Page:Zinzendorff and Other Poems.pdf/16

Rever'd the wisdom that doth wait on time.
—But still the cloud of paganism did blight
The blossom of their virtues, brooding dark
With raven pinion o'er the gloomy soul.
——I said that Summer glow'd.—
And with her came
A white-brow'd ⁵ stranger. Open as the day
Was his fair, noble forehead, and his voice
In its sweet intonations, threw a charm
O'er rudest spirits. Not with more surprise
Gaz'd the stern Druid, 'mid his mystic rites,
On good Augustine, preaching words of peace,
What time with hatred fierce and unsubdued,
The woad-stain'd Briton in his wattled ⁶ boat
Quail'd neath the glance of Rome.
Thus fix'd the eye
Of jealous chieftains and their wandering clans
On Zinzendorff.—Sought he to grasp their lands?
To search for gold? to found a mystic throne
Of dangerous power? Where the red council-fire
Disturb'd the trance of midnight, long they sate
Weighing his purpose with a cautious tone
In grave debate. For scarce they deem'd it truth
That from a happy home, o'er Ocean's wave,
He thus should come, to teach a race unknown
Of joys beyond the tomb. Their fetter'd minds
Still blindly rul'd by groping ignorance,
Sank at the threshhold of such bold belief,
And with the skeptic doubt of modern times,
The Missionary scann'd.
Yet some there were
Who listen'd spell-bound to his charmed words;