Where coiled on glowing rocks he basking lies,
When, at the approaching step his rattles shake,
Flickers his forky tongue, and burn his eyes,
Than glared that crowd of warriors round the stake,
Arrayed in murderous arms and martial guise;
Their turbulent murmurs kindling through the whole
The sympathetic wrath of one inspiring soul.
XVII.
But when the Sachem, coming, near them trod,
He raised his open hand, and, pausing, spoke:
“Keenomps! Awanux, prompted by his God,
Brings back the pipe the Wampanoag broke.
Our fathers ever answered good with good,
And for the bearer of the pipe ne’er woke
The storm of vengeance;--list ye to his talk;
He brings no message from the tomahawk.”
XVIII.
As thus he spake, the sullen murmurs died,
And, hushed and listening, all the warriors stood;
Again he moved--and at his onward stride
The deep mass parted like a severing flood;
And, yielding either way, the living tide
Left clear the space through which our Founder trod:
Their breath alone he heard--like the hoarse breeze
Foreboding tempests to the shuddering trees.
XIX.
At last he came where the old Sachems sate,
Who formed the Narraganset senate grave;
Renownéd were they once, in fierce debate
Of battle dire, as bravest of the brave;
But now, as guardians of their little state,
To younger hands they prudent counsel gave.
Their youth was gone, but their experience sage
Had thrice its value in a wise old age.
XX.
On settles, raised around the mounting blaze,
Sit gray Wauontom, Keenomp, Sagamore;
But he who most attracts our Founder’s gaze
Is sage Canonicus, whose tresses hoar
Float on the passing breeze; whose brow displays
The care-worn soul in many a furrowed score;
But whose bright eyes, that underneath it glow,
Still show the chief of sixty years ago.
XXI.
Beside him lay the calumet of peace--
It was his sceptre mid the din of arms;
No martial dyes did on his visage trace
The lines of wrath--for him they had no charms;
The neyhom’s[17] mantle did his shoulders grace,
With ample folds that stayed the winter’s harms;
At every movement, changing in the sun,
From plume to plume its glistering glories run.
[17] The neyhom, or wild turkey. See note.
XXII.
Mute were the chiefs and seemed to meditate;
Nor turned their heads, nor cast a glance aside,
When on the offered mat our Founder sate,
And close behind him came his watchful guide.
Then spread the warriors round in circle great,
And did the earth beneath their numbers hide;
They sit, kneel, stand, or climb the forest boughs,
Till all around the live enclosure grows.
XXIII.
When ceased the crowd to stir, and died their hum,
Long on our Sire the old chief kept his gaze;
At length he said: “And has Awanux come?
He’s welcome to the red man’s council blaze.
What news brings he from the pale stranger’s home?
Or from the dog that near his wigwam strays?
Our young men see the pipe--what does it seek?
Our ears are open--let Awanux speak.”
XXIV.
Sire Williams rose;--a thousand staring eyes
Were on him fixed; a thousand ears were spread
To catch his words, whilst all around him lies
That mass of life hushed in a calmness dread,
Like that of dark Ontario, when the skies
Are mustering their tempests overhead;
And the round moon looks through the gathering storm
And, glassed mid tempest shapes, beholds her form.
XXV.
He paused a while; at last he thus began:
“Sachem of many moons, and wise as gray!
Well knowest thou how short the life of man;
These aged oaks have witnessed the decay
Of many a generation of thy clan,
Which flourished like their leaves, and past away;
Why war ye, then, upon a life so brief!--
Why fill its little span with wretchedness and grief?
XXVI.
“But they who seek the pure unmingled goods
That last for aye,--to strenuous duty true,--
Count freedom of the soul, in her high moods,
The first of gifts from the Great Manittoo:--
For this I wander to these distant woods;
For this from persecution’s brands I flew,
And left my friends, my kindred, and my home,
Through stormy skies and snowy wilds to roam.
XXVII.
