A deep ship’s hold of plundered gold!
The golden cruise, the golden cross,
From many a church of Mexico,
From Panama’s mad overthrow,
From many a ransomed city’s loss,
From many a follower stanch and bold,
And many a foeman stark and cold.
He found this wild, lost land. He drew
His ship to shore. His ruthless crew,
Like Romulus, laid lawless hand
On meek brown maidens of the land,
And in their bloody forays bore
Red firebrands along the shore.
III.
The red men rose at night. They came,
A firm, unflinching wall of flame;
They swept, as sweeps some fateful sea
O’er land of sand and level shore
That howls in far, fierce agony.
The red men swept that deep, dark shore
As threshers sweep a threshing-floor.
And yet beside the slain Don’s door
They left his daughter, as they fled:
They spared her life, because she bore
Their Chieftain’s blood and name. The red
And blood-stained hidden hoards of gold
They hollowed from the stout ship’s hold,
And bore in many a slim canoe—
To where? The good priest only knew.
IV.
The course of life is like the sea:
Men come and go; tides rise and fall;
And that is all of history.
The tide flows in, flows out to-day,—
And that is all that man may say;
Man is, man was,—and that is all.
Revenge at last came like a tide,—
’T was sweeping, deep, and terrible;
The Christian found the land, and came
To take possession in Christ’s name.
For every white man that had died
I think a thousand red men fell,—
A Christian custom; and the land
Lay lifeless as some burned-out brand.
V.
Ere while the slain Don’s daughter grew
A glorious thing, a flower of spring,
A lithe slim reed, a sun-loved weed,
A something more than mortal knew;
A mystery of grace and face,—
A silent mystery that stood
An empress in that sea-set wood,
Supreme, imperial in her place.