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Down the white rapids like a sear leaf whirled, On the sharp rocks and piled up ices hurled,

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Cold, crafty, proud, of woman's weak distress,
Her home-bound grief and pining loneliness?

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The wild March rains had fallen fast and long
The snowy mountains of the North among,
Making each vale a water-course each hill
Bright with the cascade of some new made rill.

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Gnawed by the sunbeams, softened by the rain,
Heaved underneath by the swollen current's strain,
The ice-bridge yielded, and the Merrimack
Bore the huge ruin crashing down its track.

On that strong turbid water, a small boat
Guided by one weak hand was seen to float,
Evil the fate which loosed it from the shore,
Too early voyager with too frail an oar!

Down the vexed centre of that rushing tide,
The thick huge ice-blocks threatening either side,
The foam-white rocks of Amoskeag in view,
With arrowy swiftness sped that light canoe.

The trapper moistening his moose's meat

On the wet bank by Uncanoonuc's feet,

Saw the swift boat flash down the troubled stream

Slept he, or waked he?

-was it truth or dream?

The straining eye bent fearfully before,

The small hand clenching on the useless oar,

The bead-wrought blanket trailing o'er the water
He knew them all wo for the Sachem's daughter!

Sick and aweary of her lonely life,
Heedless of peril the still faithful wife

Had left her mother's grave, her father's door,
To seek the wigwam of her chief once more.

Down the white rapids like a sear leaf whirled,
On the sharp rocks and piled up ices hurled,

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