LI 
 
 S OF AMERICA 
 
 PS 2667 
 .$63 
 
 
 %v/J' 
 
 EDNA DEAN PROCTOR 
 
Class y§AM>l 
 
 Book :*&(o b 
 
 Copyright N° 
 
 COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 
 
38p <£fcna iDean proctor 
 
 SONGS OF AMERICA. i2mo, $1.25, net. Postage 
 
 extra. 
 THE SONG OF THE ANCIENT PEOPLE. With 
 
 Introduction and Notes by John Fiske, and 
 
 Commentary. 8vo, leather, #5.00, net; postpaid. 
 A RUSSIAN JOURNEY. Illustrated. i6mo, $1.25. 
 POEMS. i6mo, $1.25. 
 THE MOUNTAIN MAID, AND OTHER POEMS 
 
 OF NEW HAMPSHIRE. Illustrated. Square 
 
 8vo, $1.00. 
 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & COMPANY, 
 
 Boston and New York. 
 
SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS 
 
SONGS OF AMERICA 
 ana €)t^cif ^oems 
 
 BY 
 
 EDNA DEAN PROCTOR 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
 
 HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 
 
 @%t fiitoergi&e $te?tf, Cambri&0e 
 
 1905 
 
OCT. 26 19U5 
 
 COPY *!► 
 
 
 COPYRIGHT I905 BY EDNA DEAN PROCTOR 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
 
 Published November, iqo$ 
 
®o m &>imt 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 the new world's queen ... 3 
 
 Columbia's banner .... 6 
 columbus dying . . . . .11 
 
 13 
 
 citizenship for the red man . . 16 
 
 the forests of the white hills . 18 
 
 Columbia's emblem .... 22 
 
 MOOSIL'aUK ..... 25 
 
 natas'ka: a legend of lake mohonk 26 
 
 THE WAYSIDE INN .... 37 
 
 THE HILLS ARE HOME .... 38 
 
 WELCOME ...... 42 
 
 THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN .... 44 
 
 OUR COUNTRY ..... 51 
 
 CROWNING VERMONT .... 53 
 
 MAIZE IN NORWAY .... 55 
 
 STAR ISLAND CHURCH .... 57 
 
 MARY, MOTHER OF WASHINGTON . . 59 
 
 THE SONG OF THE ANCIENT PEOPLE . 61 
 
viii CONTENTS 
 
 OTHER POEMS 
 
 IMMORTAL BEAUTY .... 79 
 
 GAINING WINGS 80 
 
 the morning star {John Greenleaf 
 
 Whittier) 82 
 
 MEMORIES OF CHILDHOOD . . 84 
 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON ... 86 
 
 O FOR DIVINER AIR .... 87 
 
 THOMAS AND NANCY LINCOLN . . 88 
 
 god's MARINER .... 90 
 
 THE HEAVENLY WAY .... 91 
 
 THE NATIVITY 92 
 
 THE CHRISTMAS ROSE .... 95 
 
 AT JERUSALEM 97 
 
 THE KINGDOM OF GOD ... 99 
 
 HIS CHILDREN THREE ... 103 
 
 O LIFE IS LIFE 105 
 
 NOTES 107 
 
SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
Measureless lands Columbus gave and rivers through 
 
 zones that roll, 
 But his rarest, noblest bounty was a New World for 
 
 the soul! 
 
SONGS OF AMEEICA 
 
 THE NEW WORLD'S QUEEN 
 
 Swift to the Queen, St. Angel came — 
 
 Resolute, fearless, his heart aflame; 
 
 Swift to the Queen, by Granada's gate, 
 
 Lest tidings should fall too late, too late: 
 
 " Columbus is parting for France ! alas, 
 
 If he and his wondrous purpose pass 
 
 From Spain for ever! for sure am I 
 
 He will sail and find where the Indies lie; 
 
 And renown and splendor that might be yours 
 
 As long as the land or the sea endures, 
 
 And gain to the Church of realms unknown 
 
 Will all, alas! to the winds be thrown! 
 
 Oh, Sovereign Lady! call him back 
 
 As north he speeds on his cheerless track, 
 
 For, over the vast, mysterious seas, 
 
 Glory will sail with the Genoese ! " 
 
 Coifed and kerchiefed with Flanders lace, 
 Isabel sat in her royal place; 
 
4 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Her robe, of velvet, with broidered hems; 
 
 On her bosom a cross whose priceless gems 
 
 Flashed from the burnished bars to tell 
 
 Of the holy faith she loved so well ; — 
 
 Sat, and listened, and thought of him 
 
 Who had waited and prayed till hope grew 
 
 dim; 
 And a new light beamed from her eyes of blue, 
 And the world spread wide to her spirit's view. 
 Ferdinand, King, turned cold away 
 From the suppliant fleeing to France that day; 
 Castile's rich coffers by wars were drained; 
 But her jewels, her jewels at least remained ! — 
 And, rising, regally calm and fair, 
 Ready the boldest quest to dare: 
 "For my crown of Castile I will undertake 
 The enterprise, and my jewels stake 
 To fay the cost of the voyage ! " she said. 
 With a blessing St. Angel bowed his head, 
 And a courier spurred from the Queen to stay 
 Columbus, leagues on his lonely way. 
 'T was an April morn ; but when the sheaves 
 Were ripe, and Granada's yellowing leaves 
 To earth by the autumn blasts were whirled, 
 He had sought and found the great New World ! 
 
THE NEW WORLD'S QUEEN 5 
 
 Aye! over the vast, mysterious seas, 
 Glory had sailed with the Genoese, 
 And fadeless bays for her brow serene, 
 Borne Isabella — the New World's Queen ! 
 
COLUMBIA'S BANNER 1 
 
 (From the official programme of the National Public School 
 Celebration of Columbus Day, October 21, 1892.) 
 
 "God helping me," cried Columbus, "though 
 fair or foul the breeze, 
 
 I will sail and sail till I find the land beyond the 
 western seas!" 
 
 So an eagle might leave its eyrie, bent, though the 
 blue should bar, 
 
 To fold its wings on the loftiest peak of an undis- 
 covered star! 
 
 And into the vast and void abyss he followed the 
 setting sun; 
 
 Nor gulfs nor gales could fright his sails till the 
 wondrous quest was done. 
 
 But oh, the weary vigils, the murmuring, tortur- 
 ing days, 
 
 Till the Pinta's gun, and the shout of "Land!" 
 set the black night ablaze! 
 
 Till the shore lay fair as Paradise in morning's 
 balm and gold, 
 
 And a world was won from the conquered deep, 
 and the tale of the ages told! 
 
COLUMBIA'S BANNER 7 
 
 Uplift the starry Banner! The best age is be- 
 gun! 
 We are the heirs of the mariners whose voyage 
 
 that morn was done. 
 Measureless lands Columbus gave and rivers 
 
 through zones that roll, 
 But his rarest, noblest bounty was a New World 
 
 for the soul! 
 For he sailed from the past with its stifling walls, 
 
 to the future's open sky, 
 And the ghosts of gloom and fear were laid as the 
 
 breath of heaven went by; 
 And the pedant's pride and the lordling's scorn 
 
 were lost, in that vital air, 
 As fogs are lost when sun and wind sweep ocean 
 
 blue and bare; 
 And freedom and larger knowledge dawned clear, 
 
 the sky to span, 
 The birthright, not of priest or king, but of every 
 
 child of man! 
 
 Uplift the New World's banner to greet the 
 
 exultant sun! 
 Let its rosy gleams still follow his beams as swift 
 
 to west they run, 
 
8 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Till the wide air rings with shout and hymn to 
 
 welcome it shining high, 
 And our eagle from lone Katahdin to Shasta's 
 
 snow can fly 
 In the light of its stars as fold on fold is flung to 
 
 the autumn sky! 
 Uplift it, youths and maidens, with songs and 
 
 loving cheers; 
 Through triumphs, raptures, it has waved, through 
 
 agonies and tears. 
 Columbia looks from sea to sea and thrills with 
 
 joy to know 
 Her myriad sons, as one, would leap to shield it 
 
 from a foe! 
 And you who soon will be the state, and shape 
 
 each great decree, 
 Oh, vow to live and die for it, if glorious death 
 
 must be! 
 The brave of all the centuries gone this starry 
 
 flag have wrought; 
 In dungeons dim, on gory fields, its light and 
 
 peace were bought; 
 And you who front the future — whose days our 
 
 dreams fulfil — 
 On Liberty's immortal height, oh, plant it firmer 
 
 still! 
 
COLUMBIA'S BANNER 9 
 
 For it floats for broadest learning; for the soul's 
 
 supreme release; 
 For law disdaining license; for righteousness and 
 
 peace; 
 For valor born of justice ; and its amplest scope 
 
 and plan 
 Makes a queen of every woman, a king of every 
 
 man! 
 While forever, like Columbus, o'er truth's un- 
 
 fathomed main 
 It pilots to the hidden isles, a grander realm to 
 
 gain. 
 
 Ah! what a mighty trust is ours, the noblest 
 
 ever sung, 
 To keep this banner spotless its kindred stars 
 
 among ! 
 Our fleets may throng the oceans — our forts the 
 
 headlands crown — 
 Our mines their treasures lavish for mint and 
 
 mart and town — 
 Rich fields and flocks and busy looms bring 
 
 plenty, far and wide — 
 And statelier temples deck the land than Rome's 
 
 or Athens' pride — 
 
10 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And science dare the mysteries of earth and wave 
 and sky — 
 
 Till none with us in splendor and strength and 
 skill can vie; 
 
 Yet, should we reckon liberty and manhood less 
 than these, 
 
 And slight the right of the humblest between our 
 circling seas — 
 
 Should we be false to our sacred past, our fa- 
 thers' God forgetting, 
 
 This banner would lose its lustre, our sun be nigh 
 his setting! 
 
 But the dawn will sooner forget the east, the tides 
 their ebb and flow, 
 
 Than you forget our radiant flag and its match- 
 less gifts forego! 
 
 Nay! you will keep it high-advanced with ever- 
 brightening sway — 
 
 The banner whose light betokens the Lord's 
 diviner day, 
 
 Leading the nations gloriously in freedom's holy 
 way! 
 
 No cloud on the field of azure — no stain on the 
 rosy bars — 
 
 God bless you, youths and maidens, as you guard 
 the Stripes and Stars! 
 
COLUMBUS DYING 
 
 ("In manustuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum." Last 
 words of Columbus.) 
 
 Hark ! do I hear again the roar 
 
 Of the tides by the Indies sweeping down ? 
 Or is it the surge from the viewless shore 
 
 That swells to bear me to my crown ? 
 Life is hollow and cold and drear 
 
 With smiles that darken and hopes that flee; 
 And, far from its winds that faint and veer, 
 
 I am ready to sail the vaster sea! 
 
 Lord, Thou knowest I love Thee best; 
 
 And that scorning peril and toil and pain, 
 I held my way to the mystic West, 
 
 Glory for Thee and Thy Church to gain. 
 And Thou didst lead me, only Thou, 
 
 Cheering my heart in cloud and calm, 
 Till the dawn my glad, victorious prow 
 
 Greeted Thine isles of bloom and balm. 
 
 And then, O gracious, glorious Lord, 
 
 I saw Thy face, and all heaven came nigh 
 
n SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And my soul was lost in that rich reward, 
 And ravished with hope of the bliss on high. 
 
 So, I can meet the sovereign's frown — 
 
 My dear Queen gone — with a large disdain ; 
 
 For the time will come when his chief renown 
 Will be that I sailed from his realm of Spain. 
 
 I have found New Lands — a world, maybe, 
 
 Whose splendor will yet the Old outshine; 
 And life and death are alike to me, 
 
 For earth will honor, and heaven is mine. 
 Is mine ! — What songs of sweet accord ! 
 
 What billows that nearer, gentler roll! 
 Is mine! — Into Thy hands, O Lord, 
 
 Into Thy hands I give my soul! 
 
SA-CA-GA-WE-A 
 
 (The Indian girl who guided Lewis and Clark in their 
 expedition to the Pacific.) 
 
 Sho-sh6-ne Sa-ca*-ga-we-a — captive and wife 
 
 was she 
 On the grassy plains of Dakota in the land of the 
 
 Minnetaree; 
 But she heard the west wind calling, and longed 
 
 to follow the sun 
 Back to the shining mountains and the glens 
 
 where her life begun. 
 So, when the valiant Captains, fain for the Asian 
 
 sea, 
 Stayed their marvellous journey in the land of 
 
 the Minnetaree 
 (The Red Men wondering, wary — Omaha, 
 
 Mandan, Sioux — 
 Friendly now, now hostile, as they toiled the 
 
 wilderness through), 
 Glad she turned from the grassy plains and led 
 
 their way to the West, 
 Her course as true as the swan's that flew north 
 
 to its reedy nest; 
 
14 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Her eye as keen as the eagle's when the young 
 
 lambs feed below; 
 Her ear alert as the stag's at morn guarding the 
 
 fawn and doe. 
 Straight was she as a hillside fir, lithe as the 
 
 willow-tree, 
 And her foot as fleet as the antelope's when the 
 
 hunter rides the lea; 
 In broidered tunic and moccasins, with braided 
 
 raven hair, 
 And closely belted buffalo robe with her baby 
 
 nestling there — 
 Girl of but sixteen summers, the homing bird of 
 
 the quest, 
 Free of the tongues of the mountains, deep on 
 
 her heart imprest, 
 Sho-sho-ne Sa-ca-ga-we-a led the way to the 
 
 West! — 
 To Missouri's broad savannas dark with bison 
 
 and deer, 
 While the grizzly roamed the savage shore and 
 
 cougar and wolf prowled near; 
 To the cataract's leap, and the meadows with lily 
 
 and rose abloom; 
 The sunless trails of the forest, and the canyon's 
 
 hush and gloom; 
 
SA-CA-GA-WE-A 15 
 
 By the veins of gold and silver, and the moun- 
 tains vast and grim — 
 
 Their snowy summits lost in clouds on the wide 
 horizon's rim; 
 
 Through sombre pass, by soaring peak, till the 
 Asian wind blew free, 
 
 And lo ! the roar of the Oregon and the splendor 
 of the Sea! 
 