“Some thoughts of mine, that the Great Spirit might
Rule better His own kingdom than frail men,
Awoke the anger of my brothers white,
And sent me forth to seek some far-off glen,
Where I, unharmed, my council fire might light,
And share its freedom with my kindred, when
Under the tree of peace, the red men should
Smoke the white pipe in friendly neighborhood.
XXVIII.
“On Seekonk’s eastern marge I chose a glade,
Fertile and fair, with hope to plant thereon;
The Wampanoag would the grant have made,
But, momently, the startling rumor run
That all Coweset was in arms arrayed
Against that chief, and, had the dance begun;
Then paused your brother--for he would not bring
His friends to sit beneath the hatchet’s swing.
XXIX.
“Then did he take Haup’s calumet to crave
That peace between the hostile nations be;
Not that the Wampanoag warriors brave
Sought from the Narraganset storm to flee;
But that no guilty stain, on Seekonk’s wave,
Rebuke the Pokanoket Chief or thee,--
The work, perchance, of darts from heedless bows,
Confounding pale-faced friends with warring foes.
XXX.
“My motives these; now let the wise chief tell
What wrongs he suffers; what redress he seeks.
Do not his buried kindred slumber well?
What murdered victim’s ghost for vengeance shrieks--
Sends through the echoing woods the warrior’s yell,
And from its iron sleep the hatchet wakes?
Or does some impious tongue his anger brave,
By speaking names made sacred by the grave?”
XXXI.
Then passed a murmur through that concourse wide,
And man on man cast the inquiring eye;
At length the old chief laid his pipe aside,
And, musing, sate, as pondering his reply;
Then slowly rose, and drew the pluméd hide
From his right shoulder, and, with stature high,
Stretched forth his long bare arm and shriveled hand,
And pointing round the sky-encircled land;--
XXXII.
“As far,” he said, and solemn was his tone,
“As from Coweset’s hill the hunter’s sight
Goes tow’rd the Nipnet--tow’rd the rising sun--
And o’er the mighty billows, foaming bright,
Where bleak Manisses’ shores they thunder on,
Moved Narraganset warriors,--till the White
Came from the east, and o’er the waters blue,
Brought his loud thunders in the big canoe:
XXXIII.
“Yes, ere he came, Pocasset’s martial band
Did at our bidding come to fight the foe,
And the tall warriors of the Nipnet land
Rushed with swift foot to bend our battle bow;
And e’en the dog of Haup did cringing stand
Beside our wigwam, and his tribute show.
Then we were strong--we fought the Maquas fell,
And laughed to hear the bordering Pequot’s yell.
XXXIV.
“But, Yengee, hear: The pale-faced strangers came;
No runners told us that they trod our shores;
Near the big waters rose their council flame,
And to it ran our eastern Sagamores;
Haup’s dog forgot the Narraganset name,
And ate the offal cast from white men’s doors,
Moved at their heels, and after him he drew
The strong Pocassets, and the Nipnets too.
XXXV.
“Then the fierce Pequots on our borders broke,--
We sent the belt to claim the accustomed aid;
The rebel chiefs the angry hatchet shook--
They were the Yengee’s men, not ours, they said;
We stood alone; and, like a steadfast rock,
Turned back the torrent to its fountain head,
Which else had swept those sluggard tribes away,
That by Awanux’ wigwam slumbering lay.
XXXVI.
“These are our wrongs, and who can ever mend
The belt thus broken by the rebel train?
The falling waters with earth’s bosom blend,
And who shall hold them in his palm again?
Against the common foe our warriors spend
Their blood like rivers--who can wake the slain?
Heal up the wounds for other men endured--
Give back the blood which has their rest secured?”
XXXVII.
The Sachem ceased, and mingled murmurs ran
Through all that crowd--“He speaks a manittoo!
Base Wampanoag! we’ll devour that clan,
And drive the Yengees back o’er ocean blue!”
