Indian son and Indian sire!
Lo! the embers of your fire
On the wigwam hearth burn low,
Never to revive its glow!
And the Indian's heart is ailing,
And the Indian's blood is failing.
Now the hunter's bow 's unbent,
And his arrows all are spent!
Like a very little child
Is the red man of the wild;
'To his day there 'll dawn no morrow; Therefore is he full of sorrow.
From his hills the stag is fled,
And the fallow deer are dead,
And the wild beasts of the chase
Are a lost and perished race;
And the birds have left the mountain,
And the fishes the clear fountain.
Indian woman, to thy breast
Closer let thy babe be pressed,
For thy garb is thin and old,
And the winter wind is cold;
On thy homeless head it dashes;
Round thee the grim lightning flashes.
We, the rightful lords of yore,
Are the rightful lords no more;
Like the silver mist we fail,
Like the red leaves in the gale,
Fail like shadows, when the dawning
Waves the bright flag of the morning.
By the river's lonely marge
Rotting is the Indian barge;
And his hut is ruined now,
On the rocky mountain-brow;
The fathers' bones are all neglected,
And the children's hearts dejected.
Therefore, Indian people, flee
To the farthest western sea;
Let us yield our pleasant land
To the stranger's stronger hand ;
Red men and their realms must sever;
They forsake them, and for ever!
FROM THE GERMAN OF RÜCKERT, BY MILNES.
CHIDHAR the Prophet, ever young,
Thus loosed the bridle of his tongue.
I journeyed by a goodly town,
Beset with many a garden fair,
And asked of one who gathered down
Large fruit how long the town was there.
He spoke, nor chose his hand to stay,
"The town has stood for many a day,
And will be here for ever and aye.
A thousand years went by, and then
I went the selfsame road again.
No vestige of that town I traced, -
But one poor swain his horn employed,
His sheep unconscious browsed and grazed,
I asked, "When was that town destroyed?
He spoke, nor would his horn lay by,
"One thing may grow and another die,
But I know nothing of towns, -not I.”
A thousand years went by, and then
I passed the selfsame place again.
There in the deep of waters cast
His nets one lonely fisherman,
And as he drew them up at last,
I asked him how that lake began.
He looked at me and laughed to say,
"The waters spring for ever and aye,
And fish are plenty every day."
A thousand years went by, and then
I went the selfsame road again.
I found a country wild and rude,
And, axe in hand, beside a tree,
The hermit of that solitude, -
I asked how old that wood might be.
He spoke, "I count not time at all,
A tree may rise, a tree may fall,
The forest overlives us all."
A thousand years went on,
I passed the selfsame place again.
And there a glorious city stood,
And, 'mid tumultuous market-cry,
I asked when rose the town, where wood,
Pasture, and lake forgotten lie.
They heard me not, and little blame,
For them the world is as it came,
And all things must be still the same.
A thousand years shall pass, and then
I mean to try that road again.
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