Dart his slant beam on unobeying snows,
While yet the stern and solitary Night
Brooks no alternate 'sway, the Boreal Morn
With mimic lustre substitutes its gleam,
Guiding his course or by Niemi lake
Or Balda-Zhiok,* or the mossy stone
Of Solfar-Kapper,t while the snowy blast
Drifts arrowy by, or eddies round his sledge,
Making the poor babe at its mother's backi

Scream in its scanty cradle: he the while
Wins gentle solace as with upward eye
He marks the streamy banners of the North,
Thinking himself those happy spirits shall join
Who there in floating robes of rosy light
Dance sportively. For Fancy is the Power
That first unsensualizes the dark mind,
Giving it new delights; and bids it swell
With wild activity; and peopling air,
By obscure fears of Beings invisible,
Emancipates it from the grosser thrall
Of the present impulse, teaching Self-controul,
Till Superstition with unconscious hand
Seat Reason on her throne. Wherefore not vain,
Nor yet without permitted power impress'd,
I deem those legends terrible, with which
The polar ancient thrills his uncouth throng:
Whether of pitying Spirits that make their moan
O’er slaughter'd infants, or that Giant Bird
VUOKHO, of whose rushing wings the noise
Is Tempest, when the unutterable* shape
Speeds from the mother of Death, and utters once
That shriek, which never Murderer heard, and lived.
Or if the Greenland Wizard in strange trance
Pierces the untravelled realms of Ocean's bed
(Where live the innocent as far from cares
As from the storms and overwhelming waves
Dark tumbling on the surface of the deep),
Over the abysm, even to that uttermost cave
By mis-shaped prodigies beleaguered, such
As Earth ne'er bred, nor Air, nor the upper Sea. .

There dwells the Fury Form, whose unheard name With eager eye, pale cheek, suspended breath, And lips half-opening with the dread of sound, Unsleeping SILENCE guards, worn out with fear Lest haply escaping on some treacherous blast The fateful word let slip the Elements And frenzy Nature. Yet the wizard her, Armed with *Torngarsuck's power, the Spirit of Good, Forces to unchain the foodful progeny

* They call the Good Spirit, Torngarsuck. The other great but malignant spirit is a nameless Female; she dwells under the sea in a great house, where she can detain in captivity all the animals of the ocean by her magic power.

When a dearth befalls the Greenlanders, an Angekok or magician must undertake a journey thither: he passes through the kingdom of souls, over an horrible abyss into the Palace of this phantom, and by his enchantments causes the captive creatures to ascend directly to the surface of the ocean.

See CRANTZ Hist, of Greenland, vol. i. 206.

Of the Ocean stream.-Wild phantasies ! yet wise,
On the victorious goodness of high God
Teaching Reliance, and medicinal Hope,
Till from Bethabra northward, heavenly Truth
With gradual steps winning her difficult way, ,
Transfer their rude Faith perfected and pure.

If there be Beings of higher class than Man, I deem no nobler province they possess, Than by disposal of apt circumstance To rear up Kingdoms : and the deeds they prompt, Distinguishing from mortal agency, They chuse their mortal ministers from such states As still the Epic Song half fears to name, Repelled from all the Minstrelsies that strike The Palace-Roof and sooth the Monarch's pride.

And such, perhaps, the Spirit, who (if words Witnessed by answering deeds may claim our Faith) Held commune with that warrior-maid of France Who scourg'd the Invader. From her infant days, With Wisdom, Mother of retired Thoughts, Her soul had dwelt; and she was quick to mark The good and evil thing, in human lore Undisciplin’d. For lowly was her Birth,

And Heaven had doom'd her early years to Toil
That

pure from Tyranny's least deed, herself
Unfear’d by Fellow-natures, she might wait
On the poor Lab'ring man with kindly looks,
And minister refreshment to the tir'd
Way-wanderer, when along the rough-hewn Bench
The sweltry man had stretch'd him, and aloft
Vacantly watch'd the rudely pictured board
Which on the Mulberry-bough with welcome creek
Swung to the pleasant breeze. Here, too, the Maid
Learnt more than Schools could teach : Man's shifting

mind,
His Vices and his Sorrows ! And full oft
At Tales of cruel Wrong and strange Distress
Had wept and shiver'd. To the tottering Eld
Still as a Daughter would she run: she plac'd
His cold Limbs at the sunny Door, and lov’d
To hear him story, in his garrulous sort,
Of his eventful years, all come and gone.

So twenty seasons past. The Virgin's Form,
Active and tall, nor Sloth nor Luxury
Had shrunk or paled. Her front sublime and broad,
Her flexile eye-brows wildly hair'd and low,
And her full eye, now bright, now unillum'd,