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(From The Song of Hiawatha)
ON the Mountains of the Prairie, | |
| On the great Red Pipe-stone Quarry, | |
| Gitche Manito, the Mighty, | |
| He the Master of Life, descending, | |
| On the red crags of the quarry | 5 |
| Stood erect, and called the nations, | |
| Called the tribes of men together. | |
| From his footprints flowed a river, | |
| Leaped into the light of morning, | |
| O’er the precipice plunging downward | 10 |
| Gleamed like Ishkoodah, the comet. | |
| And the Spirit, stooping earthward, | |
| With his finger on the meadow | |
| Traced a winding pathway for it, | |
| Saying to it, “Run in this way!” | 15 |
| From the red stone of the quarry | |
| With his hand he broke a fragment, | |
| Moulded it into a pipe-head, | |
| Shaped and fashioned it with figures; | |
| From the margin of the river | 20 |
| Took a long reed for a pipe-stem, | |
| With its dark green leaves upon it; | |
| Filled the pipe with bark of willow, | |
| With the bark of the red willow; | |
| Breathed upon the neighboring forest, | 25 |
| Made its great boughs chafe together, | |
| Till in name they burst and kindled; | |
| And erect upon the mountains, | |
| Gitche Manito, the Mighty, | |
| Smoked the calumet, the Peace-Pipe, | 30 |
| As a signal to the nations. | |
| And the smoke rose slowly, slowly, | |
| Through the tranquil air of morning, | |
| First a single line of darkness, | |
| Then a denser, bluer vapor, | 35 |
| Then a snow-white cloud unfolding, | |
| Like the tree-tops of the forest, | |
| Ever rising, rising, rising, | |
| Till it touched the top of heaven, | |
| Till it broke against the heaven, | 40 |
| And rolled outward all around it. | |
| From the Vale of Tawasentha, | |
| From the Valley of Wyoming, | |
| From the groves of Tuscaloosa, | |
| From the far-off Rocky Mountains, | 45 |
| From the Northern lakes and rivers | |
| All the tribes beheld the signal, | |
| Saw the distant smoke ascending, | |
| The Pukwana of the Peace-Pipe. | |
| And the Prophets of the nations | 50 |
| Said: “Behold it, the Pukwana! | |
| By this signal from afar off, | |
| Bending like a wand of willow, | |
| Waving like a hand that beckons, | |
| Gitche Manito, the Mighty, | 55 |
| Calls the tribes of men together, | |
| Calls the warriors to his council!” | |
| Down the rivers, o’er the prairies, | |
| Came the warriors of the nations, | |
| Came the Delawares and Mohawks, | 60 |
| Came the Choctaws and Camanches, | |
| Came the Shoshonies and Blackfeet, | |
| Came the Pawnees and Omahas, | |
| Came the Mandans and Dacotahs, | |
| Came the Hurons and Ojibways, | 65 |
| All the warriors drawn together | |
| By the signal of the Peace-Pipe, | |
| To the Mountains of the Prairie, | |
| To the great Red Pipe-stone Quarry. | |
| And they stood there on the meadow, | 70 |
| With their weapons and their war-gear, | |
| Painted like the leaves of Autumn, | |
| Painted like the sky of morning, | |
| Wildly glaring at each other; | |
| In their faces stern defiance, | 75 |
| In their hearts the feuds of ages, | |
| The hereditary hatred, | |
| The ancestral thirst of vengeance. | |
| Gitche Manito, the Mighty, | |
| The Creator of the nations, | 80 |
| Looked upon them with compassion, | |
| With paternal love and pity; | |
| Looked upon their wrath and wrangling | |
| But as quarrels among children, | |
| But as feuds and fights of children! | 85 |
| Over them he stretched his right hand, | |
| To subdue their stubborn natures, | |
| To allay their thirst and fever, | |
| By the shadow of his right hand; | |
| Spake to them with voice majestic | 90 |
| As the sound of far-off waters, | |
| Falling into deep abysses, | |
| Warning, chiding, spake in this wise:— | |
| “O my children! my poor children! | |
| Listen to the words of wisdom, | 95 |
| Listen to the words of warning, | |
| From the lips of the Great Spirit, | |
| From the Master of Life, who made you. | |
| “I have given you lands to hunt in, | |
| I have given you streams to fish in, | 100 |
| I have given you bear and bison, | |
| I have given you roe and reindeer, | |
| I have given you brant and beaver, | |
| Filled the marshes full of wildfowl, | |
| Filled the rivers full of fishes; | 105 |
| Why then are you not contented? | |
| Why then will you hunt each other? | |
| “I am weary of your quarrels, | |
| Weary of your wars and bloodshed, | |
| Weary of your prayers for vengeance, | 110 |
| Of your wranglings and dissensions; | |
| All your strength is in your union, | |
| All your danger is in discord; | |
| Therefore be at peace henceforward, | |
| And as brothers live together. | 115 |
| “I will send a Prophet to you, | |
| A Deliverer of the nations, | |
| Who shall guide you and shall teach you, | |
| Who shall toil and suffer with you. | |
| If you listen to his counsels, | 120 |
| You will multiply and prosper; | |
| If his warnings pass unheeded, | |
| You will fade away and perish! | |
| “Bathe now in the stream before you, | |
| Wash the war-paint from your faces, | 125 |
| Wash the blood-stains from your fingers, | |
| Bury your war-clubs and your weapons, | |
| Break the red stone from this quarry, | |
| Mould and make it into Peace-Pipes, | |
| Take the reeds that grow beside you, | 130 |
| Deck them with your brightest feathers, | |
| Smoke the calumet together, | |
| And as brothers live henceforward!” | |
| Then upon the ground the warriors | |
| Threw their cloaks and shirts of deer-skin, | 135 |
| Threw their weapons and their war-gear, | |
| Leaped into the rushing river, | |
| Washed the war-paint from their faces. | |
| Clear above them flowed the water, | |
| Clear and limpid from the footprints | 140 |
| Of the Master of Life descending; | |
| Dark below them flowed the water, | |
| Soiled and stained with streaks of crimson, | |
| As if blood were mingled with it! | |
| From the river came the warriors, | 145 |
| Clean and washed from all their war-paint; | |
| On the banks their clubs they buried, | |
| Buried all their warlike weapons. | |
| Gitche Manito, the Mighty, | |
| The Great Spirit, the Creator, | 150 |
| Smiled upon his helpless children! | |
| And in silence all the warriors | |
| Broke the red stone of the quarry, | |
| Smoothed and formed it into Peace-Pipes, | |
| Broke the long reeds by the river, | 155 |
| Decked them with their brightest feathers, | |
| And departed each one homeward, | |
| While the Master of Life, ascending, | |
| Through the opening of cloud-curtains, | |
| Through the doorways of the heaven, | 160 |
| Vanished from before their faces, | |
| In the smoke that rolled around him, | |
| The Pukwana of the Peace-Pipe! | |
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