And through the concourse motions mixed began,
With clash of arms, and twanging of the yew;
But when they saw our Founder rise again,
Mute stillness hushed the murmurs of the train.
XXXVIII.
“Brother,” said Williams, “thou art old and wise,
And know’st the pipe is better than the dart.
The barb can drink the blood of enemies;
But the pipe’s conquest is the foeman’s heart;
It gives to us his strength and energies,
And makes the Pequot from our path depart.
This, to the good, gives triumph long and just--
That, to the bad, a victory over dust.
XXXIX.
“If, then, my brother can subdue his foes
By the white pipe, he will be very strong!
The offending chiefs once more will bend his bows,
And shout around his fire their battle song;
No more will Pequot harass his repose,
Or Maqua yells resound these hills among.
See not my brothers whence all this distrust?--
The belt between them and the Yengees rust.
XL.
“Hearken a space--Deem not the Yengee weak;
Betwixt him and Haup’s chief the chain is bright;
If thou on him a finger’s vengeance wreak,
The conscious chain will vibrate to the White,
And, roused from slumber, will the big guns speak,
And flames will flash from every woodland height.
Pause, brother, pause--and to the pale-faced train
Extend thy friendship, and keep bright the chain.
XLI.
“But hearken still--Thy brother knows no guile;
His tongue speaks truly what his heart conceives;
Against the Pequots do your bosoms boil,
And for the Pequot deeds Awanux grieves;
Their hands are laden with the white man’s spoil,
And crimsoned with the stain that murder leaves;
Soon will the big guns to their nation speak,
And, in their aid, may’st thou just vengeance wreak.
XLII.
“Thou would’st compel the Wampanoag’s aid
To guard thy borders, and chastise thy foes;
Will not my brothers let me them persuade
To get them warriors armed with more than bows?
Even Awanux, in his strength arrayed,
Whose thunder roars and whose red lightning glows?
Make him your friend and victory follows sure,
And Narraganset rests in peace secure.”
XLIII.
The old chief downward gazed; the warriors round,
Some in stern silence sate of doubtful mood,
Some gave a scornful smile, some fiercely frowned,
And others toiled to sharp their darts for blood;
At length the Sachem, rising from the ground,
With piercing eyes, full in the visage viewed
Our anxious Founder.--“Thou dost speak,” he said,
“The words of wisdom, but these ears are dead;
XLIV.
“Dead to a Yengee’s voice. When did the tongue
Of the white stranger fail to speak most fair?
When did his actions not his speeches wrong,
And lay the falsehood of his bosom bare?
Fain would I die in peace, and leave this throng
To have their glory down the ages fare;
But still I feel the stranger’s grasping hand,
And still he soothes me with his accents bland.
XLV.
“If true he speak--that should his actions show;
May not his heart be darker than yon cloud,
And yet his words white as its falling snow?
Still, if his speech were true, and not a shroud
To hide dark thought, these gray hairs yet might go
Down to the grave in peace--and of my blood
Might all, whilst rivers roll, or rain descends,
Live with the Yengee, kind and loving friends.”
XLVI.
’Twas for our Founder now in turn to pause--
He felt his weakness at rebuff so stern;
The kid had leaped beneath the lion’s paws,
Whose fangs began to move, and eyes to burn;
At length he said, “What bold encroachment draws
The Sachem’s mind into this deep concern?
How have the Yengees given thee offence?
What deeds of theirs have marred thy confidence?”
XLVII.
At this, the Sachem from his girdle took
His snow-white pipe, and snapt the stem in twain:
“They came intruders, and the pipe was broke,”
Said the stern Sachem, and it snapt again;
“Our subject chiefs their ruling chiefs forsook,
And they were sheltered by the stranger’s train.
This fragment shows the serpent’s skin they sent,
Filled with round thunders to our royal tent.
XLVIII.
“This shows, they raised their bulwarks high and proud,
And poised their big guns at our distant home.
