IV. Yet earnestly the pious man bcsought, That Heaven would deign to shed the Gospel light On the kind pagan's soul, as yet untaught Save in the dreams of her primordial night; And much he prayed, that to the truth when brought,- V. Williams the task of goodness now essayed, - Concealed her workings from our Founder's view, Save when some question, rare and strange, betrayed His dream-bewildered glimpses of the true.— Long was the task; and Williams back began, At earth's creation and the fall of man. vi. He told how God from nothing formed the earth, Placed with His blessing the first human pair; And they, and theirs, consigned to sad despair, Until, incarnate, God in pity gave Himself for man, and made it just to save. VII. He then told how the blessed martyrs bore The chains of dungeons, and the fagot's flame, Glad that their sufferings might attest the more Their perfect faith in their Redeemer's name; How His disciples past from shore to shore, How hither now they brought the Gospel's light VIII. Waban attentive listened to the strain, And at its close for long in silence sate; And all his heart's deep feelings indicate. IX. "Great news Awanux brings the red men here News that their legends old doth much excel; Yet give to Waban the attentive ear, And the traditions of his sires he'll tell. From days afar, down many a rolling year Down to thy brothers red- - their fathers' tale Comes to inform them, in their mortal state, X. Here Waban paused, and sitting mused a space, To gather up the legends of his race. At length he roused, as from a passing dream, And from his mat, majestically slow Rearing his form, began in accents low: XI. far away, "Brother, that time is distant When Heaven or Earth or living thing was not, Save our great God, Cawtantowit, who lay Extended through immensity, where naught XII. "But though he slept, yet, as the human soul To this small frame, his being did pervade The universal space, and ruled the whole; E'en as the soul, when in deep slumber laid, Doth her wild dreams and fantasies control, And give them action, color, shape and shade Just as she wills. But the Great Spirit broke His sleep at last, and all the boundless shook. XIII. "In a vast eagle's form embodied, He Did o'er the deep on outstretched pinions spring; Fire in his eye lit all immensity, Whilst his majestically gliding wing The conscious waters felt their Manittoo, XIV. "The moutain whale came spouting from below, The porpoise plunged along the foaming main, The smaller fry in sporting myriads go, With glancing backs above the liquid plain; Yet still refused her giant form to show XV. "Then great Cawtantowit in his anger spoke, And her huge back of woods and mountains vast From the far depths tow'rd upper light began Slowly to heave. The affrighted waters ran XVI. "Hither and thither, tumultous and far; But still Unamis, heaving from below The full formed earth, first, through the waves did rear The fast sky-climbing Alleghany's brow, Dark, huge and craggy; from its summits bare The rolling billows fell, and rising now, All its broad forest to the breezy air XVII. "Shed the salt showers. Far o'er the deep, And rock, and forest waving to the breeze, XVIII. "But great Cawtantowit, on his pinions still, XIX. "Yet man was not.—Then great Cawtantowit spoke XX. "Then He the oak, of fibre hard and fine, With the first red man's soul and form endowed, And woman made he of the tapering pine, Which 'neath that oak in peaceful beauty bowed; She on the red man's bosom did recline, Like the bright rainbow on the thunder-cloud. XXI. "He gave them all these forests far and near, * Sesek-rattlesnake. |