XII.

The sassafras took leaf, and men Push'd west in hosts. The black men drew Their black-maned horses silent through The solemn woods.

One midnight when The curl'd moon tipp'd her horn, and threw A black oak's shadow slant across A low mound hid in leaves and moss,

Old Morgan cautious came and drew From out the ground, as from a grave, A great box, iron-bound and old, And fill'd, men say, with pirates’ gold,

And then they, silent as a dream, In long black shadows cross'd the stream. Lo! here the smoke of cabins curl'd, The borders of the middle world;

And mighty, hairy, half-wild men Sat down in silence, held at bay By mailed forests. Far away The red men's boundless borders lay,

And lodges stood in legions then, Strip'd pyramids of painted men. What strong uncommon men were these, These settlers hewing to the seas!

Great horny-handed men and tan; Men blown from any border land; Men desperate and red of hand, And men in love and men in debt,

And men who lived but to forget, And men whose very hearts had died, Who only sought these woods to hide Their wretchedness, held in the van;

Yet every man among them stood Alone, along that sounding wood, And every man somehow a man. A race of unnamed giants these,

That moved like gods among the trees, So stern, so stubborn-brow'd and slow, With strength of black-maned buffalo, And each man notable and tall,

A kingly and unconscious Saul, A sort of sullen Hercules. A star stood large and white awest, Then Time uprose and testified;

They push'd the mailed wood aside, They toss'd the forest like a toy, That great forgotten race of men, The boldest band that yet has been

Together since the siege of Troy, And followed it... and found their rest. What strength! what strife! what rude unrest! What shocks! what half-shaped armies met!

A mighty nation moving west, With all its steely sinews set Against the living forests. Hear The shouts, the shots of pioneer!

The rended forests, rolling wheels, As if some half-check'd army reels, Recoils, redoubles, comes again, Loud sounding like a hurricane.

O bearded, stalwart, westmost men, So tower-like, so Gothic-built! A kingdom won without the guilt Of studied battle; that hath been

Your blood's inheritance.... Your heirs Know not your tombs. The great ploughshares Cleave softly through the mellow loam

Where you have made eternal home And set no sign. Your epitaphs Are writ in furrows. Beauty laughs

While through the green ways wandering Beside her love, slow gathering White starry-hearted May-time blooms Above your lowly levell'd tombs;

And then below the spotted sky She stops, she leans, she wonders why The ground is heaved and broken so, And why the grasses darker grow

And droop and trail like wounded wing. Yea, Time, the grand old harvester, Has gather'd you from wood and plain. We call to you again, again;

The rush and rumble of the car Comes back in answer. Deep and wide The wheels of progress have pass'd on; The silent pioneer is gone.

His ghost is moving down the trees, And now we push the memories Of bluff, bold men who dared and died In foremost battle, quite aside.

O perfect Eden of the earth, In poppies sown, in harvest set! O sires, mothers of my West! How shall we count your proud bequest?

But yesterday ye gave us birth; We eat your hard-earn'd bread to-day, Nor toil nor spin nor make regret, But praise our petty selves and say

How great we are, and all forget The still endurance of the rude Unpolish'd sons of solitude.