers,
Ourselves and our children,
Because we have sinned against Thee.

[But mercies and forgivenesses belong]

But mercies and forgivenesses belong
To Thee, O Lord our God,
Rebellious though we be.

[Incline thine ear, and hear]

Incline thine ear, and hear;
Open thine eyes, and pitifully see
Our sins, our miseries,
The impending punishment,
Too long, too much deserved.

Amos, v. 8.

Who calleth for the waters of the sea,
And poureth them in seasonable rain
Upon the face of earth.

100

Nahum, i. 3–8.

The Lord hath his way in the whirlwind,
The Lord hath his way in the storm,
The clouds are the dust of his feet,
And darkness shall pursue his enemies.

Nahum, iii. 15. 17.

There shall the fire devour thee,
The sword shall cut thee off.
Make thyself many as the canker-worm,
As the locusts make thyself many.
Thou hast multiplied thy merchants
Above the stars of heaven!
But the canker-worm spoileth,
Then fleeth away,
And his place is not found.

1 Kings, viii. 23. 27. 30.

Lord God of Israel!
There is no God like Thee,
In heaven above, or on the earth beneath,
Who keepest covenant
And mercy with thy servants, when with all
Their heart they walk before Thee.

101

[.... will God indeed]

.... will God indeed
Dwell on the earth? Behold, the heaven, and heaven
Of heavens, cannot contain Thee; how much less
This house that man hath builded!

[.... hear Thou in heaven, thy dwelling-place]

.... hear Thou in heaven, thy dwelling-place;
And when Thou hearest, O Lord God, forgive!

Isaiah, xxv. 1. 4. 7.

Thy counsels, Lord, of old,
Are faithfulness and truth.

[A strength to the weak hast thou been]

A strength to the weak hast thou been,
A help to the poor in his need,
A refuge from the storm,
A shadow from the heat.

[The covering that is cast]

The covering that is cast
Over all people shall be then removed,
And the veil that is spread
Over all nations be taken away.

102

Isaiah, xxvi. 3. 5. 8.

Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace
Whose mind is stay'd on Thee.

[He bringeth down them that dwell on high]

He bringeth down them that dwell on high;
The lofty city He layeth it low,
He layeth it low to the ground,
He bringeth it down to the dust:
The foot shall tread it down,
The feet of the poor and the needy.

[In the way of thy judgments]

In the way of thy judgments,
O Lord, have we waited for Thee.

Isaiah, xxviii. 15. 17. 18.

They have made lies their refuge,
And under falsehood have they hid themselves;
Their covenant is with death, with hell
The agreement wherein they trust.
O fools! O miserables!
The covenant shall be annull'd,
The agreement shall not stand.
By the storm shall their refuge be swept away,
Their hiding-place
By the flood be overflown.

103

Isaiah. xxviii. 16.

In Zion the foundation hath been laid,
A precious corner-stone, a sure foundation.

Isaiah, xxxi. 3.

When the Lord shall put forth his anger,
Then both he that helpeth shall fall, and he that is holpen.

Isaiah, lvii. 1.

The righteous perisheth,
And none layeth it to heart!
The merciful man
Is taken away
From the evil to come.

Ezekiel, vii. 5, 6, 7. 12.

An evil, an only evil,
Behold, is come! an end
Is come,—the end is come!
It watcheth for thee, behold it is come.
The time of trouble is near,
The morning is gone forth;
Behold the day is come.
Let not the buyer rejoice,
Nor let the seller mourn,
For wrath, the wrath of God,
Is upon all the multitudes thereof.

104

Ezekiel, xxii. 7, 8. 14.

In thee have they set light
By venerable age,
By natural piety.
In thee God's holy things have they despised,
God's sabbaths have profaned.
Oh can thine heart endure,
Or can thine hand be strong,
When God shall deal with thee?

105

LITTLE BOOK, IN GREEN AND GOLD.

Little Book, in green and gold,
Thou art thus bedight to hold
Robert Southey's Album Rhymes,
Wrung from him in busy times:
Not a few to his vexation,
By importune application;
Some in half-sarcastic strain,
More against than with the grain;
Other some, he must confess,
Bubbles blown in idleness;
Some in earnest, some in jest,
Good for little at the best:
Yet, because his Daughter dear
Would collect them fondly here,
Little Book, in gold and green,
Thou art not unfitly seen
Thus apparell'd for her pleasure,
Like the casket of a treasure.
Other owner, well I know,
Never more can prize thee so.

Little Book, when thou art old,
Time will dim thy green and gold.
Little Book, thou wilt outlive
The pleasure thou wert made to give:

106

Dear domestic recollections,
Home-born loves, and old affections,
Incommunicable they:
And when these have past away,
As perforce they must, from earth,
Where is then thy former worth?
Other value, then, I ween,
Little Book, may supervene,
Happily if unto some
Thou in due descent shouldst come,
Who would something find in thee
Like a relic's sanctity,
And in whom thou may'st awake,
For thy former owner's sake,
A pious thought, a natural sigh,
A feeling of mortality.

