# The Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier/The Bridal of Pennacook

THE BRIDAL OF PENNACOOK
Winnepurkit, otherwise called George, Sachem of Sangus, married a daughter of Passaconaway, the great Pennacook chieftain, in 1662. The wedding took place at Pennacook (now Concord, N. H.), and the ceremonies closed with a great feast. According to the usages of the chiefs, Passaconaway ordered a select number of his men to accompany the newly married couple to the dwelling of the husband, where in turn there was another great feast. Some time after, the wife of Winnepurkit expressing a desire to visit her father’s house was permitted to go, accompanied by a brave escort of her husband’s chief men. But when she wished to return, her father sent a messenger to Saugus, informing her husband, and asking him to come and take her away. He returned for answer that he had escorted his wife to her father’s house in a style that became a chief, and that now if she wished to return, her father must send her back, in the same way. This Passaconaway refused to do, and it is said that here terminated the connection of his daughter with the Saugus chief.—Vide Morton’s New Canaan.
We had been wandering for many days Through the rough northern country. We had seen The sunset, with its bars of purple cloud, Like a new heaven, shine upward from the lake Of Winnepiseogee; and had felt The sunrise breezes, midst the leafy isles Which stoop their summer beauty to the lips Of the bright waters. We had checked our steeds, Silent with wonder, where the mountain wall Is piled to heaven; and, through the narrow rift Of the vast rocks, against whose rugged feet Beats the mad torrent with perpetual roar, Where noonday is as twilight, and the wind Comes burdened with the everlasting moan Of forests and of far-off waterfalls, We had looked upward where the summer sky, Tasselled with clouds light-woven by the sun, Sprung its blue arch above the abutting crags O’er-roofing the vast portal of the land Beyond the wall of mountains. We had passed The high source of the Saco; and bewildered In the dwarf spruce-belts of the Crystal Hills, Had heard above us, like a voice in the cloud, The horn of Fabyan sounding; and atop Of old Agioochook had seen the mountains Piled to the northward, shagged with wood, and thick As meadow mole-hills,—the far sea of Casco, A white gleam on the horizon of the east; Fair lakes, embosomed in the woods and hills; Moosehillock’s mountain range, and Kearsarge Lifting his granite forehead to the sun!
And we had rested underneath the oaks Shadowing the bank, whose grassy spires are shaken By the perpetual beating of the falls Of the wild Ammonoosuc. We had tracked The winding Pemigewasset, overhung By beechen shadows, whitening down its rocks, Or lazily gliding through its intervals, From waving rye-fields sending up the gleam Of sunlit waters. We had seen the moon Rising behind Umbagog’s eastern pines, Like a great Indian camp-fire; and its beams
At midnight spanning with a bridge of silver The Merrimac by Uncanoonuc’s falls.
There were five souls of us whom travel’s chance Had thrown together in these wild north hills: A city lawyer, for a month escaping From his dull office, where the weary eye Saw only hot brick walls and close thronged streets; Briefless as yet, but with an eye to see Life’s sunniest side, and with a heart to take Its chances all as godsends; and his brother, Pale from long pulpit studies, yet retaining The warmth and freshness of a genial heart, Whose mirror of the beautiful and true, In Man and Nature, was as yet undimmed By dust of theologic strife, or breath Of sect, or cobwebs of scholastic lore; Like a clear crystal calm of water, taking The hue and image of o’erleaning flowers, Sweet human faces, white clouds of the noon, Slant starlight glimpses through the dewy leaves, And tenderest moonrise. ’T was, in truth, a study, To mark his spirit, alternating between A decent and professional gravity And an irreverent mirthfulness, which often Laughed in the face of his divinity, Plucked off the sacred ephod, quite unshrined The oracle, and for the pattern priest Left us the man. A shrewd, sagacious merchant, To whom the soiled sheet found in Crawford’s inn, Giving the latest news of city stocks And sales of cotton, had a deeper meaning Than the great presence of the awful mountains Glorified by the sunset; and his daughter, A delicate flower on whom had blown too long Those evil winds, which, sweeping from the ice And winnowing the fogs of Labrador, Shed their cold blight round Massachusetts Bay, With the same breath which stirs Spring’s opening leaves And lifts her half-formed flower-bell on its stem, Poisoning our seaside atmosphere.
