PREFACE.
In Indian mythology may be found the richest poetic materials. An American Author is unworthy of the land that gave him birth if he passes by with indifference this well-spring of inspiration, sending liberally forth a thousand enchanted streams. It has given spiritual inhabitants to our valleys, rivers, hills and inland seas; it has peopled the dim and awful depths of our forests with spectres, and, by the power of association, given our scenery a charm that will make it attractive forever. The material eye is gratified by a passing glimpse of nature's external features, but a beauty, unseen, unknown before, invests them if linked to stories of the past, in the creation of which fabling fancy has been a diligent co-worker with memory.
The red man was a being who delighted in the mystical and the wild—it was a part of his woodland inheritance. Good and evil genii performed for him their allotted tasks. Joyous tidings, freedom from disease and disaster—success in the chase, and on the war path were traceable to the Master of Life and his subordinate ministers:—blight that fell upon the corn was attributed, on the contrary, to demoniac agency, and the shaft that missed its mark was turned aside by the invisible hand of some mischievous sprite. Deities presided over the elements. The Chippewas have their little wild men of the woods, that remind us of Puck and his frolicsome brotherhood, and the dark son of the wilderness, like our first parents
—"from the steep
Of echoing hill or thicket often heard
Celestial voices."
My tent is pitched on the hunting grounds of the Senecas, (or So-non-ton-ons) and I deem it not inappropriate to select for my theme the Legend of their origin.
Different versions of the story are in circulation, but I have been guided mainly, in the narrative part of my poem, by notes taken down after an interview with the late Captain Horatio Jones, the Indian Interpreter of the Six Nations.
The great hill at the head of Canandaigua Lake, from whence the Senecas sprung, is called Genundewah. Tradition says that it was crowned by a fort to which the braves of the tribe resorted at night-fall, after waging war with a race of giants. These giants were worshippers of Ut-co, or the Evil Spirit, who sent, after their extermination, a great serpent to destroy the conquerors. Quitting its watery lair in Canandaigua Lake, the monster encircled their fortification. The head and tail completed a horrid ring at the gateway, and, when half famished, the wretched inmates vainly attempted to escape. All were destroyed with the exception of a pair, whose miraculous preservation is related in the poem that follows. Ever after Genundewah was a chosen seat of Iroquois Council, and wrinkled seers were in the habit of climbing its sides for the purpose of offering up prayers to the Great Spirit.
GENUNDEWAH,
[A LEGEND OF CANANDAIGUA LAKE.]
BY WILLIAM H. C. HOSMER.
WRITTEN AT THE REQUEST OF THE "NEW CONFEDERATION OF THE IROQUOIS," AND PRONOUNCED BEFORE THEM IN GENERAL COUNCIL, AT AURORA, AUGUST 15th, 1845.
I.
II.
A fort they reared upon this summit bleak
Guided by counsel from the Spirit Land,
And clad in dart-proof panoply would seek
The plains beneath each morn, a valiant band,
And warfare wage with giants hand to hand:
They conquered in the struggle, and the bones
Of their dead foemen on the echoing strand
Of the clear lake lay blent with wave-washed stones,
And pale, unbodied ghosts filled air with hollow moans.
III.
Ut-co, the scowling King of Evil, heard
The voice of lamentation, and wild ire
The depths of his remorseless bosom stirr'd;
Of that gigantic brood he was the sire,
And flying from his cavern, arched with fire,
He hovered o'er these, waters—at his call
Up rushed a hideous monster, spire on spire;—
Call so astounding that the rocky wall
Of this blue chain of hills seemed tott'ring to its fall!
IV.
With his infernal parent for a guide,
The hungry serpent left his watery lair,
Dragging his scaly terrors up the side
Of this tall hill, now desolate and bare:
Filled with alarm the Senecas espied
His dread approach, and launched a whizzing shower
Of arrows on the foe, whose iron hide
Repelled their flinty points—and in that hour
The boldest warrior fled from strife with fiendish power.
V.
The loathsome messenger of wo and death
True to his dark and awful mission wound,
Polluting air with his envenom'd breath,
Huge folds the palisadoed camp around:
Crouched at his master's feet the faithful hound,
And raised a piteous and despairing cry;
No outlet of escape the mother found
For her imploring infants, and on high
Lifted her trembling hands in voiceless agony.
VI.
