I.

Hear not ye their shrill-piping screams on the air? Up! Braves for the conflict prepare ye--prepare! Aroused from the canebrake, far south by your drum, With beaks whet from carnage, the Battle Birds come.

Oh God of my Fathers, as swiftly as they, I ask but to swoop from the hills on my prey: Give this frame to the winds, on the Prairie below, But my soul--like thy bolt--I would hurl on the foe!