Poisoning our seaside atmosphere. It chanced That as we turned upon our homeward way, A drear northeastern storm came howling up The valley of the Saco; and that girl Who had stood with us upon Mount Washington, Her brown locks ruffled by the wind which whirled In gusts around its sharp, cold pinnacle, Who had joined our gay trout-fishing in the streams Which lave that giant’s feet; whose laugh was heard Like a bird’s carol on the sunrise breeze Which swelled our sail amidst the lake’s green islands, Shrank from its harsh, chill breath, and visibly drooped Like a flower in the frost. So, in that quiet inn Which looks from Conway on the mountains piled Heavily against the horizon of the north, Like summer thunder-clouds, we made our home: And while the mist hung over dripping hills, And the cold wind-driven rain-drops all day long Beat their sad music upon roof and pane, We strove to cheer our gentle invalid.
The lawyer in the pauses of the storm Went angling down the Saco, and, returning, Recounted his adventures and mishaps; Gave us the history of his scaly clients, Mingling with ludicrous yet apt citations Of barbarous law Latin, passages From Izaak Walton’s Angler, sweet and fresh As the flower-skirted streams of Staffordshire, Where, under aged trees, the southwest wind Of soft June mornings fanned the thin, white hair Of the sage fisher. And, if truth be told, Our youthful candidate forsook his sermons,
His commentaries, articles and creeds, For the fair page of human loveliness, The missal of young hearts, whose sacred text Is music, its illumining, sweet smiles. He sang the songs she loved; and in his low, Deep, earnest voice, recited many a page Of poetry, the holiest, tenderest lines Of the sad bard of Olney, the sweet songs, Simple and beautiful as Truth and Nature, Of him whose whitened locks on Rydal Mount Are lifted yet by morning breezes blowing From the green hills, immortal in his lays. And for myself, obedient to her wish, I searched our landlord’s proffered library: A well-thumbed Bunyan, with its nice wood pictures Of scaly fiends and angels not unlike them; Watts’ unmelodious psalms; Astrology’s Last home, a musty pile of almanacs, And an old chronicle of border wars And Indian history. And, as I read A story of the marriage of the Chief Of Saugus to the dusky Weetamoo, Daughter of Passaconaway, who dwelt In the old time upon the Merrimac, Our fair one, in the playful exercise Of her prerogative,—the right divine Of youth and beauty,—bade us versify The legend, and with ready pencil sketched Its plan and outlines, laughingly assigning To each his part, and barring our excuses With absolute will. So, like the cavaliers Whose voices still are heard in the Romance Of silver-tongued Boccaccio, on the banks Of Arno, with soft tales of love beguiling The ear of languid beauty, plague-exiled From stately Florence, we rehearsed our rhymes To their fair auditor, and shared by turns Her kind approval and her playful censure.
It may be that these fragments owe alone To the fair setting of their circumstances,— The associations of time, scene, and audience,— Their place amid the pictures which fill up The chambers of my memory. Yet I trust That some, who sigh, while wandering in thought, Pilgrims of Romance o’er the olden world, That our broad land,—our sea-like lakes and mountains Piled to the clouds, our rivers overhung By forests which have known no other change For ages than the budding and the fall Of leaves, our valleys lovelier than those Which the old poets sang of,—should but figure On the apocryphal chart of speculation As pastures, wood-lots, mill-sites, with the privileges, Rights, and appurtenances, which make up A Yankee Paradise, unsung, unknown, To beautiful tradition; even their names, Whose melody yet lingers like the last Vibration of the red man’s requiem, Exchanged for syllables significant, Of cotton-mill and rail-car, will look kindly Upon this effort to call up the ghost Of our dim Past, and listen with pleased ear To the responses of the questioned Shade.
I. THE MERRIMAC
O child of that white-crested mountain whose springs Gush forth in the shade of the cliff-eagle’s wings, Down whose slopes to the lowlands thy wild waters shine, Leaping gray walls of rock, flashing through the dwarf pine;
From that cloud-curtained cradle so cold and so lone, From the arms of that wintry-locked mother of stone, By hills hung with forests, through vales wide and free, Thy mountain-born brightness glanced down to the sea!