Forming a hideous circle at the gate
The reptile's head and tail together lay;
Distended were the fang-set jaws in wait
For victims, thus beleaguered, night and day;
And not unlike the red and angry ray
Shot by the bearded comet was the light
Of his unslumbering eye that watched for prey;
His burnished mail flashed back the sunshine bright,
And round him pale the woods grew with untimely blight.
VII.
When famine raged within their guarded hold,
And wan distemper thinn'd their numbers fast,
Crowding the narrow gateway young and old
With the fixed look of desperation passed
From life to dreadful death—a charnel vast—
The reptile's yawning throat entombed the strong,
And lovely of the Tribe:—remained at last
Two lovers only of that mighty throng
To chaunt with feeble voice a nation's funeral song.
VIII.
Comely to look on was the youthful pair:—
One, like the mountain pine erect and tall,
Was of imposing presence;—his dark hair
Had caught its hue from night's descending pall;
Light was his tread—his port majestical,
And well his kingly brow became a form
Of matchless beauty:—like the rise and fall
Of a strong billow in the hour of storm
Beat his undaunted heart with glory's impulse warm.
IX.
Graced was his belt by beads of dazzling sheen
And painted quills—the handiwork of one
Dearer than life to him;—though he had seen
From the gray hills, beneath a wasting sun,
Only the snows of twenty winters run,
The warrior's right his scalp lock to adorn
With eagle plumes in battle he had won:
O'erjoyed were prophets old when he was born,
And hailed him with one voice "First Sunbeam of the Morn."
X.
The other!—what of her?—bright shapes beyond
This darkened earth wear looks like those she wore;
Graceful her mien as lilly of the pond
That nods to every wind that passes o'er
Its fragrant head a welcome:—never more
By loveliness so rare will earth be blest;
Softer than ripple breaking on the shore
By moonlight was her voice, and in her breast
Pure thought a dwelling found—the Bird of Love a nest.
XI.
Round her would hop unscared the sinless bird,
And court the lustre of her gentle glance,
Hushing each wood-note wild whene'er it heard
Her song of joy:—her countenance
Inspired beholders with a thought that chance
Had borne her hither from some better land:—
To deck her tresses for the festive dance
Girls of the tribe would bring, with liberal hand,
Blossoms and rose-lipped shells from bower and reedy strand.
XII.
A thing of beauty is the slender vine
That wreaths its verdant arm around the oak
As if it there could safely intertwine
Shielded from ringing axe—the lightning stroke—
And like that vine the girl of whom I spoke
Clung to her companion:—scalding tears
Rained from her elk-like eyes, and sobs outbroke
From her o'er-labored bosom, while her ears
Were filled with soothing tones that did not hush her fears.
XIII.
Mourner! the hour of rescue is at hand!
This hill will tremble to its rocky base
When Ou-wee ne-you utters stern command;
Joy ere another fleeting moon the trace
Of clouding sorrow from thy brow will chase:—
Fear not!—for I am left to guard thee yet
Last of the daughters of a luckless race!
We must not in the time of grief forget
That light breaks forth anew from orbs that darkly set.
XIV.
Thus, day by day, would O-wen-do-skah strive
To cheer the drooping spirits of the maid,
And keep one glimmering spark of hope alive;
In the deep midnight for celestial aid,
While cowered the trembler at his knee, he prayed
In tones that might have touched a heart of rock:
One morn exclaimed he—"be no more afraid
Bright, peerless scion of a broken stock,
For Heaven the monster's coil is arming to unlock.
XV.
"Reserved for some high destiny despite
The downfall of our people we live on—
My dreams were of deliverance last night,
And peril of impending death withdrawn:
A light, my weeping one, begins to dawn
On the thick gloom by sorrow round us cast;
The lead-like pressure of despair is gone,
And rides a viewless courier on the blast
Who whispers—Lo! the hour of vengeance comes at last.
XVI.
"Gorged with his meal of gore unstirring sleeps
In his tremendous ring our mortal foe:
Film-veiled his savage eye no longer keeps
Grim watch for victims—warily and slow!
Follow thy lover arrived with bended bow
Of timber shaped, in many a battle tried—
Some guardian spirit will before me throw
A shield by human vision undescried
Should he awake in wrath, and hence our footsteps guide."
XVII.
