“And now, my brother, through the wilds I go, To seek some far--some lone sequestered glen-- Where burning fagot nevermore shall glow, Fired by the wrath of persecuting men; Where all may worship, as their gods they know, Or conscience lights and leads their varying ken;-- Where ages after ages still may bow, And from free hearts free orisons may flow.” LXVII. Waban a while mused on our Founder’s tale, And silent sate in meditative mood; For much he wondered why his brothers pale For differing worship sought their kindred’s blood. At last he thought that they must surely fail To know the Great Spirit as a father good, Or Chepian[1] was their god, and had inclined Them to indulge a fell and cruel mind. [1] The name of the Indian devil. LXVIII. Then pity blended with his wonder grew; Here was a victim of that Evil One, Who from him and his angry servants flew To seek a shelter in the forest lone. “Brother,” he said, “thy brother much doth rue (Hearing thy tales,) that thou art forced to shun Thy well-framed wigwam--thy familiar fire, And sleep so far amid this tempest dire. LXIX. “Now, brother, hear, what Waban has to say: The night is cold, and fast the snows descend; Still round thy sleep will howl the beasts of prey;-- Will not my brother to my wigwam wend? It smokes well-sheltered and not far away; There may my brother this drear season spend, And shun the wrath of Chepian’s angry men, Until Sowaniu’s breezes scatter flowers again. LXX. “Right welcome to the red man’s lodge shall be His pale-faced brother, safe from Sachems pale; Waban’s nausamp and venison shall be free When hunger craves, and, when his store shall fail, His dart is true, and swift and far will he Pursue the bounding deer o’er hill and dale;-- When melts the snow we may together raise, On Seekonk’s banks, our common field of maize.” LXXI. Williams replied, “My brother sure is kind, But his red friends are doubtless with him here; And they may teach my kindred, left behind, To track my footsteps through the forest drear;-- To journey homeward I have little mind; My course is with the sun to wilds less near, Where I would form, if granted the domain, A tribe which never should the soul enchain.” LXXII. “Alone is Waban,” was the sad reply; “His wife and child have to that country gone Where go our spirits when our bodies die, And left thy brother in his lodge alone: He goes by day to catch the beavers shy, And sits by night in his still house to moan, And much ’twould please him should the wanderer come, And tell him where the loved ones’ spirits roam.” LXXIII.