 Some day, in the lordly upland where the snow- 
 fed streams divide — 
 Afoam for the far Atlantic, afoam for Pacific's 
 
 tide — 
 There, by the valiant Captains whose glory will 
 
 never dim 
 While the sun goes down to the Asian sea and 
 
 the stars in ether swim, 
 She will stand in bronze as richly brown as the 
 
 hue of her girlish cheek, 
 With broidered robe and braided hair and lips 
 
 just curved to speak; 
 And the mountain winds will murmur as they 
 
 linger along the crest, 
 " Sho-sho-ne Sa-ca-ga-we-a, who led the way to 
 
 the West!" 
 
CITIZENSHIP FOR THE RED MAN 
 
 A mighty nation we have built 
 
 Of many a race, remote or kin, — 
 Briton and Teuton, Slav and Celt, 
 
 All Europe's tribes are wrought therein; 
 And Asia's children, Afric's hordes, 
 
 Millions the world would crush or flout: 
 To each some help our rule affords, 
 
 And shall we bar the Red Man out ? 
 
 The Red Man was the primal lord 
 
 Of our magnificent domain, 
 And craft, and crime, and wasting sword 
 
 Oft gained us mount and stream and plain. 
 And shall we still add wrong to wrong ? 
 Is this the largess of the strong — 
 His need to slight, his faith to doubt, 
 And thus to bar the Red Man out, 
 
 Though welcoming all other men ? 
 Nay! let us nobly build him in, 
 Nor rest till " ward " and " alien " win 
 
 The rightful name of citizen! 
 
CITIZENSHIP FOR THE RED MAN 17 
 
 Then will the "reservation" be 
 Columbia's breadth from sea to sea, 
 And Sioux, Apache, and Cheyenne 
 Merge proudly in American! 
 
THE FORESTS OF THE WHITE HILLS 
 
 (Waumbek Methna — Mountains with Snowy Foreheads 
 — the Indian name of the White Hills ; Agi'ochook, of Mt. 
 Washington.) 
 
 O lone Waumbek Methna ! Who dares to profane 
 Thy solitudes, sacred to Manitou's reign ? 
 Thy peaks rosy-flushed with the last beam of day, 
 Or lost in the stars, white and stainless as they ? 
 Thy woods in whose dimness the bright streams 
 
 are born, 
 And the loud winds are lulled till the breaking of 
 
 morn? 
 The sagamore turned from thy borders in dread, 
 Afraid the high trails of the hill-gods to tread, 
 Lest in flood, or in flame leaping vengeful, their 
 
 ire 
 Made the black pool his grave, the bleak summit 
 
 his pyre. 
 He saw their weird forms as the clouds floated 
 
 past; 
 He heard their dark words in the wail of the blast; 
 Their arrows the lightnings, their drumbeats the 
 
 thunder 
 
THE MOUNTAIN FORESTS 19 
 
 That rolled till the mountains seemed rending 
 
 asunder; 
 And hunter and warrior stole valeward to shun 
 Agi'ochook lifting his brow to the sun. 
 
 What! Pemigewas'set glide pale to his tryst 
 With Winnepesau'kee — his waning tide kissed 
 No more by the shadows that droop and entwine 
 Of the birch and the maple, the beech and the 
 
 pine, 
 The firs whose battalions so slender and tall 
 Guard the gloom of the gorge and the flash of the 
 
 fall? 
 What! Merrimack's might left to languish and 
 
 fail, 
 While Pennacook's meadows their verdure be- 
 wail ; 
 While the mill-wheels are moveless, the flying 
 
 looms still, 
 For the proud stream no longer his channels can 
 
 fill? — 
 But, shorn of his forests, bereft of his springs, 
 Forlorn as an eagle despoiled of its wings, 
 Now grieving by rapids, now moaning by lea, 
 Deserted, he creeps to the scorn of the sea! 
 
20 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 What ! swift Ammonoo'suc, the foam-wreath, the 
 
 bride 
 Of lordly Connecticut, faint at his side, 
 While his lakes, wood-embosomed, and pure as 
 
 his snows, 
 Are ravaged, and robbed of their sylvan repose ? 
 What! Saco forsake his loved intervales, spent 
 Ere the brooks of the lowlands their tributes have 
 
 sent, 
 While eastward and westward the gray ledges rise 
 All treeless and springless confronting the skies, 
 And Moosil'auk, Pequaw'ket, Chocor'ua, frown, 
 As sad on the bare river- vales they look down ? 
 
 By the bounty and grandeur of river and steep, 
 What the Red Man has hallowed the White Man 
 
 must keep ! — 
 Must pause with the hill-roving hunter, and ken 
 The mighty ones guarding the cliff and the glen. 
 No impious Vandal shall ruthless invade 
 The temple whose stones were to Manitou laid; 
 Shall quench the clear springs and leave desert 
 
 and bare 
 The slopes and the valleys the gods have made 
 
 fair! 
 
THE MOUNTAIN FORESTS 21 
 
 O peerless New Hampshire! awake from thy 
 
 dreams ! 
 Save the wealth of thy woodlands, the rush of thy 
 
 streams, 
 Thy wild mountain splendor — the torrent, the 
 
 pine — 
 Thy groves and thy meadows, thy shade and thy 
 
 shine ! 
 For, part with the forest, the bright, brimming 
 
 river, 
 And thy strength and thy glory will vanish forever, 
 And in wide desolation and ruin will fall 
 Great Manitou's vengeance, thy soul to appall ! — 
 Away with this folly, this madness, this shame! 
 Be true to thy birthright, thy future, thy fame! 
 And vow, by thy grandeurs of river and steep, 
 What the Red Man has hallowed the White Man 
 
 will keep! 
 
COLUMBIA'S EMBLEM 
 
 Blazon Columbia's emblem, 
 
 The bounteous, golden Corn! 
 Eons ago, of the great sun's glow 
 
 And the joy of the earth, 't was born. 
 From Superior's shore to Chili, 
 
 From the ocean of dawn to the west, 
 With its banners of green and silken sheen 
 
 It sprang at the sun's behest; 
 And by dew and shower, from its natal hour, 
 
 With honey and wine 'twas fed, 
 Till on slope and plain the gods were fain 
 
 To share the feast outspread: 
 For the rarest boon to the land they loved 
 
 Was the Corn so rich and fair, 
 Nor star nor breeze o'er the farthest seas 
 
 Could find its like elsewhere. 
 
 In their holiest temples the Incas 
 Offered the heaven-sent Maize — 
 
 Grains wrought of gold, in a silver fold, 
 For the sun's enraptured gaze; 
 
COLUMBIA'S EMBLEM 23 
 
 And its harvest came to the wandering tribes 
 
 As the gods' own gift and seal, 
 And Montezuma's festal bread 
 
 Was made of its sacred meal. 
 Narrow their cherished fields; but ours 
 
 Are broad as the continent's breast, 
 And, lavish as leaves, the rustling sheaves 
 
 Bring plenty and joy and rest; 
 For they strew the plains and crowd the wains 
 
 When the reapers meet at morn, 
 Till blithe cheers ring and west winds sing 
 
 A song for the garnered Corn. 
 
 The rose may bloom for England, 
 
 The lily for France unfold; 
 Ireland may honor the shamrock, 
 
 Scotland her thistle bold; 
 But the shield of the great Republic, 
 
 The glory of the West, 
 Shall bear a stalk of the tasselled Corn — 
 
 The sun's supreme bequest! 
 The arbutus and the goldenrod 
 
 The heart of the North may cheer, 
 And the mountain laurel for Maryland 
 
 Its royal clusters rear, 
 
24 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And jasmine and magnolia 
 The crest of the South adorn; 
 
 But the wide Republic's emblem 
 Is the bounteous, golden Corn! 
 
MOOSIL'AUK 
 
 Moosii/auk! mountain sagamore! thy brow 
 The wide hill-splendor circles. Not a peer, 
 Among New Hampshire's lordly heights that fear 
 Nor summer's bolt nor winter's blast, hast thou 
 For grand horizons. Lo, to westward now 
 Towers Whiteface over Killington; and clear, 
 To north, Mount Royal cleaves the blue; while 
 
 near, 
 Franconia's, Conway's peaks, the east endow 
 With glory, round great Washington whose cone 
 Of sunset shade, athwart his valleys thrown, 
 Darkens and stills a hundred miles of Maine! 
 To south the bright lake smiles, and rivers flow 
 Through elm-fringed meadows to the ocean 
 
 plain ; 
 Lone peak! what realms are thine, above, below! 
 
NA-TAS'-KA 2 
 
 A LEGEND OF LAKE MOHONK 
 
 Why does the south wind sigh as it passes Mohonk's lovely 
 water ? 
 Why are the shadows so deep where the cliffs hang over the 
 tide? 
 Ages ago the shore was the home of the Sagamore's daughter; 
 Ages to come her story with mountain and lake will 
 abide. 
 Still, through the lapsing years, the winds and the shadows 
 have sought her, 
 Sighing and falling for ever for lover and bride. 
 
 Where Shawangunk's ■ rampart meets the skies, 
 Cool in its broad embrasure lies 
 The fairest lake the hills enfold — 
 Crystal Mohonk, whose warders bold 
 Challenge the winds, and answer loud 
 When thunders roll from cloud to cloud. 
 The Red Man loved its sparkling tide, 
 Its crags, its woods, its valleys wide, 
 And on its sunny marge, of yore, 
 Dwelt the high-hearted Sagamore 
 Who ruled from mount to river shore, 
 1 Pronounced shong'gum. 
 
NA-TAS'-KA 27 
 
 But now, for many a restless day, 
 Had bent beneath the Mohawk's sway, 
 And tribute paid for cliff and strand 
 To chiefs of Ononda'ga's band. 
 
 Of all the ills her sire had known 
 Little his sheltering care had shown 
 His young Natas'ka — rarest maid 
 That ever roamed in Shawangunk's glade. 
 How blithe she was! how light and free 
 Her footsteps over hill and lea! 
 Her velvet cheek, her smiling eyes, 
 Her lustrous hair whose soft disguise 
 Her dimpled shoulders fell adown, 
 Her rounded arms so rosy brown, 
 The fawn-skin tunic's careless grace, 
 The girdle thick with wampum strewn, 
 The shining beads that, lace on lace, 
 About her shapely throat were thrown, 
 The moccasins with broidery fine 
 Her fingers wrought beneath the pine — 
 From Shawangunk mountains to the sea 
 No other maid was rare as she. 
 
 And had she lovers ? Aye, her name 
 Thrilled many a youth of forest fame 
 
28 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Who heaped his gifts and sued her sire 
 With eager words and heart of fire; 
 But one and all he answered still, 
 
 " The maid shall wed the man she will ! " 
 For pleased he knew his faith was plight 
 To Wis'sewa of lineage bright, 
 Who proudly wore by crag and lea 
 The wolf -badge of the Len'a-pe; 
 To Wis'sewa the valorous, 
 Peer of the chiefs of Esopus, 
 And worthy, joyful days or dire, 
 To share Wawas'sing's council-fire; 
 To Wis'sewa whose tender gaze 
 As in the mead she plucked the maize 
 That golden morn he gayly bore 
 Good tidings to the Sagamore, 
 Entranced her heart, unmoved before. 
 
 " Welcome ! " her gracious sire had said, 
 And to the fur-strewn couch had led; 
 The while she brought their highland cheer 
 Their trout, their samp, their venison — 
 And when the simple meal was done, 
 And tidings told, delayed to hear 
 Of wars, and hunts, and phantom deer 
 Fleet as the wind, with antlers wide, 
 By wanderers on the hills descried; 
 
NA-TAS'-KA 29 
 
 And stolen glance and mantling cheek 
 Revealed the charm they could not speak. 
 And when beside the spring they met 
 And vowed to love and love for ever, 
 Within her necklace-beads he set 
 His treasured, magic amulet 
 Wrought by the gods of ruddy ore 
 On the Great Lake's mysterious shore, 
 That naught their wedded lives might sever. 
 Then — with the honored, ancient ways 
 Befitting chiefs and bridal days 
 Observed — the Sagamore decreed 
 When trees should bud and brooks be freed, 
 With feast and train the maid should go 
 To glad his lodge the hills below. 
 
 Alas! an alien eye has seen 
 Natas'ka in her forest sheen! — 
 Bold Tagonwe'ta from the river 
 Where the fierce Mohawk fills his quiver 
 Has marked the maid and swiftly sped 
 This darling of the woods to wed; 
 Nor brooked he rite, nor form's delay, 
 Bent but to win and haste away. 
 Renowned in hunt and war was he, 
 And versed in woodland gallantry: 
 
30 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 His beaver robe, his broidered vest, 
 The bear emblazoned on his breast, 
 His locks with eagle feathers crowned, 
 The wampum-belt his waist that bound, 
 His regal port, his manly form, 
 Were fit a maiden's heart to warm. 
 And pipes of carven stone he brought, 
 And richest furs through perils sought 
 In lonely wastes and northern snows, 
 Quivers of otter skin, and bowls 
 Painted with potent, mystic scrolls; 
 All at her father's feet he throws — 
 He who denial ne'er had known — 
 And asks Natas'ka for his own. 
 
 " Brave Mohawk," said the Sagamore, 
 " Thy words would open many a door, 
 But I have said, and say it still, 
 The maid shall wed the man she will; 
 And now my faith for her is plight 
 To Wis'sewa of lineage bright 
 Who proudly wears by crag and lea 
 The wolf -badge of the Len'-a-pe; 
 Our tribes are kindred, and their sway 
 Was mightier once than thine to-day. 
 
