Chapter C: P. R. EASTBOUND--No. 2 (1)

I swing to the land of morn,
The grey old East, with its grey old seas,
The land of leisure, the land of ease,
The land of flowers and fruits and trees,
And the place where we were born.

Freighted with wealth I come:
Food, and fortune, and fellow that went
Far out west on adventure bent,
With well-worn pick and a folded tent,
Is bringing his bullion home.

I never will be renowned
As my twin that swings to the western marts,
For I am she of the humbler parts;
But I am the joy of the waiting hearts,
For I am the homeward bound!

ROBERT KIRKLAND KERNIGHAN

THE SONG OF THE THAW

My sandalled feet are firm and fleet,
My chariot wheels are splendid;
I rush and run before the sun
With balmy breezes blended;
O'er forest dry, past mountains high,
O'er snowy valleys hollow,
I sweep along with muffled song
And robin red-breasts follow.

Before my blade the snow wreaths fade,
The frosty blast I cripple;
The frozen stream wakes from its dream,
And straight begins to ripple;
I hush the wail along my trail
Past hamlet, home and hollow,
While on I go with noiseless flow
And robin red-breasts follow.

And like a psalm, benign and calm,
I blight the brow of winter;
I snap the chains that hold the reins--
The fields of ice I splinter;
And like the tide I run and ride,
The bated winds I swallow;
Triumphant still past rock and rill,
And robin red-breasts follow.

A wing of light from night to night
My perfumed chariot passes,
And I can hear in meadows clear
The whispering of the grasses;
With joyous face I onward race
Past hopeless height and hollow,
While swift and strong with simple song
My robin red-breasts follow.

The north wind bleeds--the rustling reeds
The happy news is telling,
And I can hear in forests near
The juicy leaf-buds swelling;
I onward rush without the thrush,
The red bird or the swallow,
You needn't mind, for close behind
My robin red-breasts follow.

PEEPY IS NOT DEAD

"If Peepy had lived," the mother sighed,
"He'd be of age to-day."
She bowed her head as she softly cried--
The head that was turning gray.
Now, one would think that Peepy was dead,
Underneath the snow:
One would think that Peepy was dead
Since seventeen years ago.

'Tis true they hid poor Peepy away,
Down in the churchyard green,
And ever since that pitiful day
Peepy's never been seen.
No one has seen his curly head
Or heard his laughter flow;
But it doesn't follow that Peepy's been dead
Since seventeen years ago!

They laid his toddling feet to rest;
They folded his fingers small,
Around the lily upon his breast;
Then laid him away--that's all.
They curtained his vacant trundle bed
In his little room of woe;
They really thought that Peepy was dead
Seventeen years ago.

But it wasn't Peepy they put to stay
Under the churchyard sod--
He's young and gay and strong to-day
Up in the realms of God.
He walks in the light by the Saviour's side,
The Saviour that loved him so.
So it's folly to think that Peepy died
Seventeen years ago.

His form returned to its mother mould,
But his soul began to grow--
This is the story an angel told,
And I'm sure these things are so.
Creeds and churches bother my head,
But this one thing I know--
It isn't true that Peepy's been dead
Since seventeen years ago!

WILLIAM KIRBY

THE MARQUIS OF LORNE'S VISIT TO THE NORTH-WEST

What went ye to the wilderness to see?
A shaking reed? Men in king's houses dwelling?
A prophet? Yea, more than a prophet telling
Of lands new named for Christ--a gift in fee,
And heritage of millions yet to be.
Green prairies like an ocean swelling
From rise to set of sun--great rivers spelling
Their rugged names in Blackfoot and in Cree.
That went you forth to see, and saw it lie,
The glorious land reserved by God till now,
For England's help in need--to drive the plough,
A thousand miles on end--till in the sky
The snowy mountains, from the plains upborne,
Bear on the proudest peak the name of Lorne.

AT SPENCER GRANGE

Upon the heights of Sillery one day,
Led by the dryad of the fairy wood,
A daughter of the land, as bright and good
As spring's first daffodil, bade me survey
Wolfe's cove, the gleaming city with array
Of walls and pinnacles, each in a hood
Of sunset glory, while the shining flood
Swept through the mountains far and far away.
And then the nearer landscape she recalls,
The grove, the Grange, Belle Borne's romantic rill,
Which in a chain of silvery waterfalls
Ran down the cliff and vanished; but she still
Stands there to me. A memory will not fade--
Part of the glorious vision I surveyed.

