VI.-HIAWATHA'S HUNTING.

LONGFELLOW.

[The following passage is from "The Song of Hiawatha," a narrative poem, founded upon traditions current among some tribes of North American Indians, respecting an imaginary being of more than mortal powers and gifts, named Hiawatha. The author of this poem is Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, an American poet of the finest genius and widest popularity, now (1856) residing in Cambridge, Massachusetts.]

THEN the little Hiawatha

Learned of every bird its language,

Learned their names and all their secrets,
How they built their nests in summer,
Where they hid themselves in winter,
Talked with them where'er he met them,
Called them "Hiawatha's chickens.'
Of all beasts he learned the language,
Learned their names and all their secrets,
How the beavers built their lodges,
Where the squirrels hid their acorns,
How the reindeer ran so swiftly,

Why the rabbit was so timid,

Talked with them where'er he met them,
Called them "Hiawatha's brothers."

Then Iagoo, the great boaster,

He, the marvellous story teller,

He, the traveller and the talker,

Made a bow for Hiawatha;

From a branch of ash he made it,

From an oak bough made the arrows,

Tipped with flint, and winged with feathers,

And the cord he made of deer skin.

Then he said to Hiawatha,

"Go, my son, into the forest,

Where the red deer herd together,

Kill for us a famous roebuck,

Kill for us a deer with antlers."

Forth into the forest straightway
All alone walked Hiawatha

Proudly with his bow and arrows.

And the birds sang round him, o'er him, "Do not shoot us, Hiawatha."

Sang the robin, sang the bluebird,
"Do not shoot us, Hiawatha."
Up the oak tree, close beside him,
Sprang the squirrel, lightly leaping
In and out among the branches;
Coughed and chattered from the oak tree,
Laughed, and said between his laughing,
"Do not shoot me, Hiawatha."
And the rabbit from his pathway
Leaped aside, and at a distance
Sat erect upon his haunches,
Half in fear, and half in frolic,
Saying to the little hunter,
"Do not shoot me, Hiawatha."

But he heeded not nor heard them,

For his thoughts were with the red deer;
On their tracks his eyes were fastened,
Leading downward to the river,

To the ford across the river,
And as one in slumber walked he.
Hidden in the alder bushes,

There he waited till the deer came,
Till he saw two antlers lifted,
Saw two eyes look from the thicket,
Saw two nostrils point to windward,
And a deer came down the pathway,
Flecked with leafy light and shadow.
And his heart within him fluttered,
Trembled like the leaves above him,
Like the birch leaf palpitated,

*

*Flecked, spotted.

As the deer came down the pathway.
Then, upon one knee uprising,
Hiawatha aimed an arrow;

Scarce a twig moved with his motion,
Scarce a leaf was stirred or rustled,
But the wary roebuck started,
Stamped with all his hoofs together,
Listened with one foot uplifted,
Leaped as if to meet the arrow;
Ah, the stinging, fatal arrow,

Like a wasp it buzzed and stung him.
Dead he lay there in the forest,

By the ford across the river;
Beat his timid heart no longer;
But the heart of Hiawatha

Throbbed, and shouted, and exulted,
As he bore the red deer homeward.

VII. AN ARAB AND HIS HORSE.

TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH.

A CARAVAN proceeding to Damascus was once attacked by a tribe of Arabs, and after a brief resistance, entirely overpowered. A rich booty fell into the hands of the robbers. But while they were occupied in the examination and distribution of their spoils, they in their turn were assailed by a troop of Turkish horsemen, who had gone out from Acre to meet and escort the luckless caravan. The scale of fortune was at once turned. The robbers were overpowered; many of them were killed, and the rest were taken prisoners. These last were securely bound with cords, and carried to Acre to be given as presents to the pacha.*

Among the Arabs who had escaped death was a man named Hassan. He had been wounded during the fight by a

*Pronounced pa-shaw'.

bullet in the arm; but as his wound was not mortal, the Turks placed him upon the back of a camel, and carried him away with the others. Hassan was the possessor of a very fine horse, which also fell into the hands of the conquerors.

The evening before they expected to reach Acre, the Turks and their prisoners were encamped in a hilly country. Hassan lay by the side of one of the tents, his feet bound together by a leathern thong. Kept awake by the pain of his wound, he heard the neighing of his horse, which, as is the custom in the East, passed the night in the open air, near the tents, with his legs fastened together, so that he could not move. He recognized the voice of his faithful companion, and unable to resist the desire to see and caress him once more, he slowly and painfully crawled along upon his hands and knees, till he reached the spot where the horse stood.

"My poor friend," said he, "what will become of you in the hands of the Turks? They will shut you up in close and unwholesome stables with the horses of a pacha. My wife and children will no longer bring you camels' milk to drink, or give you barley to eat in the hollow of their hands. You will no longer skim over the desert with the fleetness of the wind. You will no longer bathe in the refreshing waters of the Jordan, the foam of which is not whiter than thy silken skin. Go back to the tent of thy master. Tell my wife that she will never see her husband more; and lick the hands of my children with your tongue in token of a father's love."

While thus speaking, Hassan had gnawed away with his teeth the thong of goat skin with which the legs of his horse were fastened together, and the noble animal stood free. But the faithful and intelligent creature, seeing his master wounded and motionless at his feet, seemed instinctively to comprehend what no language could have communicated to him. He stooped his head, and grasping with his teeth the leathern girdle which encircled his master's waist, ran off with him in his mouth at full gallop. He thus bore him over many a weary league of mountain and plain, until his desert home was

reached. Then, gently depositing his beloved master by the side of his wondering wife and children, he fell himself, and died from exhaustion.

All the tribe to which Hassan belonged wept over the body of the faithful steed; and more than one Arab poet has commemorated in song his sagacity and his self-sacrificing de

votion.

VIII.

GREEN RIVER.

BRYANT.

[William Cullen Bryant is an American poet, remarkable for the beauty of his descriptions, the accuracy of his language, and his dignity of sentiment. He is now (1856) a resident of the city of New York.]

WHEN breezes are soft and skies are fair,

I steal an hour from study and care,
And hie me away to the woodland scene,
Where wanders the stream with waters of green,
As if the bright fringe of herbs on its brink
Had given their stain to the wave they drink;
And they, whose meadows it murmurs through,
Have named the stream from its own fair hue.

Yet pure its waters its shallows are bright
With colored pebbles and sparkles of light,
And clear the depths where its eddies play,
And dimples deepen and whirl away,

And the plane tree's speckled arms o'ershoot

The swifter current that mines its root,

Through whose shifting leaves, as you walk the hill,
The quivering glimmer of sun and rill

With a sudden flash on the eye is thrown,

Like the ray that streams from the diamond stone.
O, loveliest there the spring days come,

With blossoms, and birds, and wild bees' hum;
The flowers of summer are fairest there,
And freshest the breath of the summer air;