Lays of Ancient Virginia | Page 8

bright?Than ever lent the loveliest charm?To goddess of the Festal light.?Come, hear a story of the time,?When this wide land was one green bower,?The roving Red man's Eden-chine,?Where bloomed the wildest flower.?The great ships brought a wondrous race,?One evening o'er the ocean beach;?Strange was the pallor of their face,?Strange was the softness of their speech.?'Twas evening, and the sunset threw?A gorgeous brilliance o'er the scene,?Deep crimson stained the heaven's sweet blue,?But ocean rivalled all its sheen.?The painted red men came to view,?With marvel, what the winds had brought,--?For, surely, those proud vessels flew,?As if their force from Heaven they caught.?But who is yonder slender youth,?With smoothest brow and smoother cheek,?And eyes so full of boyhood's truth,?And mouth, which closed, yet seems to speak??"Ah, sure, that lovely youth's from Heaven!"?A dark-eyed maiden of the wood?Sighed out upon the breath of even,?As in the mellowed light she stood.?And, ever from that fatal hour,?This white youth's image, slight and pale,?Would haunt the maiden's leafy bower,?And wake her spirit's wail.?In that high heart that fiercely hates,?Love is as fierce and wild;?And so the love is wild, that waits?To mount its height in this poor child:?This poor, frail child who born beneath?A roof of leaves, is made to dream,?That she may wear a bridal wreath?For youth of snowy gleam.?Watoga! sure some demon lied,?To thee, when wrapt amid thy sleep,?To make thee his forlornest bride,?Beneath the moaning deep.?That youth who floats an Angel through,?Thy night, thy daily dream--?He loves a maid whose eyes are blue,?And cheek like yon full moon's white beam.?The simple ornaments which thou?Hast taken thy form to deck,?The wild flower wreath that binds thy brow,?The shells that gem thy neck;?Each ornament shall deck a bride?To wed the Demon Death,?Beneath the ocean's sluggish tide,?A thousand feet beneath!?The fair youth who hath warped thy mind,?He loves a snow-white maid!?Then know'st it!--now not long confined,?Thou'lt fly the greenwood shade.?'Tis night on lone Atlantic's deep,?And summer o'er that placid sea,?The stars watch Earth's scarce-breathing sleep--?Oh! she sleeps deeply--tenderly.?What figure o'er yon bluff that scowls,?Upon the smiling water??Ah! whose that wild and freezing howl??It is the forest's daughter.?One moment,--and the hollow moan?Of billows sings her funeral song;--?In sooth, it was a dreadful tone,?And it will haunt us long.?This is the brief and mournful tale?Of one who loved in vain;--?She slept not in the flowery vale,?But in the deep, deep main,?They tell she was a demon's bride,?But now a wondrous wail,?Each night swells o'er the peaceful tide,?And through the loudest gale.?Watoga was her Indian name,?The white men called her yellow-flower;--?And evil fire, a poisonous flame,?Blasted her heart's sweet bower.?Failing to be the youth's dear bride,?Adorned in colors gay,?She went to a Demon's pride,?Under the Sea, they say.?And I have grieved to think of her,?And, if in these degenerate years,?There's feeling, her most mad despair,?Would melt a stone to tears.
NAPOLEON.
INTRODUCTION.
If ye will walk amid the ancient wood,?Ye will perceive the lordly oak o'erspread?The slender shrubs, and shield them from the storm.?If ye will look upon a thrifty hive?Of honey-loving bees, ye will remark?A Sovereign rules this small but populous State;?And, if she live, they live, and fill with life?The sunny air around--but if she die,?They quickly die, and then their precious sweet,?Becomes a dainty dish for vilest worms.?If ye will scan the custom of those birds,?That seek the boreal lakes, when spring unfolds--?Soaring far up amid the azure heaven,?Ye will note one who leads them in their flight,?As Chief his army to the embattled fight,?And, oft he shouts far back to them to cheer?Their fainting hearts, and flagging pinions on,?To trace the long, long course to far off lands.?If ye will note the noblest of a flock,?Ye will observe the weaker follow him.?And thus if ye will wisely look on men,?Ye will perceive the wisest lead them on?To every work; for this is nature's law,?And whoso breaks it, breaks it to his hurt.?Fair France once drooped beneath the feeble rule,?A blighting reign, of many a Bourbon fool,?Until Napoleon rose, her natural king,?And crushed the Bourbon, as an abscess thing.?Great Heaven decrees, that Greater still must reign,?Or else the weaker must exist in vain.?Fair France seemed conscious of this grand design,?And hailed Napoleon as a man divine--?Bedecked his path for many a flowery mile,?And claimed her monarch with a beaming smile.?Thus came Napoleon--and, on every hand,?Fair Joys prepared to hover o'er the land.?Then, France! thy glorious age was nigh begun,?When rose upon thee such a glorious sun;?Soon had thy bliss and praises been complete,?And Earth had, falling, worshipped at thy feet.?Beneath this monarch's rule--who loved the best--?Thy meanest subject had been very blest.?And thou had'st antidated our high claim?Of rescuing man from civil slavery's shame.?But, ever, Envy views, with murderous eye,?Those souls who strive to make their station high.?When France was weak, her sister realms were kind--?When France grew strong, in