In clouds of dust the muskets fire,
And volleying oaths old Stuyvesant from:
"Turn out! In yonder Kills he'll mire,
Or drown, unless the fiends conspire.
Mount! Follow! Still he must succumb--
That tide was never swum."
Through hut and chimney, down the ditch
And up the bank, plunge horse and man;
And down the Kills of bramble pitch,
Oft-stumbling, those old gray knees which,
Hunting the raccoon, led the van;
Now, limp yet game he ran.
But cool and supple, Herman sat,
His mind at work, his frame the horse's,
And knew with each pulsation, that
Past foe and fen, past crag, and flat,
And marsh, the steed he nearer forces
To the broad sea's recourses.
"Old friend," he thought, "thou art too weak
To try the Kills and drown, or falter,
The while from shore their marksmen seek
My heart. (Once o'er the Chesapeake
I paddled oarless.) Lest the halter
Be mine, I must not palter--
"Thou diest, though my marriage-gift:
I still can swim. Poor Joost, adieu!"
Ere ceased the heartfelt sigh he lift,
The prospect widened: all adrift,
The salty sluice burst into view,
Where grappling tides fought through,
And sucked to doom the venturous bear,
And from his ferry swept the rower--
How wide, how terrible, how fair!
Yet how inspiriting the air--
How tempts the long salt grass the mower!
How treacherous the shore!
Far up the right spread Newark Bay,
To lone Secaucus wooded rock;
Nor could the Kill von Kull convey
Passaic's mountain flood away:
In Arthur Kill the surges choke,
The wild tides interlock.
O'er Arthur Kill the Holland farms
Their gambril roofs, red painted, show;
Beyond the newer Yankee swarms--
His cider-presses spread their arms.
Before, the squatter; back, the foe;
And the dark waters flow.
As that salt air the stallion felt,
He whimpers gayly, as if still is
Upon his sight his native Scheldt,
Or Skagger Rack, or Little Belt,--
Their waving grass and silver lilies,
Where browsed the amorous fillies.
And o'er the tide some lady nags
Blew back his challenge. Scarce could Herman
Hold in his seat. "By John of Prague's
True faith!" he thought, "thy spirit lags
Not, Joost! Thy course thyself determine!"
And plunges like a merman.
Leander's spirit in the steed
Inspired his stroke, not Herman's fear;
And fast the island shores recede,
Fast rise the rider's spirits freed,
The golden mainland draws more near--
"O gallant horse! 'tis here!"