Page:Song of Hiawatha (1855).djvu/258

248 Like a blind man seated upright,

Floated down the Taquamenaw,

Underneath the trembling birch-trees,

Underneath the wooded headlands,

Underneath the war encampment

Of the pigmies, the Puk-Wudjies.

There they stood, all armed and waiting,

Hurled the pine-cones down upon him,

Struck him on his brawny shoulders,

On his crown defenceless struck him.

"Death to Kwasind!" was the sudden

War-cry of the Little People.

And he sideways swayed and tumbled,

Sideways fell into the river,

Plunged beneath the sluggish water

Headlong, as an otter plunges;

And the birch-canoe, abandoned,

Drifted empty down the river,

Bottom upward swerved and drifted:

Nothing more was seen of Kwasind.