One only prayer I dare to make, As onward thus my course I take;-- Oh, be my falls as bright as thine!
May heaven"s relenting rainbow shine Upon the mist that circles me, As soft as now it hangs o"er thee!
[1] There is a dreary and savage character in the country immediately about these Falls, which is much more in harmony with the wildness of such a scene than the cultivated lands in the neighborhood of Niagara.
SONG OF THE EVIL SPIRIT OF THE WOODS.[1]
_qua via difficilis, quaque est via nulla_ OVID _Metam. lib_ iii. v. 227.
Now the vapor, hot and damp, Shed by day"s expiring lamp, Through the misty ether spreads Every ill the white man dreads; Fiery fever"s thirsty thrill, Fitful ague"s shivering chill!
Hark! I hear the traveller"s song, As he winds the woods along;-- Christian, "tis the song of fear; Wolves are round thee, night is near, And the wild thou dar"st to roam-- Think, "twas once the Indian"s home![2]
Hither, sprites, who love to harm, Wheresoe"er you work your charm, By the creeks, or by the brakes, Where the pale witch feeds her snakes, And the cayman[3] loves to creep, Torpid, to his wintry sleep: Where the bird of carrion flits, And the shuddering murderer sits,[4]
Lone beneath a roof of blood; While upon his poisoned food, From the corpse of him he slew Drops the chill and gory dew.
Hither bend ye, turn ye hither, Eyes that blast and wings that wither Cross the wandering Christian"s way, Lead him, ere the glimpse of day, Many a mile of maddening error Through the maze of night and terror, Till the morn behold him lying On the damp earth, pale and dying.
Mock him, when his eager sight Seeks the cordial cottage-light; Gleam then, like the lightning-bug, Tempt him to the den that"s dug For the foul and famished brood Of the she wolf, gaunt for blood; Or, unto the dangerous pa.s.s O"er the deep and dark mora.s.s, Where the trembling Indian brings Belts of porcelain, pipes, and rings, Tributes, to be hung in air, To the Fiend presiding there![5]
Then, when night"s long labor past, Wildered, faint, he falls at last, Sinking where the causeway"s edge Moulders in the slimy sedge, There let every noxious thing Trail its filth and fix its sting; Let the bull-toad taint him over, Round him let mosquitoes hover, In his ears and eyeb.a.l.l.s tingling, With his blood their poison mingling, Till, beneath the solar fires, Rankling all, the wretch expires!
[1] The idea of this poem occurred to me in pa.s.sing through the very dreary wilderness between Batavia, a new settlement in the midst of the woods, and the little village of Buffalo upon Lake Erie. This is the most fatiguing part of the route, in travelling through the Genesee country to Niagara.
[2] "The Five Confederated Nations (of Indians) were settled along the banks of the Susquehannah and the adjacent country, until the year 1779, when General Sullivan, with an army of 4000 men drove them from their country to Niagara, where, being obliged to live on salted provisions, to which they were unaccustomed, great numbers of them died. Two hundred of them, it is said, were buried in one grave, where they had encamped."-- _Morse"s American Geography_.
[3] The alligator, who is supposed to lie in a torpid state all the winter, in the bank of some creek or pond, having previously swallowed a large number of pine-knots, which are his only sustenance during the time.
[4] This was the mode of punishment for murder (as Charlevoix tells us) among the Hurons. "They laid the dead body upon poles at the top of a cabin, and the murderer was obliged to remain several days together, and to receive all that dropped from the carca.s.s, not only on himself but on his food."
[5] "We find also collars of porcelain, tobacco, ears of maize, skins, etc., by the side of difficult and dangerous ways, on rocks, or by the side of the falls; and these are so many offerings made to the spirits which preside in these places."--See _Charlevoix"s Letter on the Traditions and the Religion of the Savages of Canada_.
Father Hennepin too mentions this ceremony; he also says, "We took notice of one barbarian, who made a kind of sacrifice upon an oak at the Cascade of St. Anthony of Padua upon the river Mississippi."--See _Hennepin"s Voyage into North America_.
TO THE HONORABLE W. R. SPENCER.
FROM BUFFALO, UPON LAKE ERIE.
_nec venit ad duros musa vocata Getas_.
OVID. _ex Ponto, lib. 1. ep. 5_.
Thou oft hast told me of the happy hours Enjoyed by thee in fair Italia"s bowers, Where, lingering yet, the ghost of ancient wit Midst modern monks profanely dares to flit.
And pagan spirits, by the Pope unlaid, Haunt every stream and sing through every shade.
There still the bard who (if his numbers be His tongue"s light echo) must have talked like thee,-- The courtly bard, from whom thy mind has caught Those playful, sunshine holidays of thought, In which the spirit baskingly reclines, Bright without effort, resting while it shines,-- There still he roves, and laughing loves to see How modern priests with ancient rakes agree: How, "neath the cowl, the festal garland shines, And Love still finds a niche in Christian shrines.
