It was at daybreak that they heard the cry:
"The Iroquois!--The Iroquois! They come!
Fly to the hidden forest places! Fly!--
To linger in the village is to die--
Steal through the river grasses--and be dumb!"
Swiftly the women and the children fled,
But with the braves de Breboeuf stayed behind.
"Go!" cried the chief, "good father--we be dead!"
Yet soft he answered as he shook his head:
"I stay with thee--and with thy old and blind."
When the red sun came creeping up the sky
Grey death had reaped the harvest hate had sown;
The Jesuit heard no longer curse or sigh--
His prayers were said for those about to die--
He faced the living Iroquois alone.
They bound him fast beneath the forest green,
And when was come the shadowy edge of night--
Nay--ask not what the horned owl hath seen,
Nor what the moon doth know--white and serene
The soul of Jean de Breboeuf took its flight.
IN EGYPT
It was the Angel Azrael the Lord God sent below
At midnight, into every house in Egypt, long ago--
0 long, and long ago.
All day the wife of Pharaoh had paced the palace hall
Or the long white pillared court that was open to the sky;
A passion of wild restlessness ensnared her in its thrall
While she fought a fear within her--a thing that would not die.
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