La Santa Indita [pp. 114-117]

La Santa Indita.
Whirr of the reaper,
Like a giant bee;
Like a Titan cricket,
Thrilling with glee.
On mart, and meadow,
Pavement, or plain;
On azure mountain,
Or azure main,
Heaven bends in blessing;
Lost is but won;
Goes the good rain-cloud?
Comes the good sun!
Only babes whimper,
And sick men wail,
And faint-hearts, and feeble-hearts,
And weaklings fail.
Down the great currents
Let the boat swing;
There was never winter
But brought the spring.
LA SANTA INDITA.
MORE than three hundred years ago a little
village of mud-built cottages, thatched with
long, sharp zacale de cuchillo, or knife grass,
nestled at the foot of a mountain, covered
half its height with tropical shrubs and trees,
which formed a sombre and beautiful base
for the summit of dazzling snow that reflected the brilliant sunlight, or was half lost
in fleecy clouds.
There is a large town now where the humble village once stood, and handsome dwellings overshadow mud-built huts, while for
both rich and poor a massive church opens
its large and heavy portals. How grand is
its facade of dark brown stone, wrought in
myriad forms of saints and angels, prostrate
demons, leaves, and flowers; how its dome,
covered with polished and many colored porcelain, flashes in the sun, upholding a towering cross of glittering bronze-the symhbol of
Christianity-where once arose the smoke
of heathen sacrifice.
In those days, when the village was one of
the most unimportant in all the great realm
of Montezuma, the Aztec king, there lived
there a little brown maiden called "Otzli,"
or "The Wind Flower." Perhaps we should
smile at such a comparison, but to her father
and mother and all the villagers she was the
most lovely and delicate creature upon the
earth. She was the chief's daughter, a princess, and was served with the tenderness and
deference due to her high rank, and she was
loved as only the gentle and pure minded
can be.
Her days passed by in perfect happiness.
She lay beneath the shade of flower laden
trees, and looked up at the silvery mountain
or the blue, cloudless sky. Her playfellow
was a pet fawn, which gamboled at her side
E. R. Sill.
114
[Aug.