They were strange wanderers on life's sad deep,
And paused a moment in God's mystic plan
A little vigil on time's shores to keep,
Then passed forever from the tribes of man.
They heard a voice and a strange face did scan,
And what of conquest or of kingly sway
Had filled their dreams, they gave the white man's clan,
And with the dawning of a wondrous day,
They spread their sails again and, voiceless, passed away.
IV.
Silent as ever, stoic as of old,
Their children sit with empty hands to wait
The sequel that the future shall unfold,—
The unwritten "Finis" of remorseless fate.
Vanquished they stand before oblivion's gate,
Knowing that soon the everlasting seal
Of destiny shall all obliterate
Their finished story, which, for woe or weal,
Shall be with Him who writ to hide or to reveal.
KENOTAPHION.
O wanderer! whoever thou mayest be,
I beg of thee to pass in silence here
And leave me with my empty sepulchre
Beside the ceaseless turmoil of the sea;
Pass me as one whom life's old tragedy
Hath made distraught—who now in dreams doth keep
His cherished dead, unmindful of her sleep
In ocean's bosom locked eternally!
Scorn not the foolish grave that I have made
Beside the deep sea of my soul's unrest,
But let me hope that when the storms are stayed
My phantom ship shall sail from out the west
Bringing the boon for which I long have prayed—
The broken vigil and the ended quest.