"This is one of the melancholy airs of my native land," he would
say. "You may think it strange to see a soldier weep, and indeed
it is to make a near friend of you," says he. "But the notes of
this singing are in my blood, and the words come out of my heart.
And when I mind upon my red mountains and the wild birds calling
there, and the brave streams of water running down, I would scarce
think shame to weep before my enemies." Then he would sing again,
and translate to me pieces of the song, with a great deal of
boggling and much expressed contempt against the English language.
"It says here," he would say, "that the sun is gone down, and the
battle is at an end, and the brave chiefs are defeated. And it
tells here how the stars see them fleeing into strange countries or
lying dead on the red mountain; and they will never more shout the
call of battle or wash their feet in the streams of the valley.
But if you had only some of this language, you would weep also
because the words of it are beyond all expression, and it is mere
mockery to tell you it in English.
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