THE DYING INDIAN.

"ON yonder lake I spread the sail no more!
Vigour, and youth, and active days are past—
Relentless demons urge me to that shore

On whose black forests all the dead are cast:-
Ye solemn train, prepare the funeral song,
For I must go to shades below,

Where all is strange and all is new;
Companion to the airy throng!-
What solitary streams,

In dull and dreary dreams,

All melancholy, must I rove along!

To what strange lands must CHEQUI take his way!
Groves of the dead departed mortals trace:
No deer along those gloomy forests stray,
No huntsmen there take pleasure in the chase,
But all are empty, unsubstantial shades,
That ramble through those visionary glades;
No spongy fruits from verdant trees depend,
But sickly orchards there

Do fruits as sickly bear,

And apples a consumptive visage shew,
And withered hangs the whortleberry blue.

Ah me! what mischiefs on the dead attend!
Wandering a stranger to the shores below,
Where shall I brook or real fountain find!
Lazy and sad deluding waters flow-
Such is the picture in my boding mind!
Fine tales, indeed, they tell
Of shades and purling rills,
Where our dead fathers dwell
Beyond the western hills;

But when did ghost return his state to shew;
Or who can promise half the tale is true!

I too must be a fleeting ghost!—no moreNone, none but shadows to those mansions go; I leave my woods, I leave the Huron shore, For emptier groves below!

Ye charming solitudes,

Ye tall ascending woods

Ye glassy lakes and purling streams,

Whose aspect still was sweet,

Whether the sun did greet,

Or the pale moon embraced you with her beams-
Adieu to all!

To all, that charm'd me where I strayed,
The winding stream, the dark sequester'd shade;
Adieu all triumphs here!

Adieu the mountain's lofty swell,
Adieu, thou little verdant hill,

And seas, and stars, and skies-farewell,
For some remoter sphere!

Prepare the hollow tomb, and place me low,
My trusty bow and arrows by my side,
The cheerful bottle and the venison store,
For long the journey is that I must go,
Without a partner, and without a guide."

He spoke, and bid the attending mourners weep, Then closed his eyes, and sunk to endless sleep!

THE INDIAN BURYING-GROUND.

In spite of all the learn'd have said,
I still my old opinion keep;
The posture that we give the dead,

Points out the soul's eternal sleep.
Not so the ancients of these lands-

The Indian, when from life released, Again is seated with his friends,

And shares again the joyous feast." His imaged birds, and painted bowl, And venison, for a journey dressed, Bespeak the nature of the soul,

Activity that knows no rest.

His bow, for action ready bent,

And arrows, with a head of stone, Can only mean that life is spent,

And not the old ideas gone. Thou, stranger, that shalt come this way, No fraud upon the dead commitObserve the swelling turf, and say, They do not lie, but here they sit.

Here still a lofty rock remains,

On which the curious eye may trace
(Now wasted, half, by wearing rains,)
The fancies of a ruder race.
Here still an aged elm aspires,

Beneath whose far-projecting shade
(And which the shepherd still admires)
The children of the forest played!
There oft a restless Indian queen

(Pale SHEBAH, with her braided hair) And many a barbarous form is seen

To chide the man that lingers there. By midnight moons, o'er moistening dews, In habit for the chase arrayed, The hunter still the deer pursues,The hunter and the deer, a shade!† And long shall timorous fancy see

The painted chief and pointed spear, And Reason's self shall bow the knee To shadows and delusions here.

The North American Indians bury their dead in a sitting posture; decorating the corpse with wampum, the images of birds, quadrupeds, &c.: and (if that of a warrior) with bows, arrows, tomahawks, and other military weapons.

CAMPBELL appropriated this line, in his beautiful poems entitled "O'Conor's Child:"

"Now o'er the hills in chase he flits-
The hunter and the deer--a skade."

TO AN OLD MAN.