It was I ween a sight to freeze each vein
That courses through our perishable clay
When sallied forth with muffled tread the twain;
A look of wild, unutterable dismay
Convulsed Te-yos-yu's[F] visage while the way,
A spear-length in advance, her lover led:
Reaching the portal paused he to survey
The dangerous pass through which a grisly head
Deprest to earth he saw, its mouth with murder red.
XVIII.
"On! On!"—he whispered—"and the sightless mole
Our footfall must not hear, or we are lost:"
Nerved to high purpose was his war-like soul
As the dark threshold of the gate he cross'd;
But fear that instant chilled his limbs with frost,
For high its swollen neck the monster raised
Gore dripping from its jaws with foam embossed,
And rimmed with fire, and circling eye-ball blazed
As light unwounding dart its horrid armor grazed.
XIX.
Sick by a foul and fetid odor made
Recoiled the champion from unequal fray;
Cut off all hope of rescue, he surveyed
Fiercely the danger like a stag at bay:
Where was Te-yos-yu?—she had swooned away,
And hoof-crushed wild-flower of the forest brown
Resembled her as soiled with mould she lay;
Long on the seeming corpse the chief looked down,
For 'twas a sight the cup of his despair to crown.
XX.
Kneeling at length, upheld he with strong arm
Her beauteous head, but in the temples beat
No pulse of life:—tears gushing fast and warm
Refresh a heart, of transcient ill the seat,
As raindrops cool the summer's midday heat;
But when descends some desolating blow
That makes this world a desert, how unmeet
Is outward symbol!—and far, far below
The water-mark of grief was Oh-wen-do-skah's wo!
XXI.
In broken tones he murmured—"must the name
Of a great people be revived no more,
And like an echo pass away their fame,
Or moccasin's faint impress on the shore
Of the salt lake when billows foam and roar?
Black night enwraps my soul, for she is dead
Who was its light—desire to live is o'er!"
Scarce were these words in mournful accent said,
When peals of thunder shook low vale and mountain-head.
XXII.
Up sprang the Chief;—and on a throne of cloud,
Robed in a snowy mantle fringed with light,
The Lord of life beheld:—the forest bowed
Its head in awe before that presence bright,
And a wild shudder at the dazzling sight
Ran through the mighty monster's knotted ring
Shaking the hill from base to rocky height;
Rose from her trance the maid with fawn-like spring,
And balanced in mid-air the bird on trembling wing.
XXIII.
"Notch on the twisted sinew of thy bow
This fatal weapon"—Ou-wee-ne-you[G] cried,
Dropping a golden shaft—"and pierce the foe
Under the rounded scale that wall his side!"
Then vanished, while again the valley wide
And mountain quaked with thunder:—from the ground
The warrior raised the gift of Heaven, and hied
On his heroic mission while around
The hill with closer clasp his train the serpent wound.
XXIV.
Flame-hued and hissing played its nimble tongue
Between thick, ghastly rows of pointed bone
Round which commingled gore and venom clung:
Raging its flattened head like copper shone,
And flinty earth returned a heavy groan
Lashed by quick strokes of its resounding tail;
Heard is like uproar when the hills bleak cone
Is wildly beat by winter's icy flail,
But in that moment dire the archer did not quail.
XXV.
Firm in one hand his trusty bow he held,
And with the other to its glittering head
Drew the long shaft while full each muscle swell'd;
A twanging sound!—and on its errand sped
The messenger of vengeance:—warm and red
Gushed from a gaping wound the vital tide—
Wrenched was the granite from its ancient bed,
And pines were broken in their leafy pride,
When throes of mortal pain the monster's coil untied.
XXVI.
Down the steep hill outstretched and dead he rolled
Disgorging human heads in his descent;
Oaks that in earth had deeply fixed their hold
Like reeds by that revolving mass were bent,
Splintered their boughs as if by thunder rent:
High flung the troubled lake its glittering spray,
And far the beach with flakes of foam besprent,
When the huge carcass disappeared for aye
In depths from whence it rose to curse the beams of day.
XXVII.
When winds its murmuring bosom cease to wake
Through bright transparent waves you may discern
On the hard, pebbled bottom of the lake
Skulls changed to stone:—when fires no longer burn
Kindled by sunset, and the glistening urn
Of night o'erflows with dew the phantoms pale
Of matron, maid, child, seer and chieftain stern
Their ghastly faces to the moon unveil,
And raise upon the shore a low heart-broken wail.
XXVIII.