There still, too, roam those other souls of song, With whom thy spirit hath communed so long, That, quick as light, their rarest gems of thought, By Memory"s magic to thy lip are brought.
But here, alas! by Erie"s stormy lake, As, far from such bright haunts my course I take, No proud remembrance o"er the fancy plays, No cla.s.sic dream, no star of other days Hath left that visionary light behind, That lingering radiance of immortal mind, Which gilds and hallows even the rudest scene, The humblest shed, where Genius once has been!
All that creation"s varying ma.s.s a.s.sumes Of grand or lovely, here aspires and blooms; Bold rise the mountains, rich the gardens glow, Bright lakes expand, and conquering[1] rivers flow; But mind, immortal mind, without whose ray, This world"s a wilderness and man but clay, Mind, mind alone, in barren, still repose, Nor blooms, nor rises, nor expands, nor flows.
Take Christians, Mohawks, democrats, and all From the rude wigwam to the congress-hall, From man the savage, whether slaved or free, To man the civilized, less tame than he,-- "Tis one dull chaos, one unfertile strife Betwixt half-polished and half-barbarous life; Where every ill the ancient world could brew Is mixt with every grossness of the new; Where all corrupts, though little can entice, And naught is known of luxury but its vice!
Is this the region then, is this the clime For soaring fancies? for those dreams sublime, Which all their miracles of light reveal To heads that meditate and hearts that feel?
Alas! not so--the Muse of Nature lights Her glories round; she scales the mountain heights, And roams the forests; every wondrous spot Burns with her step, yet man regards it not.
She whispers round, her words are in the air, But lost, unheard, they linger freezing there,[2]
Without one breath of soul, divinely strong, One ray of mind to thaw them into song.
Yet, yet forgive me, oh ye sacred few, Whom late by Delaware"s green banks I knew; Whom, known and loved through many a social eve, "Twas bliss to live with, and "twas pain to leave.[3]
Not with more joy the lonely exile scanned The writing traced upon the desert"s sand, Where his lone heart but little hoped to find One trace of life, one stamp of human kind, Than did I hail the pure, the enlightened zeal, The strength to reason and the warmth to feel, The manly polish and the illumined taste, Which,--mid the melancholy, heartless waste My foot has traversed,--oh you sacred few!
I found by Delaware"s green banks with you.
Long may you loathe the Gallic dross that runs Through your fair country and corrupts its sons; Long love the arts, the glories which adorn Those fields of freedom, where your sires were born.
Oh! if America can yet be great, If neither chained by choice, nor doomed by fate To the mob-mania which imbrutes her now, She yet can raise the crowned, yet civic brow Of single majesty,--can add the grace Of Rank"s rich capital to Freedom"s base, Nor fear the mighty shaft will feebler prove For the fair ornament that flowers above;-- If yet released from all that pedant throng, So vain of error and so pledged to wrong, Who hourly teach her, like themselves, to hide Weakness in vaunt and barrenness in pride, She yet can rise, can wreathe the Attic charms Of soft refinement round the pomp of arms, And see her poets flash the fires of song, To light her warriors" thunderbolts along;-- It is to you, to souls that favoring heaven Has made like yours, the glorious task is given:-- Oh! but for _such_, Columbia"s days were done; Rank without ripeness, quickened without sun, Crude at the surface, rotten at the core, Her fruits would fall, before her spring were o"er.
Believe me, Spencer, while I winged the hours Where Schuylkill winds his way through banks of flowers, Though few the days, the happy evenings few; So warm with heart, so rich with mind they flew, That my charmed soul forgot its wish to roam, And rested there, as in a dream of home.
And looks I met, like looks I"d loved before, And voices too, which, as they trembled o"er The chord of memory, found full many a tone Of kindness there in concord with their own.
Yes,--we had nights of that communion free, That flow of heart, which I have known with thee So oft, so warmly; nights of mirth and mind,
Of whims that taught, and follies that refined.
When shall we both renew them? when, restored To the gay feast and intellectual board, Shall I once more enjoy with thee and thine Those whims that teach, those follies that refine?
Even now, as, wandering upon Erie"s sh.o.r.e, I hear Niagara"s distant cataract roar, I sigh for home,--alas! these weary feet Have many a mile to journey, ere we meet.
[1] This epithet was suggested by Charlevoix"s striking description of the confluence of the Missouri with the Mississippi.
[2] Alluding to the fanciful notion of "words congealed in northern air."
[3] In the society of Mr. Dennie and his friends, at Philadelphia, I pa.s.sed the few agreeable moments which my tour through the States afforded me. Mr. Dennie has succeeded in diffusing through this cultivated little circle that love for good literature and sound politics which he feels so zealously himself, and which is so very rarely the characteristic of his countrymen. They will not, I trust, accuse me of illiberality for the picture which I have given of the ignorance and corruption that surround them. If I did not hate, as I ought, the rabble to which they are opposed, I could not value, as I do, the spirit with which they defy it; and in learning from them what Americans _can be_, I but see with the more indignation what Americans _are_.
BALLAD STANZAS.