The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1871-09-28

FROM the tales OF Wilke and Carlton"
Should you ask me where I found them,
Found these legends and traditions,
[ should answer should tell you:
Never in the beaver lodges,
Never liz the forest BIRDS nests,
Never in the eagles eyrie,
Never IN the bisons footprints;
Neither did the wild fowl sing them
Plover duck, nor prairie chicken,
Swan, nor goose, nor hawk, nor pigeon,
In the moorlands, in the Park.lands.'
In the Paradise of Eden
But they felt an Inspiration
Their imagination moving,
Therefore wrote they as directed
Wrote they as the spirit moved them
OF the green and silent valleys,
of the pleasant water-courses,
Ofthe climate quite perfection,
OF the never failing cOrnfelds.
We begin to understand them;
We who lack the Inspiration
May not see the golden vistas
OF the clouds with silver lining
Still, it is glorious country
Glorious in its lakes and rivers
Glorious in It's woods and prairies !
Glorious in its golden harvests!
Glorious in its men a. d women
Promising future glory.
Happy land of the Dakotas!
Happy land Of the Ojibways!
Happy land of Hiawatha !
Now I've answered, now I've told you
Told the E1gle In its eyre
Why I wander in Dakota,
What / think of Minnesota.
What think Of the great Northland-
Land so famed for big mosquitoes
And the North Pacific Railroad;
Think the chase is wild goose-Wah Wah
When / look tor the romantic.
Shall tell you Of the Indians
Tell you otsthe noble () Red Man?"
I'm not Fellow very leughthy-
Never wrote a "Hiawatha"-
Never called the Prince of poets
Never eaten yet by Laura. Poet Laureate.
Still, I've seen the Minnehaha,
notwithstanding Wat"r-
And surpass that other fellow
When he wrote his q" HiaWatha."
And I've been among the Red Men.
Seen them daily in their Wigwams,
Sten them gaming, sporting, fishing,
Seen the men who lived among them.
Heard them tell their frightful stories
Stories of these thieves and traitors,
OF their malice, hate and envy;
Drunken, dissipated wretches
STEPPED in vice, and full of vermin J
Filthy, lazy, cruel, bloody
Unrestrained by laws most wholesome,
Is the verdict that is given
By the men Who've lived among them
Men OF every creed and party
All say " distance lends enchantment,"
hCGp the IuOuEIeTS very ulSLduGs
Poets take poetic license,
Plume the wing imagination,
Soar into the realms Of fancy,
ThSn they make, with ink aud paper,
Her0ts, like our paper Cities"
Only vound upon the paper,
Solely made for speculation.
Mid the curling smoke of wigwams,
Mid the fl III scales and the otfal,
Lo the maidens there are squatting,
Seeking animated something's"
Finding them among the tresses,
Raven tresses. tangled tresses
Thick as blackbirds in the cCrnfields,
Thick a. locusts in their season,
Thick as crows around a carcass
Hark the cracking now commences,
Not of rifes-game is plenty,
Quite too plenty, l should fancy.
Here you see your "Minnehaha,"
" Notwithstanding water"
AS she is, and true to nature
On behold her She needs water.
Yonder see them making sugar
Maple sugar in the forrest;
Packing it in birchen baskets,
Sweeter than the sweetest nectar
Sweet as lips of Minnehaha,
When she kissed her Hiawatha--
Sweet o sweet, beyond expression
But I'd like to see them make it,
See them boil it, see them strain it.
Well, behold them they are at it;
Now they spread their Indian blanket
Dirty, greasy, full of vermin
See them strain the syrup through it;
Here's your nectar, poet, sip it.
Made for you by Z" Minnehaha,"
She, the arrow makers daughter,
In the land of the Dakotas,
In the land of Minneope, - 81
In the land of Okabena, 4l3sh
In the land of Hiawatha,
Makes this nectar for the poets, .
Sweet enough for gods to feed on.
Take 1t, poets, if you like it;
I'd prefer different StrGtneT
"a prefer it rather cleaner.
u, thus the Red Man." stripped OF romance,
Dirty as the swine that wallows.
This I've seen in Minnesota.
In the land of the Oiibwas.
In the land of Hiawstha.
In the land of Minnehaha.
g Notwithstanding water.'
Minneapolis, MIMI. July IT, 1871.