This, when at Sowams[18] raged our battle loud,
How their round thunders made that battle dumb.
This, the fire-water how they have bestowed,
And with its madness have our youth o’ercome.
This, how amid the Pequot nation they
Build the square lodge, and whet him to the fray.
[18] See note to stanza XXXIII.
XLIX.
“This, with the Maqua how a league they made,
And filled with arms his all-destroying hand.
This, how they claim right over quick and dead--
Our fathers’ buried bones, their children’s land.
This, how the earth grows pale, as fast they spread
From glade to glade, like snow from Wamponand,
When borne o’er ocean on the sounding gales,
It crowns the hills and whitens through the vales.
L.
“Take thou the fragments--count their numbers well--
Ten times complains our violated right;
They’ll help thy memory, and perchance will tell,
Ten causes have we to distrust the White;
Scarce can the grave our fathers’ spirits quell--
They come complaining in the dreams of night;
Ten times the pipe was by the strangers broke,
Ten times the hatchet from its slumbers woke.”
LI.
Williams the fragments took, and, counting ten,
He promptly answered with this calm reply:
“Sachem, some charity is due to men
Who tread upon thy pipe unwittingly.
Long had the waters tossed those wanderers, when,
Hungry and cold, they came thy borders nigh;
And, Sachem, they were ignorant of thy race,
They only sought a safe abiding place.
LII.
“And this they found in that deserted strand,
Where slept the dead--where living men were not;
They knew no wrong in this--a rightful hand
Appeared, and welcomed to the vacant spot;
Each Sachem seemed as sovereign of his band--
They took his belt, for ’twas a token brought
Of friendly greeting--who can this condemn?
They aid the Whites, the Whites in turn aid them.
LIII.
“Bound in the skin of the great sachem snake,
My brother sent his barbs--but to his foe,
Awanux took the challenge by mistake,
And let his bullets for an answer go;
They deemed the Sachem angry, and did take
Some wise precaution ’gainst a secret blow;
They raise their bulwarks, and their guns they poise;
This was respect to sovereign brave and wise.
LIV.
“No leagues have they with the fierce Maqua made,
Nor with the Pequot hostile is the race;
But if my brothers, for the fight arrayed,
O’er Pokanoket’s borders speed their pace,
I dare not say they would forego the aid
Of any tribe that would thy battle face;
Mohegans, Pequots, Tarrateens would fly
To join their force, and swell their battle cry.
LV.
“To these six fragments of the pipe I’ve spoke;
Take them again, if I have answered well;
But those which tell me that the stem was broke
By the fire-water, and of what befel
Thee upon Haup--of claims thou canst not brook,
Made by those strangers from the nations pale
To these broad forests as their own domain--
These will I ask Awanux to explain.
LVI.
“This fragment tells me that his numbers grow,
That they are spreading fast, from glade to glade;
If the Great Spirit does increase bestow,
Will the wise Sachem that great Power upbraid?
The lands they take, well does my brother know,
They fairly purchase of the nations red;
E’en thus would I on Seekonk’s marge abide,
If peaceful nations dwelt on either side.
LVII.
“On Seekonk’s bank, betwixt my brothers white
And the red nations I might friendly stand,
And help them still to understand aright
Whate’er was doubtful from each other’s hand;
The chain of friendship hold, and keep it bright,
And strengthen thus all Narraganset’s band;
Till ’gainst our common foes we all unite,
And conquer safety through resistless might.
LVIII.
“This question seeks the Sachem’s plain reply:
Takes he the pipe--lays he the axe aside?
Have I his peace, or does he peace deny,
Nor in my honest counsels aught confide?
Still chooses he the doubtful strife to try,
And brave the Yengees with his foes allied?
Say--can he listen to an exiled man,
Whose words and deeds might still befriend his clan?”
LIX.