When those feelings, and that race,
Have in course of time given place,
Little worth, and little prized,
Disregarded or despised,
Thou wilt then be bought and sold,
In thy faded green and gold.
Then, unless some curious eye
Thee upon the shelf should spy,
Dust will gather on thee there,
And the worms, that never spare,
Feed their fill within, and hide,
Burrowing safely in thy side,
Till transfigured out they come
From that emblem of the tomb:

107

Or, by mould and damp consumed,
Thou to perish may'st be doom'd.

But if some collector find thee,
He will, as a prize, re-bind thee;
And thou may'st again be seen
Gayly drest in gold and green.

9th September, 1831.

108

LINES WRITTEN IN THE ALBUM OF ROTHA Q.

Rotha, after long delays,
Since thy book must cross the Raise,
Down I sit to turn a stave,
Be it gay or be it grave.

Wiser wish than what thy name
Prompts for thee I cannot frame;
No where find a better theme
Than thy native namesake stream.
Lovelier river is there none
Underneath an English sun;
From its source it issues bright
Upon hoar Hellvellyn's height,
Flowing where its summer voice
Makes the mountain herds rejoice;
Down the dale it issues then;
Not polluted there by men;
While its lucid waters take
Their pastoral course from lake to lake,
Please the eye in every part,
Lull the ear, and soothe the heart,
Till into Windermere sedate
They flow and uncontaminate.

109

Rotha, such from youth to age
Be thy mortal pilgrimage;
Thus in childhood blithe and free,
Thus in thy maturity,
Blest and blessing, may it be;
And a course, in welfare past,
Thus serenely close at last.

110

IMAGINATION AND REALITY.

The hill was in the sunshine gay and green,
The vale below could not be seen;
A cloud hung over it,
A thin white cloud, that scarce was seen to fly,
So slowly did it flit;
Yet cloud methinks I err in calling it,
It spread so evenly along the sky.
It gave the hills beyond a hue
So beautiful and blue,
That I stood loitering for the view:
Loitering and musing thoughtfully stood I,
For well those hills I knew,
And many a time had travell'd them all o'er;
Yet now such change the hazy air had wrought,
That I could well have thought
I never had beheld the scene before.
But while I gazed the cloud was passing by;
On the slow air it slowly travell'd on,
Eftsoon and that deceitful haze was gone,
Which had beguiled me with its mockery;
And all things seem'd again the things they were.
Alas! but then they were not half so fair
As I had shaped them in the hazy air!

111

MADRIGAL,

TRANSLATED FROM LUIS MARTIN.

On the green margin of the land,
Where Guadalhorce winds his way,
My Lady lay.
With golden key Sleep's gentle hand
Had closed her eyes so bright,
Her eyes—two suns of light,
And bade his balmy dews
Her rosy cheeks suffuse.
The River God in slumber saw her laid
He raised his dripping head
With weeds o'erspread,
Clad in his watery robes approach'd the maid,
And with cold kiss, like Death,
Drank the rich perfume of the maiden's breath.
The maiden felt that icy kiss;
Her suns unclosed, their flame
Full and unclouded on the intruder came.

112

Amazed, the bold intruder felt
His frothy body melt,
And heard the radiance on his bosom hiss;
And, forced in blind confusion to retire,
Leapt in the water to escape the fire.

February, 1799.

113

MOHAMMED;

A FRAGMENT, WRITTEN IN 1799.

Cloak'd in the garment of green, who lies on the bed of Mohammed,
Restless and full of fear, yet semblant of one that is sleeping?
Every sound of the feet at his door he hears, and the breathing
Low of inaudible words: he knows their meaning of murder,
Knows what manner of men await his outgoing, and listens
All their tread, and their whisp'ring, till even the play of his pulses
Disturbs him, so deep his attention. The men of the Koreish
Fix on the green-robed youth their eyes; impatiently watchful
Wait they the steps of his rising, the coming of him whom they hated.
He rises and makes himself pure, and turning towards the Caaba,
Loud he repeats his prayer; they hear, and, in eagerness trembling,
Grasp the hilts of their swords—their swords that are sworn to the slaughter.
But when the youth went forth, they saw, and, behold! it was Ali!
Steady the hero's face: it was pale, for his life was a blessing;
It was calm, for in death he look'd on to the crown of the martyr.
Dark as they were of soul, and goaded by rage disappointed,
They shed not the blood of the youth, but remember'd their chieftain his father,
Abu Taleb the good, and respected the virtue of friendship.
Baffled, and full of wrath, through Mecca they scatter the tidings:
“He has fled, has discover'd our plans, has eluded our vengeance.

114

“Saw ye the steps of his flight? Where lurks he, the lying blasphemer?
“Now to the chase, to the chase; seize now the bow and the quiver;
“Now with the sword and the spear, ye stubborn of Mecca! pursue him;
“Seek him now to the north and the south, to the sunset and sunrise;
“Follow, follow the chosen one's flight!” They rush from the city:
Over the plain they pursue him, pursue him with cries and with curses—
Sounds that rung over the plain, and rung in the echoing mountains;
And Mecca received in her streets the din of their clamorous uproar.
But the voice of the Moslem, the silent prayer of the faithful,
Rose to the throne of God; and tears of the heart overflowing
Interceded for him whom they loved and believed his apostle.

