Page:Selections from the American poets (IA selectamerpoet00bryarich).pdf/19

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Philip Freneau.
15
Think not that Nature has unveiled in vainThe mystic magnet to the mortal eve:So late have we the guiding needle plannedOnly to sail beneath our native sky?Ere this was known, the ruling power of allFormed for our use an ocean in the land,Its breadth so small we could not wander long,Nor long be absent from the neighbouring strand.Short was the course, and guided by the stars,But stars no more must point our daring way;The Bear shall sink, and every guard be drowned,And great Arcturus scarce escape the sea,When southward we shall steer. Oh grant my wish,Supply the bark, and bid Columbus sail;He dreads no tempests on the untravelled deep;Reason shall steer, and skill disarm the gale.

THE DYING INDIAN.—Tomo-Chequi

"On yonder lake I spread the sail no more!Vigour, and youth, and active days are past;Relentless demons urge me to that shoreOn whose black forests all the dead are cast:Ye solemn train, prepare the funeral song,For I must go to shades below,Where all is strange and all is new;Companion to the airy throng!  What solitary streams,  In dull and dreary dreams, All melancholy, must I rove along!To what strange lands must Chequi take his way!Groves of the dead departed mortals trace;No deer along those gloomy forests stray,No huntsmen there take pleasure in the chase,
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