NA-TAS'-KA 31 
 
 Seek in thy vales thy heart's desire — 
 The maid to tend thy wigwam fire — 
 Natas'ka cannot be thy bride." 
 
 "Vain boaster!" fierce the Mohawk cried, 
 
 "Shall Tagonwe'ta be denied? 
 Shall thus a vassal chieftain dare? 
 Let the base Len'-a-pe beware ! — 
 The sun will sooner leave the sky, 
 The river northward flow, than I 
 My purpose lose! for, mark me well, 
 Natas'ka in my lodge shall dwell! 
 Ye hear my words." That instant fell 
 A gloom of clouds o'er lake and wood; — 
 And, turning quickly where he stood, 
 Scorn on his lips, his brow a frown, 
 The Mohawk strode the mountain down, 
 And vanished, like a shadow fled, 
 Where the slight pathway valeward led. 
 
 "Begone, bold robber!" said her sire, 
 "And let the north wind cool thine ire. 
 Thy words are hawks. The dove shall fly 
 Beyond their swoop to safer sky. 
 Natas'ka, thou hast naught to fear!" 
 And forth he fared to chase the deer. 
 
32 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Now fell the snows; the brooks were still; 
 
 The hunters housed by plain and hill; 
 
 But in her wigwam's fold, the maid, 
 
 Her robes to deck, her mats to braid, 
 
 Forgot the lodges by the river 
 
 Where the fierce Mohawk filled his quiver, 
 
 And let her fancy wander free 
 
 To Wis'sewa the Len'-a-pe, 
 
 Sure that his talisman had power 
 
 To shield her in an evil hour. 
 
 Thrice the new moon o'er Shawangunk hung, 
 
 Then March winds roared the woods among, 
 
 And April's sunny, showery weather 
 
 Woke bird and brook and tree together. 
 
 To-morrow, at the break of day, 
 
 Natas'ka takes her westward way, 
 
 And all the forest pomp with her 
 
 Of gift and guard and servitor. 
 
 Content, yet fain to keep the hills, 
 Before the evening dew distils, 
 Or the low sun the vale bereaves, 
 Unseen the merry camp she leaves 
 And climbs the steep to view once more 
 The crags, the lake, the lovely shore; 
 
NA-TAS'-KA 33 
 
 While down the vale the day declines 
 And crimsons all the mountain shrines. 
 Wistful she stands above the brink 
 And marks a fawn that stoops to drink, 
 And a lone eagle circling high 
 Where the huge cliffs uphold the sky, 
 And north, upon the horizon's rim, 
 Greets the great ranges, blue and dim, 
 That bar her father from his foes; 
 Then — wondering what the years will prove 
 Borne from this scene of childhood's love 
 WTiere sweet is every breeze that blows — 
 To all the gods of earth and air 
 She breathes a fervent, maiden prayer; 
 And the wind died; the vale was still; 
 And twilight hung o'er lake and hill. 
 
 Natas'ka!" said a voice so near 
 
 It smote her heart with chilling fear; 
 
 And all the joy within her dies 
 
 To see the dreaded Mohawk rise 
 
 From the dusk wood and front her thus, 
 
 Defiant, stern, victorious. 
 
 Natas'ka! sire nor Powers Divine 
 
 Can aught avail, for thou art mine! 
 
34 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Long have I watched; my warriors wait 
 
 To guard thee to the river-gate, 
 
 And thence our light canoes will fly 
 
 Up where the Mohawk meadows lie. 
 
 The base-born, coward Len'-a-pe 
 
 'T were shame to mate with maid like thee ! " 
 
 A step, and he is at her side, — 
 But, swift as fawn, afar she springs, 
 And where the pathway closest clings 
 To the sheer edge, she holds her way, 
 Pursued as hawk pursues its prey! 
 Woe to the magic amulet 
 Her lover in her necklace set! 
 Where was the hill-god's kindly care? 
 Why failed the powers of wave and air 
 Her frantic homeward flight to guide ? 
 A riven, treacherous rock she pressed 
 Crashed downward to the lake's clear breast 
 And plunged the maid, to-morrow's bride, 
 Full deep beneath the whelming tide ! — 
 Madly the Mohawk followed her, 
 Dropping from crag to cleft and spur; 
 But when he gained the startled shore 
 No trace the rippling waters bore, 
 
NA-TAS'-KA 35 
 
 Nor sight nor sound in cove or glade, 
 
 Save the wild moan the night wind made, 
 
 Natas'ka's hapless fate betrayed! 
 
 And rent with bitterest rage and pain, 
 
 Baffled, and powerless to deliver, 
 
 To the dusk wood he turned again 
 
 And sought, with stealthy steps, the river. 
 
 I love to think athwart the wave 
 She swam to find some hidden cave, 
 Some secret bower whence glad she stole 
 To meet the sachem of her soul; 
 I know not — but the legend's bride 
 Sleeps, evermore, beneath the tide! 
 
 — And yet, they say, in balmy eves 
 Above the brink the maiden stands, 
 And, silent, while the south wind grieves, 
 Lifts to the sky imploring hands; 
 And then her bold, relentless lover 
 Leaps toward her from the laurel cover, 
 And proud salute and sharp recall 
 Echo along the mountain wall; 
 But, should you near them, man and maid 
 Grow faintest shadows in the shade, 
 
36 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And down the lake pursuit and cry 
 Blend with the wandering zephyr's sigh. 
 
 Gone are the sagamores of old; 
 Their heights and valleys strangers hold; 
 And blue-eyed girls with sunny locks 
 Roam the shy glades or climb the rocks, 
 And list to lovers' vows, and dream 
 Of bridal morns, by cliff and stream. 
 But while Mohonk spreads crystal-fair 
 And Shawangunk lifts its crags in air, 
 While laurels flush and sunsets flame, 
 The waves will speak Natas'ka's name. 
 
THE WAYSIDE INN 
 
 (Sudbury, Massachusetts.) 
 
 Set by the meadows, with great oaks to guard, 
 Huge as their kin for Sherwood's outlaw grew, 
 Oaks that the Indian's bow and wigwam knew 
 And by whose branches yet the sky is barred, — 
 Lightning, nor flame, nor whirlwind evil-starred 
 Disturbed its calm; but, lapsing centuries 
 
 through, 
 Peace kept its doors though war's wild trumpets 
 
 blew; 
 And still it stands beside its oaks, unscarred. 
 
 Ah, happy hostelry, that Washington 
 
 And Lafayette among its guests can number, 
 
 With many a squire and dame of old renown! — 
 
 Happiest that from the Poet it has won 
 
 Tales that will ever keep its fame from slumber, 
 
 Songs that will echo sweet the ages down! 
 
THE HILLS ARE HOME 
 
 (For New Hampshire's first "Old Home Week," August, 
 1899.) 
 
 Forget New Hampshire? By her cliffs, her 
 meads, her brooks afoam, 
 
 With love and pride where'er we bide, the Hills, 
 the Hills are Home! 
 
 On Mississippi or by Nile, Ohio, Volga, Rhine, 
 
 We see our cloud-born Merrimack adown its 
 valley shine; 
 
 And Contoo'cook — Singing Water — Monad- 
 nock's drifts have fed, 
 
 With lilt and rhyme and fall and chime flash o'er 
 its pebbly bed; 
 
 And by Como's wave, yet fairer still, our Winne- 
 pesau'kee spread. 
 
 Alp nor Sierra, nor the chains of India or 
 
 Peru, 
 Can dwarf for us the white-robed heights our 
 
 wondering childhood knew — 
 
THE HILLS ARE HOME 39 
 
 The awful Notch, and the Great Stone Face, and 
 
 the Lake where the echoes fly, 
 And the sovereign dome of Washington throned 
 
 in the eastern sky; — 
 For from Colorado's Snowy Range to the crest of 
 
 the Pyrenees 
 New Hampshire's mountains grandest lift their 
 
 peaks in the airy seas, 
 And the winds of half the world are theirs across 
 
 the main and the leas. 
 
 Yet far beyond her hills and streams New Hamp- 
 shire dear we hold: 
 A thousand tender memories our glowing hearts 
 
 enfold ; 
 For in dreams we see the early home by the elms 
 
 or the maples tall, 
 The orchard-trees where the robins built, and the 
 
 well by the garden wall; 
 The lilacs and the apple-blooms make paradise 
 
 of May, 
 And up from the clover-meadows floats the 
 
 breath of the new-mown hay; 
 And the Sabbath bells, as the light breeze swells, 
 
 ring clear and die away. 
 
40 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And oh, the Lost Ones live again in love's im- 
 mortal year! 
 
 We are children still by the hearth-fire's blaze 
 while night steals cold and drear; 
 
 Our mother's fond caress we win, our father's 
 smile of pride, 
 
 And " Now I lay me down to sleep " say, rever- 
 ent, at their side. 
 
 Alas! alas! their graves are green, or white with 
 a pall of snow, 
 
 But we see them yet by the evening hearth as in 
 the long ago, 
 
 And the quiet churchyard where they rest is the 
 holiest spot we know. 
 
 Forget New Hampshire ? Let Kearsarge forget 
 
 to greet the sun; 
 Connecticut forsake the sea; the Shoals their 
 
 breakers shun; 
 But fervently, while life shall last, though wide 
 
 our ways decline, 
 Back to the Mountain-Land our hearts will turn 
 
 as to a shrine! 
 Forget New Hampshire ? By her cliffs, her meads, 
 
 her brooks afoam, 
 
THE HILLS ARE HOME 41 
 
 By all her hallowed memories — our lode-star 
 
 while we roam — 
 Whatever skies above us rise, the Hills, the Hills 
 
 are Home! 
 
WELCOME 
 
 (Sung at the Saengerfest of 1902, held in Peoria, Illinois, and 
 dedicated to the Saengerbund of the Northwest.) 
 
 Welcome, O Brothers, joy and cheer! 
 Your ancient race and ours were one; 
 Freedom and song to them were dear 
 Where Rhine and Elbe seaward run; 
 And here, beneath this Western sky 
 If foes assail, your valiant cry 
 Will ring, as by the German strand: 
 " Forward, with God, for Fatherland! " 
 
 One are our hopes, our aims, our needs; 
 One force the gage of battle flings; 
 We thrill with Hermann's mighty deeds; 
 We glow with songs that Korner sings; 
 And know, beneath this Western sky 
 If foes assail, your valiant cry 
 Will ring, as by the German strand : 
 " Forward, with God, for Fatherland ! " 
 
 Ah! Freedom, room for hand and brain, 
 Full manhood, justice, love divine — 
 
WELCOME 43 
 
 These make the patriot's dear domain 
 By Mississippi or by Rhine! 
 And so, beneath this Western sky 
 If foes assail, your valiant cry 
 Will ring, as by the German strand: 
 "Forward, with God, for Fatherland!" 
 
 Hail to the land so great and free — 
 Your land and ours to guard and prize! 
 With one accord, from sea to sea, 
 Let joyful songs and anthems rise! 
 Oh, heart to heart and eye to eye, 
 If foes assail, your valiant cry 
 Will ring, as by the German strand: 
 "Forward, with God, for Fatherland!" 
 
THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN 3 
 
 (Carlisle, Pa., Dec. 31, 1764.) 
 
 The Indian war was over, 
 
 And Pennsylvania's towns 
 Welcomed the blessed calm that comes 
 
 When peace a conflict crowns. 
 Bitter and long had been the strife, 
 
 But gallant Colonel Bouquet 
 Had forced the foe to sue for grace, 
 
 And named the joyful day 
 When Shawnees, Tuscara'was, 
 
 Miamis, Delawares, 
 And every band that roved the land 
 
 And called a captive theirs — 
 From the pathless depths of the forest, 
 
 By stream and dark defile, 
 Should bring their prisoners, on their lives, 
 
 In safety to Carlisle; 
 Carlisle in the Cumberland valley, 
 
 Where Conodogwin'net flows, 
 And the guardian ranges, north and south, 
 
 In mountain pride repose. 
 
THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN 45 
 
 Like the wind the Colonel's order 
 
 To hamlet and clearing flew; 
 And mourning mothers and wives and sons 
 From banks where Delaware seaward runs, 
 From Erie's wave, and Ohio's tide, 
 And the vales where the southern hills divide, 
 
 Flocked to the town, perchance to view, 
 At last, 'mid the crowds by the startled square, 
 The faces lost, but in memory fair. 
 
 How strange the scene on the village green 
 
 That morning cold and gray! 
 To right the Indian tents were set, 
 And in groups the dusky warriors met, 
 While their captives clung to the captors yet, 
 
 As wild and bronzed as they — 
 In rags and skins, with moccasined feet, 
 Some loath to part, some fain to greet 
 
 The friends of a vanished day; 
 And, eagerly watching the tents, to left 
 Stood mothers and sons and wives bereft, 
 While, beyond, were the throngs from hill and 
 
 valley, 
 And, waiting the keen-eyed Colonel's rally, 
 
 The troops in their brave array. 
 
46 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Now friends and captives mingle, 
 
 And cries of joy or woe 
 Thrill the broad street as loved ones meet, 
 Or in vain the tale of the past repeat, 
 
 And back in anguish go. 
 Among them lingered a widow — 
 
 From the Suabian land was she — 
 And one fell morning she had lost 
 
 Husband and children three, 
 All slain save the young Regina, 
 
 A captive spared to be. 
 Nine weary years had followed, 
 
 But the wilderness was dumb, 
 And never a word to her aching heart 
 
 Through friend or foe had come, 
 And now, from Tulpehocken, 
 
 Full seventy miles away, 
 She had walked to seek her daughter, 
 
 The Lord her only stay. 
 
