The Song of Hiawatha   ::   Longfellow Henry Wadsworth

He it was whose hand in Autumn

Painted all the trees with scarlet,

Stainedthe leaves with red and yellow;

He it was who sent the snow-flake,

Sifting, hissing through the forest,

Froze the ponds, the lakes, the rivers,

Drove the loon and sea-gull southward,

Drove the cormorant and curlew

To their nests of sedge and sea-tang

In the realms of Shawondasee.

Once the fierce Kabibonokka

Issued from his lodge of snow-drifts

From his home among the icebergs,

And his hair, with snow besprinkled,

Streamed behind him like a river,

Like a black and wintry river,

As he howled and hurried southward,

Over frozen lakes and moorlands.

There among the reeds and rushes

Found he Shingebis, the diver,

Trailing strings of fish behind him,

O'er the frozen fens and moorlands,

Lingering still among the moorlands,

Though his tribe had long departed

To the land of Shawondasee.

Cried the fierce Kabibonokka,

"Who is this that dares to brave me?

Dares to stay in my dominions,

When the Wawa has departed,

When the wild-goose has gone southward,

And the heron, the Shuh-shuh-gah,

Long ago departed southward?

I will go into his wigwam,

I will put his smouldering fire out!"

And at night Kabibonokka,

To the lodge came wild and wailing,

Heaped the snow in drifts about it,

Shouted down into the smoke-flue,

Shook the lodge-poles in his fury,

Flapped the curtain of the door-way.

Shingebis, the diver, feared not,

Shingebis, the diver, cared not;

Four great logs had he for firewood,

One for each moon of the winter,

And for food the fishes served him.

By his blazing fire he sat there,

Warm and merry, eating, laughing,

Singing, "O Kabibonokka,

You are but my fellow-mortal!"

Then Kabibonokka entered,

And though Shingebis, the diver,

Felt his presence by the coldness,

Felt his icy breath upon him,

Still he did not cease his singing,

Still he did not leave his laughing,

Only turned the log a little,

Only made the fire burn brighter,

Made the sparks fly up the smoke-flue.