<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=409440" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Evangeline: Part The Second. IV.</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">FAR in the West there lies a desert land, where the mountains<br>Lift, through perpetual snows, their lofty and luminous summits.<br>Down from their jagged, deep ravines, where the gorge, like a gateway,<br>Opens a passage rude to the wheels of the emigrant's wagon,<br>Westward the Oregon flows and the Walleway and Owyhee.<br>Eastward, with devious course, among the Windriver Mountains,<br>Through the Sweet-water Valley precipitate leaps the Nebraska;<br>And to the south, from Fontaine-qui-bout and the Spanish sierras,<br>Fretted with sands and rocks, and swept by the wind of the desert,<br>Numberless torrents, with ceaseless sound, descend to the ocean,<br>Like the great chords of a harp, in loud and solemn vibrations.<br>Spreading between these streams are the wondrous, beautiful prairies,<br>Billowy bays of grass ever rolling in shadow and sunshine,<br>Bright with luxuriant clusters of roses and purple amorphas.<br>Over them wandered the buffalo herds, and the elk and the roebuck;<br>Over them wandered the wolves, and herds of riderless horses;<br>Fires that blast and blight, and winds that are weary with travel;<br>Over them wander the scattered tribes of Ishmael's children,<br>Staining the desert with blood; and above their terrible war-trails<br>Circles and sails aloft, on pinions majestic, the vulture,<br>Like the implacable soul of a chieftain slaughtered in battle,<br>By invisible stairs ascending and scaling the heavens.<br>Here and there rise smokes from the camps of these savage marauders;<br>Here and there rise groves from the margins of swift-running rivers;<br>And the grim, taciturn bear, the anchorite monk of the desert,<br>Climbs down their dark ravines to dig for roots by the brookside,<br>And over all is the sky, the clear and crystalline heaven,<br>Like the protecting hand of God inverted above them.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Into this wonderful land, at the base of the Ozark Mountains,<br>Gabriel far had entered, with hunters and trappers behind him.<br>Day after day, with their Indian guides, the maiden and Basil<br>Followed his flying steps, and thought each day to o'ertake him.<br>Sometimes they saw, or thought they saw, the smoke of his camp-fire<br>Rise in the morning air from the distant plain; but at nightfall,<br>When they had reached the place, they found only embers and ashes.<br>And, though their hearts were sad at times and their bodies were weary,<br>Hope still guided them on, as the magic Fata Morgana<br>Showed them her lakes of light, that retreated and vanished before them.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Once, as they sat by their evening fire, there silently entered<br>Into the little camp an Indian woman, whose features<br>Wore deep traces of sorrow, and patience as great as her sorrow.<br>She was a Shawnee woman returning home to her people,<br>From the far-off hunting-grounds of the cruel Camanches,<br>Where her Canadian husband, a Coureur-des-Bois, had been murdered.<br>Touched were their hearts at her story, and warmest and friendliest welcome<br>Gave they, with words of cheer, and she sat and feasted among them<br>On the buffalo-meat and the venison cooked on the embers.<br>But when their meal was done, and Basil and all his companions,<br>Worn with the long day's march and the chase of the deer and the bison,<br>Stretched themselves on the ground, and slept where the quivering fire-light<br>Flashed on their swarthy cheeks, and their forms wrapped up in their blankets,<br>Then at the door of Evangeline's tent she sat and repeated<br>Slowly, with soft, low voice, and the charm of her Indian accent,<br>All the tale of her love, with its pleasures, and pains, and reverses.<br>Much Evangeline wept at the tale, and to know that another<br>Hapless heart like her own had loved and had been disappointed.<br>Moved to the depths of her soul by pity and woman's compassion,<br>Yet in her sorrow pleased that one who had suffered was near her,<br>She in turn related her love and all its disasters.<br>Mute with wonder the Shawnee sat, and when she had ended<br>Still was mute; but at length, as if a mysterious horror<br>Passed through her brain, she spake, and repeated the tale of the Mowis;<br>Mowis, the bridegroom of snow, who won and wedded a maiden,<br>But, when the morning came, arose and passed from the wigwam,<br>Fading and melting away and dissolving into the sunshine,<br>Till she beheld him no more, though she followed far into the forest.<br>Then, in those sweet, low tones, that seemed like a weird incantation,<br>Told she the tale of the fair Lilinau, who was wooed by a phantom,<br>That, through the pines o'er her father's lodge, in the hush of the twilight,<br>Breathed like the evening wind, and whispered love to the maiden,<br>Till she followed his green and waving plume through the forest,<br>And never more returned, nor was seen again by her people.<br>Silent with wonder and strange surprise, Evangeline listened<br>To the soft flow of her magical words, till the region around her<br>Seemed like enchanted ground, and her swarthy guest the enchantress.<br>Slowly over the tops of the Ozark Mountains the moon rose,<br>Lighting the little tent, and with a mysterious splendor<br>Touching the sombre leaves, and embracing and filling the woodland.<br>With a delicious sound the brook rushed by, and the branches<br>Swayed and sighed overhead in scarcely audible whispers.<br>Filled with the thoughts of love was Evangeline's heart, but a secret,<br>Subtile sense crept in of pain and indefinite terror,<br>As the cold, poisonous snake creeps into the nest of the swallow.<br>It was no earthly fear. A breath from the region of spirits<br>Seemed to float in the air of night; and she felt for a moment<br>That, like the Indian maid, she, too, was pursuing a phantom.<br>With this thought she slept, and the fear and the phantom had vanished.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Early upon the morrow the march was resumed; and the Shawnee<br>Said, as they journeyed along, 'On the western slope of these mountains<br>Dwells in his little village the Black Robe chief of the Mission.