 She scanned the sun-browned maidens; 
 
 But the tunic's rude disguise, 
 The savage tongue, the forest ways, 
 Baffled and mocked her yearning gaze, 
 
 And with sobs and streaming eyes 
 
THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN 47 
 
 She turned to the Colonel and told him 
 
 How hopeless was her quest — 
 Moaning, "Alas, Regina! 
 
 The grave for me is best ! " 
 " Nay, Madam," gently he replied, 
 " Don't be disheartened yet, but bide, 
 
 And try some other test. 
 What pleasant song or story 
 
 Did she love from your lips to hear ? " 
 "O Sir, I taught her 'Our Father;' 
 
 And the ' Creed ' we hold so dear, 
 And she said them over and over 
 
 While I was spinning near; 
 And every eve, by her little bed, 
 
 When the light was growing dim, 
 I sung her to sleep, my darling! 
 
 With Schmolke's beautiful hymn." 
 "Then sing it now," said the Colonel, 
 
 And close to the captive band 
 He brought the mother with her hymn 
 
 From the far Suabian land; 
 And with faltering voice and quivering lips, 
 
 While all was hushed, she sung 
 The strain of lofty faith and cheer 
 
 In her rich German tongue: 
 
48 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 "Allein, und doch nicht ganz allein," 
 (How near the listeners press!) 
 
 Alone, yet not alone am I, 
 
 Though all may deem my days go by 
 In utter dreariness; 
 
 The Lord is still my company, 
 
 I am with Him, and He with me, 
 The solitude to bless. 
 
 He speaks to me within His word 
 As if His very voice I heard, 
 
 And when I pray, apart, 
 He meets me in the quiet there 
 With counsel for each cross and care, 
 
 And comfort for my heart. 
 
 The world may say my life is lone, 
 With every joy and blessing flown 
 
 Its vision can descry; 
 I shall not sorrow nor repine, 
 For glorious company is mine 
 
 With God and angels nigh. 
 
 As she sung, a maid of the captives 
 Threw back her tangled hair, 
 
THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN 49 
 
 And forward leaned as if to list 
 
 The lightest murmur there; 
 Her breath came fast, her brown cheek 
 flushed, 
 Her eyes grew bright and wide 
 As if some spell the song had cast, 
 
 And, ere the low notes died, 
 With a bound like a deer in the forest 
 
 She sprang to the singer's side, 
 And, "Liebe, kleine Mutter!" 
 Enfolding her, she cried — 
 "My dear, dear, little Mother!" — 
 Then swift before her knelt 
 As in the long, long buried days 
 When by the wood they dwelt; 
 And, "Vater unser, der du bist 
 
 Im Himmel," chanted she, 
 The sweet "Our Father" she had learned 
 
 Beside that mother's knee; 
 And then the grand "Apostles' Creed" 
 That in her heart had lain: 
 "Ich glaube an Gott den Vater," 
 Like a child she said again — 
 "I believe in God the Father" — 
 Down to the blest "Amen." 
 
50 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Stooping and clasping the maiden 
 
 Whose soul the song had freed, 
 " Now God be praised ! " said the mother, 
 " This is my child indeed ! — 
 My own, my darling Regina, 
 
 Come back in my sorest need, 
 For she knows the Hymn, and * Our Father,' 
 
 And the holy 'Apostles' Creed'!" 
 Then, while the throng was silent, 
 
 And the Colonel bowed his head, 
 With tears and glad thanksgivings 
 
 Her daughter forth she led; 
 And the sky was lit with sunshine, 
 
 And the cold earth caught its smile 
 For the mother and ransomed maiden, 
 
 That morning in Carlisle. 
 
OUR COUNTRY 
 
 Our Country! whose eagle exults as he flies 
 In the splendor of noonday broad-breasting the 
 
 skies, 
 That from ocean to ocean the Land overblown 
 By the winds and the shadows is Liberty's own — 
 We hail thee! we crown thee! To east and to 
 
 west 
 God keep thee the purest, the noblest, the best, 
 While all thy domain with a people He fills 
 As free as thy winds and as firm as thy hills! 
 
 Our Country ! bright region of plenty and peace, 
 Where the homeless find refuge, the burdened 
 
 release, 
 Where Manhood is king, and the stars as they 
 
 roll 
 Whisper courage and hope to the lowliest soul, — 
 We hail thee ! we crown thee ! To east and to west 
 God keep thee the purest, the noblest, the best, 
 While all thy domain with a people He fills 
 As free as thy winds, and as firm as thy hills ! 
 
52 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Our Country! whose story the angels record — 
 Fair dawn of that glorious day of the Lord 
 When men shall be brothers, and love, like the 
 
 sun, 
 Illumine the earth till the nations are one — 
 We hail thee ! we crown thee ! To east and to west 
 God keep thee the purest, the noblest, the best, 
 While all thy domain with a people He fills 
 As free as thy winds and as firm as thy hills! 
 
CROWNING VERMONT 
 
 (For the "Brooklyn (N. Y.) Society of Vermonters," Jan. 17, 
 1899.) 
 
 How shall we crown Vermont ? With the beauty 
 and balm of her mountains ? 
 The wealth of her fields of clover, her quarries, 
 and flocks, and corn ? 
 The charm of her towns, hill-guarded, or set by 
 Champlain's clear fountains, 
 Or Connecticut, fairest river, that winds 
 through the meads of morn ? 
 
 Nay! for the fame of her sons is more than her 
 quarries and clover; 
 Strength of the hills is theirs, like her Allen of 
 bravest mould 
 Who seized Ticonderoga in the name of the great 
 Jehovah 
 And the Continental Congress — bold as the 
 right is bold. 
 
54 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Strength of the hills is hers ; aye, and the strength 
 of the waters! 
 Proud she points to her Dewey that morn in 
 Manila Bay; 
 Happy the hearts and homes of her patriot sons 
 and daughters — 
 With the might of the hills and the seas we will 
 crown her to-day! 
 
MAIZE IN NORWAY 
 
 By an inn of wildest Norway — 
 
 A dark fiord below, 
 And the peaks of the Norska-field, above. 
 
 In a waste of gleaming snow; 
 And between the sombre fir-trees, 
 
 The mead where the kine fed free, 
 And a mountain torrent leaping down 
 
 To be lost in the Maelstrom sea — 
 There, in a narrow garden, 
 
 One breezy August morn, 
 I saw, beside its hardy flowers, 
 
 A cluster of Indian Corn! 
 
 And I said to blue-eyed Lena 
 
 With braided flaxen hair, 
 The child of the inn who had brought 
 me forth 
 To see her small parterre, 
 "Your land lies far to the frozen north, 
 And a day your summer spans; 
 Why do you plant the tropic Maize 
 When frost the harvest bans ? 
 
56 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Barley and oats and rye you may reap 
 
 Ere yet the snows fall cold, 
 But the stately Maize, the grain of the sun, 
 
 Will never yield its gold." 
 
 " T is true," the maiden answered, 
 " That frost our harvest bans, 
 But we plant the beautiful, waving Maize 
 
 To please the Americans! 
 They smile when they see its shining leaves, 
 
 And say, on their boundless plains 
 It grows like a forest, rich and tall, 
 
 In the warmth and the mellow rains; 
 And the bins are filled with its blessed gold 
 
 Before the bright year wanes." 
 
 "O child," I said, "you have planted well!" 
 And I thought, that August morn, 
 As I looked at peak and stream and tree, 
 The dark fiord and the grassy lea, 
 There was naught so fair on shore or sea 
 As that cluster of waving Corn. 
 
STAR ISLAND CHURCH 
 
 (Isles of Shoals.) 
 
 Gray as the fog-wreaths over it blown 
 
 When the surf beats high and the caves make 
 
 moan, 
 Stained with lichens and stormy weather, 
 The church and the scarred rocks rise together; 
 And you scarce may tell, if a shadow falls, 
 Which are the ledges and which the walls. 
 
 By the sombre tower, when daylight dies, 
 And dim as a cloud the horizon lies, 
 I love to linger and watch the sails 
 Turn to the harbor with freshening gales, 
 Till yacht and dory and coaster bold 
 Are moored as safe as a flock in fold. 
 
 White Island lifts its ruddy shine 
 High and clear o'er the weltering brine, 
 And Boone and Portsmouth and far Cape Ann 
 Flame the dusk of the deep to span; 
 
58 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And the only sounds by the tower that be 
 Are the wail of the wind and the wash of the sea. 
 
 Gray as the fog-wreaths over it blown 
 
 When the surf beats high and the caves make 
 
 moan, 
 Stained with lichens and stormy weather, 
 The church and the scarred rocks rise together; 
 And you scarce may tell, if a shadow falls, 
 Which are the ledges and which the walls. 
 
MARY, MOTHER OF WASHINGTON 4 
 
 (Read at the Meeting in the Old South Meeting House, 
 Boston, October 26, 1889.) 
 
 Children of fair St. Botolph's town, 
 
 Boston, set by the northern sea, 
 Listen! Where warmer skies look down 
 On Fredericksburg with its sad renown, 
 And Rappahannock broad and brown, — 
 
 In a lonely grave by the grassy lea 
 Has slept, while a hundred years have run, 
 Mary, Mother of Washington. 
 
 Sacred her slumber! dust so dear — 
 
 So close to the nation's heart the shrine — 
 When battle raged in that awful year, 
 And shot and shell flew far and near, 
 "Fire away from the sleeper here!" 
 Rang all along the serried line; 
 And for her was peace, disturbed by none — 
 Mary, Mother of Washington. 
 
 Alas, alas! that hallowed place, 
 
 Long marked alone by a cedar tree, 
 
60 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Shows now but crumbling stones whose face 
 
 Bears not even the faintest trace 
 
 Of the name of her God granted grace 
 
 To give us him who made us free! 
 Yet deathless she with her deathless son — 
 Mary, Mother of Washington. 
 
 And shall we leave the dew and the rain 
 
 To deck the spot where her ashes lie, 
 With the creeping grass and the flowery train 
 That to wreathe the mound with bloom are fain, 
 While the west wind sings a mournful strain, 
 
 And the birds, lamenting, warble nigh ? 
 Nay ! for her honor our hearts are one ! — 
 
 Let us crown her grave, the river by, 
 
 With a column to stand eternally 
 And say to earth, and to star and sun : 
 Mary, Mother of Washington! 
 
THE SONG OF THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 
 
 (The Pueblo Indians of the Southwest.) 
 
 We are the Ancient People; 
 
 Our father is the Sun; 
 Our mother, the Earth, where the mountains 
 tower 
 
 And the rivers seaward run; 
 The stars are the children of the sky, 
 
 The Red Men, of the plain; 
 And ages over us both had rolled 
 
 Before you crossed the main ; — 
 For we are the Ancient People, 
 
 Born with the wind and rain. 
 
 And ours is the ancient wisdom, 5 
 The lore of Earth and cloud : — 
 
 We know what the awful lightnings mean, 
 
 Wi'-lo-lo-a-ne with arrows keen, 
 And the thunder crashing loud ; — 
 
 And why with his glorious, burning shield 
 His face the Sun-God 6 hides, 
 
 As, glad from the east, while night recedes, 
 
62 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Over the Path of Day he speeds 
 
 To his home in the ocean tides; 
 For the Deathless One at eve must die, 
 To flame anew in the nether sky, — 
 Must die, to mount when the Morning Star, 
 First of his warrior-host afar, 
 
 Bold at the dawning rides! 
 And we carry our new-born children forth 7 
 
 His earliest beams to face, 
 And pray he will make them strong and brave 
 
 As he looks from his shining place, — 
 Wise in council and firm in war, 
 
 And fleet as the wind in the chase ; — 
 And why the Moon, the Mother of Souls, 
 
 On summer nights serene, 
 Fair from the azure vault of heaven 
 
 To Earth will fondly lean, 
 While her sister laughs from the tranquil lake, 
 
 Soft-robed in rippling sheen; 
 For the Moon is the bride of the glowing Sun, 
 
 But the Goddess of Love is she 
 Who beckons and smiles from the placid depths 
 
 Of the lake and the shell-strown sea ; — 
 Why the Rainbow, A'-mi-to-lan-ne, 8 
 
 From the Medicine lilies drew 
 
THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 63 
 
 Orange and rose and violet 
 
 Before the fall of the dew, — 
 The dews that guard the Corn-maids, 9 
 
 And the fields keep fair to view; 
 But the Rainbow is false and cruel, 
 
 For it ends the gentle showers, 
 And the opening leaves and the tender buds 
 
 Like the ruthless worm devours, 
 And still its stolen tints are won 
 
 From the blanching, withering flowers; 
 The Morning Star, the Sun, and the Moon — 
 Ya'-o-na, Ya-to-k'-ya, and Mo'-ya-tchun — 
 
 Bring bounty and love and life, 
 But the Bow of the Sides and the Lightning 
 
 With famine and death are rife, 
 And we paint their forms on our arrow-shafts 
 
 And our shields, when battle lowers : — 
 We know what the breeze to the pine-tree sings, 
 
 And the brook to the meadow fair, 
 And the eagle screams to the plunging streams 
 
 Where the cliffs are cold and bare, — 
 The eagle, bird of the Whirlwind-God, 10 
 
 Lone-wheeling through the air; 
 And we can charm the serpent's tooth, 
 
 And wile the wolf from his den, 11 
 
64 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 For the beasts have told us their secrets 
 
 Close-kept from other men, — 
 The mighty beasts that rove the hills, 
 
 Or lurk in cave and fen: 
 The bear in his gloomy canon; 
 
 High 'mid the crags, the sheep; 
 The antelope, whose endless files 
 O'er the far mesa's rocky isles 
 
 Their silent marches keep; 
 The lordly bison with his herds; 
 
 Coyote swift and sly; 
 The badger in his earthy house 
 
 Where warm the sunbeams lie; 
 The savage mountain Hon 
 
 With his deadly roar and leap : — 
 And, when the serpent has sought his lair 
 
 And the thunder peal is still, 
 We know why the down of the Northland drifts 
 
 O'er wood and waste and hill; 
 And how the light-winged butterflies 
 
 To the brown fields summer bear, 
 And the balmy breath of the Corn-maids floats 
 
 In June's enchanted air; 
 And when to pluck the Medicine flowers 
 
 On the brow of the mountain peak, 
 
THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 65 
 
 The lilies of Te'-na-tsa-li, 12 
 
 That brighten the faded cheek, 
 And heal the wounds of the warrior 
 
 And the hunter worn and weak; 
 And where in the hills the crystal stones 
 
 And the turquoise blue to seek; 
 And how to plant the earliest maize, 13 
 
 Sprinkling the sacred meal, 
 And setting our prayer-plumes 14 in the midst 
 
 As full to the east we kneel, 15 — 
 The plumes whose life shall waft our wish 
 
 To the heights the skies conceal; 
 Nay, when the stalks are parched on the plain 
 
 And the deepest springs are dry, 
 And the Water-God, the jewelled toad, 18 
 
 Is lost to every eye, 
 With song and dance and voice of flutes 
 
 That soothe the Regions Seven, 
 We can call the blessed summer showers 
 
 Down from the listening heaven! 
 For ours is the lore of a dateless past, 
 
 And we have power thereby, — 
 Power which our vanished fathers sought 
 
 Through toil and watch and pain, 
 
66 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Till the spirits of wood and wave and air 
 
 To grant us help were fain; 
 For we are the Ancient People, 
 
 Born with the wind and rain. 
 
