I've calmly felt the winter's storms, o'er my unshelter'd head, And trod the snow with naked foot, till every track was red!
My soldier's fare is poor and scant 't is what
my comrades share, Yon heaven my only canopy-but that I well can bear; A dull and feverish weight of pain is pressing on my brow, And I am faint with recent wounds-for that I care not now.
But oh, I long once more to view my childhood's dwelling-place,
To clasp my mother to my heart to see my father's face!
To list each well-remember'd tone, to gaze on every eye
That met my ear, or thrill'd my heart, in moments long gone by.
In vain with long and frequent draught of every wave I sip,-
A quenchless and consuming thirst is ever on my lip!
The very air that fans my cheek no blessed coolness brings,—
A burning heat or chilling damp is ever on its wings.
Oh! let me seek my home once more-for but a little while-
But once above my couch to see my mother's gentle smile;
It haunts me in my waking hours 't is ever in my dreams,
With all the pleasant paths of home, rocks, woods, and shaded
There is a fount,-I know it well-it springs beneath a rock,
Oh, how its coolness and its light, my feverish fancies mock!
I pine to lay me by its side, and bathe my lips and brow,
'T would give new fervour to the heart that beats so languid now.
I may not I must linger here-perchance it may be just!
But well I know this yearning soon will scorch my heart to dust;
One breathing of my native air had call'd me back to life-
But I must die-must waste away beneath this inward strife.
THE APPEAL OF THE CHOCTAW.
WE cannot leave our fathers' land!
We cannot leave our fathers' graves!
The long-loved hills that round us stand-
Our valleys, with their pleasant waves.
Oh, bid us not to trace afar,
The pathway of the evening star;
We cannot find, where'er we roam,
A spot which bears, like this, the name of home!
What though the western forest rise,
More tall, more darkly close, than these;
And calm the stately wild deer lies,
In slumber 'neath the stately trees ;-
Though hill and vale are passing fair,
And all seems bright and lovely there,
We cannot love the beauteous spot,
To us the great Manitto gave it not!
What care we for those prairies wide?
Our fathers never hunted there;—
Those cavern echoes ne'er, in pride,
Flung back their wild halloo of war.
Those wooded glens, and shaded streams,
Came never to our children's dreams;
Nor have we, in our young hearts' glee,
Loved, like familiar friends, each rock and tree.
But here, amid the tempest's rush,
Our spirit fathers' voices thrill!
They come at midnight's moonlit hush,
Or when the eve-star lights the hill.
The thoughts of other times are spread
O'er every gray crag's misty head;—
And how then can we lightly leave
The scenes to which our hearts so fondly cleave?
Then have we not in worship bow'd,
Before your God, the humbled head?
And tamed our spirits, fierce and proud,
To till our hunting grounds for bread?
And now, that in our bosom's cell,
A white man's calmer soul would dwell,
You seek to grasp our planted soil,
And drive us hence, in distant lands to toil!
white men ! ye have fair smooth brows,
And lips whose words we well might trust,
But treachery mingles in your vows,
Your chain of friendship is but dust!
Ye come with falsehood in your hearts,
Ye frame your laws with wily arts,
And bid us 'neath their shades to dwell,
That we may wither by their blighting spell!
THE ark was resting on the mountain's side,
And those who dwelt beneath its sheltering veil,
Look'd forth upon the earth-that sight denied
Their anxious gaze so long!—their cheeks grew pale
As Noah moved the covering from their frail,
Yet safe abode of refuge; for they thought
Of those dark hours, when, ever on the gale,
The voice of ruin and despair was brought,
Telling how wide a scathe destruction's hand had wrought.
And now they look'd abroad upon the scene
With a sick, painful interest, and a dread
Of seeing-what till now had only been
A picture of their thoughts-before them spread
In all its dark reality. The dead,
The guilty dead, seem'd rising to their sight,
As when in sinful happiness, their tread
Pass'd gayly o'er the earth, ere that long night
Of utter darkness pass'd above them with its blight.
Then how could those lone dwellers of the earth-
The only rescued-how could they but weep?
What though the lost ones, in their guilty mirth,
Had mock'd their pious prayers, and wrought them deep
And sore affliction? In one whelming sweep,
The wrath of God had crush'd them! and could now
The righteous triumph o'er their dreamless sleep?
But Noah-only he-upraised his brow,
As if his spirit could be moved by nought below.
And yet the green earth bore but little trace
Of its late ravage ;-scatter'd here and there,
The wreck of some proud palace, or a place
Of their vain worship-with their pillars fair,
Grown o'er with sea-weed, and their treasures rare,
Gone to the ocean caverns;-but the light
Of the rich sunset melted through an air,
All fill'd with odours from a world as bright
As though it only waked in freshness from the night.
So thus they trod the silent world once more,-
Its only habitants !-all gather'd there,
And praising Him who bade the waters pour
Their whelming floods around them, and yet spare
The cherish'd few whom he had made his care,
And shielded with his love. And thus they grew,
Peaceful and calm, and hymns rose on the air
In grateful joyfulness; for then they knew
That all that scathe had pass'd forever from their view.
THE BATTLE FIELD.
THE last fading sunbeam has sunk in the ocean,
And darkness has shrouded the forest and hill;
The scenes that late rang with the battle's commotion,
Now sleep 'neath the moonbeams serenely and still;
Yet light misty vapours above them still hover,
And dimly the pale beaming crescent discover,
Though all the stern clangour of conflict is over,
And hush'd the wild trump-note that echoed so shrill.
Around me the steed and the rider are lying,
To wake at the bugle's loud summons no moreAnd here is the banner that o'er them was flying,
Torn, trampled, and sullied, with earth and with gore. With morn-where the conflict the wildest was roaring, Where sabres were clashing, and death-shot were pouring, That banner was proudest and loftiest soaring
Now, standard and bearer alike are no more!
All hush'd! not a breathing of life from the numbers
That scatter'd around me so heavily sleep,-
Hath the cup of red wine lent its fumes to their slumbers,
And stain'd their bright garments with crimson so deep?
Ah no! these are not like gay revellers sleeping,
The night-winds, unfelt, o'er their bosoms are creeping,
Ignobly their plumes o'er the damp ground are creeping,
And dews, all uncared for, their bright falchions steep.
Bright are they? at morning they were-ay, at morning,
Yon forms were proud warriors, with hearts beating high,
The smiles of stern valour their lips were adorning,
And triumph flash'd out from the glance of their eye!
But now-sadly alter'd, the evening hath found them,
They care not for conquest, disgrace cannot wound them,
Distinct but in name, from the earth spread around them,
Beside their red broad-swords, unconscious, they lie.
How still is the scene! save when dismally whooping,
The night-bird afar hails the gathering gloom;
Or a heavy sound tells that their comrades are scooping
A couch, where the sleepers may rest in the tomb.
Alas! ere yon planet again shall be lighted,
What hearts shall be broken, what hopes will be blighted,
How many, 'midst sorrow's dark storm-clouds benighted,
Shall envy, e'en while they lament, for their doom.
Oh war! when thou 'rt clothed in the garments of glory, When Freedom has lighted thy torch at her shrine And proudly thy deeds are emblazon'd in story,
We think not, we feel not, what horrors are thine. But oh! when the victors and vanquish'd have parted, When lonely we stand on the war-ground deserted, And think on the dead, and on those broken-hearted, Thy blood-sprinkled laurel-wreath ceases to shine.
THE moon hath risen o'er the silent height
Of the blue vaulted heaven-and each star
Is faintly glimmering in its silver light,
That dimly shows the mountain-tops afar,
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