I.
Hear not ye their shrill-piping screams on the air? Up! Braves for the conflict prepare ye—prepare! Aroused from the canebrake, far south by your drum, With beaks whet from carnage, the Battle Birds come.
II.
Oh God of my Fathers, as swiftly as they, I ask but to swoop from the hills on my prey: Give this frame to the winds, on the Prairie below, But my soul—like thy bolt— I would hurl on the foe!
III.
On the forehead of Earth strikes the Sun in his might, Oh gift me with glances as searching as light. In the front of the onslaught, to single each crest, Till my hatchet grows red on their bravest and best.
IV.
Why stand ye back idly, ye Sons of the Lakes? Who boast of the scalp-locks, ye tremble to take. Fear-dreamers may linger, my skies are all bright— Charge—charge—on the War-Path, for God and the Right.
Take the following additional example, of a death song. These stanzas have all been actually sung on warlike occasions, and repeated in my hearing. They have been gleaned from the traditionary songs of the Chippewas of the north, whose villages extend through the region of lake Superior, and to the utmost sources of the Mississippi. Those bands are the hereditary foes of their western neighbours, the Dacotahs or Sioux, who are generally called by them, by way of distinction, Na do wä′ sees, that is to say, OUR ENEMIES. The allusions in the songs are exclusively to them. In writing the original, I omit the chorus, as it is not susceptible of translation, and would increase considerably the space occupied.
DEATH SONG.