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OHNÁWA
SCENE.Within the fort of Quebec. Soldiers carousing.
One sings:
FILL, comrades, fill the bowl right well, | |
| Trowl round the can with mirth and glee, | |
| Zip-zip, huzza, Noël! Noël! | |
| A health to me, a health to thee | |
| And Normandie. | 5 |
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Chorus:
Pass, comrades, pass the reaming can, | |
| And swig the draught out every man! | |
| |
| Another round as deep as last, | |
| Down to the bottom peg, pardie! | |
| Eyes to the front,—half pikes,—stand fast! | 10 |
| A health to me, a health to thee | |
| And Picardie. | |
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Chorus:
Pass, comrades, pass the reaming can, | |
| And swig the draught out every man! | |
| Though this be naught but soldiers’ tap, | 15 |
| None better wine none ne’er did see, | |
| It riped on our own crofts mayhap, | |
| So here ’s a health to thee, to me | |
| And fair Lorraine, | |
| Again— | 20 |
| Lorraine! | |
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Chorus:
May he be shot that shirks the can! | |
| Quick, drain the draught out every man! | |
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Enter OHNÁWA: Soldiers crowd around her.
1st Soldier. Whom have we here? This is a shapely wench. | |
| 2d Sold. Clean-limbed. | 25 |
| 3d Sold. Round-armed. | |
| 4th Sold. Svelte | |
| 5th Sold. And lithe and lissome. | |
| 6th Sold. Like a Provençale in her mumming garb. | |
| On Pope Unreason’s day. But where ’s her dog? | 30 |
| 7th Sold. I saw one like that one in Italy; | |
| A statue like her as two peas. They called her | |
| Bronze something,—I forget. They dug her up, | |
| And polished her, and set her up on end. | |
| 1st Sold. Hi! graven image, hast thou ne’er a tongue? | 35 |
| 2d Sold. How should she speak but as a magpie chatters, | |
| Chat, chat! pretty Mag! | |
| 3d Sold. Leave her alone, now. | |
| 4th Sold. Lay hold on her and see if she feels warm. [OOHNÁWA draws a knife. | |
| All. Aha! well done! encore the scene! well played! [ROBERVAL approaches; she advances towards him. | 40 |
| Soldiers. [Retiring.] Meat for our master. | |
| Rob. Ohnawa! | |
| Ohn. Great Chief! | |
| Rob. What then, my wild fawn, has’t indeed come in, | |
| A live pawn for thy people? Then I hope | 45 |
| ’T will be long time ere they make matters up, | |
| So that we still may keep thee hostage here. | |
| But say, do practised warriors, shrewd and cunning, | |
| Send such bright eyes as thine to arméd camp, | |
| To glancing catch full note of our weak points | 50 |
| Or of our strength? We hang up spies, Ohnawa. | |
| Ohn. I am no spy. No warrior sent me here. | |
| Rob. Why didst thou come? | |
| Ohn. Didst thou thyself not ask me? | |
| Rob. I did, i’ faith; and now, thou being here | 55 |
| Shalt see such wonders as are to be seen. | |
| They will impress thy untutored savage mind. | |
| Not’st thou those arms upon that slender mast, | |
| Whose fingers, sudden moving, form new shapes? | |
| By that we speak, without the aid of words, | 60 |
| Long leagues away. | |
| Ohn. This is not new to me. | |
| Our braves, on journeys, speak in silent signs | |
| By leaves, grass, mosses, feathers, twigs and stones, | |
| So that our people can o’ertake the trail, | 65 |
| And tell a message after many moons. | |
| Rob. I have heard of the woodland semaphore. | |
| ’T is a thing to be learned,—and acted on. | |
| Ohn. Why dost thou raise thy head-gear to that blanket? | |
| Rob. Blanket! young savage,—’t is the flag of France, | 70 |
| The far most glorious flag of earth and sea, | |
| That, floating over all this continent, | |
| Shall yet surmount the red brick towers of Spain. | |
| But, pshaw! why do I speak. | |
| Gunner, fire off a fauconet. [Gun. | 75 |
| What, not a wink? Art thou, then, really bronze, | |
| Insensible to wonder? | |
| Ohn. All is new. | |
| Rob. Then why not show astonishment? Young maids, | |
| When marvels are presented to their view, | 80 |
| Clasp their fore-fingers, or put hand to ears, | |
| Simper, cry “O, how nice!” look down and giggle, | |
| And show the perturbation of weak minds. | |
| Ohn. I see new marvels that I ne’er have seen, | |
| But when I once have seen them they are old. | 85 |
| Rob. These are the stables where the chargers are. [Horse led out; Groom gallops. | |
| No wonder in thine eyes even at this sight? | |
| Canst thou look on this steed, and yet not feel | |
| No sight so beautiful in all the world? | |
| Ohn. I have seen herds of these brave gallant beasts. | 90 |
| Rob. [Quickly.] When? where was this? | |
| Ohn. When that I was a child | |
| A tribe came scouting from the sinking sun, | |
| The hatchet buried, on a pilgrimage | |
| To take salt water back from out the sea, | 95 |
| As is their custom in their solemn rites. | |
| They all were mounted, every one, on steeds. | |
| Rob. Indeed! | |
| Ohn. Our brethren, who live six moons nearer night, | |
| And many more in number than the stars, | 100 |
| With steeds in number many more than they, | |
| Dwell on the boundless, grassy, hunting-plains, | |
| Beyond which mountains higher than the clouds, | |
| And on the other side of them the sea. | |
| Rob. Important this, but of it more anon. [They enter the caserne. | 105 |
| These are called books. These are the strangest things | |
