The league of the Iroquois and other legends : from the Indian muse

NYAH-TAH-WANTA. 79
If by her side, with fear and pain
She saw at whiles pale Famine stand,
When failed the harvest-promised grain,
Her field laid waste by hostile band,
She careful eked the failing store
In ways but woman can devise ;
With patient trust her hunger bore
And all heroic sacrifice. M
Above the spring-time floods that rise,
The Musk-rat builds his winter tent ;
So to the forest-maiden's eyes
And mind another sense is lent ;
To see beyond each fleeting form,
Of all the changeful seasons send,
In wind and rain, in cloud and storm,
What these may omen and portend.
Though all unlearned in lettered lore,
She all the forest secrets knew ;
Of every beast the cry and roar,
The call of every bird that flew ;
She heard anon, without affright,
The Be-zhu's mimic scream of woe ;
The Jit-sho yelping through the night,
The fiercely-howling 0-kwa-ho.