“Where is the blasphemous fled?—the lying disturber of Mecca?
“Has he journey'd to Tayef? Under the shield of his uncle
“Lurks he for safety there?—or to Yathreb, the credulous city?
“Or seeks he the Ethiop's court, where the earlier runaways shelter?”
Lashing their steeds, they pursue; to the east and the dwelling of Abbas
Hasten the thirsty for blood; to the north they hurry, to Yathreb;
Some to the shore of the sea, lest haply a bark might await him,
And the waves should become his protectors; impetuously rushing,
Drive they in fury along; beneath the hoofs of their horses
Sparkles the rock of the valley, and rises the dust of the desert.

Others the while, more cool in wrath, and thoughtful in fury,
Over the town search sedulous: they in the Hashemites' dwellings
Seek for the man proscribed; in the dwellings of Hamza and Omar,
Ali, Abubeker, and Saad, and Abu Obeidah;
All whom the Prophet loved, who believed in the son of Abdallah.
Every house they search in the populous city, whose threshold
Ever his feet had trod; thus vainly through Mecca they seek him
Then, unassuaged of hate, of rancour and wrath unabated,
They to the mountains turn, to seek in their dens and retirings

115

If from the death he lurks: they enter the cavern of Hira,
Place of his fasting and prayer; the cavern of Hira is lonely.
Not in the depth of the cave, and not in the mountain retirings,
Not in their hollows and glens, can they track the steps of his going.
So through the day they sought; and still, when the sun was descending,
They were among the hills: then faint, disappointed, and weary,
Turning their faces homeward, they journey'd slowly and sullen
Down their rough mountain path; but often paused, and around them
Linger'd with prowling eyes: a little wide of their pathway,
Thus as they paused, they saw in the side of the stony mountain
A cave-mouth, narrow and high: the hill had the hue of the evening
Rich on its rugged sides, and the chasm was distinct in its blackness.
Thither turning, they sped; and one who forewent his companions
Came to the cavern's mouth: disturb'd by the noise of his footsteps,
From her nest, in the side of the chasm, a pigeon affrighted
Fled. The advancing pursuers heard the whirr of her pinions,
And he who was first exclaim'd, “There is none in the hole of the mountain;
“For lo! a pigeon fled from her nest at the sound of my coming,
“And the spider hath spread his network over the entrance.”
Then from the cave he turn'd.

Was thy spirit shaken, Mohammed,
When in the depth of the rock thou heardest the voice of the Koreish?
He who was with thee trembled; the sweat on his forehead was chilly,
And his eyes in alarm were turn'd towards thee in the darkness.
Silent they sat in the rock; nor moved they, nor breathed they; but listen'd
Long to the tread of the feet, that, fainter and fainter sounding,
Died in the distance now: yet still they were silent, and listen'd.
Abubeker first, as his fear gave faith to the echo,
Fresh in his sense alarm'd—“Hark! hark! I hear them returning
“They are many, and we but two!” he whisper'd, in terror.
“There is a third!” aloud replied the son of Abdallah—
“God!”

116

So the night came on, and they in the place of their refuge
Silently sat. And now in hope they listen'd, awaiting
Sound of approaching feet—of trusted friend or disciple,
Bringing them food and tidings, now that the darkness had settled.
Slow past the expectant hours: nearer the mouth of the cavern
Eagerly now they drew. The sound of the wind that was passing
Took from their hope its tone; and now in its distant murmurs
They heard the tread of feet; and now despairingly argued
Danger was yet abroad, and none could venture towards them.
Midnight came; and a step was heard—distinctly they heard it:
Heavier it comes,—and now in the rock—and a voice—it is Ali.
He in the cave laid down the water-skin that he carried,
And the figs wrapt under his robe: then told he his tidings.
Low was his voice, for he spake in fear: “The peril is pressing,
“Prophet of God, I saw thy foes return in the twilight:
“Sullen they came from their toil, and talk'd of the search on the morrow.
“The Idolaters joy in thy flight, and grieve at thy safety:
“God shall remember their joy, and that grief, in the day of his judgment.
“They shall feel in their evil load! A price is appointed
“His who shall shed thy blood: but keep thou close in the mountain;
“God will confound their plots.”

He paused; so suddenly checking
Words on their way, as one who tells but half of his errand,
Loath to utter the worse remainder, that yet must be utter'd.
Sure if Mohammed had seen his eye, he had read in its trouble
Tidings of evil to come. At length to the son of Abdallah,
Telling his tale of woe, spake Ali the first of believers:
“Prophet, there is grief in thy dwelling: Cadijah in sickness
“Lies on her bed of pain: for death she is stricken, I fear me.’
Mohammed heard; and he bow'd his head, and groan'd for his exile.

THE END.