_From_ "THE SPARROWS"

So sat I yesterday, with weary eyes
Looking at leafless trees and snow-swept plains,
And broad Ontario's ice-encumbered sea.
My thoughts had wandered in a waking dream
Across the deep abyss of vanished years,
To that dear land I never saw again--
When suddenly a fluttering of wings
Shook the soft snow--a twittering of birds
Chirping a strange old note, but heard before
In English hedges and on roofs red-tiled,
Of cottage homes that looked on village greens!
An old familiar note! Who says the ear
Forgets a voice once heard? the eye, a charm?
The heart, affection's touch, from man or woman?
Not mine at least! I knew my own birds' language,
And recognised their little forms with joy.

A flock of English sparrows at my door,
With feathers ruffled in the cold north wind,
Claimed kinship with me--hospitality!--
Brown-coated things! Not for uncounted gold
Would I have made denial of their claims!
Five! six! ten! twenty! But I lost all count
In my great joy. Whence come I knew not; glad
They came to me, who loved them for the sake
Of that dear land at once both theirs and mine.

I ran to get the food I knew they liked,
Remembering how--a child--in frost and snow--
I used to scatter crumbs before the door,
And wheat in harvest gleaned, to feed the birds
Which left us not in winter, but made gay
The bleak, inclement season of the year.
The sparrows chirped and pecked while eyeing me
With little diamond glances, like old friends,
As round my feet they fluttered, hopped and fed,
In perfect confidence and void of fear.
Their forms, their notes, their pretty ways so strange,
Yet so familiar--like a rustic word
Learned in my childhood and not spoken since--
All, all came back to me! and as I looked
And listened--a thousand memories rose up,
Like a vast audience at the nation's song!

Old England's hills and dales of matchless charm,
Sweeping in lines of beauty, stood revealed:
Her fragrant lanes where woodbine trailed the hedge,
And little feet with mine ran side by side
As we plucked primroses, or marked the spot
Where blackbird, thrush or linnet reared its young,
While sang the cuckoo on the branching tree.
Those meadows, too! Who can forget them ever?
So green! with buttercups and daisies set,
Where skylarks nested and sprang up at dawn
To heaven's top, singing their rapturous lay!
Those gentle rivers, not too large to grasp
By the strong swimmer of his native streams;
Those landward homes that breed the nation's strength;
Those beaconed cliffs that watch her stormy seas,
Covered with ships that search all oceans round:
Those havens, marts, and high-built cities, full
Of work and wealth and men who rule the world!
All rose before me in supernal light,
As when beheld with childhood's eyes of strength,
And stirred my soul with impulses divine.

My heart opened its depths--glad tears and sad
Mingled upon my cheek, which forty years'
Strange winds had fanned and heat and cold embrowned.
God's hand is nearer than we think--a touch
Suffices to restore the dead; a word
Becomes a wonder of creative power.
The little sparrows in their rustic speech
Talking a tongue I knew--this message brought
From Christ, who spake it, merciful to man:
"Are not two sparrows for a farthing sold,
And not one falls without the Father's leave?
Fear not, therefore! for of more value, ye,
Than many sparrows, yea, whose very hairs
Are numbered by the loving care of God."

I blessed the little messengers who brought
These words of comfort to my lonely heart,
To teach me resignation, hope and peace.
Like children in a darkened room we cry,
Despairing of the light when 'tis most nigh....
The callow bird must wait its wings to fly,
And so must thou! God's love is law in love,
Working in elements of moral strife
That will not yield obedience but with pain.

"Perfect through suffering." Comprehend'st thou that?
Upon the cross who was it, dying, cried,
In the last agony that rends the soul:
"Eli! Eli! lama sabacthani!"
No other way! Christ, too, must drink that cup
Before His human life was made divine
And our redemption possible from sin!
Or if a gentler lesson thou would'st learn,
Dismayed at those tremendous mysteries,
Think of the birds, the lilies, all things He
Takes care of to the end: why not of thee?
But while their round of life is here complete,
Thine but begins! The law of laws is love,
That needs two worlds to perfect all of man,
And an eternity to teach God's ways!...

MATTHEW RICHEY KNIGHT

JACQUES CARTIER

No flame of war was he, no flower of grace,
No star of wisdom; but a plain, bold man,
More careful of the end than of the plan.
No mystery was he afraid to face;
No savage strategy, no furious storm,
No stings of climate, no unthought disease:
His master purpose would not bend to these,
But saw, through all, achievement's towering form.

He first beheld the gloomy Saguenay,
And Stadacona's high, forbidding brow;
His venturous vision too did first survey
Fair Hochelaga, but not fair as now.
St. Malo holds his dust, the world his fame,
But his strong, dauntless soul 'tis ours to claim.