The lovers of Genundewah were blest
By the Great Spirit, and their lodge became
The nursery of a nation:—when the West
Opened its gates of parti-colored flame
To give their souls free passage loud acclaim
Rang through the Spirit Land, and voices cried
"Welcome! ye builders of eternal fame!
Ye royal founders of an empire wide
The stream of joy flows by, quaff ever from its tide!"
XXIX.
At Onondaga burned the sacred fire
A thousand winters with unwasting blaze;
In guarding it son emulated sire,
And far abroad were flung its dazzling rays:
Followed were happy years by evil days—
Blue-eyed and pale came Children of the Dawn
Tall spires on site of bark-built town to raise;
Change groves of beauty to a naked lawn,
And whirl their chariot wheels where led the doe her fawn.
XXX.
Where are the mighty?—morning finds them not!
I call—and echo gives response alone;
The fiery bolt of Ruin hath been shot,
The blow is struck—the winds of death have blown!
Cold are the hearths—their altars overthrown:
For them with smoking venison the board,
Reward of toilsome chase, no more will groan;
Sharper than hatchet proved the conqueror's sword,
And blood, in fruitless strife, like water they outpoured.
XXXI.
The spotted Demon of Contagion came
Ere the sacred bird of Peace could find a nest,
And vanished Tribes like summer grass when flame
Reddens the level prairie of the West,
Or wasting dew drops when the rocky crest
Of this enchanted hill is tipped with gold;
And ere the Genii of the wild-wood drest
With flowers and moss the grave mound's hollowed mould,
Before the ringing axe went down the forest old.
XXXII.
Oh! where is Gar-an-gu-la—Sachem wise?
Who was the father of his people?—where
King Hendrick, Cay-en-guac-to?—who replies?
And Sken-an-do-ah, was thy silver hair
Brought to the dust in sorrow and despair
By pale oppression, though thy bow was strong
To guard their Thirteen Fires?—they did not spare
E'en thee, old chieftain, and thy tuneful tongue
The death-dirge of thy race in measured cadence sung.
XXXIII.
Thea-an-de-nea-gua[H] of the martial brow,
Gy-ant-wa,[I] Hon-ne-ya-was[J] where are they?
Sa-go-ye-wat-hah![K] is he silent now?
No more will listening throngs his voice obey.
Like visions have the mighty passed away!
Their tears descend in rain-drops, and their sighs
Are heard in wailing winds when evening gray
Shadows the landscape, and their mournful eyes
Gleam in the misty light of moon-illumin'd skies.
XXXIV.
Gone are my tribesmen, and another race,
Born of the foam, disclose with plough and spade
Secrets of battle-field and burial-place;
And hunting grounds, once dark with pleasant shade,
Bask in the golden light:—but I have made
A pilgrimage from far to look once more
On scenes through which in childhood's hour I strayed,
Though robbed of might my limbs, my locks all hoar,
And on this Holy Mount mourn for the days of yore,
XXXV.
Our house is broken open at both ends
Though deeply set the posts, its timber strong—
From ruthless foes, and traitors masked as friends,
Tutored to sing a false but pleasant song
The Seneca and Mohawk guarded long
Its blood-stained doors:—the former faced the sun
In his decline—the latter watched a throng
Clouding the eastern hills—their tasks are done;
A game for life was played, and prize the white man won.
XXXVI.
Around me soon will bloom unfading flowers
Ye glorious Spirit Islands of the just!
No fatal axe will hew away your bowers,
Or lay the green-robed forest king in dust:
Far from the spoiler's fury, and his lust
Of boundless power will I my fathers meet
Tiaras wearing never dimm'd by rust,
And they, while airs waft music passing sweet,
To blest abodes will guide my silver-sandal'd feet.
NOTES.
The warrior's right his scalp lock to adorn
With eagle plumes in battle he had won.—[Stanza ix.]
No one but a brave who has slain an enemy in battle, is allowed the distinguished honor of wearing eagle feathers.
Rained from her elk-like eyes.—[Stanza xii.]
Objects clear and bright are often compared by the Indian to the elk's eye. The definition of Muskingum is—"clear as an elk's eye."
Born of the foam.—[Stanza xxxiv.]
The red man believes that the whites sprang from the foam of the salt water.
FOOTNOTES:
[F] Bright eye.
[G] Great Spirit.
[H] Brunt.
[I] Corn Planter.
[J] Farmer's Brother.
[K] Red Jacket.