Page:Zinzendorff and Other Poems.pdf/25

To bind obedience. Eagerly they sought
The abode of Zinzendorff. His lonely tent
Rear'd its white bosom thro' embowering shades,
As if some remnant of the wintry snow
Did linger there. The earliest cluster'd grape
Was in its purple flush,—and twilight's breath
Betray'd a chill, prelusive of the sway
Of sober autumn.
                        Through a narrow chasm
In his slight screen, glar'd the assassins' eyes,
As when the fierce and fell hyena finds
A fleshless carcase. Stern, and hard of heart!
How can ye cleave the breast that thrills for you
With generous sympathy? But what know they
Of soft compunction?—train'd from youth to tear
The scalp fresh bleeding from the tortur'd brain,
To mock the victim, writhing at the stake,
Or hurl the mother, with her wailing babe
Into the wigwam's flame.
                                 Slow midnight came,
In dark companionship with sullen storms,
The red pine blazes in the old man's cave,
And every moment mov'd with leaden feet,
To him who trac'd it on the dial-plate
Of mad impatience and unresting sin.
At length, above the tempest's groan, is heard
The sound of rushing steps. His blood-shot eyes
Look'd fiery glad, as when a tiger marks
The unwary traveller near his jungle draw.
And as the mother of Herodias snatch'd
The reeking charger, and the sever'd head
Of John the Baptist,—so he thought to grasp