Round and round the yearly cycle
Rolled the ever changing seasons,
With the coming of the robins,
In the sweet and pleasant spring times;
With the sunshine and the shadows
In the sultry days of summers;
With the robins flying southward
Midst the falling leaves of autumn;
With the lonely desolation
In the cold and dreary winters.
THE SEASONS PASSED AND YEARS GREW OLD.
With summer heat and winter cold,
Changed the river's nightly cadence,
As seasons passed and years grew old
In the valley of the Tunxis.
With the changing of the seasons,
Changed the river's nightly cadence.
In the sumlmer and the autumn,
Quiet was the Tunxis River,
Just a murmur of the waters
As they wandered ever southward
Through the sultry shadows flowing,
Making music in the night time
For the people of the village.
In the cold and dreary winters,
Flowing in its ice-bound channel,
Hardly was the river's murmur
Heard within the little village;
Yet the sleepers oft were startled,
When the northern lights were shining,
In the cold and frosty night-time,
By the sudden cracking, snapping,
Of the ice along the river,
Breaking thus the star-lit silence
Of the river and the village.
When the air of spring grew warmer,
Black and low the storm clouds gathered,
Driven by the east wind's power,
Swept across the darkened sky-ways,
Pouring rain upon the valley,
'Till the river, slowly swelling,
Moaning 'neath its heavy bondage,
Burst its hard and icy fetters.
Raced the swirling billows foaming,
Sweeping southward through the forest.;
Tossing logs and jagged ice-cakes,
With a mighty roar of waters,
Crashing on the rocks and boulders,
Tossing spray across the hill-side,
'Till the people of the village
Trembled at the river's power,
Fearing for their habitations.
32. CHAUGHAM'S SPIRIT LEFT THE HILL-SIDE,
And Molly Barber labored bravely on,
Strong and stately, hale and hearty,
Until brave Chaugham's life was gone,
And they laid him in the grave-yard;
Wisely, kindly Molly Barber,
Long the wife of Honest Chaugham,
As is written in the records,
Moved about among her children,
Strong and stately, hale and hearty,
Loved by all her children's children.