Page:Pocahontas and Other Poems (NY).pdf/19

18 A fair example of his own pure creed; Patient of error, pitiful to need, Persuasive wisdom in his thoughtful mien, And in that Teacher's heavenly meekness bless'd, Who laved his followers' feet with towel-girded vest.

Music upon the breeze! the savage stays His flying arrow, as the strain goes by; He starts! he listens! lost in deep amaze, Breath half-suppress'd, and lightning in his eye. Have the clouds spoken? Do the spirits rise From his dead fathers' graves, with wildering melodies? Oft doth he muse, 'neath midnight's solemn sky, On those deep tones, which, rising o'er the sod, Bore forth, from hill to hill, the white man's hymn to God.

News of the strangers stirr'd Powhatan's dreams, The mighty monarch of the tribes that roam A thousand forests, and on countless streams Urge the swift bark and dare the cataract's foam; The haughtiest chieftains in his presence stood Tame as a child, and from the field of blood His war-cry thrill'd with fear the foeman's home: His nod was death, his frown was fix'd as fate, Unchangeable his love, invincible his hate.