"The Puritans took their pleasures seriously," and this did not cease to be true till at least two hundred years after the Pilgrims landed or Boston was founded. Time, that covered the ghastly faces on the old grave-stones with moss, gradually stole away the unction of minor-tune singing. The songs of the great revival of 1740 swept the country with positive rather than negative music. Even Jonathan Edwards admitted the need of better psalm-books and better psalmody. Edwards, during his life, spent some time among the Indians as a missionary teacher; but probably neither he nor David Brainerd ever saw a Christian hymn composed by an Indian. The following, from the early years of the last century, is apparently the first, certainly the only surviving, effort of a converted but half-educated red man to utter his thoughts in pious metre. Whoever trimmed the original words and measure into printable shape evidently took care to preserve the broken English of the simple convert. It is an interesting relic of the Christian thought and sentiment of a pagan just learning to prattle prayer and praise: In de dark wood, no Indian nigh, Den me look heaben, send up cry, Upon my knees so low. Dat God on high, in shinee place, See me in night, with teary face, De priest, he tell me so. God send Him angel take me care; Him come Heself and hear um prayer, If Indian heart do pray. God see me now, He know me here. He say, poor Indian, neber fear, Me wid you night and day. So me lub God wid inside heart; He fight for me, He take my part, He save my life before. God lub poor Indian in de wood; So me lub God, and dat be good; Me pray Him two times more. When me be old, me head be gray, Den He no lebe me, so He say: Me wid you till you die. Den take me up to shinee place, See white man, red man, black man's face, All happy 'like on high. Few days, den God will come to me, He knock off chains, He set me free, Den take me up on high. Den Indian sing His praises blest, And lub and praise Him wid de rest, And neber, neber cry. The above hymn, which may be found in different forms in old New England tracts and hymn-books, and which used to be sung in Methodist conference and prayer-meetings in the same way that old slave-hymns and the "Jubilee Singers" refrains are sometimes sung now, was composed by William Apes, a converted Indian, who was born in Massachusetts, in 1798. His father was a white man, but married an Indian descended from the family of King Philip, the Indian warrior, and the last of the Indian chiefs. His grandmother was the king's granddaughter, as he claimed, and was famous for her personal beauty. He caused his autobiography and religious experience to be published. The original hymn is quite long, and contains some singular and characteristic expressions.