The Hero, undaunted,
Turned not on his track;
A duty before him,
And way peril-haunted,
Far rather would spur him,
Than hold a rein o'er him,
Save guidingly slack.
The hearts of his chosen,
By terror unfrozen,
Exultingly panted
To ride on the back
Of that wild foaming charger.
Right down through the roar
Of the turbulent river —
By keel of the voyager
Ne'er cloven before —
By bold Rider never,
In gallant endeavor,
So scourged with the oar.
They launched on a bubble!
A spacious, tenacious,
Exotical bubble —
A thread at the helm
Of that tenuous film —
That spun in that trouble
Of weltering water,
As spins, for a little,
A brain-dizzied otter
Ill-struck by the hunter —
Then, borne to the middle,
And finding her center,
She darted! she flew!
With her dexterous crew,
Just skimming the wave
As a rapid sea-mew,
And shunning her grave
In the hollows beneath,
Where the splintering jags
Would have cloven her through,
With their terrible teeth !
The precipitous crags,
In the glimmering blue.
Flew hurriedly back,
Like the thunderous rack
That the hurricanes brew!
And sunlight and shadow —
As over the meadow
When Taurus is nigh —
With smiling and weeping
Unstable and fickle —
Went troopingly by.
But more of terrific
And ruinous power
Rode, deaf'ningly sweeping,
Along with that shower,
As a cold, clammy trickle
Dropped down from petrific
Rock-cumuli o'er them!
While round them, and under,
Above, and before them,
One Maelstrom of thunder
Involved them, and bore them;
With rapid reef-whit'ning,
That flashed, intermitting,
The sun-splendors flitting,
Shot by for their lightning!
With singing and shouting
Unheard in the roar,
Nor fearing nor doubting
The perils before,
They flew through the hollow
Reverberant caves,
As a tiny cliff-swallow
Alone with the waves.
From the bow of the falls
Like an arrow they leapt,
And around in the sling
Of the vortices swept.
Were hurled to the walls,
With a perilous fling,
Like the pebble that leveled
The Anakim king;
But gracefully shunning
The shock, in a breath,
They flew where the stunning,
White cataracts reveled;
Exultingly running
Their gauntlet of death!
So daring and well,
With his chosen companions,
Our braver Ulysses
Went down the abysses
The Phlegethon-flood
Of that watery hell;
Went down through the cañon's
Gehenna of waves,
Till they stood where the blood
Of immaculate Braves
Had thrilled with a shiver
To see the mad river,
With a death-gurgled note
Sucked down through the teeth
Of the black jaws beneath,
To the fathomless throat
Of impassable caves.
O! the wilds and abysms,
Rough danger and toil,
Are the nurture and soil
Of sublime Heroisms!
And better than war is,
And better than peace,
Are the perilous forays
'Gainst desert and river,
And stern wilderness;
They open the door-ways
Of future endeavor,
And challenge the Darkness,
Close-lipped in its starkness.
To stand and deliver!
Running the Cañon