The moon, in pity veiled that night, Shed out a transitory light, As dusky clouds, in rapid chase, Now hid, and now revealed her face; And by her feeble, trembling ray, I took my solitary way— The narrow, winding, leaf-clad road, Conducting to my own abode— The fragile shed, that, low and poor, So oft hath made me feel secure; So oft hath spread its sheathing wild To guard the mother and the child; That shed, which, howsoe’er he roam, Still forms the Indian warrior’s home— And which he would not change, or give, Like Briton, Scot, or Gaul to live, For all the wealth that kings command, Or temples made with mortal hand. Brief space I walked, when, turning round A beetling rock that walled the ground, And just o’erhung my lodge, there fell Sounds on my ear I knew not well; A murmur indistinct—and then The harsh, brief words of stranger men. A pause ensued—shriek! I sped To guard my lowly, leaf-crowned shed, And saw, with deeply rous’d alarms, My Ednee in a soldier’s arms Borne shrieking off, in accents wild, ‘Oh, father! save thy injured child!’ What space there was ’twixt him that bore And my own stand upon the shore, Ill can I vouch—but, wide or spare, One instant served to waft me there. I raised one yell my warriors knew— For I had warriors still, and true— Then sprang, and drew, and smote with might, And still the plunderers answered—smite! And still those thrilling accents wild, Rung in my ears—“Oh, save thy child!” Vain cry! outnumbered, hand to hand I felt the foeman’s heavy brand, And reeled to earth—and bleeding there, I felt unutt’rable despair, For still I heard that plaint so wild, “Oh, father! save thy injured child!”