SKETCHES OF AMERICAN HISTORY[290]
This American world, all our histories say,
Secluded from Europe, long centuries lay,
And peopled by beings whom white-men detest,
The sons of the Tartars, that came from the west.
These Indians, 'tis certain, were here long before ye all,
And dwelt in their wigwams from time immemorial;
In a mere state of nature, untutored, untaught,
They did as they pleased, and they spoke as they thought—
No priests they had then for the cure of their souls,
No lawyers, recorders, or keepers of rolls;
No learned physicians vile nostrums concealed—
Their druggist was Nature—her shop was the field.
In the midst of their forests how happy and blest,
In the skin of a bear or buffalo drest!
No care to perplex, and no luxury seen
But the feast, and the song, and the dance on the green.
Some bowed to the moon, and some worshipped the sun,
And the king and the captain were centered in one;
In a cabin they met, in their councils of state,
Where age and experience alone might debate.
With quibbles they never essayed to beguile,
And Nature had taught them the orator's style;
No pomp they affected, not quaintly refined
The nervous idea that glanced on the mind.
When hunting or battle invited to arms,
The women they left to take care of their farms—
The toils of the summer did winter repay,
While snug in their cabins they snored it away.