No bridge arched thy waters save that where the trees Stretched their long arms above thee and kissed in the breeze: No sound save the lapse of the waves on thy shores, The plunging of otters, the light dip of oars.
Green-tufted, oak-shaded, by Amoskeag’s fall Thy twin Uncanoonucs rose stately and tall,
Thy Nashua meadows lay green and unshorn, And the hills of Pentucket were tasselled with corn.
But thy Pennacook valley was fairer than these, And greener its grasses and taller its trees, Ere the sound of an axe in the forest had rung, Or the mower his scythe in the meadows had swung.
In their sheltered repose looking out from the wood The bark-builded wigwams of Pennacook stood; There glided the corn-dance, the council-fire shone, And against the red war-post the hatchet was thrown.
There the old smoked in silence their pipes, and the young To the pike and the white-perch their baited lines flung; There the boy shaped his arrows, and there the shy maid Wove her many-hued baskets and bright wampum braid.
O Stream of the Mountains! if answers of thine Could rise from thy waters to question of mine, Methinks through the din of thy thronged banks a moan Of sorrow would swell for the days which have gone.
Nor for thee the dull jar of the loom and the wheel, The gliding of shuttles, the ringing of steel; But that old voice of waters, of bird and of breeze, The dip of the wild-fowl, the rustling of trees!
II. THE BASHABA
Lift we the twilight curtains of the Past, And, turning from familiar sight and sound, Sadly and full of reverence let us cast A glance upon Tradition’s shadowy ground, Led by the few pale lights which, glimmering round That dim, strange land of Eld, seem dying fast; And that which history gives not to the eye, The faded coloring of Time’s tapestry, Let Fancy, with her dream-dipped brush, supply.
Roof of bark and walls of pine, Through whose chinks the sunbeams shine, Tracing many a golden line On the ample floor within; Where, upon the earth-floor stark, Lay the gaudy mats of bark, With the bear’s hide, rough and dark, And the red-deer’s skin.
Window-tracery, small and slight, Woven of the willow white, Lent a dimly checkered light; And the night-stars glimmered down, Where the lodge-fire’s heavy smoke, Slowly through an opening broke, In the low roof, ribbed with oak, Sheathed with hemlock brown.
Gloomed behind the changeless shade By the solemn pine-wood made; Through the rugged palisade, In the open foreground planted, Glimpses came of rowers rowing, Stir of leaves and wild-flowers blowing, Steel-like gleams of water flowing, In the sunlight slanted.
Here the mighty Bashaba Held his long-unquestioned sway, From the White Hills, far away, To the great sea’s sounding shore; Chief of chiefs, his regal word All the river Sachems heard, At his call the war-dance stirred, Or was still once more.
There his spoils of chase and war, Jaw of wolf and black bear’s paw, Panther’s skin and eagle’s claw, Lay beside his axe and bow; And, adown the roof-pole hung, Loosely on a snake-skin strung,
In the smoke his scalp-locks swung Grimly to and fro.
Nightly down the river going, Swifter was the hunter’s rowing, When he saw that lodge-fire glowing O’er the waters still and red; And the squaw’s dark eye burned brighter, And she drew her blanket tighter, As, with quicker step and lighter, From that door she fled.
For that chief had magic skill, And a Panisee’s dark will, Over powers of good and ill, Powers which bless and powers which ban; Wizard lord of Pennacook, Chiefs upon their war-path shook, When they met the steady look Of that wise dark man.
Tales of him the gray squaw told, When the winter night-wind cold Pierced her blanket’s thickest fold, And her fire burned low and small, Till the very child abed, Drew its bear-skin over head, Shrinking from the pale lights shed On the trembling wall.
All the subtle spirits hiding Under earth or wave, abiding In the caverned rock, or riding Misty clouds or morning breeze; Every dark intelligence, Secret soul, and influence Of all things which outward sense Feels, or hears, or sees,—
These the wizard’s skill confessed, At his bidding banned or blessed, Stormful woke or lulled to rest Wind and cloud, and fire and flood; Burned for him the drifted snow, Bade through ice fresh lilies blow, And the leaves of summer grow Over winter’s wood!
