Song Of Indian Maids. (The Missionary.)

Oh, shout for Lautaro, the young and the brave!
The arm of whose strength was uplifted to save,
When the steeds of the strangers came rushing amain,
And the ghosts of our fathers looked down on the slain!

'Twas eve, and the noise of the battle was o'er,
Five thousand brave warriors were cold in their gore;
When, in front, young Lautaro invincible stood,
And the horses and iron-men rolled in their blood!

As the snows of the mountain are swept by the blast,
The earthquake of death o'er the white men has passed;
Shout, Chili, in triumph! the battle is won,
And we dance round the heads that are black in the sun!

William Lisle Bowles

William Lisle Bowles was an English cleric, poet, and critic who was born on 24th September 1762 and died on 7th April 1850. He is best known for his sonnets, which were highly praised by the Romantic poets. Bowles's work significantly influenced Samuel Taylor Coleridge and William Wordsworth. Besides his poetry, he wrote extensively on literary criticism and editing. Bowles spent much of his clerical career in Wiltshire and Gloucestershire.

William Lisle Bowles

On A Beautiful Landscape

William Lisle Bowles, Simple Poetry

Retrospection

William Lisle Bowles, Simple Poetry

Evening

William Lisle Bowles, Simple Poetry

Wardour Castle

William Lisle Bowles, Simple Poetry

English

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The Missionary. Canto Seventh

Argument.


Midnight, Valdivia's tent, Missionary, March to the Valley Arauco, First sight of assembled Indians.

The watchman on the tower his bugle blew,
And swelling to the morn the streamers flew;
The rampart-guns a dread alarum gave,
Smoke rolled, and thunder echoed o'er the wave;
When, starting from his couch, Valdivia cried,
What tidings? Of the tribes! a scout replied;
Ev'n now, prepared thy bulwarks to assail,
Their gathering numbers darken all the vale!
Valdivia called to the attendant youth,
Philip, he cried, belike thy words have truth;
The formidable host, by holy James,
Might well appal our priests and city dames!
Dost thou not fear? Nay, dost thou not reply?
Now by the rood, and all the saints on high,
I hold it sin that thou shou...

William Lisle Bowles

Song To The God Of War. (The Missionary.)

By thy habitation dread,
In the valley of the dead,
Where no sun, nor day, nor night,
Breaks the red and dusky light;
By the grisly troops, that ride,
Of slaughtered Spaniards, at thy side,--
Slaughtered by the Indian spear,
Mighty Epananum, hear!
Hark, the battle! Hark, the din!
Now the deeds of Death begin!
The Spaniards come, in clouds! above,
I hear their hoarse artillery move!
Spirits of our fathers slain,
Haste, pursue the dogs of Spain!
The noise was in the northern sky!
Haste, pursue! They fly--they fly!
Now from the cavern's secret cell,
Where the direst phantoms dwell,
See they rush, and, riding high,
Break the moonlight as they fly;
And, on the shadowed plain beneath,
Shoot, unseen, the shafts of Death!
O'er the devoted...

William Lisle Bowles

The Missionary. Introduction

When o'er the Atlantic wild, rocked by the blast,
Sad Lusitania's exiled sovereign passed,
Reft of her pomp, from her paternal throne
Cast forth, and wandering to a clime unknown,
To seek a refuge on that distant shore,
That once her country's legions dyed with gore;
Sudden, methought, high towering o'er the flood,
Hesperian world! thy mighty genius stood;
Where spread, from cape to cape, from bay to bay,
Serenely blue, the vast Pacific lay;
And the huge Cordilleras to the skies
With all their burning summits seemed to rise.
Then the stern spirit spoke, and to his voice
The waves and woods replied: Mountains, rejoice!
Thou solitary sea, whose billows sweep
The margin of my forests, dark and deep,
Rejoice! the hour is come: the mortal blow,
That smote the ...

William Lisle Bowles

The Missionary. Preface To The Second Edition.[1]

The Missionary.

Amor patriæ ratione potentior omni.




It is not necessary to relate the causes which induced me to publish this poem without a name.

The favour with which it has been received may make me less diffident in avowing it; and, as a second edition has been generally called for, I have endeavoured to make it, in every respect, less unworthy of the public eye.

I have availed myself of every sensible objection, the most material of which was the circumstance, that the Indian maid, described in the first book, had not a part assigned to her of sufficient interest in the subsequent events of the poem, and that the character of the Missionary was not sufficiently professional.

The single circumstance that a Spanish commander, with his army in South America, was de...

William Lisle Bowles

The Missionary. Canto Fourth

Argument.

Assembly of Indian warriors, Caupolican, Ongolmo, Teucapel,
Mountain-chief, Song of the Indian Wizard, White woman and child.

Far in the centre of the deepest wood,
The assembled fathers of their country stood.
'Twas midnight now; the pine-wood fire burned red,
And to the leaves a shadowy glimmer spread;
The struggling smoke, or flame with fitful glance,
Obscured, or showed, some dreadful countenance;
And every warrior, as his club he reared,
With larger shadow, indistinct, appeared;
While more terrific, his wild locks and mien,
And fierce eye, through the quivering smoke, was seen.                        
In sea-wolf's skin, here Mariantu stood;
Gnashed his white teeth, impatient, and cried, blood!
His lofty brow, with crimson feathers bound,...

William Lisle Bowles

An Indian Massacre-Song.

See, the waves clasp the Sun, as he sinks from our sight,
And Despair sullen rides on the wings of the night;
Lo! he comes, and reproaches our arms with delay, -
Then arise, let us go where Revenge points the way!

In the deed should we fall, (since who'll e'er breathe a slave?)
Our free souls shall repose in the realms of the brave;
In the song we shall live, and fresh heroes inspire,
While the son shall exult in the fate of his sire.

Then know, ye white race! ye too long shake the rod;
By this arm ye shall soon be dismiss'd to your God!
Then demand, if he bade ye torment, why he gave
All the soul of a man to the breast of a slave?

Then prepare; know our hatchets atone for our wrong,
And our hearts, like our hatchets, are stubborn and strong:
Sleep you...

John Carr