This little nursling, take him to thy love, rent dove. XV. "Christian! I am the foeman of thy foe; We launch'd our pirogues for the bison chase, XVI. "It was encamping on the lake's far port, *The Indian God of War. Sprang upward like a torch to light the skies, Then down again it rain'd an ember shower, And louder lamentations heard we rise As when the evil Manitou* that dries Th' Ohio woods, consumes them in his ire, And howls amidst his wilderness of fire: Alas! too late, we reach'd and smote those Hurons dire! XVIII. "But as the fox beneath the nobler hound, pray. XIX. "Our virgins fed her with their kindly bowls But she was journeying to the land of souls, *Manitou, Spirit or Deity. That we should bid an ancient friend convey Her orphan to his home of England's shore ;And take, she said, this token far away, To one that will remember us of yore, When he beholds the ring that Waldegrave's Julia wore. XX. "And I, the eagle of my tribe,* have rush'd With this lorn dove." A sage's self-command Had quell'd the tears from Albert's heart that gush'd; But yet his cheek his agitated handThat shower'd upon the stranger of the land No common boon, in grief but ill-beguiled A soul that was not wont to be unmann'd ; "And stay," he cried, "dear pilgrim of the wild, Preserver of my old, my boon companion's child! XXI. "Child of a race whose name my bosom warms, On earth's remotest bounds how welcome here! Whose mother oft, a child, has fill'd these arms, Young as thyself, and innocently dear, *The Indians are distinguished, both personally and by tribes, by the name of particular animals, whose qualities they affect to resemble, either for cunning, strength, swiftness, or other qualities:-as the eagle, the serpent, the fox, or bear. Whose grandsire was my early life's compeer. XXII. "And, Julia! when thou wert like Gertrude now, Can I forget thee, favourite child of yore? Or thought I, in thy father's house, when thou To meet and kiss me at my journey's end? He said XXIII. and strain'd unto his heart the boy : Far differently, the mute Oneida took Calumet of peace. The calumet is the Indian name for the ornamental pipe of friendship, which they smoke as a pledge of amity. Train'd from his tree-rock'd cradle* to his bier A stoic of the woods a man without a tear. XXIV. Yet deem not goodness on the savage stock A song of parting to the boy he sung, Who slept on Albert's couch, nor heard his friendly tongue. XXV. "Sleep, wearied one! and in the dreaming land Shouldst thou to-morrow with thy mother meet, Oh! tell her spirit, that the white man's hand Hath pluck'd the thorns of sorrow from thy feet; While I in lonely wilderness shall greet Thy little footprints or by traces know The fountain, where at noon I thought it sweet *Tree-rock'd cradle. -The Indian mothers suspend their children in their cradles from the boughs of trees, and let them be rocked by the wind. |