Not untrue that tale of old! Now, as then, the wise and bold All the powers of Nature hold Subject to their kingly will; From the wondering crowds ashore, Treading life’s wild waters o’er, As upon a marble floor, Moves the strong man still.
Still, to such, life’s elements With their sterner laws dispense, And the chain of consequence Broken in their pathway lies; Time and change their vassals making, Flowers from icy pillows waking, Tresses of the sunrise shaking Over midnight skies.
Still, to th’ earnest soul, the sun Rests on towered Gibeon, And the moon of Ajalon Lights the battle-grounds of life; To his aid the strong reverses Hidden powers and giant forces, And the high stars, in their courses, Mingle in his strife!
III. THE DAUGHTER
The soot-black brows of men, the yell Of women thronging round the bed, The tinkling charm of ring and shell, The Powah whispering o’er the dead! All these the Sachem’s home had known, When, on her journey long and wild To the dim World of Souls, alone, In her young beauty passed the mother of his child.
Three bow-shots from the Sachem’s dwelling They laid her in the walnut shade, Where a green hillock gently swelling Her fitting mound of burial made. There trailed the vine in summer hours, The tree-perched squirrel dropped his shell,— On velvet moss and pale-hued flowers, Woven with leaf and spray, the softened sunshine fell!
The Indian’s heart is hard and cold, It closes darkly o’er its care, And formed in Nature’s sternest mould, Is slow to feel, and strong to bear. The war-paint on the Sachem’s face, Unwet with tears, shone fierce and red, And still, in battle or in chase, Dry leaf and snow-rime crisped beneath his foremost tread.
Yet when her name was heard no more, And when the robe her mother gave, And small, light moccasin she wore, Had slowly wasted on her grave, Unmarked of him the dark maids sped Their sunset dance and moonlit play; No other shared his lonely bed, No other fair young head upon his bosom lay.
A lone, stern man. Yet, as sometimes The tempest-smitten tree receives From one small root the sap which climbs Its topmost spray and crowning leaves, So from his child the Sachem drew A life of Love and Hope, and felt His cold and rugged nature through The softness and the warmth of her young being melt.
A laugh which in the woodland rang Bemocking April’s gladdest bird,— A light and graceful form which sprang To meet him when his step was heard,— Eyes by his lodge-fire flashing dark, Small fingers stringing bead and shell Or weaving mats of bright-hued bark,— With these the household-god had graced his wigwam well.
Child of the forest! strong and free, Slight-robed, with loosely flowing hair, She swam the lake or climbed the tree, Or struck the flying bird in air. O’er the heaped drifts of winter’s moon Her snow-shoes tracked the hunter’s way; And dazzling in the summer noon The blade of her light oar threw off its shower of spray!
Unknown to her the rigid rule, The dull restraint, the chiding frown, The weary torture of the school, The taming of wild nature down. Her only lore, the legends told Around the hunter’s fire at night; Stars rose and set, and seasons rolled, Flowers bloomed and snow-flakes fell, unquestioned in her sight.
Unknown to her the subtle skill With which the artist-eye can trace In rock and tree and lake and hill The outlines of divinest grace; Unknown the fine soul’s keen unrest, Which sees, admires, yet yearns alway; Too closely on her mother’s breast To note her smiles of love the child of Nature lay!
It is enough for such to be Of common, natural things a part, To feel, with bird and stream and tree, The pulses of the same great heart; But we, from Nature long exiled, In our cold homes of Art and Thought Grieve like the stranger-tended child, Which seeks its mother’s arms, and sees but feels them not.
The garden rose may richly bloom In cultured soil and genial air, To cloud the light of Fashion’s room Or droop in Beauty’s midnight hair; In lonelier grace, to sun and dew The sweetbrier on the hillside shows Its single leaf and fainter hue, Untrained and wildly free, yet still a sister rose!
Thus o’er the heart of Weetamoo Their mingling shades of joy and ill The instincts of her nature threw; The savage was a woman still. Midst outlines dim of maiden schemes, Heart-colored prophecies of life, Rose on the ground of her young dreams The light of a new home, the lover and the wife.
