THE BRIDAL OF PENNACOOK. Too closely on her mother's breast To note her smiles of love the child of Nature lay! It is enough for such to be Of common, natural things a part, In our cold homes of Art and Grieve like the stranger-tended child, Which seeks its mother's arms, and sees but feels them not. The garden rose may richly bloom The sweetbrier on the hillside Its single leaf and fainter hue, Untrained and wildly free, yet still a sister rose ! Thus o'er the heart of Weetamoo Their mingling shades of joy and ill The instincts of her nature threw, The savage was a woman still. Midst outlines dim of maiden schemes, Heart-colored prophecies of life, Rose on the ground of her young dreams The light of a new home, -the lover and the wife. IV. THE WEDDING. Cool and dark fell the autumn night, But the Bashaba's wigwam glowed with light, For down from its roof by green withes hung Flaring and smoking the pine-knots swung. And along the river great wood-fires Shot into the night their long red spires, Showing behind the tall, dark wood, Flashing before on the sweeping flood. 29 In the changeful wind, with shimmer and shade, Now high, now low, that firelight played, On tree-leaves wet with evening dews, On gliding water and still canoes. The trapper that night on Turee's brook, And the weary fisher on Contoocook, Saw over the marshes and through the pine, And down on the river the dance-lights shine. For the Saugus Sachem had come to WOO The Bashaba's daughter Weetamoo, And laid at her father's feet that night His softest furs and wampum white. From the Crystal Hills to the fa southeast The river Sagamores came to the feast; And chiefs whose homes the sea-winds shook, Sat down on the mats of Pennacook. They came from Sunapee's shore of rock, From the snowy sources of Snooganock, And from rough Coos whose thick woods shake Their pine-cones in Umbagog Lake. From Ammonoosuc's mountain pass, Wild as his home, came Chepewass; And the Keenomps of the hills which throw Their shade on the Smile of Manito. With pipes of peace and bows unstrung, Glowing with paint came old and young, In wampum and furs and feathers arrayed To the dance and feast the Bashaba made. Bird of the air and beast of the field, All which the woods and waters yield, On dishes of birch and hemlock piled, Garnished and graced that banquet wild. Steaks of the brown bear fat and large From the rocky slopes of the Kear sarge; The moons of forty winters had shed A fawn beside the bison grim, - Ask why the graceful grape entwines Why, with wise instinct, Nature seems To harmonize her wide extremes, Linking the stronger with the weak, The haughty with the soft and meek! The steep bleak hills, the melancholy shore, The long dead level of the marsh between, A coloring of unreal beauty wore Through the soft golden mist of young love seen. For o'er those hills and from that dreary plain, Nightly she welcomed home her hunter chief again. No warmth of heart, no passionate burst of feeling Repaid her welcoming smile and parting kiss, No fond and playful dalliance half concealing, Under the guise of mirth, its tender ness; But, in their stead, the warrior's settled pride, And vanity's pleased smile with homage satisfied. Enough for Weetamoo, that she alone Sat on his mat and slumbered at his side: That he whose fame to her young ear had flown Now looked upon her proudly as his bride; That he whose name the Mohawk trembling heard Vouchsafed to her at times a kindly look or word. For she had learned the maxims of her race, Which teach the woman to become a slave And feel herself the pardonless disgrace Of love's fond weakness in the wise and brave, The scandal and the shame which they incur, Who give to woman all which man requires of her. So passed the winter moons. at last The sun Broke link by link the frost chain of the rills, And the warm breathings of the southwest passed Over the hoar rime of the Saugus hills, The gray and desolate marsh grew green once more, |