Classic Poem

A stately stag comes down to drink
Beside the mountain lakelet's brink;
Around him, towering to the skies,
The brown Sierras sharply rise.
This is the haunt of silence; here
Dwells loneliness akin to fear;
And as the stag with agile tread
Crosses that ragged lava bed,
The careful putting of his feet
But makes the stillness more complete.
What means this utter dearth of sounds?
Are these the happy hunting grounds?
Now gracefully the neck of him,
So beautiful, so sleek, so slim,
Bends bowlike, till at last he sips
The crystal tide with velvet lips.
One moment, and the spell is past;
His antlered head on high is cast;
His thin, red nostrils sniff the air,
As though it said to him “Beware!”
A moment thus, and then a quick,
A nervous sound, a warning “click!”—
The four hard hoofs together met
Sharp as a Spanish castanet.
Away! away! at every spring
A shower of pebbles round him ring.
He falls, rolls over—now again
Is rattling down the rocky glen.
Gone like a flash, and silence now
Sifts down from cliff and mountain brow.
The silence grows. What ailed the stag?
No grizzly looms against yon crag,
Grim, clumsy, ponderous and gaunt;
This is no mountain lion's haunt;
No city hunter with his hound
This rocky fastness yet has found.
Ah, none of these! and yet the deer
Had sudden cause for direst fear,
For yonder, up the rough ravine,
A runner comes, brown, lithe and lean;
A perfect athlete—trained as one
Who in Olympic games would run.
Stark naked, save for sandals tied,
Beneath his feet, thin strips of hide;
Unarmed, save that his fingers clasp
A long, keen knife in bony grasp.
Gods, what a runner! Deep of chest,
And all his muscles at their best—
See how above the skin they rise,
As every move their temper tries!
How free his action! Slightly bent,
His eyes upon the ground intent,
He moves along with easy swing,
A Mercury who needs no wing;
Yet, not too fast, but more as one
Who wins the race before 'tis run.
This is the primal hunter, this
The man whose weapons never miss—
The runner of New Mexico,
Cliff-dwelling Candelario.
His half-starved dog before him goes,
Leading the way with faithful nose.
The stag is doomed, for never back
Turns Candelario from the track.
All day through canyon dark and deep,
Through mountain passes, rugged, steep,
Up walls of rock more wild and sheer
Then ever clomb Swiss mountaineer,
And over plains of scrub mesquite
He follows with untiring feet.
He sleeps upon the trail at night
And starts again at grayest light.
But one such other hunter's name
In all this world is known to fame,
Or e'er was shaped of human breath,
And such a one, I ween, is Death.
He follows so each mortal wight,
So camps upon the trail at night,
Sure that his game, if slow or fast,
Must weary of the flight at last.
Three days are gone since first began
That race between the deer and man,—
A noble course, and nobly run!
The better animal has won.
And now the stag, tired, hungry, weak,
His hair no longer smooth and sleek,
But trickling sweat and dusted gray,
Stands gamely waiting, brought to bay.
His antlered head is bended low,
And near the ground swings to and fro;
His eyes, though shot with streaks of gore,
Blaze fierce defiance all the more.
Not long he waits, for soon there glides
Into the opening where he bides
A naked runner, brown and lean,
Clutching a knife, long, wicked, keen.
Then each the other quickly spies,
And first they wage a war of eyes.
The hunter, bending at the hips,
With twitching hands and parted lips,
Glides watchfully around and round
The stag that turns, but holds his ground,
Disdaining though he often feels
The starved cur snapping at his heels.
Some moments thus, and then at last
The snarling mongrel seizes fast
Upon the deer's hock; mad with pain.
The forest monarch leaps in vain;
He leaps, he stamps, he turns his head—
Swift as a shaft from bowstring sped
The swarthy hunter forward springs;
His left hand to an antler clings,
His right the gleaming weapon wields.
The stag sways to and fro, he yields,
He slowly sinks to earth, his gore
Smokes on the ground, and all is o'er!
And all is o'er, but who would check
The Indian's joy, as on the neck
Kneeling, he swings his knife on high
And wakes the hills with one wild cry?