Burial of the Minnisink

On sunny slope and beechen swell,The shadowed light of evening fell;And, where the maple's leaf was brown,With soft and silent lapse came down,The glory, that the wood receives,At sunset, in its golden leaves.

Far upward in the mellow lightRose the blue hills. One cloud of white,Around a far uplifted cone,In the warm blush of evening shone;An image of the silver lakes,By which the Indian's soul awakes.

But soon a funeral hymn was heardWhere the soft breath of evening stirredThe tall, gray forest; and a bandOf stern in heart, and strong in hand,Came winding down beside the wave,To lay the red chief in his grave.

They sang, that by his native bowersHe stood, in the last moon of flowers,And thirty snows had not yet shedTheir glory on the warrior's head;But, as the summer fruit decays,So died he in those naked days.

A dark cloak of the roebuck's skinCovered the warrior, and withinIts heavy folds the weapons, madeFor the hard toils of war, were laid;The cuirass, woven of plaited reeds,And the broad belt of shells and beads.

Before, a dark-haired virgin trainChanted the death dirge of the slain;Behind, the long procession cameOf hoary men and chiefs of fame,With heavy hearts, and eyes of grief,Leading the war-horse of their chief.

Stripped of his proud and martial dress,Uncurbed, unreined, and riderless,With darting eye, and nostril spread,And heavy and impatient tread,He came; and oft that eye so proudAsked for his rider in the crowd.

They buried the dark chief; they freedBeside the grave his battle steed;And swift an arrow cleaved its wayTo his stern heart! One piercing neighArose, and, on the dead man's plain,The rider grasps his steed again.