WHY, dotard, wouldst thou longer groan Beneath a weight of years and wo; Thy youth is lost, thy pleasures flown, And age proclaims, "'T is time to go." To willows sad and weeping yews

With us a while, old man, repair, Nor to the vault thy steps refuse;

Thy constant home must soon be there. To summer suns and winter moons Prepare to bid a long adieu; Autumnal seasons shall return,

And spring shall bloom, but not for you. Why so perplex'd with cares and toil To rest upon this darksome road? "T is but a thin, a thirsty soil,

A barren and a bleak abode.

Constrain'd to dwell with pain and care, These dregs of life are bought too dear; "T is better far to die, than bear

The torments of life's closing year.

Subjected to perpetual ills,

A thousand deaths around us grow:
The frost the tender blossom kills,

And roses wither as they blow.
Cold, nipping winds your fruits assail;
The blasted apple seeks the ground;
The peaches fall, the cherries fail;

The grape receives a mortal wound.

The breeze, that gently ought to blow,

Swells to a storm, and rends the main; The sun, that charm'd the grass to grow, Turns hostile, and consumes the plain; The mountains waste, the shores decay,

Once purling streams are dead and dry"T was Nature's work-'t is Nature's play, And Nature says that all must die.

Yon flaming lamp, the source of light,

In chaos dark may shroud his beam, And leave the world to mother Night, A farce, a phantom, or a dream.

What now is young, must soon be old: Whate'er we love, we soon must leave; "T is now too hot, 't is now too cold

To live, is nothing but to grieve.
How bright the morn her course begun!
No mists bedimm'd the solar sphere;
The clouds arise-they shade the sun,
For nothing can be constant here.
Now hope the longing soul emplovs,
In expectation we are bless'd;
But soon the airy phantom flies,

For, lo! the treasure is possess'd.

Those monarchs proud, that havoc spread, (While pensive Reason dropt a tear,) Those monarchs have to darkness fled, And ruin bounds their mad career.

The grandeur of this earthly round,
Where folly would forever stay,
Is but a name, is but a sound-
Mere emptiness and vanity.

Give me the stars, give me the skies,
Give me the heaven's remotest sphere,
Above these gloomy scenes to rise
Of desolation and despair.

Those native fires, that warm'd the mind,
Now languid grown, too dimly glow,
Joy has to grief the heart resign'd,

And love itself, is changed to wo.

The joys of wine are all your boast,

These, for a moment, damp your pain; The gleam is o'er, the charm is lostAnd darkness clouds the soul again. Then seek no more for bliss below,

Where real bliss can ne'er be found; Aspire where sweeter blossoms blow,

And fairer flowers bedeck the ground; Where plants of life the plains invest,

And green eternal crowns the year:The little god, that warms the breast, Is weary of his mansion here. Like Phospher, sent before the day, His height meridian to regain, The dawn arrives-he must not stay To shiver on a frozen plain. Life's journey past, for fate prepare,— "T is but the freedom of the mind; Jove made us mortal-his we are, To Jove be all our cares resign'd.

THE WILD HONEYSUCKLE.

FAIR flower that dost so comely grow,
Hid in this silent, dull retreat,
Untouch'd thy honey'd blossoms blow,
Unseen thy little branches greet:

No roving foot shall crush thee here,
No busy hand provoke a tear.

By Nature's self in white arrayed,
She bade thee shun the vulgar eye,
And planted here the guardian shade,
And sent soft waters murmuring by;

Thus quietly thy summer goes—
Thy days declining to repose.
Smit with those charms, that must decay,
I grieve to see your future doom;
They died-nor were those flowers more gay-
The flowers that did in Eden bloom;

Unpitying frosts and Autumn's power
Shall leave no vestige of this flower.
From morning suns and evening dews
At first thy little being came:
If nothing once, you nothing lose,
For when you die you are the same;
The space between is but an hour,
The frail duration of a flower.

