Many years passed away, and the swift and stealthy hunter had been succeeded by the patient and industrious white cultivator. Few traces of the Indian were remaining. The weak and irresolute—they who could see unmoved the dwelling-places of their fathers usurped by strangers, had found unhonoured graves in their own woods—the brave and resolute had gone yet farther into the forest. The rotten bow and quiver, and the rusted arrow, were frequently turned up by the plough, and little fields of scarce the breadth of an arrow's flight disclosed where the red man had once tasted his narrow enjoyments of home and shelter, and these were all that marked where he had been. The bitter persecutors of the rightful possessors of these wide-spread lands were in possession of every fertile spot, while the Indian roved in strange lands, a wanderer, and an outcast.
It was in the pleasant month when the birds build their nests on the boughs of trees, that a white man, seated on the margin of the river which swept along by the grave of the deceased maiden, saw a train of men slowly approaching, bearing a human corpse. He crept into a sequestered spot, and watched their progress. Approaching the little hillock where the dust of the maiden reposed, they deposited their load on the earth, and commenced digging a fresh grave by its side. When it was finished, they placed the corpse in it, together with the implements commonly buried with an Indian warrior, his bow, quiver of arrows, spear, pipe, &c. The white man, fearing discovery, retreated, and left them to finish their solemn labours unobserved. In the morning, the funeral train had departed, but the fresh earth and the low heap of stones revealed the secret. They remain there to this day, and the two little mounds are shown by the villagers, as the graves of the beautiful Mary and the faithful Pomperaug.
IV. THE SON OF ANNAWAN.
The son of the white man sat in his house on the border of the Indian nations, when there came a red man to his door, leading a beautiful woman with a little child in her arms, and spoke thus:—
"Dost thou see the sun?"
"I see the sun," answered the white man, haughtily.
"Three times," said the Indian, "has that sun risen, and thrice has he sunk from my eyes behind the dark hills of the west, since I or mine have tasted food. For myself, I care little—I am a man of the woods, a patient warrior; I can fast seven suns; I am not even now faint—but a tender woman has not the soul of a strong warrior, and when she sees not meat every day, she leans her head upon her hand, and when her child droops for food she weeps. Give me food."
"Begone!" said the white man, "I earn my bread and meat by the sweat of my brow—"
"On the lands of the Indian," interrupted the stern warrior.