O doubly lost! oblivion's shadows close Around their triumphs and their woes. On other realms, whose suns have set, Reflected radiance lingers yet; There sage and bard have shed a light That never shall go down in night; There time-crowned columns stand on high, To tell of them who cannot die; Even we, who then were nothing, kneel In homage there, and join earth's general peal. But the doomed Indian leaves behind no trace, To save his own, or serve another race; With his frail breath his power has passed away, His deeds, his thoughts are buried with his clay; Nor lofty pile, nor glowing page Shall link him to a future age, Or give him with the past a rank: His heraldry is but a broken bow, His history but a tale of wrong and wo, His very name must be a blank. XXI. Cold, with the beast he slew, he sleeps; O'er him no filial spirit weeps; No crowds throng round, no anthem-notes ascend, To bless his coming and embalm his end; Even that he lived, is for his conqueror's tongue, By foes alone his death-song must be sung; No chronicles but theirs shall tell His mournful doom to future times; May these upon his virtues dwell, And in his fate forget his crimes. XXII. Peace to the mingling dead! Beneath the turf we tread, Chief, Pilgrim, Patriot sleep-- All gone! how changed! and yet the same, As when faith's herald bark first came In sorrow o'er the deep. Still from his noonday height, The sun looks down in light; Along the trackless realms of space, The stars still run their midnight race; The same green valleys smile, the same rough shore Still echoes to the same wild ocean's roar:-- But where the bristling night-wolf sprang Upon his startled prey, Where the fierce Indian's war-cry rang, Through many a bloody fray; And where the stern old Pilgrim prayed In solitude and gloom, Where the bold Patriot drew his blade, And dared a patriot's doom-- Behold! in liberty's unclouded blaze, We lift our heads, a race of other days. XXIII. All gone! the wild beast's lair is trodden out; Proud temples stand in beauty there; Our children raise their merry shout, Where once the death-whoop vexed the air: The Pilgrim--seek yon ancient place of graves, Beneath that chapel's holy shade; Ask, where the breeze the long grass waves, Who, who within that spot are laid: The Patriot--go, to fame's proud mount repair, The tardy pile, slow rising there, With tongueless eloquence shall tell Of them who for their country fell. XXIV.