TO THE MEMORY OF THE AMERICANS WHO FELL AT EUTAW.*

Ar Eutaw Springs the valiant died;

Their limbs with dust are cover'd o'er; Weep on, ye springs, your tearful tideHow many heroes are no more! If, in this wreck of ruin, they

Can yet be thought to claim the tear, Oh smite your gentle breast and say,

The friends of freedom slumber here!
Thou who shalt trace this bloody plain,
If goodness rules thy generous breast,
Sigh for the wasted rural reign;

Sigh for the shepherds, sunk to rest!
Stranger, their humble graves adorn ;
You too may fall, and ask a tear;
"T is not the beauty of the morn

That proves the evening shall be clear. They saw their injured country's woThe flaming town, the wasted field, Then rush'd to meet the insulting foe;

They took the spear, but left the shield.† Led by the conquering genius, GREENE,

The Britons they compell'd to fly : None distant viewed the fatal plain;

None grieved, in such a cause, to die. But like the Parthians, famed of old, Who, flying, still their arrows threw ; These routed Britons, full as bold,

Retreated, and retreating slew. Now rest in peace, our patriot band; Though far from Nature's limits thrown, We trust they find a happier land,

A brighter sunshine of their own.

INDIAN DEATH-SONG.

THE sun sets at night and the stars shun the day,
But glory remains when their lights fade away.
Begin, ye tormentors! your threats are in vain,
For the son of Alknomock can never complain.
Remember the woods where in ambush he lay,
And the scalps which he bore from your nation
away.

Why do ye delay ? 'till I shrink from my pain?
Know the son of Alknomock can never complain.
Remember the arrows he shot from his bow;
Remember your chiefs by his hatchet laid low.
The flame rises high-you exult in my pain!
But the son of Alknomock will never complain.
I go to the land where my father has gone;
His ghost shall exalt in the fame of his son.
Death comes like a friend; he relieves me from pain,
And thy son, oh Alknomock! has scorned to com-
plain.

The Battle of Eutaw, South Carolina, fought September 8, 1781.

↑ Sir Walter Scott adopted this line in the introduction to the third canto of " Marmion:"

"When Prussia hurried to the field,

And snatched the spear, but left the shield."

THE PROSPECT OF PEACE.

THOUGH clad in winter's gloomy dress
All Nature's works appear,
Yet other prospects rise to bless
The new returning year.
The active sail again is seen

To greet our western shore,
Gay plenty smiles, with brow serene,
And wars distract no more.

No more the vales, no more the plains
An iron harvest yield;

Peace guards our doors, impels our swains
To till the grateful field:

From distant climes, no longer foes,
(Their years of misery past,)
Nations arrive, to find repose
In these domains at last.

And if a more delightful scene
Attracts the mortal eye,

Where clouds nor darkness intervene,
Behold, aspiring high,

On freedom's soil those fabrics plann'd,
On virtue's basis laid,

That makes secure our native land,

And prove our toils repaid.
Ambitious aims and pride severe,

Would you at distance keep,
What wanderer would not tarry here,
Here charm his cares to sleep?
Oh, still may health her balmy wings

O'er these fair fields expand,
While commerce from all climates brings
The products of each land.

Through toiling care and lengthened views,
That share alike our span,

Gay, smiling hope her heaven pursues,
The eternal friend of man:

The darkness of the days to come

She brightens with her ray,
And smiles o'er Nature's gaping tomb,
When sickening to decay!

HUMAN FRAILTY.

DISASTERS on disasters grow,

And those which are not sent we make; The good we rarely find below,

Or, in the search, the road mistake.
The object of our fancied joys
With eager eye we keep in view.
Possession, when acquired, destroys
The object and the passion too.
The hat that hid Belinda's hair

Was once the darling of her eye;
"T is now dismiss'd, she knows not where
Is laid aside, she knows not why.
Life is to most a nauseous pill,

A treat for which they dearly pay:
Let's take the good, avoid the ill,
Dis 1arge the debt, and walk away

EXTRACTS FROM "GAINE'S LIFE."

Now, if I was ever so given to lie, My dear native country I would n't deny; (I know you love Teagues) and I shall not conceal, That I came from the kingdom where PHELIM

Ο' ΝΕΛΙ.

