They who here roamed, of yore, the forest wide, Felt, by such charm, their simple bosoms won; They deemed their quivered warrior, when he died, Went to bright isles beneath the setting sun; Where winds are aye at peace, and skies are fair, And purple-skirted clouds curtain the crimson air.
So, with the glories of the dying day,
Its thousand trembling lights and changing hues, The memory of the brave who passed away
Tenderly mingled;-fitting hour to muse
On such grave theme, and sweet the dream that shed Brightness and beauty round the destiny of the dead.
For ages, on the silent forests here,
Thy beams did fall before the red man came To dwell beneath them; in their shade the deer Fed, and feared not the arrow's deadly aim. Nor tree was felled, in all that world of woods, Save by the beaver's tooth, or winds, or rush of floods.
Then came the hunter tribes, and thou didst look, For ages, on their deeds in the hard chase, And well-fought wars; green sod and silver brook Took the first stain of blood; before thy face
The warrior generations came and passed, And glory was laid up for many an age to last.
Now they are gone, gone as thy setting blaze Goes down the west, while night is pressing on, And with them the old tale of better days,
And trophies of remembered power, are gone. Yon field that gives the harvest, where the plough Strikes the white bone, is all that tells their story now.
I stand upon their ashes in thy beam, The offspring of another race, I stand, Beside a stream they loved, this valley stream; And where the night-fire of the quivered band Showed the gray oak by fits, and war-song rung, I teach the quiet shades the strains of this new tongue.
Farewell! but thou shalt come again-thy light Must shine on other changes, and behold The place of the thronged city still as night-
States fallen-new empires built upon the old
But never shalt thou see these realms again
Darkened by boundless groves, and roamed by savage men.
OH! could I hope the wise and pure in heart Might hear my song without a frown, nor deem My voice unworthy of the theme it tries,— I would take up the hymn to Death, and say To the grim power, The world hath slandered thee And mocked thee. On thy dim and shadowy brow They place an iron crown, and call thee king
Of terrors, and the spoiler of the world, Deadly assassin, that strik'st down the fair, The loved, the good-that breathest on the lights Of virtue set along the vale of life,
And they go out in darkness. I am come, Not with reproaches, not with cries and prayers, Such as have stormed thy stern, insensible ear From the beginning; I am come to speak Thy praises. True it is, that I have wept
Thy conquests, and may weep them yet again, And thou from some I love wilt take a life
Dear to me as my own. Yet while the spell Is on my spirit, and I talk with thee In sight of all thy trophies, face to face, Meet is it that my voice should utter forth Thy nobler triumphs; I will teach the world To thank thee. Who are thine accusers ?-Who?
The living!-they who never felt thy power, And know thee not. The curses of the wretch Whose crimes are ripe, his sufferings when thy hand Is on him, and the hour he dreads is come, Are writ among thy praises. But the good- Does he whom thy kind hand dismissed to peace, Upbraid the gentle violence that took off His fetters, and unbarred his prison-cell?
Raise then the hymn to Death. Deliverer! God hath anointed thee to free the oppressed And crush the oppressor. When the armed chief, The conqueror of nations, walks the world, And it is changed beneath his feet, and all Its kingdoms melt into one mighty realm- Thou, while his head is loftiest and his heart Blasphemes, imagining his own right hand Almighty, thou dost set thy sudden grasp Upon him, and the links of that strong chain
Which bound mankind are crumbled; thou dost break
Sceptre and crown, and beat his throne to dust.
Then the earth shouts with gladness, and her tribes Gather within their ancient bounds again.
Else had the mighty of the olden time, Nimrod, Sesostris, or the youth who feigned His birth from Libyan Ammon, smitten yet
The nations with a rod of iron, and driven Their chariot o'er our necks. Thou dost avenge, In thy good time, the wrongs of those who know No other friend. Nor dost thou interpose
Only to lay the sufferer asleep,
Where he who made him wretched troubles not His rest-thou dost strike down his tyrant too. Oh, there is joy when hands that held the scourge Drop lifeless, and the pitiless heart is cold. Thou too dost purge from earth its horrible And old idolatries;-from the proud fanes Each to his grave their priests go out, till none Is left to teach their worship; then the fires Of sacrifice are chilled, and the green moss O'ercreeps their altars; the fallen images Cumber the weedy courts, and for loud hymns, Chanted by kneeling multitudes, the wind Shrieks in the solitary aisles. When he
Who gives his life to guilt, and laughs at all
The laws that God or man has made, and round
Hedges his seat with power, and shines in wealth,- Lifts up his atheist front to scoff at Heaven, And celebrates his shame in open day, Thou, in the pride of all his crimes, cutt'st off The horrible example. Touched by thine, The extortioner's hard hand foregoes the gold Wrung from the o'er-worn poor. The perjurer, Whose tongue was lithe, e'en now, and voluble Against his neighbor's life, and he who laughed And leaped for joy to see a spotless fame Blasted before his own foul calumnies, Are smit with deadly silence. He, who sold His conscience to preserve a worthless life, Even while he hugs himself on his escape,
Trembles, as, doubly terrible, at length, Thy steps o'ertake him, and there is no time For parley, nor will bribes unclench thy grasp. Oft, too, dost thou reform thy victim, long Ere his last hour. And when the reveller, Mad in the chase of pleasure, stretches on, And strains each nerve, and clears the path of life Like wind, thou point'st him to the dreadful goal, And shak'st thy hour-glass in his reeling eye,
And check'st him in mid course. Thy skeleton hand Shows to the faint of spirit the right path, And he is warned, and fears to step aside. Thou sett'st between the ruffian and his crime Thy ghastly countenance, and his slack hand
Drops the drawn knife. But, oh, most fearfully
Dost thou show forth Heaven's justice, when thy shafts Drink up the ebbing spirit-then the hard
Of heart and violent of hand restores
The treasure to the friendless wretch he wronged. Then from the writhing bosom thou dost pluck
The guilty secret; lips, for ages sealed,
Are faithless to their dreadful trust at length,
And give it up; the felon's latest breath
Absolves the innocent man who bears his crime; The slanderer, horror-smitten, and in tears, Recalls the deadly obloquy he forged
To work his brother's ruin. Thou dost make
Thy penitent victim utter to the air
The dark conspiracy that strikes at life,
And aims to whelm the laws; ere yet the hour
Is come, and the dread sign of murder given.
Thus, from the first of time, hast thou been found On virtue's side; the wicked, but for thee,
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