IV. THE WEDDING
Cool and dark fell the autumn night, But the Bashaba’s wigwam glowed with light, For down from its roof, by green withes hung, Flaring and smoking the pine-knots swung.
And along the river great wood-fires Shot into the night their long, red spires, Showing behind the tall, dark wood, Flashing before on the sweeping flood.
In the changeful wind, with shimmer and shade, Now high, now low, that firelight played,
On tree-leaves wet with evening dews, On gliding water and still canoes.
The trapper that night on Turee’s brook, And the weary fisher on Contoocook, Saw over the marshes, and through the pine, And down on the river, the dance-lights shine.
For the Sangus Sachem had come to woo The Bashaba’s daughter Weetamoo, And laid at her father’s feet that night His softest furs and wampum white.
From the Crystal Hills to the far southeast The river Sagamores came to the feast; And chiefs whose homes the sea-winds shook Sat down on the mats of Pennacook.
They came from Sunapee’s shore of rock, From the snowy sources of Snooganock, And from rough Coös whose thick woods shake Their pine-cones in Umbagog Lake.
From Ammonoosuc’s mountain pass, Wild as his home, came Chepewass; And the Keenomps of the hills which throw Their shade on the Smile of Manito.
With pipes of peace and bows unstrung, Glowing with paint came old and young, In wampum and furs and feathers arrayed, To the dance and feast the Bashaba made.
Bird of the air and beast of the field, All which the woods and the waters yield, On dishes of birch and hemlock piled, Garnished and graced that banquet wild.
Steaks of the brown bear fat and large From the rocky slopes of the Kearsarge; Delicate trout from Babboosuck brook, And salmon speared in the Contoocook;
Squirrels which fed where nuts fell thick In the gravelly bed of the Otternic; And small wild-hens in reed-snares caught From the banks of Sondagardee brought;
Pike and perch from the Suncook taken, Nuts from the trees of the Black Hills shaken, Cranberries picked in the Squamscot bog, And grapes from the vines of Piscataquog:
And, drawn from that great stone vase which stands In the river scooped by a spirit’s hands, Garnished with spoons of shell and horn, Stood the birchen dishes of smoking corn.
Thus bird of the air and beast of the field, All which the woods and the waters yield, Furnished in that olden day The bridal feast of the Bashaba.
And merrily when that feast was done On the fire-lit green the dance begun, With squaws’ shrill stave, and deeper hum Of old men beating the Indian drum.
Painted and plumed, with scalp-locks flowing, And red arms tossing and black eyes glowing, Now in the light and now in the shade Around the fires the dancers played.
The step was quicker, the song more shrill, And the beat of the small drums louder still Whenever within the circle drew The Saugus Sachem and Weetamoo.
The moons of forty winters had shed Their snow upon that chieftain’s head, And toil and care and battle’s chance Had seamed his hard, dark countenance.
A fawn beside the bison grim,— Why turns the bride’s fond eye on him, In whose cold look is naught beside The triumph of a sullen pride?
Ask why the graceful grape entwines The rough oak with her arm of vines; And why the gray rock’s rugged cheek The soft lips of the mosses seek:
Why, with wise instinct, Nature seems To harmonize her wide extremes, Linking the stronger with the weak, The haughty with the soft and meek!
V. THE NEW HOME
A wild and broken landscape, spiked with firs, Roughening the bleak horizon’s northern edge;
Steep, cavernous hillsides, where black hemlock spurs And sharp, gray splinters of the wind-swept ledge Pierced the thin-glazed ice, or bristling rose, Where the cold rim of the sky sunk down upon the snows.
And eastward cold, wide marshes stretched away, Dull, dreary flats without a bush or tree, O’er-crossed by icy creeks, where twice a day Gurgled the waters of the moon-struck sea; And faint with distance came the stifled roar, The melancholy lapse of waves on that low shore.
No cheerful village with its mingling smokes, No laugh of children wrestling in the snow, No camp-fire blazing through the hillside oaks, No fishers kneeling on the ice below; Yet midst all desolate things of sound and view, Through the long winter moons smiled dark-eyed Weetamoo.
