Lo the puffing, panting steamers, through thy foaming waters sweep;
And behold the grain-fields golden, where the bison grazed of eld;
See the fanes of forests olden by the ruthless Saxon felled,--
Plumed pines that spread their shadows ere Columbus spread his sails.
Firs that fringed the mossy meadows ere the Mayflower braved the gales,
Iron oaks that nourished bruin while the Vikings roamed the main,
Crashing fall in broken ruin for the greedy marts of gain.

Still forever and forever rolls the restless river on,
Slumbering oft but ceasing never, while the circling centuries run.
In his palm the lakelet lingers, in his hair the brooklets hide,
Grasped within his thousand fingers lies a continent fair and wide,--
Yea, a mighty empire swarming with its millions like the bees,
Delving, drudging, striving, storming, all their lives, for golden ease.

Still, methinks, the dusky shadows of the days that are no more
Stalk around the lakes and meadows, haunting oft the wonted shore,--
Hunters from the land of spirits seek the bison and the deer,
Where the Saxon now inherits golden field and silver mere;
And beside the mound where burried lies the dark-eyed maid he loves,
Some tall warrior, wan and wearied, in the misty moonlight moves.
See--he stands erect and lingers--stoic still, but loth to go--
Clutching in his tawny fingers feathered shaft and polished bow.
Never wail or moan he utters and no tear is on his face,
But a warrior's curse he mutters on the crafty Saxon race.

O thou dark, mysterious River, speak and tell thy tales to me;
Seal not up thy lips forever--veiled in mist and mystery.
I will sit and lowly listen at the phantom-haunted falls,
Where thy waters foam and glisten o'er the rugged, rocky walls.