“Brother,” the Sachem said in milder tone,
“Six fragments of the pipe, as well explained,
My willing hand receives--I ponder on
The last in doubt--the three, thou hast retained,
Send to Awanux--may he answer soon,
And show our blindness has of them complained;
Thy heart seems open, and its speech is brave;
Queries of weight demand an answer grave.
LX.
“Large is our regal lodge, and furnished well
With skins of beaver, bear, and buffalo;
Nausamp and venison is its royal meal;
And its warm fire is like the summer’s glow:
There, with that Wampanoag shalt thou dwell,
And all our comforts in full safety know;
The whilst, our old chiefs shall, in council great,
Upon thy questions gravely meditate.”
LXI.
Here closed the long debate, and, from the ground,
Rose the thronged warriors, and hoarse murmurs past
Through all that concourse, like the hollow sound
Of Narraganset’s waters, when the blast
Begins to roll the tumbling billows round
The rock-bound cape, which had so lately glassed
Its imaged self--its pendant crags and wood--
In the calm bosom of the silent flood.
CANTO FIFTH.
[SCENES. A Sequestered Dale--Open Glade and Grand National Council--The
SUMMIT OF HAUP.]
Deep in the dale’s sequestered solitude,
Screened from the winter’s storm and chilling blast
By branching cedars and thick underwood,
And ever with their shadows overcast,
Old Narraganset’s regal wigwam stood,
Where dwelt her chief, while yet the cold did last,
And tempests, driving from the frozen north,
Detained his warriors from the work of wrath.
II.
And near it rose an ample council hall,
Where oft the Narraganset senate sate,
When came the wise men, at their Sachem’s call,
On schemes of high emprise to hold debate;
And in the shade were shelters meet, for all
His grave advisers who should on him wait;
And, with the red men just as with the white,
Such free provision did delays invite.
III.
Here Father Williams must a while remain.
And, with apt converse born of feelings mild,
Soothe the stern natures of the warlike train,
His destined neighbors in that barbarous wild;
Allay distrust and confidence obtain,
Until suspicion and fierce wrath, despoiled
Of all their terrors, leave the vanquished mind
To generous friendship and full faith inclined.
IV.
Day after day he passed from man to man,
Whome’er of note the mightier Sachems swayed,
And, to the chieftains of each martial clan,
In paints all grim--in horrid arms arrayed--
He talked of peace; then o’er the dangers ran,
Were war against the Wampanoag made;
And then besought them that with friendly eyes,
They would behold his smoke from Seekonk rise.
V.
Betwixt the tribes, on either side the stream,
Still he the belt would hold--the pipe would bear;
But never in his hand should lightning gleam
For either Sachem when he rushed to war;
And with the Yengees still might it beseem
Him to promote an understanding fair,
Till wide the tree of peace its branches spread,
And white and red men smoked beneath its shade.
VI.
But chiefly did he this free converse hold
With M’antonomi, Sachem young and brave,
And great Canonicus, sagacious, old
And in his speech deliberate and grave.
One eve they sate--the storm without was cold,
’Twas ere the council their decision gave,
And thus the talk went on among the three,
The questions simple and the answers free.
VII.
MIANTONOMI.
Why will my brother dwell amid our foes,
Yet seek from us a peaceful neighborhood?
May we not think he’ll bend their battle bows,
And thirst like them for Narraganset’s blood?
Why has he Seekonk’s eastern border chose,
And not surveyed Mooshausick’s winding flood?
Its banks are green,--its forests waving fair,--
Its fountains cool, the deer abundant there.
VIII.
WILLIAMS.
Ne’er will I dwell among my brother’s foes,--
To make them friends is now thy brother’s toil;
Too weak I am to bend their battle bows,
Had I the heart for such unseemly broil.
The forest fair that by Mooshausick grows,
Would long withstand the hardy woodman’s toil.
The Seekonk’s marge will easy tillage yield,
And soon the spiry maize will clothe its field.
IX.
CANONICUS.
How could my brother’s thoughts his friends offend?
Why flies he to the red from faces pale?
How can he still the nations red befriend?