| Thou yet hast seen. I take one of them down, | |
| And lo! a learned dead man comes from his grave, | |
| Sits in my chair and holds discourse with me. | |
| And these are pictures. | 110 |
| Ohn. They are good totem. | |
| Rob. These, maps. | |
| Ohn. I, with a stick, upon the sand | |
| Can trace the like. | |
| Rob. By ’r Lady of St. Roque | 115 |
| That shalt thou do! The Pilot missed it there; | |
| These savages must know their country well. | |
| This girl shall be my chief topographer, | |
| By her I ’ll learn the gold and silver coast | |
| That Cartier could not find. | 120 |
| Come hither to this window. Music, ho! [Band plays. | |
| Art thou not pleased with these melodious sounds? | |
| Ohn. The small sounds sparkle like a forest fire, | |
| The big horn brays like lowing of the moose, | |
| The undertone is as Niagara. | 125 |
| Rob. Have ye no music, enfans, in the woods? | |
| No brave high ballad that your warriors sing | |
| To cheer them on a march? | |
| Ohn. We have music, | |
| But our braves sing not. We have tribal bards | 130 |
| Who see in dreams things to make music of. | |
| They tell our squaws, and the good mothers croon | |
| Them over to their little ones asleep. | |
| Rob. Sing me a forest song, one of thine own. [OHNÀWA goes to a drum and beats softly with her hand, humming the while. | |
| This verily is music without words. | 135 |
| Explain, now, what its purport most may mean. | |
| Ohn. The cataracts in the forests have many voices, | |
| They talk all day and converse beneath the stars, | |
| The mists hide their faces from the moon. | |
| The spirits of braves come down from the hunting-grounds; | 140 |
| They swim in the night rainbows, and stalk among the trees, | |
| Hearing the voice of the waters. | |
| Rob. Poetic, by my soul. Why, Ohnáwa, | |
| I ’ve found a treasure in thee. Go now, child; | |
| Halt e’er thou goest! | 145 |
| Here are our wares for trading with the tribes; | |
| Take something with thee for remembrance, | |
| Bright scarlet cloth, beads, buttons, rosaries, | |
| Ribbons and huswifes, scissors, looking-glasses— | |
| To civilized and savage women dear. | 150 |
| Take one, take anything, nay, lade thyself. | |
| Nothing? Shrewd damsel, but that shall not be; | |
| No visitor declines a souvenir. | |
| What hast thou ta’en? A dagger double-edged: | |
| Good, ’t is a choice appropriate; guard it well, | 155 |
| And hide it in thy corset,—I forget, | |
| Thou wear’st none. Go now, girl,—and come again. | |
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ADIEU TO FRANCE
ADIEU to France! my latest glance | |
| Falls on thy port and bay, Rochelle; | |
| The sun-rays on the surf-curls dance, | 160 |
| And springtime, like a pleasing spell, | |
| Harmonious holds the land and sea. | |
| How long, alas, I cannot tell, | |
| Ere this scene will come back to me! | |
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| The hours fleet fast, and on the mast | 165 |
| Soon shall I hoist the parting sail; | |
| Soon will the outer bay be passed, | |
| And on the sky-line eyes will fail | |
| To see a streak that means the land. | |
| On, then! before the tides and gale, | 170 |
| Hope at the helm, and in God’s hand. | |
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| What doom I meet, my heart will beat | |
| For France, the débonnaire and gay; | |
| She ever will in memory’s seat | |
| Be present to my mind alway. | 175 |
| Hope whispers my return to you, | |
| Dear land, but should Fate say me nay, | |
| And this should be my latest view, | |
| Fair France, loved France, my France, adieu! | |
| Salut à la France, salut! | 180 |
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TWILIGHT SONG
THE MOUNTAIN peaks put on their hoods, | |
| Good-night! | |
| And the long shadows of the woods | |
| Would fain the landscape cover quite; | |
| The timid pigeons homeward fly, | 185 |
| Scared by the whoop owl’s eerie cry, | |
| Whoo-oop! whoo-oop! | |
| As like a fiend he flitteth by; | |
| The ox to stall, the fowl to coop, | |
| The old man to his nightcap warm, | 190 |
| Young men and maids to slumbers light,— | |
| Sweet Mary, keep our souls from harm! | |
| Good-night! good-night! | |
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THE GALLANT FLEET
A GALLANT fleet sailed out to sea | |
| With the pennons streaming merrily. | 195 |
| |
| On the hulls the tempest lit, | |
| And the great ships split | |
| In the gale, | |
| And the foaming fierce sea-horses | |
| Hurled the fragments in their forces | 200 |
| To the ocean deeps, | |
| Where the kraken sleeps, | |
| And the whale. | |
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| The men are in the ledges’ clefts, | |
| Dead,—but with motion of living guise | 205 |
| Their bodies are rocking there; | |
| Monstrous sea-fish and efts | |
| Stare at them with glassy eyes | |
| As their limbs are stirred and their hair. | |
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| Moan, O sea! | 210 |
| O death at once and the grave, | |
| And sorrow in passing, O cruel wave! | |
| Let the resonant sea-caves ring, | |
| And the sorrowful surges sing, | |
| For the dead men rest but restlessly. | 215 |
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| We do keep account of them | |
| And sing an ocean requiem | |
| For the brave. | |
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