 And, year by year, when the mellow moons 
 
 Beam over the mountain wall, 
 Or the hearths are bright with the pinon fires 
 
 And the wild winds rise and fall, 
 Our precious things to their shrines are brought 
 That the tribes may be brave and strong; 
 And round our altars with mystic rite, 
 Vigil and fast and song's delight, 
 
 And measured dance we throng, — 
 The dance and prayers of the A'-ka-ka 17 
 
 That peace and joy prolong. 
 Of the Wood-Gods' flesh these altars 
 
 To the Great Six Realms we frame : — 
 For the North, of the Pine, whose yellow heart 
 
 Nor blasts nor snows can tame; 
 For the West, of the Willow, whose leaves are 
 blue 
 
 As they toss in the breeze at morn; 
 For the South, of the Cedar, ruddy-hued, 
 
 From whose bark the flame is born; 
 
THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 67 
 
 For the East, of the Poplar, downy-white 
 
 In the dawn of the gladsome year; 
 For the Realm Above, of the Juniper, 
 
 That climbs to the summits clear; 
 And of Laurel Root, for the Realm Below, 
 
 Deep-hid in the canons drear; — 
 Frame that the Beings Beloved may come 
 
 And their forms and thoughts reveal; 
 For naught, from the heart through vigils pure, 
 
 Will the Mighty Ones conceal. 
 Our richest robes and brightest hues 
 
 For the watching sky we wear, 
 With necklace-beads and eagle-plumes 
 
 Above our flowing hair, 
 And yellow pollen over us blown, 
 
 Good-will from the Gods to bear; 
 And with symbols of the lightning, 
 
 The winds, the clouds, the rain, — 
 Crosses, terraces, slanting bars, 18 — 
 We deck our blankets and our jars 
 
 Their favor to constrain; 
 And we weave for priest and priestess 
 
 The sash and mantle white, 
 Broidered with many a magic thread 
 
 To give these Gods delight, 
 
68 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And save our cherished homes from harm 
 
 And our fields from flood and blight. 
 And tales we tell by the evening flame 
 
 Of how the Earth was made, 
 And the tribes came up from the Under-world 
 
 To people plain and glade, — 
 Tales that will echo round our hearths 
 
 Till the last glow shall fade; 
 And of the two immortal youths, 
 
 Twin children of the Sun, 19 
 Who eastward led their faltering bands 
 
 To find where morn begun, — 
 To gain the stable, midmost lands, 
 
 And the trembling borders shun; 
 And of Po'-shai-ank'-ya, the master, 20 
 
 Whose help we never lose, 
 Who bade us turn from hate and guile 
 
 And ever the noblest choose, 
 And said that whoso smites a man 
 
 His own heart doth bruise. 
 Of Earth and the Gods he taught us, — 
 
 How slope and plain to till, 
 And the streams that fall from the mountain 
 snows 
 
 To turn and store at will; 
 
 
THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 69 
 
 And how to trace the glorious Sun 
 
 North and south to his goal; 
 And straight, when the body's life is done, 
 
 Set free the prisoned soul! 
 His voice was sweet as the summer wind, 
 
 But his robe was poor and old, 
 And, scorned of men, he journeyed far 
 
 To the city the mists enfold, — 
 Far to the land where his treasured lore 
 
 And secret rites were told; 
 And there with a chosen few he dwelt 
 
 And made their darkness day, 
 Till lo! while his words yet thrilled their 
 
 hearts, 
 Unseen, as the summer wind departs, 
 
 He vanished in mist away ! — 
 Passed to the splendor of the Sun, 
 He, the divine, the gracious one, 
 
 To hear our prayers for aye! 
 And still our holy fires we keep, 
 
 And the sacred meal we strow, 
 With many a prayer to the Gods of the air 
 
 And the Gods that dwell below, — 
 The Gods of the Great Six Regions: 
 
 The yellow, dreadful North; 
 
70 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 The West, with the blue of sea and sky; 
 The ruddy South, where the corals lie 
 
 And the fragrant winds go forth; 
 The pure white East, whose virgin dawns 
 
 Lead up the conquering Sun, 
 While stars grow pale and shadows fail, 
 
 For the shrouding night is done; 
 The Over-world, where all the hues 
 
 In radiant beauty shine; 
 The Under-world, more black and drear 
 
 Than the gloom of the deepest mine; 
 And the Middle Realm, where the Mother 
 reigns 
 
 And binds them all in one; — 
 Prayers in the words our fathers knew, 
 
 And prayers that voiceless steal 
 To the Holder of the Trails of Life 
 
 And thought to thought reveal! 
 For the clamorous cry unheard will die, 
 While, swift as light, ascends on high 
 
 The silent heart's appeal. 
 And we offer the pledge of sacrifice 
 
 To lull the earthquake's wrath, 
 And hush the roar of the whirlwind 
 
 Abroad on his furious path, — 
 
THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 71 
 
 Turquoise blue, and ocean-shells, 
 
 And the soothing, spicy scent that dwells 
 
 In the rare tobacco leaves, 21 
 And macaw-plumes to guard from ill 
 
 And bring us store of sheaves; 
 Nay, in the time when thunders pealed 
 
 And Earth swung to and fro, 
 Our dearest maids to the angry Gods 
 
 With fervent heart would go, 
 That the perfect gift of a stainless life 
 
 Might still the vengeful throe ; — 
 For our fathers were wise and pure of breath, 
 The breath that is soul the word beneath, 
 
 And all their ways we know. 
 And when at last the shadow falls 
 
 And the sleep no thunders wake, 
 By the dead a vase of water clear 22 
 
 For the parted soul we break, 
 Giving the life again to the Sun 
 
 Through Ka-thlu-el' -Ion's Lake; 23 
 And, facing the east, the body lay 
 
 In our mother Earth to rest, 
 Where dews may fall and dawns may gleam 
 And purple and crimson radiance stream 
 
 When day is low in the west; 
 
72 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And plumes of the birds of summer-land, 
 
 Freighted with many a prayer, 
 We bring to help the spirit's way 
 
 In the pathless depths of air. 
 But we do not fear that silent flight, 
 
 Nor the slumber lone and chill, 
 For the Home of the Dead has song and love, 
 
 And they wander where they will; 
 And morn and eve, by hearth and wood, 
 
 We see their faces still. 
 Thus, day and night, and night and day, 
 
 Our rites the Gods enchain, 
 And bring us peace no others win 
 
 Of all their earthly train; 
 For we are the Ancient People, 
 
 Born with the wind and rain. 
 
 And yet — and yet — on the mesa top 
 
 As we sit when the sun is low, 
 And, far to west, Francisco's peaks 24 
 
 Blaze in his parting glow, — 
 While plain, and rock, and cedar-steep 
 
 Fade slow from rose to gray, 
 And the sand-clouds, blown by the flying wind, 
 
 Like demons chase the day; 
 
THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 73 
 
 And the fires of the wandering meteors gleam, 
 
 And the dire mirage looms far 
 To beckon us hence to the nameless land 
 
 Where our Lost Others are; 
 And, weird as the wail by the Spirit Lake 
 
 Bewildered hunters know, 
 The cry of the owl comes mournful up 
 
 From the dusky glen below, — 
 That boding cry when death is nigh 
 
 And days that are dim with woe ; — 
 Sit, and think that but ruins mark 
 
 The realm that erst was ours, 
 The countless cities wrapped in dust 
 
 Which once were stately powers, 
 And that over our race, as over the plain, 
 
 The gathering darkness lowers; 
 And see how great from the Sunrise-Land 
 
 You come with every boon, 
 We know that ours is the waning, 
 
 And yours is the waxing moon! 
 Know that our grief and yearning prayers, 
 
 As reeds in the blast, are vain, 
 And with arrows of keenest anguish 
 
 Our tortured hearts are slain; 
 For we are the Ancient People, 
 
 Born with the wind and rain! 
 
74 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 But the same Earth spreads for us and you, 
 
 And death for both is one; 
 Why should we not be brothers true 
 
 Before our day is done ? 
 You are many and great and strong; 
 
 We, only a remnant weak; 
 Our heralds call at sunset still, 25 
 Yet ah, how few on plain or hill 
 
 The evening councils seek! 
 And words are dead and lips are dumb 
 
 Our hopeless woe to speak. 
 For the fires grow cold, and the dances fail, 
 
 And the songs in their echoes die; 
 And what have we left but the graves beneath, 
 
 And, above, the waiting sky ? — 
 Our fathers sought these frowning cliffs 
 
 To rid them of their foes, 
 And thrice and more, on the mesa floor, 
 
 Our terraced towns uprose; 
 But when the stress of war was past, 
 
 To the lowlands glad we went, 
 For the plain — the plain is our domain, 
 
 The home of our hearts' content; 
 And here, O brothers, let us dwell 
 
 And find at last repose, 
 
THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 75 
 
 By towering Ta-ai-yal'-lo-ne, 26 
 
 And the river that westward goes! 
 For the roads were long and rough we trod 
 
 To our fields of clustering corn, 
 And our women grew old ere youth was spent, 
 
 As wearily, night and morn, 
 They climbed the steep with the earthen jars, 
 
 Slow-filled, to the very brim, 
 From the trickling springs at the mesa foot 27 
 
 In the willow thickets dim. 
 Time was when seen from the loftiest peak 
 
 The realm was all our own, 
 And only the words of the A'-shi-wi M 
 
 To the four winds were known; — 
 Ours were the veins of silver; 
 
 The rivers' bounteous flow 
 Filling the maze of our water-ways 
 
 From the heights to the vales below; 
 The plains outspreading to the sky, 
 
 The crags, the canon's gloom, 
 The cedar shades, the pifion groves, 
 
 The mountain meadow's bloom; 29 
 Nay, even the very Sun was ours, 
 
 Above us circling slow! 
 And now — and now — from the lowest hill 
 
 Your pastures we descry; 
 
76 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Your speech is borne on every breeze 
 
 That blows the mesas by; 
 Our deep canals are furrows faint 
 
 On the wide and desert plain; 
 Of the grandeur of our temple-walls 
 
 But mounds of earth remain, 
 And over our altars and our graves 
 
 Your towns rise proud and high! 
 The bison is gone, and the antelope 
 
 And the mountain sheep will follow, 
 And all our lands your restless bands 
 
 Will search from height to hollow; 
 And the world we knew and the life we lived 
 
 Will pass as the shadows fly 
 When the morning wind blows fresh and free 
 
 And daylight floods the sky. 
 Alas for us who once were lords 
 
 Of stream and peak and plain! — 
 By ages done, by Star and Sun, 
 
 We will not brook disdain! 
 No! though your strength were thousandfold 
 
 From farthest main to main; 
 For we are the Ancient People, 
 
 Born with the wind and rain! 
 
OTHER POEMS 
 
That Other Land, that Other Land 
 Whose seas roll softly by our strand! 
 What suns will shine, what winds will blow 
 Beyond its border, who may know ? 
 Yet naught is alien, sea nor sun, 
 Since God in all his worlds is one. 
 
IMMORTAL BEAUTY 
 
 Beneath October's paling sun how fair 
 
 The wild-wood flowers in harvest beauty wait ! 
 The brier-rose berries hang in coral state; 
 
 The goldenrods their soft gray plumelets wear; 
 
 Clusters of down the meek immortelles bear; 
 The asters, bright with purple bloom so late, 
 To feathery stars have turned at touch of fate; 
 
 And all are winged and waiting for the air. 
 
 Immortal Beauty! gold and purple still 
 
 Glow in each seed the south wind wafts away, 
 
 That glade and bank and lonely nook and hill 
 Through summer suns may shine in rich array : 
 
 Not June's red rose the heart with joy can thrill 
 Like these winged florets, this October day. 
 
GAINING WINGS 
 
 A twig where clung two soft cocoons 
 I broke from a wayside spray, 
 
 And carried home to a quiet desk 
 Where, long forgot, it lay. 
 
 One morn I chanced to lift the lid, 
 
 And lo! as light as air, 
 A moth flew up on downy wings 
 
 And settled above my chair! 
 