What can his speeches with his foes avail?
No arms he bears, no Yengees him attend,
How dares his foot to print this distant vale?
The path was shut between the nations red,--
How dared my brother on that path to tread?
X.
WILLIAMS.
The white man labors to enthrall the mind,
He will not let its thoughts of God be free;
I come the soul’s hard bondage to unbind,
And clear her access to the Deity;
The pale-faced foes whom I have left behind,
Would still accept a favor done by me.
I trusted God would guard his servant’s head,
Open all paths, and soothe my brothers red.
XI.
CANONICUS.
Thy generous confidence has on me won
And oped my ears, to other Yengees deaf.
Brother, the spirit of my son is gone--
I burned my lodge to speak my mighty grief;
If thou art true I am not left alone,
Some comfort is there for the gray-haired chief;
If to thy words the fitting deeds be done,
I am thy father, thou shalt be my son.
XII.
The kindest reader would fatigued complain,
Should I recount each question and reply,
That passed between our Father and the train
Of barbarous warriors and their Sachems high;
But though he languished o’er my humble strain,
Till patience left or dullness closed his eye,
To Williams it was not an idle song--
The dull reality did days prolong.
XIII.
They had their Corbitants of surly mood,
Who scarce would yield obedience to their lord;
Alike they thirsted for the Yengees’ blood,
And Wampanoag’s and alike abhorred.
By gaudy gifts their anger he subdued,
Or won their kindness by his soothing word;
But one there was who spurned all proffers kind,
Whose demon hate was to all goodness blind.
XIV.
It was the grim Pawaw.--He came in ire
From his proud dwelling by Mooshausick’s stream;
His was the voice of gods and omens dire,
And loud he chanted his prophetic dream;
“The white man’s gods had set the woods on fire,
And Chepian vanished in its fearful gleam;
Their fathers’ ghosts came from their hunting ground--
Their children sought, and only ashes found.”
XV.
Gravely attentive did the council hear
That crafty priest his awful omens sing.
The warriors, ruled by superstitious fear,
Half credence gave, and overawed the king.
In groups they thronged the forest, far and near,
With gathered brows and surly muttering;
And still the prophet through the kindling crowds,
Moved like a comet through night’s lowering clouds.
XVI.
And as he passed, the varying rumors flew
Of secret plans hatched by the Yengees’ hate;
And still their fears and doubts and wonder grew,
Whilst on that dream the chiefs prolonged debate;
For priest he was and politician too,
And oft he meddled with affairs of state,
Wrought on the fears of superstition’s crew,
And the best counsels of the wise o’erthrew.
XVII.
Thus, when the senate dared resist his sway,
He still gained triumph with the multitude;
Till now the chiefs, half yielding to dismay,
Yet vexed and goaded by his rebel mood,
Bade that the clans assemble on a day,
And Williams meet the prophet of the wood,
And in their presence front and overthrow
His strange dominion, or all hope forego.
XVIII.
I will not say that devils did enlist
To do the bidding of the grim Pawaw;
He may have been a wild ventriloquist,
Formed by rude nature; but the age which saw
The marvels that he wrought, would aye insist
His spells surpassed material nature’s law;
And that the monarch of the infernal shade
Mustered his legions to the wizard’s aid.
XIX.
Great was his fame; for wide the rumor went
That all the demons were at his command,
And fiends in rocks, and dens, and caverns pent,
Came to the beck of his black waving hand;
The boldest Keenomps, on resistance bent,
Could not the terror of his charms withstand;
But still would shrink and shudder at the sound,
When spoke his viewless fiends in anger round.
XX.
And it was rumored that he daily held
Communion strange with monsters of the wood,
Harked to their voices, and their meanings spelled,
And muttered answers which they understood;
That he had filled with wisdom unexcelled,
A cherished serpent of the sesek’s brood,--
Had taught his forky tongue to modulate
The voice of man, and speak impending fate.
XXI.