Lydia Sigourney

“ For Pocahontas, his dearest jewel and daughter, came through the irksome woods in that dark night, and told us that great cheer might be sent us by and by, but that the king, and all the power he could make, would afterwards come and kill us all. Therefore, if we would live, she wished us presently to be gone. Such things as she delighted in we would have given her, but, with tears running down her cheeks, she said she durst not be seen to have them, for, if Powhatan should know it, she were but dead. And so she ran away by herself, as she came."—Capt. Smith. ”

“ Mine own New England, for thy once loved wheel,
By sofa and piano quite displac'd.
Why dost thou banish from thy parlour-hearth
That old Hygeian harp, whose magic rul'd
Dyspepsia, as the minstrel-shepherd's skill
Exorcis'd Saul's ennui? There was no need,
In those good times, of trim callisthenics,
And there was less of gadding, and far more
Of home-born, heart-felt comfort, rooted strong
In industry, and bearing such rare fruit
As wealth might never purchase. ”

“ Do ye say she is poor, in this land of the free,
And that all her votaries are poor as she?
It may he so! it may be so!
Yet hath she a dowry most rich and proud,
A castle that floats on the crimson cloud,
Clear sunshine within, when the storm is loud,
And a shield of diamond to foil the foe.
Do ye say she is light in the world's esteem,—
Like a puff of air, or a fairy-dream?—
It may be so! it may be so!
Yet hath she an honour more high and dear,
From the burning lips of the heaven-taught seer,
From the harp of Zion that charm'd the ear ”

“ A new existence dawn'd on nature's fervent child.
xxxv.
⁠A throng is gathering; for the hallow'd dome,
⁠At evening tide, is rich with sparkling light,—
⁠And from its verdant bound each rural home
⁠Sends forth its blossom'd gifts, profusely bright;
⁠While here and there, amid the clustering flowers,
⁠Some stately chief or painted warrior towers,
⁠Hail'd as a brother, 'mid the festal rite:
⁠Peace waves her garland o'er the favour'd place
Where weds the new-born West with Europe's lordly race. ”

“ Nor blight her blossoms, and go towering up
In their cold stateliness, while on the earth
She sank to die.
⁠But thou, rejoicing bird,
Why pourest thou such a rich and mellow lay
On my dull ear; Poor bird! ”

“ To guard a nation's germ? Thine, thine, heroic maid!
xxiii.
⁠On sped the tardy seasons,—and the hate
⁠Of the pale strangers wrung the Indian breast.
⁠Their hoary prophet breath'd the ban of fate:—
⁠"Hence with the thunderers! Hide their race, unblest,
⁠Deep 'neath the soil they falsely call their own;
⁠For, from our fathers' graves, a hollow moan,
⁠Like the lash'd surge, bereaves my soul of rest.
⁠'They come! They come!' it cries. 'Ye once were brave:
Will ye resign the world that the Great Spirit gave?'"
xxiv. ”

“ And, while they make some silver cloud thy car,
Will whispering tell thee that the unslumbering soul
Wears immortality upon its crest,
And, by its very power to soar with them,
Proves that it cannot die. ”

“ To wreck the earth, shall find it deep inscrib'd
Upon thy rocky scroll.
⁠The lofty trees,
That list thy teachings, scorn the lighter lore
Of the too fitful winds; while their young leaves
Gather fresh greenness from thy living spray,
Yet tremble at the baptism. Lo! yon birds,
How bold they venture near, dipping their wing
In all thy mist and foam. ”

“ With what a flood of light
⁠She holds her revels in this sunny clime;—
⁠The flower-sown turf, like bossy velvet bright,
⁠The blossom'd trees exulting in their prime;
⁠The leaping streamlets in their joyous play,
⁠The birds that frolic 'mid the diamond spray,
⁠Or heavenward soar, with melody sublime:—
⁠What wild enchantment spreads a fairy wing,
As from their prisoning ships the enfranchis'd strangers spring. ”

“ Ah no! the scroll of time
Is sealed;—and hope sublime
Rests but on those far heights which mortals may not climb.
The dying prayer, with trembling fervour, speeds
For that false monarch by whose will she bleeds ”

“ Tinging, too scantly, these New England vales.
But lo! the sturdy farmer lifts his flail,
To crush thy bones unpitying, and his wife
With 'kerchief'd head, and eyes brimful of dust,
Thy fibrous nerves, with hatchel-tooth divides. ”