 A dainty, beautiful thing it was, 
 
 Orange and silvery gray, 
 And I marvelled how from the leafy 
 bough 
 
 Such fairy stole away. 
 
 Had the other flown ? I turned to see, 
 
 And found it striving still 
 To free itself from the swathing floss 
 
 And rove the air at will. 
 
GAINING WINGS 81 
 
 " Poor little prisoned waif," I said, 
 "You shall not struggle more;" 
 And tenderly I cut the threads, 
 And watched to see it soar. 
 
 Alas! a feeble chrysalis 
 
 It dropped from its silken bed; 
 My help had been the direst harm — 
 
 The pretty moth was dead! 
 
 I should have left it there to gain 
 The strength that struggle brings: 
 
 'T is stress and strain, with moth or man, 
 That free the folded wings! 
 
THE MORNING STAR 
 
 (John Greenleaf Whittier died at dawn, September 7, 1892.) 
 
 "How long and weary are the nights," he said, 
 "When thought and memory wake, and sleep 
 
 has fled; 
 When phantoms from the past the chamber fill, 
 And tones, long silent, all my pulses thrill; 
 While, sharp as doom, or faint in distant towers, 
 Knell answering knell, the chimes repeat the 
 
 hours, 
 And wandering wind and waning moon have lent 
 Their sighs and shadows to the heart's lament. 
 Then, from my pillow looking east, I wait 
 The dawn, and life and joy come back, elate, 
 When, fair above the seaward hill afar, 
 Flames the lone splendor of the morning star." 
 
 O Vanished One! O loving, glowing heart! 
 When the last evening darkened round thy room, 
 Thou didst not with the setting moon depart; 
 Nor take thy way in midnight's hush and gloom; 
 
THE MORNING STAR 83 
 
 Nor let the wandering wind thy comrade be, 
 Outsailing on the dim, unsounded sea — 
 The silent sea where falls the muffled oar, 
 And they who cross the strand return no more; 
 But thou didst wait, celestial deeps to try, 
 Till dawn's first rose had flushed the paling sky, 
 And pass, serene, to life and joy afar, 
 Companioned by the bright and morning star! 
 
MEMORIES OF CHILDHOOD 
 
 O that immortal day of June 
 
 When the sky and the pine-crowned hill were 
 one, 
 As I played through the long, bright after- 
 noon, 
 
 Alone with the wind and the westering sun! 
 And when he sank, o'er the neighbor ridge, 
 
 In a blaze of crimson lit with gold, 
 The clouds were angels floating to me 
 Across that rosy, radiant sea, 
 And all was glory and mystery 
 
 In the heaven of heavens his set unrolled; — 
 
 And O that Indian Summer morn 
 When all the sighing winds were still, 
 
 And the bay of hounds and the hit of horn 
 Came up from the hollow beneath the hill! 
 
 Rich and clear from the rocky glens 
 
 As they followed the flying fox to the west; 
 
 Mellow and faint and dying away 
 
 Beyond the wood and the upland gray, 
 
MEMORIES OF CHILDHOOD 85 
 
 In the hazy, slumberous sky that lay 
 Over Monadnock's lordly crest; — 
 
 And that night when the snows the storm had 
 flung 
 
 Rose, drift on drift, to the burdened eaves ; 
 And the waning moon in the orient hung, 
 
 And the wind went by like a soul that grieves ; 
 And, wide to north, the banners waved 
 
 Of aurora's flitting, spectral host — 
 Their flaming lances flashing keen 
 The ranks of the paling stars between, 
 "While sky and snow, with the ruddy sheen, 
 
 Glowed till in dim, bleak dawn 'twas lost; — 
 
 October's morn — the skies alight — 
 
 Live still in the vision memory brings; 
 Again the cloud is an angel's flight, 
 
 And echo a fairy that hides and sings; 
 Again the wind of June blows sweet, 
 
 And heaven looks out in the setting sun; — 
 Ah! never the later world can bring 
 Such joy to the soul far journeying, 
 As the bannered host and the angel's wing 
 
 Of the days when earth and sky were one! 
 
RALPH WALDO EMERSON 
 
 (May 25, 1903.) 
 
 Monadno'ck calls the winds from peak to sea — 
 
 The clarion north wind and the full-choired 
 west — 
 And bids the streams their cliff-born melody 
 
 Blend with the airy chants above his rest ; 
 And wakes the pines to hymn his hundred years 
 
 In the weird symphonies he loved so well; 
 And listens — if perchance from starry spheres 
 
 Some echo of a kindred song should swell. 
 
 Poet whose lofty quest no creed could bar; 
 
 To whom the secret springs of life were known ; 
 One with the wild rose and the evening star; 
 
 The mountain and the mart alike thy throne; — 
 For thee, from Nature's myriad voices now 
 
 And the deep heart of man, ascends a paean: 
 Pan was not closer to the earth than thou, 
 
 Nor Plato nearer to the empyrean! 
 
O FOR DIVINER AIR 
 
 for diviner air 
 
 Out where the Vanished fare — 
 
 1 am aweary of this stifling world! 
 O for some waft of bliss 
 From richer realms than this! 
 
 Earth's winds are dead and all her ban- 
 ners furled. 
 
 For they who brought delight 
 
 Have fled from mortal sight 
 
 Farther than heaving seas or rolling suns; 
 
 O for some charm to free! 
 
 To-night I fain would be 
 Out in God's open with the vanished Ones ! 
 
THOMAS AND NANCY LINCOLN 30 
 
 " Fit us for humblest service," prayed 
 
 This kindly, reverent man, 
 Content to hold a lowly place 
 
 In God's eternal plan; 
 Content by prairie, wood, and stream, 
 
 The common lot to share, 
 Or help a neighbor in his need 
 
 Some grievous weight to bear — 
 Then trustfully resigned the life 
 
 That had fulfilled his prayer. 
 
 And she in Indiana's woods 
 
 This many a year who lies, 
 Mother and wife whose yearning soul 
 
 Looked sadly from her eyes; 
 Who, dying, called her children close 
 
 As the last shadow fell, 
 And bade them ever worship God 
 
 And love each other well — 
 Then to her forest grave was borne, 
 
 The wind her funeral knell; 
 
THOMAS AND NANCY LINCOLN 89 
 
 So drear, so lone, who could have dreamed 
 
 The boy her bed beside, 
 Forth from that narrow door would walk 
 
 Among earth's glorified? 
 But lo! his name from sea to sea 
 
 Gives patriotism wings; 
 Upon his brow a crown is set 
 
 Grander than any king's; 
 And to these fameless graves his fame 
 
 Tender remembrance brings. 
 
 Ah! still the humble God doth choose 
 
 The mighty to confound; 
 Still them that fear and follow Him 
 
 His angel campeth round; 
 And while by Indiana's woods 
 
 Ohio murmuring flows, 
 And Illinois' green levels shine 
 
 In sunset's parting glows, — 
 While Liberty is dear, our hearts 
 
 Will hallow their repose. 
 
GOD'S MARINER 
 
 (For the New England Convalescent Rest Home.) 
 
 Leagues from the light by the harbor side 
 Is the good ship, fast on a sandy shoal, 
 Waiting the wind and the morning tide 
 To spurn the bar for her distant goal; 
 Ah! when the strong waves lift her keel, 
 The sails will be wings, the timbers steel. 
 
 So voyagers over life's rough sea, 
 
 In darkness cast on shoal or shore, 
 
 Wait for some tide of sympathy 
 
 To bear them out to the deep once more — 
 
 Some blessed wind of cheer to blow; 
 
 Some guiding light of love to glow. 
 
 Let us be light and wind and tide 
 
 For those awreck on its chartless main ! — 
 
 Giving anew the hope that died; 
 
 Speeding them still their port to gain; 
 
 For oh! God's mariner is he 
 
 Who helps the storm-tossed brave the sea! 
 
THE HEAVENLY WAY 
 
 (Wherefore my counsel is that we hold fast to the heavenly 
 way. — Plato, "The Republic," Book x.) 
 
 The heavenly way ! The narrow path that leads 
 Where gulf and steep and burning desert bar, 
 Till, high and clear, it gains the golden meads 
 And the soft radiance of the morning star. 
 
 What dost thou care, O Soul, for present gloom, 
 The wind's wild tumult and the surging sea ? 
 Bear thyself grandly through the darkest doom, 
 Thou heir of all that was and is to be. 
 
 Only hold fast to heaven! The black night 
 
 speeds ; 
 The shadows vanish where the dawn gleams far; 
 And lo! the rapture of the golden meads, 
 And peace celestial with the morning star ! 
 
THE NATIVITY 
 
 Down Kedron's vale the wind blows chill; 
 
 The sun in the Great Sea has set; 
 Its glow has gone from Zion's hill, 
 
 From Ramah, and from Olivet; 
 And on the Temple's marble walls 
 
 And the Roman eagle by the gate, 
 Sombre and shadowy, twilight falls, 
 
 And the wide courts grow desolate; 
 And eastward, black and still and deep, 
 Looms the Salt Sea in sullen sleep, 
 And Moab's barren mountains lie 
 Gloomy and dim against the sky. 
 
 Midway, up Bethlehem's terraced height 
 
 Come toiling travellers, hastening 
 To reach their shelter ere the night 
 
 Its darker shade and fear shall bring — 
 From proud, palm-girdled Jericho, 
 
 Whose tropic gardens still are green; 
 From Hebron, fair its vines below, 
 
 And many a hill and glen between; 
 
THE NATIVITY 93 
 
 From Jordan's plains; from slopes that 
 north 
 
 Greet mighty Hermon towering cold; 
 For Caesar's mandate has gone forth 
 
 That every house must be enrolled. 
 
 Now darkness falls, and Bethlehem's inn 
 
 Is crowded as a fold with flocks; 
 Arches and court the travellers win, 
 Group after group, with eager din; 
 
 And, last of all, a pilgrim knocks — 
 A grave man, gently shielding there 
 His wan young wife from the chill air — 
 Knocks at the strong door of the gate, 
 And begs admittance, though so late: 
 "O keeper! strangers here are we 
 From Nazareth of Galilee, 
 And worn and weary with our quest; 
 Unbar the gate, and let us rest ! " 
 "Nay!" rough the host's brief answer falls, 
 "No room is left, save in the stalls 
 Where stand the beasts. Now get you 
 
 thither, 
 Since late and lone you journey hither! 
 No other place the walls afford." 
 
94 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And thus, that eve, a stable-cave 
 Was the rude shelter Bethlehem gave 
 To Mary, Mother of the Lord. 
 
 But, lo! when midnight winds went by, 
 Aflame was Bethlehem's watching sky! 
 Great gulfs of splendor clove the blue, 
 And, flashing their abysses through, 
 God's angel stood within the ray, 
 And to the shepherds cried: "This day, 
 
 In David's city, Christ is born!" 
 And suddenly the heavenly host 
 Filled all the air, and fear was lost 
 
 In visions of celestial morn, 
 As swelled that song of ecstasy — 
 
 Herald of Eden's prime again: 
 " Glory to God in the highest be, 
 
 And on earth peace, good will toward 
 
 men 
 
 And the shepherds hastened, wondering, 
 To find the manger-cradled King. 
 
THE CHRISTMAS ROSE 
 
 (Helleborus niger.) 
 
 A star-eyed child of Judah's line 
 Watched, in the wintry day's decline — 
 A loving child whose shepherd sire 
 Was first to heed the heavenly choir 
 As swelled the song o'er hill and glen, 
 On earth be peace, good will toward men 
 Watched by the manger-cave to see 
 With reverent steps the wise men three 
 Their camels leave, and entering, 
 With rapture greet the new-born King; 
 While myrrh and frankincense and gold 
 Borne far across the wintry wold, 
 With blessings at his feet they laid. 
 Then, sorrowful, the little maid 
 Turned to behold the sunset fall 
 On Bethlehem's plain and Moab's wall, 
 And grieved for empty hands, and sighed, 
 "Ah me! the world is rich and wide, 
 But birds are flown and fields are bare, 
 And not one gift of earth or air 
 
96 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Have I, dear God, to offer Him!" 
 
 And then her starry eyes grew dim, 
 
 And tears dropped fast — when lo! there 
 
 sprung 
 Where warm they fell the sands among, 
 Green leaves that stainless bloom disclose — 
 "See! God has sent a flower!" she said, 
 And for a moment bowed her head; 
 Then bore the Babe the Christmas Rose. 
 
AT JERUSALEM 
 
 I stood by the Holy City, 
 
 Without the Damascus Gate, 
 While the wind blew soft from the distant 
 sea, 
 
 And the day was wearing late, 
 And swept its wide horizon 
 
 With reverent, lingering gaze, 
 From the rolling uplands of the west 
 
 That slope a hundred ways, 
 To Olivet's gray terraces 
 
 By Kedron's bed that rise, 
 Upon whose crest the Crucified 
 
 Was lost to mortal eyes; 
 And, far beyond, to the tawny line 
 
 Where the sun seemed still to fall — 
 So bright the hue against the blue, 
 
 Of Moab's mountain wall; 
 And north to the hills of Benjamin, 
 
 Whose springs are flowing yet, 
 Ramah, and sacred Mizpah, 
 
 Its dome above them set; 
 
98 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 And the beautiful words of the Psalmist 
 Had meaning before unknown: 
 
 As the mountains are round Jerusalem 
 The Lord is round His own. 
 
THE KINGDOM OF GOD 
 
 (For the Woman's Congress of Missions, Chicago, 1893.) 
 
 The Kingdom of God! Is it lands and seas, 
 
 Temples, palaces, power and pride ? 
 Learning and beauty and lordly ease ? 
 
