Pocahontas

Wearied arm and broken sword
  Wage in vain the desperate fight:
Round him press a countless horde,
  He is but a single knight.
Hark! a cry of triumph shrill
  Through the wilderness resounds,
As, with twenty bleeding wounds,
  Sinks the warrior, fighting still.
Now they heap the fatal pyre,
  And the torch of death they light:
Ah! 'tis hard to die of fire!
  Who will shield the captive knight?
Round the stake with fiendish cry
  Wheel and dance the savage crowd,
Cold the victim's mien, and proud.
  And his breast is bared to die.
Who will shield the fearless heart?
  Who avert the murderous blade?
From the throng, with sudden start,
  See there springs an Indian maid.
Quick she stands before the knight,
  "Loose the chain, unbind the ring,
I am daughter of the king,
  And I claim the Indian right!"
Dauntlessly aside she flings
  Lifted axe and thirsty knife;
Fondly to his heart she clings,
  And her bosom guards his life!
In the woods of Powhattan,
  Still 'tis told by Indian fires,
How a daughter of their sires
  Saved the captive Englishman.

FROM POCAHONTAS.

Returning from the cruel fight
How pale and faint appears my knight!
He sees me anxious at his side;
"Why seek, my love, your wounds to hide?
Or deem your English girl afraid
To emulate the Indian maid?"

Be mine my husband's grief to cheer
In peril to be ever near;
Whate'er of ill or woe betide,
To bear it clinging at his side;
The poisoned stroke of fate to ward,
His bosom with my own to guard:
Ah! could it spare a pang to his,
It could not know a purer bliss!
'Twould gladden as it felt the smart,
And thank the hand that flung the dart!