“ A forest-child, amid the flowers at play.
"Pocahontas, the daughter of Powhatan, a girl of ten or twelve years of age, who, not only for feature, countenance, and expression, much exceeded any of the rest of her people, but for wit and spirit was the only nonpareil of the country."—Capt. John Smith.
Stanza xix., line 9.
And bade the victim live, and be his servant still.
"Live! live!" said the softened monarch, "and make hatchets for me, and necklaces for Pocahontas." ”

“ And then, her arm unclasps, and she is of the dead.
li.
⁠The dead!—the sainted dead!—why should we weep
⁠At the last change their settled features take?
⁠At the calm impress of that holy sleep
⁠Which care and sorrow never more shall break?
⁠Believe we not His word who rends the tomb,
⁠And bids the slumberers from that transient gloom
⁠In their Redeemer's glorious image wake?
⁠Approach we not the same sepulchral bourne,
Swift as the shadow fleets? What time have we to mourn? ”

“ There pour'd its praise to Heaven, for all thy love and care.
x.
⁠And they who 'neath the vaulted roof had bow'd
⁠Of some proud minster of the olden time,
⁠Or where the vast cathedral toward the cloud
⁠Rear'd its dark pile, in symmetry sublime,
⁠While through the storied pane the sunbeam play'd,
⁠Tinting the pavement with a glorious shade,
⁠Now breath'd from humblest fane their ancient chime.
⁠And learn'd they not, His presence sure might dwell
With every seeking soul, tho' bow'd in lowliest cell? ”

“ And strange their living freshness gleam'd
⁠Amid that sculptur'd dust;
Those hands a monument have deck'd
⁠Where pausing pilgrims come;
That voice a filial requiem pour'd
⁠When all the world was dumb. ”

“ The deep sea took the dead. It was a babe
Like sculptur'd marble, pure and beautiful,
That lonely to its yawning gulfs went down.
⁠— Poor cradled nursling — no fond arm was there
To wrap thee in its folds ”

“ The mode of computation by cutting notches upon a stick prevailed among many of our aboriginal tribes. One of the council of Powhatan, who accompanied Pocahontas, was directed in this manner to mark the number of the people he might meet. ”

“ INDIAN NAMES.
"How can the Red Men be forgotten, while so many of our states and territories, bays, lakes, and rivers, are indelibly stamped by names of their giving?"
Ye say, they all have passed away,
That noble race and brave,
That their light canoes have vanished
From off the crested wave ”

“ The rest were chiefly made up of poor gentlemen, broken tradesmen, footmen, and such others as were much fitter to spoil and ruin a commonwealth than to help to raise and maintain one. 'When you send again,' Captain Smith was constrained to write to the Corporation in London, 'I entreat you, rather send but thirty carpenters, husbandmen, gardeners, fishermen, blacksmiths, masons, and diggers up of trees' roots, than a thousand of such as we have.' ”

“ It was he who administered the sacrament of the Lord's supper for the first time in Virginia, at Jamestown, the first permanent habitation of the English in America, and the site of the first Christian temple. He was a man of a truly humble, meek, and peaceful spirit; and it is impossible now to estimate the value of the beneficent influence he exercised upon the fortunes of the colony. His kind offices, as peace-maker, were frequently interposed to harmonize differences which would have been fatal to the enterprise ”

“ Where weds the new-born West with Europe's lordly race.
The marriage of Mr. Rolfe with Pocahontas took place in the church at Jamestown, in the month of April, 1613, and gave great delight to Powhatan and his chieftains, who were present at the ceremony, and also to the English, and proved a bond of peace and amity between them, as lasting as the life of the Indian king. ”

“ From whose long-trampled dust our flowers and herbage grow.
liii.
⁠Like the fallen leaves those forest-tribes have fled:
⁠Deep 'neath the turf their rusted weapon lies;
⁠No more their harvest lifts its golden head,
⁠Nor from their shaft the stricken red-deer flies:
⁠But from the far, far west, where holds, so hoarse,
⁠The lonely Oregon, its rock-strewn course,
⁠While old Pacific's sullen surge replies,
⁠Are heard their exil'd murmurings, deep and low,
Like one whose smitten soul departeth, full of woe.
liv. ”

“ To those not familiar with the appearance of the Indian corn, on whose cultivation the aborigines of America relied as a principal article of subsistence, it may be well to say that a silky fibre, sometimes compared to a tassel, is protruded from the extremity of the sheath which envelopes the golden ear or sheaf of that stately and beautiful vegetable. ”

“ Who robbed thy casket."
Then the appellant tore
The turban from his head, and cast it down;
"Lo! the false jewel see. And would'st thou know
Whose fraud exchanged it for my precious gem?
Thou art the man. ”