Page:Poems (Bryant, 1821).djvu/28



And where his willing waves yon bright blue bay

Sends up, to kiss his decorated brim,

And cradles, in his soft embrace, the gay

Young group of grassy islands born of him,

And, crowding nigh, or in the distance dim,

Lifts the white throng of sails, that bear or bring

The commerce of the world;—with tawny limb,

And belt and beads in sunlight glistening,

The savage urg’d his skiff like wild bird on the wing.

Then all this youthful paradise around,

And all the broad and boundless mainland, lay

Cool’d by the interminable wood, that frown’d

O’er mound and vale, where never summer ray

Glane’d, till the strong tornado broke his way

Through the grey giants of the sylvan wild;

Yet many a shelter’d glade, with blossoms gay,

Beneath the showery sky and sunshine mild,

Within the shaggy arms of that dark forest smil’d.