_qua via difficilis, quaque est via nulla_
OVID _Metam. lib_ iii. v. 227.
Now the vapor, hot and damp,
Shed by day's expiring lamp,
Through the misty ether spreads
Every ill the white man dreads;
Fiery fever's thirsty thrill,
Fitful ague's shivering chill!
Hark! I hear the traveller's song,
As he winds the woods along;--
Christian, 'tis the song of fear;
Wolves are round thee, night is near,
And the wild thou dar'st to roam--
Think, 'twas once the Indian's home![2]
Hither, sprites, who love to harm,
Wheresoe'er you work your charm,
By the creeks, or by the brakes,
Where the pale witch feeds her snakes,
And the cayman[3] loves to creep,
Torpid, to his wintry sleep:
Where the bird of carrion flits,
And the shuddering murderer sits,[4]
Lone beneath a roof of blood;
While upon his poisoned food,
From the corpse of him he slew
Drops the chill and gory dew.
Hither bend ye, turn ye hither,
Eyes that blast and wings that wither
Cross the wandering Christian's way,
Lead him, ere the glimpse of day,
Many a mile of maddening error
Through the maze of night and terror,
Till the morn behold him lying
On the damp earth, pale and dying.
Mock him, when his eager sight
Seeks the cordial cottage-light;
Gleam then, like the lightning-bug,
Tempt him to the den that's dug
For the foul and famished brood
Of the she wolf, gaunt for blood;
Or, unto the dangerous pass
O'er the deep and dark morass,
Where the trembling Indian brings
Belts of porcelain, pipes, and rings,
Tributes, to be hung in air,
To the Fiend presiding there![5]
Then, when night's long labor past,
Wildered, faint, he falls at last,
Sinking where the causeway's edge
Moulders in the slimy sedge,
There let every noxious thing
Trail its filth and fix its sting;
Let the bull-toad taint him over,
Round him let mosquitoes hover,
In his ears and eyeballs tingling,
With his blood their poison mingling,
Till, beneath the solar fires,
Rankling all, the wretch expires!
[1] The idea of this poem occurred to me in passing through the very
dreary wilderness between Batavia, a new settlement in the midst of the
woods, and the little village of Buffalo upon Lake Erie. This is the most
fatiguing part of the route, in travelling through the Genesee country to
Niagara.
[2] "The Five Confederated Nations (of Indians) were settled along the
banks of the Susquehannah and the adjacent country, until the year 1779,
when General Sullivan, with an army of 4000 men drove them from their
country to Niagara, where, being obliged to live on salted provisions, to
which they were unaccustomed, great numbers of them died. Two hundred of
them, it is said, were buried in one grave, where they had encamped."--
_Morse's American Geography_.
[3] The alligator, who is supposed to lie in a torpid state all the
winter, in the bank of some creek or pond, having previously swallowed a
large number of pine-knots, which are his only sustenance during the time.
[4] This was the mode of punishment for murder (as Charlevoix tells us)
among the Hurons. "They laid the dead body upon poles at the top of a
cabin, and the murderer was obliged to remain several days together, and
to receive all that dropped from the carcass, not only on himself but on
his food."
[5] "We find also collars of porcelain, tobacco, ears of maize, skins,
etc., by the side of difficult and dangerous ways, on rocks, or by the
side of the falls; and these are so many offerings made to the spirits
which preside in these places."--See _Charlevoix's Letter on the
Traditions and the Religion of the Savages of Canada_.
Father Hennepin too mentions this ceremony; he also says, "We took notice
of one barbarian, who made a kind of sacrifice upon an oak at the Cascade
of St. Anthony of Padua upon the river Mississippi."--See _Hennepin's
Voyage into North America_.