Page:Songs of the Affections.pdf/57

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THE INDIAN WITH HIS DEAD CHILD.
49


The mountain eagle hath not plumes
    So strong as Love and Scorn.

I have raised thee from the grave-sod,
    By the white man's path defiled;
On to th' ancestral wilderness,
    I bear thy dust, my child!

I have ask'd the ancient deserts
    To give my dead a place,
Where the stately footsteps of the free
    Alone should leave a trace.

And the tossing pines made answer—
    "Go, bring us back thine own!"
And the streams from all the hunters' hills,
    Rush'd with an echoing tone.

Thou shalt rest by sounding waters
    That yet untamed may roll;

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