Her heart had found a home; and freshly all Its beautiful affections overgrew Their rugged prop. As o’er some granite wall Soft vine-leaves open to the moistening dew And warm bright sun, the love of that young wife Found on a hard cold breast the dew and warmth of life.
The steep, bleak hills, the melancholy shore, The long, dead level of the marsh between, A coloring of unreal beauty wore Through the soft golden mist of young love seen. For o’er those hills and from that dreary plain, Nightly she welcomed home her hunter chief again.
No warmth of heart, no passionate burst of feeling Repaid her welcoming smile and parting kiss, No fond and playful dalliance half concealing, Under the guise of mirth, its tenderness; But, in their stead, the warrior’s settled pride, And vanity’s pleased smile with homage satisfied.
Enough for Weetamoo, that she alone Sat on his mat and slumbered at his side; That he whose fame to her young ear had flown Now looked upon her proudly as his bride; That he whose name the Mohawk trembling heard Vouchsafed to her at times a kindly look or word.
For she had learned the maxims of her race, Which teach the woman to become a slave, And feel herself the pardonless disgrace Of love’s fond weakness in the wise and brave,— The scandal and the shame which they incur, Who give to woman all which man requires of her.
So passed the winter moons. The sun at last Broke link by link the frost chain of the rills, And the warm breathings of the southwest passed Over the hoar rime of the Saugus hills; The gray and desolate marsh grew green once more, And the birch-tree’s tremulous shade fell round the Sachem’s door.
Then from far Pennacook swift runners came, With gift and greeting for the Saugus chief; Beseeching him in the great Sachem’s name, That, with the coming of the flower and leaf,
The song of birds, the warm breeze and the rain, Young Weetamoo might greet her lonely sire again.
And Winnepurkit called his chiefs together, And a grave council in his wigwam met, Solemn and brief in words, considering whether The rigid rules of forest etiquette Permitted Weetamoo once more to look Upon her father’s face and green-banked Pennacook.
With interludes of pipe-smoke and strong water, The forest sages pondered, and at length Concluded in a body to escort her Up to her father’s home of pride and strength. Impressing thus on Pennacook a sense Of Winnepurkit’s power and regal consequence.
So through old woods which Aukeetamit’s hand A soft and many-shaded greenness lent, Over high breezy hills, and meadow land Yellow with flowers, the wild procession went, Till, rolling down its wooded banks between, A broad, clear, mountain stream, the Merrimac was seen.
The hunter leaning on his bow undrawn, The fisher lounging on the pebbled shores, Squaws in the clearing dropping the seed-corn, Young children peering through the wigwam doors, Saw with delight, surrounded by her train Of painted Saugus braves, their Weetamoo again.
VI. AT PENNACOOK
The hills are dearest which our childish feet Have climbed the earliest; and the streams most sweet Are ever those at which our young lips drank Stooped to their waters o’er the grassy bank.
Midst the cold dreary sea-watch, Home’s hearth-light Shines round the helmsman plunging through the night; And still, with inward eye, the traveller sees In close, dark, stranger streets his native trees.
The home-sick dreamer’s brow is nightly fanned By breezes whispering of his native land, And on the stranger’s dim and dying eye The soft, sweet pictures of his childhood lie.
Joy then for Weetamoo, to sit once more A child upon her father’s wigwam floor! Once more with her old fondness to beguile From his cold eye the strange light of a smile.
The long, bright days of summer swiftly passed, The dry leaves whirled in autumn’s rising blast, And evening cloud and whitening sunrise rime Told of the coming of the winter-time.
But vainly looked, the while, young Weetamoo Down the dark river for her chief’s canoe; No dusky messenger from Saugus brought The grateful tidings which the young wife sought.
At length a runner from her father sent, To Winnepurkit’s sea-cooled wigwam went; “Eagle of Saugus,—in the woods the dove Mourns for the shelter of thy wings of love.”
But the dark chief of Saugus turned aside In the grim anger of hard-hearted pride; “I bore her as became a chieftain’s daughter, Up to her home beside the gliding water.
“If now no more a mat for her is found Of all which line her father’s wigwam round, Let Pennacook call out his warrior train, And send her back with wampum gifts again.”
