This, how the earth grows pale, as fast they spread
From glade to glade, like snow from Wamponand,
When borne o'er ocean on the sounding gales,
It crowns the hills and whitens through the vales.
L.
"Take thou the fragments—count their numbers well—
Ten times complains our violated right;
They'll help thy memory, and perchance will tell,
Ten causes have we to distrust the White;
Scarce can the grave our fathers' spirits quell—
They come complaining in the dreams of night;
Ten times the pipe was by the strangers broke,
Ten times the hatchet from its slumbers woke."
LI.
Williams the fragments took, and, counting ten,
He promptly answered with this calm reply:
"Sachem, some charity is due to men
Who tread upon thy pipe unwittingly.
Long had the waters tossed those wanderers, when,
Hungry and cold, they came thy borders nigh;
And, Sachem, they were ignorant of thy race,
They only sought a safe abiding place.
LII.
"And this they found in that deserted strand,
Where slept the dead—where living men were not;
They knew no wrong in this—a rightful hand
Appeared, and welcomed to the vacant spot;
Each Sachem seemed as sovereign of his band—
They took his belt, for t'was a token brought
Of friendly greeting—who can this condemn?
They aid the Whites, the Whites in turn aid them.
