Arrayed in garment white as Alpine snows,
Forlorn and pallid was the lovely maid;
Her lap contained each flower that wildly blows,
To deck the grave where him she mourned was laid.
Wild and unsettled was the virgin's look,
And as the chaplet for her tresses fair,
She'd stole the willow from the murmuring brook;
Her languid eyes seemed sunk in deep despair.
And now she sung: not e'en sweet Philomel
E'er warbled half so mournful, sadly sweet;
While from her lily hand the flowerets fell,
And strewed the grassy tomb beneath her feet.
And now her bosom wildly throbbed with woe,
Nor longer could the nymph her sorrows speak,
Save by the tears which from her eyes did flow,
And washed with Misery's dew each faded cheek.
Convulsed she stood, then sunk upon the grave,
I flew and snatched her from the icy sod;
But vain my efforts Anna's life to save,
Her spirit pure had flown unto her God.
Burial of a Pilgrim Father in America, 1630.
We anxiously hallowed the frozen ground,
And heaped up this lonely barrow,
For the Indian lurked in the woods around,
And we feared his whistling arrow.
When the surf on the sea-beach heavily beat,
When the breeze in the wilderness muttered,
We deemed it the coming of hostile feet,
Or a watchword cautiously uttered.
Above, frowned the gloom of a winter's eve,
And around, the thick snow was falling;
And the winds in the dreary branches did grieve,
Like spirits to spirits calling.
As we looked on the spotless snowy sheet,
O'er the grave of our brother sweeping,
It seemed to us all an emblem meet
Of him beneath it sleeping.
