Chapter XV

I venerate the Pilgrim's cause,
Yet for the red man dare to plead--
We bow to Heaven's recorded laws,
He turned to nature for a creed;
Beneath the pillared dome,
We seek our God in prayer;
Through boundless woods he loved to roam,
And the Great Spirit worshipped there:
But one, one fellow-throb with us he felt;
To one divinity with us he knelt;
Freedom, the self-same freedom we adore,
Bade him defend his violated shore;
He saw the cloud, ordained to grow,
And burst upon his hills in wo;
He saw his people withering by,
Beneath the invader's evil eye;
Strange feet were trampling on his fathers' bones;
At midnight hour he woke to gaze
Upon his happy cabin's blaze,
And listen to his children's dying groans:
He saw--and maddening at the sight,
Gave his bold bosom to the fight;
To tiger rage his soul was driven,
Mercy was not--nor sought nor given;
The pale man from his lands must fly;
He would be free--or he would die.