THE LOST HUNTER.

And, bursting with a roar, and shock
That made the groaning forest rock,

On rush'd the winter blast.

As o'er it whistled, shriek'd, and hiss'd,
Caught by its swooping wings,
The snow was whirl'd to eddying mist,
Barb'd, as it seem'd, with stings;
And now 'twas swept with lightning flight
Above the loftiest hemlock's height,
Like drifting smoke, and now

It hid the air with shooting clouds,
And robed the trees with circling shrouds,
Then dash'd in heaps below.

Here, plunging in a billowy wreath,
There, clinging to a limb,

The suffering hunter gasp'd for breath,
Brain reel'd, and eye grew dim;
As though to whelm him in despair,
Rapidly changed the blackening air
To murkiest gloom of night,
Till nought was seen around, below,
But falling flakes and mantled snow,
That gleam'd in ghastly white.

At every blast an icy dart

Seem'd through his nerves to fly,
The blood was freezing to his heart-
Thought whisper'd he must die.
The thundering tempest echo'd death,
He felt it in his tighten❜d breath;
Spoil, rifle, dropp'd, and slow,
As the dread torpor crawling came
Along his staggering stiffening frame,

He sunk upon the snow.

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76

THE LOST HUNTER.

Reason forsook her shatter'd throne,

He deem'd that summer-hours
Again around him brightly shone

In sunshine, leaves, and flowers;
Again the fresh, green forest-sod,
Rifle in hand, he lightly trod,-

He heard the deer's low bleat;
Or, couch'd within the shadowy nook,
He drank the crystal of the brook
That murmur'd at his feet.

It changed;-his cabin roof o'erspread,
Rafter, and wall, and chair,

Gleam'd in the crackling fire, that shed
Its warmth, and he was there;
His wife had clasp'd his hand, and now
Her gentle kiss was on his brow,

His child was prattling by,

The hound crouch'd, dozing, near the blaze,
And through the pane's frost-pictured haze
He saw the white drifts fly.

That pass'd;-before his swimming sight
Does not a figure bound,

And a soft voice, with wild delight,

Proclaim the lost is found?

No, hunter, no! 'tis but the streak
Of whirling snow-the tempest's shriek-
No human aid is near !

Never again that form will meet

Thy clasp'd embrace-those accents sweet

Speak music to thine ear.

Morn broke;-away the clouds were chased,
The sky was pure and bright,

And on its blue the branches traced

Their webs of glittering white,

THE LOST HUNTER.

Its ivory roof the hemlock stoop'd,
The pine its silvery tassel droop'd,
Down bent the burden'd wood,

And, scatter'd round, low points of green,
Peering above the snowy scene,

Told where the thickets stood.

In a deep hollow, drifted high,
A wave-like heap was thrown,
Dazzlingly in the sunny sky

A diamond blaze it shone;'
The little snow-bird, chirping sweet,
Dotted it o'er with tripping feet;
Unsullied, smooth, and fair,

It seem'd, like other mounds, where trunk
And rock amid the wreaths were sunk,
But, O! the dead was there.

Spring came with wakening breezes bland,
Soft suns and melting rains,
And, touch'd by her Ithuriel wand,
Earth bursts its winter-chains.

In a deep nook, where moss and grass
And fern-leaves wove a verdant mass,
Some scatter'd bones beside,

A mother, kneeling with her child,
Told by her tears and wailings wild
That there the lost had died.

24

MARCO BOZZARIS.*

BY FITZ-GREENE HALLECK.

At midnight, in his guarded tent,

The Turk was dreaming of the hour
When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent,
Should tremble at his power:

In dreams, through camp and court, he bore
The trophies of a conqueror:

In dreams his song of triumph heard;
Then wore his monarch's signet-ring:
Then press'd that monarch's throne-a king;
As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing,
As Eden's garden-bird.

At midnight, in the forest shades,

BOZZARIS ranged his Suliote band,
True as the steel of their tried blades,
Heroes in heart and hand.

There had the Persian's thousands stood,
There had the glad earth drunk their blood
On old Platæa's day;

And now there breathed that haunted air
The sons of sires who conquer'd there,
With arm to strike, and soul to dare,
As quick, as far as they.

* He fell in an attack upon the Turkish camp at Laspi, the site of the ancient Platæa, August 20, 1823, and expired in the moment of victory. His last words were: "To die for liberty is a pleasure, not a pain."

MARCO BOZZARIS.

An hour pass'd on-the Turk awoke;
That bright dream was his last;
He woke to hear his sentries shriek,

"To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek!"
He woke to die midst flame, and smoke,
And shout, and groan, and sabre-stroke,
And death-shots falling thick and fast
As lightnings from the mountain-cloud;
And heard, with voice as trumpet loud,
BOZZARIS cheer his band;

"Strike-till the last arm'd foe expires;
Strike-for your altars and your fires;
Strike-for the green graves of your sires;
GOD-and your native land!"

They fought-like brave men, long and well;
They piled that ground with Moslem slain;
They conquer'd-but BOZZARIS fell,
Bleeding at every vein.

His few surviving comrades saw

His smile when rang their proud hurrah,

And the red field was won:

Then saw in death his eyelids close
Calmly, as to a night's repose,

Like flowers at set of sun.

Come to the bridal chamber, Death!
Come to the mother's, when she feels,
For the first time, her firstborn's breath;
Come when the blessed seals

That close the pestilence are broke,
And crowded cities wail its stroke;
Come in consumption's ghastly form,
The earthquake-shock, the ocean-storm,
Come when the heart beats high and warm,

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