 Nay! earth's glories are swept aside, 
 Pitiful, passing, phantom things, 
 
 Fading as stars when dusk is done 
 And morning soars on radiant wings 
 
 To herald the great, victorious sun! 
 The Kingdom of God is love and peace; 
 
 Brotherhood; purity undefiled; 
 Sacrifice; service; care's release; 
 
 The simple trust of the little child; 
 Bliss for the soul though joys depart; 
 
 Thirst for righteousness; high endeavor; 
 The reign of the meek and lowly heart; 
 
 Rest in the Lord for ever and ever. 
 
 The Kingdom of God! And what the throne 
 Of its Prince whose advent thrilled the air ? 
 
100 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 Were trumpets of fame before Him blown ? 
 
 Did carving and purple His couch prepare. 
 And rabbi and haughty Roman tread 
 
 With pride in His steps by mount and mart ? — 
 Ah, no! to the poor and outcast wed, 
 
 No place had He to pillow His head, 
 And His only throne was the loving heart. 
 
 But O the freedom, and O the rest 
 He brought to the prisoned, burdened soul! 
 
 Come unto Me, was His sweet behest, 
 And leave for ever your care and dole; 
 
 And O His pity and tender cheer 
 For the weary women who thronged His way ! — 
 
 The living water, the widow's bier, 
 The full forgiveness, the silent tear, 
 
 For sister and mother and friend were they; 
 And to her who touched His robe, to glow 
 
 With the tide of life through her veins that stole, 
 Gracious He answered, Daughter, go 
 
 In peace, thy faith hath made thee whole; 
 And when, to His glory entering in, 
 
 And hovering heaven and earth between, 
 The watcher His earliest word to win 
 
 Was Mary, the loving, the Magdalene. 
 
THE KINGDOM OF GOD 101 
 
 We see Him not. He walks no more 
 
 By Zion and Jordan and Galilee, 
 But, sweet as the song the night winds bore, 
 
 And rich with meaning unknown before, 
 His words ring out as they rang of yore, 
 
 Go forth, and tell the world of me ! 
 
 O Heart of Love! we have heard Thy call; 
 
 And in peril and exile, grief and blame, 
 We have followed Thy feet where the shadows 
 fall 
 
 That the wave and the wild might praise Thy 
 Name! 
 Our dead are wrapped in the polar snows; 
 
 They sleep by the palms of tropic seas; 
 The wind of the desert above them blows; 
 The coral island their slumber knows; — 
 
 They who have drained Thy cup to the lees 
 And counted it joy, yea, blessedness 
 
 To be spent for Thee and for Thee to die! 
 So they have gained, through toil and stress, 
 
 Bliss where the river of life goes by. 
 Their fields are ours; and lo! a song 
 
 From the countless reapers swells to Thee, 
 
102 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 As they bind the sheaves while the days are long, 
 And dream of the harvests yet to be : 
 
 Through storm and sun the age draws on 
 
 When heaven and earth shall meet, 
 For the Lord has said that glorious 
 
 He will make the place of His feet; 
 And the grass may die on the summer hills, 
 
 The flower fade by the river, 
 But our God is the same through endless years 
 
 And His Word shall stand for ever. 
 
 What of the night ? O watchman set 
 
 To mark the dawn of day; — 
 "The wind blows fair from the morning star, 
 
 And the shadows flee away. 
 Dark are the vales, but the mountains glow 
 
 As the light its splendor flings, 
 And the Sun of Righteousness comes up 
 
 With healing in His wings." 
 
 Shine on, shine on, O blessed Sun, 
 
 Through all the round of heaven, 
 Till the darkest vale and the farthest isle 
 
 Full to Thy light are given! 
 Till the desert and the wilderness 
 
 As Sharon's plain shall be, 
 And the love of the Lord shall fill the earth 
 
 As the waters fill the sea! 
 
 For the toilers find Thy perfect peace 
 
 As they follow the path Thy feet have trod, 
 
 And know the woes of the world shall cease 
 In the light and joy of the Kingdom of God! 
 
HIS CHILDREN THREE 
 
 (To at two years old.) 
 
 Beautiful boy with the wistful eyes, 
 
 Are you dreaming now of your native skies ? 
 
 Do you hear the songs of the blest that swell 
 
 Over the meadows of asphodel, 
 
 And listen, intent for the voice of one 
 
 Who walks no more in the light of the sun — 
 
 Your father, gone from our life away 
 
 At the darkened dawn of your earthly day ? 
 
 He in the east and you in the west — 
 A tiny babe in your cradle-nest — 
 At twilight, to soothe his dole and pain, 
 He would hum to himself a sweet refrain, 
 And talking of you and the dear home things, 
 Say low, " 'T is a song his mother sings ; " 
 And with circling arms and radiant face 
 Would clasp you ail in a mute embrace. 
 
 Alas, alas! you cannot remember 
 
 The bitter morn of that dark December 
 
104 SONGS OF AMERICA 
 
 When even your coming could not stay 
 
 His soul that passed with the dawn away! 
 
 But for me, were I in Paradise 
 
 Tears unbidden would fill my eyes 
 
 At thought of that time, and the slumberer 
 
 there 
 Lost to our fondest call and care. 
 
 Be sure the love so strong in death 
 Would never cease with the ceasing breath! 
 Be sure as you looked on his noble form 
 Done with our varying shine and storm, 
 He stooped, whatever his new-world bliss, 
 To bless the boy unknown in this; 
 And that always tenderly, tenderly, 
 He watches over his children three ! 
 
O Life is Life for evermore! 
 
 And Death a passing shadow — 
 The gloom a cloud, from its azure floor, 
 
 Casts on the sunny meadow; 
 The west wind blows — the shadow goes. 
 
NOTES 
 
NOTES 
 
 1 Columbia's Banner. In February, 1892, at a 
 meeting of superintendents of education in Brooklyn, 
 N. Y., a plan was proposed for a celebration in the 
 schools throughout the country on Columbus Day. 
 This plan, which owed its inception and to a large 
 degree the methods by which it was consummated, to 
 Mr. James B. Upham of The Youth's Companion, was 
 unanimously approved by the superintendents, and an 
 executive committee of their number, with a repre- 
 sentative of The Youth's Companion, was appointed 
 to prepare an official programme of exercises for the 
 day, uniform for every school in America. In obedi- 
 ence to an Act of Congress, the President, on July 21, 
 1892, issued a proclamation recommending that Octo- 
 ber 21, the four hundredth anniversary of the discov- 
 ery of America, be celebrated everywhere in America 
 by suitable exercises in the schools. These exercises, 
 to commence at 9 a. m., included the reading of the 
 President's proclamation; the raising of the flag by a 
 company of veterans from the local post; the salute 
 to it by the pupils in these words : " I pledge allegiance 
 to my flag and the republic for which it stands: one 
 nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all;" 
 prayer or Scripture; patriotic music; the declamation 
 
110 NOTES 
 
 of the address for the occasion — "The Meaning of 
 the Four Centuries; " and the reading or recitation of 
 the poem for the day — "Columbia's Banner." The 
 celebration was universal in the schools from Maine to 
 Alaska, and beginning everywhere at the same hour, 
 the unfurling of the flag, the salute and the pledge, 
 the songs and recitations, followed the sun across the 
 continent. "Everywhere the place of honor for the day 
 was given to the Stars and Stripes, and everywhere the 
 central theme was the glory of America." 
 
 2 Natas'ka. Lake Mohonk is in the Shawangunk 
 Mountains of Ulster County, New York, fifteen miles 
 west of the Hudson and over twelve hundred feet above 
 the sea. Its shores and cliffs command superb views 
 of the Catskills and the river valleys. The Esopus 
 Indians who inhabited the region were of the Lenni- 
 Lenape Confederacy, and did not fraternize with the 
 Mohawks of the north, to whom at length they became 
 tributary. The council-fire of the Lenni-Lenape was 
 at Wawas'sing, near the site of Philadelphia. 
 
 3 The Captive's Hymn. At the close of the French 
 and Indian War the Indians of Pennsylvania and ad- 
 joining regions were compelled to bring their prisoners 
 to Carlisle, Pa., December 31, 1764, and on all sides the 
 friends of these prisoners were summoned to reclaim 
 them. A German woman from Reutlingen, Swabia, 
 whose little daughter, Regina, had been nine years 
 a captive, recovered her by singing Schmolke's hymn, 
 "Alone, yet not alone am I," which she had sung to her 
 
NOTES 111 
 
 in her childhood. Dr. H. M. Muhlenberg, the chief 
 founder of the Lutheran Church in the United States, 
 reported the incident, at the time, to the German 
 Hallische Nachrichten. In 1891 Mrs. Barrows, of the 
 Boston Christian Register, called my attention to the 
 story, saying she had brought it to the notice of both 
 Mr. Whittier and Dr. Holmes, but that both, while 
 expressing great interest in it, had said they were too 
 old to treat it. 
 
 4 Mary, Mother of Washington. In commem- 
 oration of the visit of Washington to Boston one hun- 
 dred years before, a meeting was held in the Old South 
 Meeting House, October 26, 1889, to which all were 
 invited, but which had special reference to the children 
 of the public schools. The object of this meeting was 
 to initiate a movement for raising money to erect 
 a suitable monument upon the long-neglected grave 
 of the mother of Washington, at Fredericksburg, Vir- 
 ginia. At this meeting the Ode written for Washing- 
 ton's reception a hundred years before, was sung to 
 the original music by a chorus from the schools; and 
 from this meeting came the influence which resulted 
 in the Mary Washington Monument Association, and 
 in the beautiful granite shaft, fifty feet tall, which was 
 placed upon the grave in May, 1904. 
 
 The following notes on The Song of the Ancient 
 People were made by the late John Fiske: 
 
 5 "Ours is the ancient wisdom." — The kiva, better 
 known to us, perhaps, by its Spanish name estuja, is, 
 
112 NOTES 
 
 among other things, the university, or perhaps we might 
 say the divinity school, of the Pueblo. Here the young 
 man is orally instructed in all the sacred rites and cere- 
 monies of his people, their genesis and their traditions. 
 So careful are they that no mistakes shall be made, 
 the youth is obliged to go over, day after day and year 
 after year, these oral instructions and the long rituals, 
 until he is able to repeat them without the loss of a 
 sentence or word, thereby proving himself qualified to 
 succeed the older men of his people, and so transmit 
 this sacred knowledge to coming generations. 
 
 Among the Moquis, the kiva is excavated out of the 
 rock below the surface of the mesa, and then covered 
 over, leaving an opening through which descent is 
 made by a ladder. The kivas of the Zurii and the Pue- 
 blos of the Rio Grande are built above the ground, 
 although entrance to them is made from the top, as 
 with the Moquis. 
 
 In each Pueblo there are as many kivas as there are 
 groups or classes of esoteric societies; as, for example, 
 the orders of the Antelope, the Snake, the Bear, the 
 Eagle, etc., etc. The basket, co-ja-ni-na (People of the 
 Willows), so called from the tribe that live at the foot 
 of Cataract Canon, among the heavy grove of willows 
 that grow there, contains pe-ki, the native bread, of a 
 slate color. The embroidered sash is used in ceremo- 
 nies. The jar, or olla, containing water, can be found 
 in all the kivas when work is going on. 
 
 The men all smoke during their ceremonies, some- 
 
NOTES 113 
 
 times their ancient pipes, but more generally cigar- 
 ettes. 
 
 6 The Sun-god, the chief deity of the Pueblo Indians, 
 is believed to be the Father of all men. He dies every 
 evening with the setting, and is born anew every morn- 
 ing with the rising sun. "The Sun-father, soaring 
 above the sun, moon, and stars, ... is surrounded by 
 the symbols of the principal phenomena in nature that 
 are regarded as essentially beneficent to mankind." 
 (Bandelier, The Delight Makers, p. 147.) 
 
 7 " We carry our new-born children forth." — Among 
 the Moqui Indians, it is customary, twenty days after 
 the birth of a child, to introduce the infant to the sun. 
 The godmother, after wrapping the baby in an old 
 blanket, and placing it in its cradle, laces the child, 
 together with an ear of corn, snugly in its place. 
 
 The father watches for the coming of the sun, and 
 when he announces its faintest appearance, the god- 
 mother with the child, followed by the mother, steps 
 out of the house, and they stand on each side of the 
 door, the mother at the right, the godmother at the left. 
 They both scatter sacred meal as the sun appears. As 
 soon as the child has been thus presented they retire 
 into the house, where their relatives are awaiting them. 
 For a complete account of this ceremony, see the arti- 
 cle "Natal Ceremonies of the Hopi Indians," by J. G. 
 Owens, in the Journal o) American Ethnology and 
 Archaeology, vol. ii, p. 163. In Zufii the ceremony, 
 which is very similar, is performed on the tenth day. 
 
114 NOTES 
 
 See Mrs. Stevenson, "Religious Life of a Zuiii Child," 
 in Fifth Report of the Bureau of Ethnology. 
 
 8 " A'-mi-to-lan-ne" is one of the Zuni names for 
 rainbow. There are distinct Rainbow gods and god- 
 desses, as there are distinct Lightning deities. Nearly 
 all phenomena, personified as gods, are in a measure 
 regarded as animals, and of each kind there are apt to 
 be many, male and female, good and evil. Thus the 
 principal Rainbow god is a male, "false and cruel" 
 like the "ruthless worm" that devours the buds. He 
 is called "consumer of clouds," "stealer of the thun- 
 der-ball," etc. On the other hand the "Rainbow of the 
 Mist," A'-mi-to-la-ni-tsa, is a fertile female, a kins- 
 woman of the Dew or Morning Mist. She is the bearer 
 of salubrious breaths and good tidings from "Those 
 Above," i. e., the immortal Cosmic Gods. 
 
 9 " The Corn-maids" are mythological beings sup- 
 posed to give fertility to the soil and foster the growth 
 of the corn. In the Corn-Drama they are personated 
 by virgins regarded as their own human sisters. 
 