And other brave worthies ate butter and cheese,
And walked in the clover-fields up to their knees:
Full early in youth, without basket or burden,
With a staff in my hand, I pass'd over Jordan,
(I remember, my comrade was Doctor MAGRAW,
And many strange things on the waters we saw,
Sharks, dolphins and sea dogs, bonettas and whales,
And birds at the tropic, with quills in their tails,)
And came to your city and government seat,
And found it was true, you had something to eat!
When thus I wrote home: "The country is good,
They have plenty of victuals and plenty of wood;
The people are kind, and whate'er they may think,
I shall make it appear I can swim where they'll sink;
And yet they're so brisk, and so full of good cheer,
By my soul! I suspect they have always New Year,
And, therefore, conceive it is good to be here."

So said, and so acted: I put up a press,
And printed away with amazing success;
Neglected my person and looked like a fright,
Was bothered all day, and was busy all night,
Saw money come in, as the papers went out,
While PARKER and WEYMAN were driving about,
And cursing and swearing and chewing their cuds,
And wishing HUGH GAINE and his press in the suds.
Thus life ran away, so smooth and serene-
Ah! these were the happiest days I had seen!
But the saying of JACOB I've found to be true,
"The days of thy servant are evil and few!"
The days that to me were joyous and glad,
Are nothing to those which are dreary and sad!
The feuds of the stamp act foreboded foul weather,
And war and vexation, all coming together.
Those days were the days of riots and mobs,
Tar, feathers, and tories, and troublesome jobs-
Priests preaching up war for the good of our souls,
And libels, and lying, and liberty-poles,
From which when some whimsical colors you waved
We had nothing to do, but look up and be saved!
But this was the season that I must lament;
I first was a whig, with an honest intent-
Yes, I was a whig, and a whig from my heart-
But still was unwilling with Britain to part.
I thought to oppose her was foolish and vain,
I thought she would turn and embrace us again,
And make us as happy as happy could be,
By renewing the era of mild sixty-three;
And yet, like a cruel, undutiful son,
Who evil returns for the good to be done,
Unmerited odium on Britain to throw,

I printed some treason for PHILIP FRENEAU!...
At this time arose a certain king SEARS,
Who made it his study to banish our fears.
He was, without doubt, a person of merit,
Great knowledge, some wit, and abundance of spirit,
Could talk like a lawyer, and that without fee,
And threatened perdition to all who drank tea.
Long sermons did he against Scotchinen prepare

And drank like a German, and drove away care,
Ah!don't you remember what a vigorous hand he put
To drag off the great guns, and plague Captain
VANDEPUT,

That night when the hero (his patience worn out)
Put fire to his cannon, and folks to the rout,
And drew up his ship with a spring on his cable,
And gave us a second confusion of Babel! ...
For my part, I hid in a cellar, (as sages
And Christians were wont, in the primitive ages.)
Yet I hardly could boast of a moment of rest,
The dogs were a howling, the town was distrest. ....
From this very day till the British came in,
We lived, I may say, in the Desert of Sin; ...
We townsmen, like women, of Britons in dread,
Mistrusted their meaning, and foolishly fled;
Like the rest of the dunces, I mounted my steed,
And galloped away with incredible speed;
To Newark I hastened-but trouble and care
Got up on the crupper, and followed me there!
So, after remaining one cold winter season,
And stuffing my papers with something like treason,
I, cursing my folly and idle pursuits,
Returned to the city and hung up my boots!....

LITERARY IMPORTATION.

HOWEVER We wrangled with Britain awhile
We think of her now in a different style,
And many fine things we receive from her isle:
Among all the rest,

Some demon possess'd

Our dealers in knowledge and sellers of sense To have a good BISHOP imported from thence. The words of SAM CHANDLER were thought to be vain,

When he argued so often and proved it so plain, That SATAN must flourish till bishops should reign: Though he went to the wall

With his project and all, Another bold SAMMY, in bishop's array, Has got something more for his pains than his pay It seems we had spirit to humble a throne, Have genius for science inferior to none, But never encourage a plant of our own:

If a college be planned, 'Tis all at a stand

THE INDIAN STUDENT: OR, FORCE OF NATURE.