The baffled runner turned upon his track, Bearing the words of Winnepurkit back. “Dog of the Marsh,” cried Pennacook, “no more Shall child of mine sit on his wigwam floor.
“Go, let him seek some meaner squaw to spread The stolen bear-skin of his beggar’s bed; Son of a fish-hawk! let him dig his clams For some vile daughter of the Agawams,
“Or coward Nipmucks! may his scalp dry black In Mohawk smoke, before I send her back.” He shook his clenched hand towards the ocean wave, While hoarse assent his listening council gave.
Alas, poor bride! can thy grim sire impart His iron hardness to thy woman’s heart? Or cold self-torturing pride like his atone For love denied and life’s warm beauty flown?
On Autumn’s gray and mournful grave the snow Hung its white wreaths; with stifled voice and low The river crept, by one vast bridge o’er-crossed, Built by the hoar-locked artisan of Frost.
And many a moon in beauty newly born Pierced the red sunset with her silver horn, Or, from the east, across her azure field Rolled the wide brightness of her full-orbed shield.
Yet Winnepurkit came not,—on the mat Of the scorned wife her dusky rival sat; And he, the while, in Western woods afar, Urged the long chase, or trod the path of war.
Dry up thy tears, young daughter of a chief! Waste not on him the sacredness of grief; Be the fierce spirit of thy sire thine own, His lips of scorning, and his heart of stone.
What heeds the warrior of a hundred fights, The storm-worn watcher through long hunting nights, Cold, crafty, proud of woman’s weak distress, Her home-bound grief and pining loneliness?
VII. THE DEPARTURE
The wild March rains had fallen fast and long The snowy mountains of the North among, Making each vale a watercourse, each hill Bright with the cascade of some new-made rill.
Gnawed by the sunbeams, softened by the rain, Heaved underneath by the swollen current’s strain, The ice-bridge yielded, and the Merrimac Bore the huge ruin crashing down its track.
On that strong turbid water, a small boat Guided by one weak hand was seen to float; Evil the fate which loosed it from the shore, Too early voyager with too frail an oar!
Down the vexed centre of that rushing tide, The thick, huge ice-blocks threatening either side, The foam-white rocks of Amoskeag in view, With arrowy swiftness sped that light canoe.
The trapper, moistening his moose’s meat On the wet bank by Uncanoonuc’s feet, Saw the swift boat flash down the troubled stream; Slept he, or waked he? was it truth or dream?
The straining eye bent fearfully before, The small hand clenching on the useless oar, The bead-wrought blanket trailing o’er the water— He knew them all—woe for the Sachem’s daughter!
Sick and aweary of her lonely life, Heedless of peril, the still faithful wife Had left her mother’s grave, her father’s door, To seek the wigwam of her chief once more.
Down the white rapids like a sear leaf whirled,
On the sharp rocks and piled-up ices hurled, Empty and broken, circled the canoe In the vexed pool below—but where was Weetamoo?
VIII. SONG OF INDIAN WOMEN
The Dark eye has left us, The Spring-bird has flown; On the pathway of spirits She wanders alone. The song of the wood-dove has died on our shore: Mat wonck kunna-monee! We hear it no more!
O dark water Spirit! We cast on thy wave These furs which may never Hang over her grave; Bear down to the lost one the robes that she wore: Mat wonck kunna-monee! We see her no more!
Of the strange land she walks in No Powah has told: It may burn with the sunshine, Or freeze with the cold. Let us give to our lost one the robes that she wore: Mat wonck kunna-monee! We see her no more!
The path she is treading Shall soon be our own; Each gliding in shadow Unseen and alone! In vain shall we call on the souls gone before: Mat wonck kunna-monee! They hear us no more!
O mighty Sowanna! Thy gateways unfold, From thy wigwam of sunset Lift curtains of gold! Take home the poor Spirit whose journey is o’er: Mat wonck kunna-monee! We see her no more!
So sang the Children of the Leaves beside The broad, dark river’s coldly flowing tide; Now low, now harsh, with sob-like pause and swell, On the high wind their voices rose and fell. Nature’s wild music,—sounds of wind-swept trees, The scream of birds, the wailing of the breeze, The roar of waters, steady, deep, and strong,— Mingled and murmured in that farewell song.