 During the planting season, and until the ripening 
 of the corn, these virgins are frequently employed in 
 watching the fields, that the ravens may not raid them 
 and destroy the prospect of a crop. They build bowers 
 of cottonwood limbs, for shade, and in these make 
 their summer homes, having with them their blankets 
 and furs, and such needlework as they occupy their 
 time with. 
 
 The costumes of all the Pueblo women are quite the 
 
NOTES 115 
 
 same. All the blanket -dresses are made by the Moquis, 
 and sold by them among the other Pueblos. Some- 
 times they receive money in return, but more often 
 ponies, shell beads, turquoise beads, silver ornaments 
 made by the Navajos, and larger and more fanciful 
 blankets for general covering. 
 
 10 " The eagle, bird of the Whirlwind-God" figures 
 often in Zuiii folk-tales, where he performs marvellous 
 feats. " Eagle feathers are highly esteemed for religious 
 purposes. Eagles are kept in wattled corrals on the 
 west side of Zuiii Pueblo, in the plaza near the church, 
 and here and there throughout the Pueblo, sometimes 
 even on the housetops, without cages. They are often 
 sorry -looking birds, poorly representing an emblem 
 of national power." (J. W. Fewkes, Journal of Ameri- 
 can Ethnology and Archaeology, vol. ii, p. 26.) 
 
 11 "Wile the wolf from his den." — The Indians 
 have peculiar calls which they use in alluring game 
 within shooting distance of the bow and arrow; and 
 sometimes so close that they can dispatch a wolf or 
 coyote with their stone axes. 
 
 The call which allures the wolf is the peculiar sound 
 uttered by the female wild turkey. Then they use the 
 bone of the turkey leg for a whistle, with which they 
 imitate various birds, calling the larger ones by uttering 
 the notes of the small ones, upon which they prey. 
 These are the methods most obvious to us, but regarded 
 by the Indian as comparatively clumsy. Priests of the 
 hunter societies, through their intimate knowledge of 
 
116 NOTES 
 
 animal habits and aptitudes, exhibit remarkable 
 powers of charming beasts and birds. They sometimes 
 produce effects analogous to hypnotism. Mr. Cushing 
 tells me that he has seen prairie-dogs lured out to the 
 edges of their burrows by cries half -imitative, half- 
 musical ; and then held motionless there by the flashing 
 of light into their eyes from prisms of rock-crystal, 
 until they became stupefied and could be captured 
 alive. 
 
 12 " The lilies of Te-na-tsa-li" — This person is the 
 hero of a folk-tale. He attempted to woo a lovely 
 maiden, who, with her three beautiful sisters, lived at 
 Kiakima on Thunder Mountain. These maidens were 
 very rich, and made beautiful baskets. Many young 
 men tried to woo them, but each one disappeared 
 mysteriously, having been killed by these cruel but 
 beautiful girls. Te-na-tsa-li, a child of the gods, the 
 brother of the god of Dew, loved the elder one, and 
 went to her house. The maiden said if he could hide 
 from her so she could not find him, then she would wed 
 him; but he, knowing her magic arts, refused to go 
 first, and insisted upon her hiding from him. This she 
 tried to do, but by means of magic he found her. Then 
 he tried to hide from her, but, knowing that she could 
 find him, by magic, anywhere on earth, he mounted 
 on a sun's ray to the Sun-father. The maiden followed 
 his footsteps till they stopped, and then, filling a shell 
 with water, looked into it and saw the reflection of the 
 sun, and Te-na-tsa-li hidden there. When he found he 
 
NOTES 117 
 
 was discovered, Te-na-tsa-li came to the earth again, 
 and asked the maiden what her commands were. 
 Without answering, she drew a sharp obsidian knife 
 from her robe and cut off his head, buried the body, 
 and dragged the bleeding head to her house, where she 
 hid it. As Te-na-tsa-li did not return home, his brother 
 went to find him, and was able to trace him by the 
 beautiful flowers which had sprung up where he had 
 stepped or his blood had dropped. The bright-colored 
 lilies which grow near Zufii are called the lilies of 
 Te-na-tsa-li, and are said to have the power to heal the 
 sick and those who have suffered in war. (Abridged 
 from a Zufii folk-tale, translated by F. H. Cushing.) 
 
 13 "Plant the earliest maize." — In aboriginal Amer- 
 ican mythology the beautiful Indian corn plays as 
 prominent a part as the cow in ancient Aryan folk-lore. 
 Dr. Fewkes observes that "this characteristic Ameri- 
 can plant may rightly be called the natural food of all 
 the Pueblo people. Their folk-tales teem with refer- 
 ences to it, and it is regarded as one of the best gifts of 
 the gods. Their language is rich in names for maize in 
 its different stages of growth, and for the products 
 made from it." 
 
 14 "Prayer-plumes" are "painted sticks to which 
 the feathers or down of various birds (according to the 
 nature of the prayer they are to signify) are attached. 
 The aborigine deposits these wherever and whenever 
 he feels like addressing himself to the higher powers, 
 be it for a request, in adoration only, or for thanks- 
 
118 NOTES 
 
 giving. In a certain way the prayer-plume or plume- 
 stick is a substitute for prayer, inasmuch as he who has 
 not time may deposit it hurriedly as a votive offering. 
 The paint which covers the piece of stick to which the 
 feather is attached becomes appropriately significant 
 through its colors; the feather itself is the symbol of 
 human thought, flitting as one set adrift in the air 
 toward heaven, where dwell those above." (Bandelier, 
 The Delight Makers, p. 100.) 
 
 "While she stands and gazes and dreams, a flake 
 of down becomes detached, and quivers upward in the 
 direction of the moon's silvery orb. Such a flitting and 
 floating plume is the symbol of prayer. It rises and 
 rises, and at last disappears as if absorbed by moon- 
 light. The mother above has listened to her entreaty, 
 for the symbol of her thought, the feather, has gone to 
 rest in the bosom of her who watches over every house, 
 who feels with every loving, praying heart." (Ibid. 
 p. 154.) 
 
 15 "As full to the east we kneel." — The ceremony 
 of planting ba-hos (prayer-sticks) at the watering- 
 places is common among all the Pueblo Indians. A 
 certain order, called Ko-Ko, is composed partly of 
 unmarried women, who take a vow of celibacy before 
 entering the order. They repair to the springs before 
 dawn, and place the ba-hos about the water. This is to 
 invoke the aid of the water-god to send them plenty of 
 rain, that their crops may be bountiful. 
 
 The feathers attached to the ba-hos symbolize 
 
NOTES 119 
 
 thought, and in this ceremony waft their prayers to the 
 water-god above; the sticks to which the feathers are 
 attached are fashioned to represent lightning, the 
 water-deity. 
 
 The Pueblo Indians, not being able to separate the 
 subjective from the objective, recognize a likeness be- 
 tween the snake and the lightning, therefore they are 
 related; and for this reason we account for their high 
 veneration of the snake. They believe lightning to be 
 the water-god himself. When he appears he strikes a 
 cloud, and the report of the blow is the thunder which 
 follows; the effect is rain. 
 
 This ceremony is performed two or three or more 
 times a year, according to the condition of the weather. 
 Drought will bring the Ko-Ko together for this cere- 
 mony more frequently, of course. 
 
 Prayer-sticks of similar construction to the ba-hos 
 are placed about the graves of the departed. 
 
 16 "And the Water-God, the jewelled toad''' — In the 
 Southwest during and after a rain the beautiful desert 
 toads come to the surface, and when wet their bodies 
 reflect the light and shine like jewels. The Indians 
 believed that these toads had power to bring rain, and 
 so they used to make images of toads which they placed 
 along their watercourses to guide the water. Very few 
 of these fetishes are known to exist now; but beautiful 
 ancient specimens, encrusted with turquoises and coral- 
 shells inlaid in gum, were found by the Hemenway 
 Expedition in the buried Pueblos of the Salado valley. 
 
120 NOTES 
 
 17 " The dance and 'prayers of the A'-ka-ka." — The 
 A'-ka-ka (called Ka-tci-nas by the Moquis) is the 
 brotherhood of the Mythic-Drama-Dance, and its 
 members represent symbolically the souls of the first 
 ancestors of mankind. For further accounts see Mrs. 
 Stevenson, "Religious Life of a Zuiii Child," in Fifth 
 Report of the Bureau of Ethnology. 
 
 18 "Crosses, terraces, slanting bars. 1 " — "The red 
 cross is the symbol of the morning star; the white, of 
 the evening. The terraced pyramids are the clouds, 
 for the clouds appear to the Indian as staircases lead- 
 ing to heaven, and they in turn support the rainbow, 
 a tri-colored arch." (Bandelier, The Delight Makers, 
 p. 147.) 
 
 19 " Twin children of the Sun." — There is a tradi- 
 tion among the Zuni and Moqui Indians that two 
 youths, called "twin children of the Sun," bade adieu 
 to their people, and started upon a pilgrimage to find 
 where day began. They were never heard of afterward, 
 but it is supposed they are now the guests of the 
 Ka-tci-nas. 
 
 These young men are represented in the traditional 
 primitive costume of the cougar skin, bow and quiver, 
 and the eagle feather. 
 
 20 " Po f -shai-ank'-ya, the master" — A great char- 
 acter in Zuni mythology, the leader and saviour of the 
 people. 
 
 21 " The rare tobacco leaves." — Dr. Fewkes says 
 (Journal, vol. iii, p. 76) that native tobacco was used 
 
NOTES 121 
 
 in the sacred ceremonials. Although he supplied the 
 Indians plentifully with white men's tobacco, he never 
 saw them use it in sacred rites. The bark of the red 
 willow is often used in place of tobacco. 
 
 22 "By the dead a vase of water clear."" — It is the 
 custom to break a bowl of clear water beside the dead, 
 that the soul may have an easy and speedy passage to 
 the other world. 
 
 23 "Through Ka-thlu-el' -Ion's Lake." — This is a 
 sacred lake about sixty miles southwest of Zufli, 
 through which A'-ka-ka are believed to have come up 
 on the earth, and through which, after death, the soul 
 passes to Shi-papu, where there is eternal dancing and 
 feasting. 
 
 24 "Far to west, Francisco's peaks." — The Pueblo 
 of Shi-mo-pa-vi is the loftiest of the Moqui villages. 
 From its walls there is a glorious view of the desert, 
 with the snow-capped peaks of the Francisco Moun- 
 tains in central Arizona, the range whence the Fran- 
 cisco River winds its way down to the Gila and the 
 weird Colorado, until its waters are lost in the Ver- 
 milion Sea, as the old explorers used to call the Gulf 
 of California. These mountains have nothing to do 
 with San Francisco, from which they are distant many 
 hundred miles; nor do they belong even to the Sierra 
 Nevada, but to the Rocky Mountain system. 
 
 25 "Our heralds call at sunset still." — It is still the 
 custom in Zufii and Moqui for the herald, who is a kind 
 of town-crier, to announce events, make known the 
 loss of goods, etc. 
 
122 NOTES 
 
 26 "By towering Ta-ai-yal'-lo-ne." — Midway be- 
 tween the gateway of Zufii and the Canon of Cotton- 
 woods stands majestic Thunder Mountain, Ta-ai- 
 yal'-lo-ne, magnificent in the coloring and chiselling 
 of its rocky sides. From its hill-ensconced base to its 
 almost level summit, the height is about a thousand 
 feet. At the foot stand the ruins of the ancient Zufii 
 town of Kiakima. It was near this spot that the negro 
 Estevanico, companion of Fray Marcos of Nizza, was 
 killed by the Zufiis in 1539. See Fiske, Discovery of 
 America, vol. ii, p. 505. 
 
 27 "The trickling springs at the mesa foot." — All 
 the water at Moqui has to be carried up to a height of 
 seven hundred feet from the springs at the foot of the 
 mesa. Morning and evening the women meet at the 
 watering-places to fill their large canteens and ollas, 
 or earthen jars. They take the occasion for rest and 
 gossip, and, after all, while their lives are full of toil, 
 they seem careless and happy, and certainly enjoy 
 themselves more than when put among civilized people 
 whose advanced condition they cannot at all compre- 
 hend. 
 
 It is extremely interesting to go to the springs early 
 in the morning or at close of day and study the groups 
 that collect by them. At first they are shy and re- 
 strained by the presence of a stranger, but on acquaint- 
 ance they resume their natural ways, and begin to 
 chatter and frolic. 
 
 The Moqui women dress their hair in different ways 
 
NOTES 123 
 
 to distinguish a maiden from a married woman. The 
 former wears upon the side of her head, just above the 
 ears, huge cart-wheel puffs, while the married women 
 and old women wear theirs braided, banged, tied in 
 a knot behind, or allowed to drop loosely by the sides. 
 The Spaniards noticed these cart-wheel puffs in 1539. 
 No other Pueblo women have adopted this peculiar 
 way of distinguishing the maidens. 
 
 28 " A' -shi-wi" is a Zufii name for the Zufiis them- 
 selves. 
 
 29 " The mountain meadow's bloom" — In the Zufii 
 Mountains there are little meadows where the deer 
 used to graze. 
 
 It was the ancient hunting-ground of the Zufii 
 Indians, and is at the present time occupied by a cattle 
 company, whose herds have supplanted the deer and 
 antelope of other days. In some of the valleys the pine- 
 tree grows to very great proportions. It should be 
 borne in mind that the altitude of these grazing spots 
 is not less than six and seven thousand feet above the 
 level of the sea. 
 
 30 The grave of Thomas Lincoln, father of Abra- 
 ham Lincoln, is in Coles County, Illinois; that of 
 Nancy Lincoln, his mother, in Spencer County, 
 Indiana. 
 
Electrotyfied and printed by H. O. Houghton & Co. 
 Cambridge, Mass., U.S. A. 
 
OCT 26 1905 
 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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