FROM Susquehanna's farthest springs,
Where savage tribes pursue their game,
(His blanket tied with yellow strings,)
A shepherd of the forest came. ....
Some thought he would in law excel,
Some said in physic he would shine;
And one that knew him passing well,
Beheld in him a sound divine.
But those of more discerning eye,
Even then could other prospects show,
And saw him lay his VIRGIL by,

To wander with his dearer bow.

The tedious hours of study spent,

The heavy moulded lecture done, He to the woods a hunting wentThrough lonely wastes he walked, he run.

No mystic wonders fired his mind

He sought to gain no learned degree, But only sense enough to find

The squirrel in the hollow tree

The shady bank, the purling stream,
The woody wild his heart possessed,
The dewy lawn his morning dream
In fancy's gayest colors drest.
"And why," he cried, "did I forsake
My native woods for gloomy walls?
The silver stream, the limpid lake

For musty books and college halls?

A little could my wants supply

Can wealth and honor give me more!

Or, will the sylvan god deny

The humble treat he gave before?

"Let seraphs gain the bright abode,
And heaven's sublimest mansions see;

I only bow to Nature's god

The land of shades will do for me.

"These dreadful secrets of the sky
Alarm my soul with thrilling fear-
Do planets in their orbits fly?

And is the earth indeed a sphere?
"Let planets still their course pursue,
And comets to the centre run:
In him my faithful friend I view,

The image of my GoD-the sun.
"Where nature's ancient forests grow,

And mingled laurel never fades, My heart is fixed, and I must go

To die among my native shades."

He spoke, and to the western springs,

(His gown discharged, his money spent, His blanket tied with yellow strings,) The shepherd of the forest went.

A BACCHANALIAN DIALOGUE.

WRITTEN IN 1803.

ARRIVED at Madeira, the island of vines,
Where mountains and valleys abound,
Where the sun the mild juice of the cluster refines,
To gladden the magical ground:

As pensive I strayed, in her elegant shade,
Now halting, and now on the move,
Old BACCHUS I met, with a crown on his head,
In the darkest recess of a grove.

I met him with awe, but no symptom of fear,
As I roved by his mountains and springs,
When he said with a sneer, "How dare you come
You hater of despots and kings? [here,

"Do you know that a prince and a regent renown'd Presides in this island of wine?

Whose fame on the earth has encircled it round And spreads from the pole to the line?

Haste away with your barque; on the foam of the To Charleston I bid you repair; [main There drink your Jamaica, taat maddens the brain; You shall have no Madeira-I swear!"

"Dear BACCHUS," I answered, for BACCHUS it was That spoke in this menacing tone:

I knew by the smirk, and the flush on his face,
It was BACCHUS and BACCHUS alone-

"Dear BACCHUS," I answered, "ah, why so severe !
Since your nectar abundantly flows,
Allow me one cargo- without it I fear
Some people will soon come to blows:

"I left them in wrangles, disorder, and strife
Political feuds were so high-

I was sick of their quarrels, and sick of my life, And almost requested to die."

The deity smiling, replied, "I relent:

For the sake of your coming so far,
Here, taste of my choicest: go, tell them repent,
And cease their political war.

"With the cargo I send, you may say I intend
To hush them to peace and repose;
With this present of mine, on the wings of the wind
You shall travel, and tell them, ⚫ Here goes-

"A health to old BACCHUS!' who sends them the best
Of the nectar his island affords,
The soul of the feast, and the joy of the guest,
Too good for your monarchs and lords.

"No rivals have I in this insular waste,
Alone will I govern the isle.

With a king at my feet, and a court to my taste, And all in the popular style.

"But a spirit there is in the order of things, To me it is perfectly plain,

That will strike at the sceptres of despots and kings, And only king BACCHUS remain."