50 THE INDIAN MOTHER. 



Oh, Indian mother ! did the beasts 



Thy sacred errand know ? 

 Oh, Indian mother! did the streams 



Dry up their wonted flow ? 



How didst thou live in those wild haunt*? 



Thy food did angels bring ? 

 Or did the God thy faith ador'd, 



Round thee his mantle fling ? 



Safely thou pass'd a wilderness 



Man since has never trod, 

 Supported by a mother's love, 



Upheld by mercy's God. 



Again they found thee near the hut 



Which held thy precious ones ; 

 Again blows, stripes, and chains were tried, 



To still thy anxious moans. 



Oh, mother ! broken, bud-stript flower 1 



Was this thy sole reward 

 For untold dangers overcome ? 



For all thy perils dared ? 



Robb'd of her treasured loves her joys 



Despair froze up her tears ; 

 It iced the very springs of life, 



Blasting both hopes and fears. 



Heart-broken withering dying fast 



With spirit unsubdued, 

 Firmly she shuts her parched lips, 



Refuses drink, or food. 



Bleeding fast fetter'd far away 



Beyond her children's cry, 

 High tow'rds the Orinoco's source, 



They bore her but to die ! 



For, passive listless stirless now, 



With closing, sunken eyes 

 With thin, attenuate, woe-worn frame, 



The Indian mother lies. 



Deserted by her savage guards, 



Left all alone to die ; 

 Half-buried 'mongst the sedgy reeds, 



Watch'd by no human eye 



Rous'd by the river's rush, the voice 



Of whispering tuneful trees ; 

 Or by the coolness freshly brought 



Upon the passing breeze ; 



She looks around a quiet smile 



Upon her pale cheeks play'd ; 

 Perchance, she dreamed that in her home 



Her dying limbs were laid. P. G. 