<br>Much he teaches the people, and tells them of Mary and Jesus;<br>Loud laugh their hearts with joy, and weep with pain, as they hear him.'<br>Then, with a sudden and secret emotion, Evangeline answered,<br>'Let us go to the Mission, for there good tidings await us!'<br>Thither they turned their steeds; and behind a spur of the mountains,<br>Just as the sun went down, they heard a murmur of voices,<br>And in a meadow green and broad, by the bank of a river,<br>Saw the tents of the Christians, the tents of the Jesuit Mission.<br>Under a towering oak, that stood in the midst of the village,<br>Knelt the Black Robe chief with his children. A crucifix fastened<br>High on the trunk of the tree, and overshadowed by grape-vines,<br>Looked with its agonized face on the multitude kneeling beneath it.<br>This was their rural chapel. Aloft, through the intricate arches<br>Of its aerial roof, arose the chant of their vespers,<br>Mingling its notes with the soft susurrus and sighs of the branches.<br>Silent, with heads uncovered, the travellers, nearer approaching,<br>Knelt on the swarded floor, and joined in the evening devotions.<br>But when the service was done, and the benediction had fallen<br>Forth from the hands of the priest, like seed from the hands of the sower,<br>Slowly the reverend man advanced to the strangers and bade them<br>Welcome; and when they replied, he smiled with benignant expression,<br>Hearing the homelike sounds of his mother-tongue in the forest,<br>And, with words of kindness, conducted them into his wigwam.<br>There upon mats and skins they reposed, and on cakes of the maize-ear<br>Feasted, and slaked their thirst from the water-gourd of the teacher.<br>Soon was their story told; and the priest with solemnity answered:-<br>'Not six suns have risen and set since Gabriel, seated<br>On this mat by my side, where now the maiden reposes,<br>Told me this same sad tale; then arose and continued his journey!'<br>Soft was the voice of the priest, and he spake with an accent of kindness;<br>But on Evangeline's heart fell his words as in winter the snow-flakes<br>Fall into some lone nest from which the birds have departed.<br>'Far to the north he has gone,' continued the priest; 'but in autumn,<br>When the chase is done, will return again to the Mission.'<br>Then Evangeline said, and her voice was meek and submissive,<br>'Let me remain with thee, for my soul is sad and afflicted.'<br>So seemed it wise and well unto all; and betimes on the morrow,<br>Mounting his Mexican steed, with his Indian guides and companions,<br>Homeward Basil returned, and Evangeline stayed at the Mission.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Slowly, slowly, slowly the days succeeded each other,-<br>Days and weeks and months; and the fields of maize that were springing<br>Green from the ground when a stranger she came, now waving above her,<br>Lifted their slender shafts, with leaves interlacing, and forming<br>Cloisters for mendicant crows and granaries pillaged by squirrels.<br>Then in the golden weather the maize was husked, and the maidens<br>Blushed at each blood-red ear, for that betokened a lover,<br>But at the crooked laughed, and called it a thief in the cornfield.<br>Even the blood-red ear to Evangeline brought not her lover.<br>'Patience!' the priest would say; 'have faith, and thy prayer will be answered!<br>Look at this delicate plant that lifts its head from the meadow,<br>See how its leaves all point to the north, as true as the magnet;<br>This is the compass-flower, that the finger of God has suspended<br>Here on its fragile stock, to direct the traveller's journey<br>Over the sea-like, pathless, limitless waste of the desert.<br>Such in the soul of man is faith. The blossoms of passion,<br>Gay and luxuriant flowers, are brighter and fuller of fragrance,<br>But they beguile us, and lead us astray, and their odor is deadly.<br>Only this humble plant can guide us here, and hereafter<br>Crown us with asphodel flowers, that are wet with the dews of nepenthe.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">So came the autumn, and passed, and the winter,-yet Gabriel came not;<br>Blossomed the opening spring, and the notes of the robin and bluebird<br>Sounded sweet upon wold and in wood, yet Gabriel came not.<br>But on the breath of the summer winds a rumor was wafted<br>Sweeter than song of bird, or hue or odor of blossom.<br>Far to the north and east, it said, in the Michigan forests,<br>Gabriel had his lodge by the banks of the Saginaw river.<br>And, with returning guides, that sought the lakes of St. Lawrence,<br>Saying a sad farewell, Evangeline went from the Mission.<br>When over weary ways, by long and perilous marches,<br>She had attained at length the depths of the Michigan forests,<br>Found she the hunter's lodge deserted and fallen to ruin!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Thus did the long sad years glide on, and in seasons and places<br>Divers and distant far was seen the wandering maiden;-<br>Now in the Tents of Grace of the meek Moravian Missions,<br>Now in the noisy camps and the battle-fields of the army,<br>Now in secluded hamlets, in towns and populous cities.<br>Like a phantom she came, and passed away unremembered.<br>Fair was she and young, when in hope began the long journey;<br>Faded was she and old, when in disappointment it ended.<br>Each succeeding year stole something away from her beauty.<br>Leaving behind it, broader and deeper, the gloom and the shadow.<br>Then there appeared and spread faint streaks of gray o'er her forehead,<br>Dawn of another life, that broke o'er her earthly horizon,<br>As in the eastern sky the first faint streaks of the morning.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Henry+Wadsworth+Longfellow">Henry Wadsworth Longfellow</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=409440" data-title="Evangeline: Part The Second. IV. de Henry Wadsworth Longfellow" data-description="FAR in the West there lies a desert land, where the mountains Lift, through perpetual snows, their lofty and luminous summits. Down from their jagged, deep ravines, where the gorge, like a gateway, Opens a passage rude to the wheels of the emigran..."></div> </div> </div>

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