Page:Song of Hiawatha (1855).djvu/273

Rh Sought for bird or beast and found none,

Saw no track of deer or rabbit,

In the snow beheld no footprints,

In the ghastly, gleaming forest

Fell, and could not rise from weakness,

Perished there from cold and hunger.

O the famine and the fever!

O the wasting of the famine!

O the blasting of the fever!

O the wailing of the children!

O the anguish of the women!

All the earth was sick and famished;

Hungry was the air around them,

Hungry was the sky above them,

And the hungry stars in heaven

Like the eyes of wolves glared at them!

Into Hiawatha's wigwam

Came two other guests, as silent

As the ghosts were, and as gloomy,

Waited not to be invited,