SOVEREIGN MOMENTS

Life has two sovereign moments;
One when we settle down
To some life-worthy purpose,--
One when we grasp the crown.

THE MERCY OF GOD

They have a saying in the East:--
Two angels note the deeds of men,
And one is first and one is least.
When men do right, one takes his pen
And magnifies the deed to ten.
This angel is at God's right hand,
And holds the other in command.
He says to him when men do wrong,
"The man was weak, temptation strong,--
"Write not the record down to-day;
"To-morrow he may grieve and pray."
It may be myth; but this is sooth--
No ruth is lasting as God's ruth;
The strongest is the tenderest;
He who best knows us loves us best.

ARCHIBALD LAMPMAN

THE RAILWAY STATION

The darkness brings no quiet here, the light
No waking: ever on my blinded brain
The flare of lights, the rush, and cry, and strain,
The engines' scream, the hiss and thunder smite:
I see the hurrying crowds, the clasp, the flight,
Faces that touch, eyes that are dim with pain:
I see the hoarse wheels turn, and the great train
Move laboring out into the bourneless night.

So many souls within its dim recesses,
So many bright, so many mournful eyes:
Mine eyes that watch grow fixed with dreams and guesses;
What threads of life, what hidden histories,
What sweet or passionate dreams and dark distresses,
What unknown thoughts, what various agonies!

OUTLOOK

Not to be conquered by these headlong days,
But to stand free: to keep the mind at brood
On life's deep meaning, nature's altitude
Of loveliness, and time's mysterious ways;
At every thought and deed to clear the haze
Out of our eyes, considering only this,
What man, what life, what love, what beauty is,
This is to live, and win the final praise.

Though strife, ill fortune, and harsh human need
Beat down the soul, at moments blind and dumb
With agony; yet, patience--there shall come
Many great voices from life's outer sea,
Hours of strange triumph, and, when few men heed,
Murmurs and glimpses of eternity.

AMONG THE MILLET

The dew is gleaming in the grass,
The morning hours are seven;
And I am fain to watch you pass,
Ye soft white clouds of heaven.
Ye stray and gather, part and fold;
The wind alone can tame you;
I think of what in time of old
The poets loved to name you.
They called you sheep, the sky your sward,
A field without a reaper;
They called the shining sun your lord,
The shepherd wind your keeper.
Your sweetest poets I will deem
The men of old for moulding,
In simple beauty, such a dream,--
And I could lie beholding,
Where daisies in the meadow toss,
The wind from morn till even
Forever shepherd you across
The shining field of heaven.

THE LOONS

Once ye were happy, once by many a shore,
Wherever Glooscap's gentle feet might stray,
Lulled by his presence like a dream, ye lay
Floating at rest; but that was long of yore.
He was too good for earthly men; he bore
Their bitter deeds for many a patient day,
And then at last he took his unseen way.
He was your friend, and ye might rest no more.

And now, though many hundred altering years
Have passed, among the desolate northern meres
Still must ye search and wander querulously,
Crying for Glooscap, still bemoan the light
With weird entreaties, and in agony
With awful laughter pierce the lonely night.

THE SUN CUP

The earth is the cup of the sun,
That he filleth at morning with wine,--
With the warm, strong wine of his might
From the vintage of gold and of light,
Fills it, and makes it divine.

And at night when his journey is done,
At the gate of his radiant hall,
He setteth his lips to the brim,
With a long last look of his eye,
And lifts it and draineth it dry,--
Drains till he leaveth it all
Empty and hollow and dim.

And then, as he passes to sleep,
Still full of the feats that he did
Long ago in Olympian wars,
He closes it down with the sweep
Of its slow-turning luminous lid,
Its cover of darkness and stars,
Wrought once by Hephaestus of old
With violet and vastness and gold.

AFTER RAIN

For three whole days across the sky,
In sullen packs that loomed and broke,
With flying fringes dim as smoke,
The columns of the rain went by;
At every hour the rain went by;
At every hour the wind awoke;
The darkness passed upon the plain;
The great drops rattled at the pane.

Now piped the wind, or far aloof
Fell to a sough remote and dull;
And all night long with rush and lull
The rain kept drumming on the roof:
I heard till ear and sense were full
The clash or silence of the leaves,
The gurgle in the creaking eaves.

But when the fourth day came--at noon,
The darkness and the rain were by;
The sunward roofs were steaming dry;
And all the world was flecked and strewn
With shadows from a fleecy sky.
The haymakers were forth and gone,
And every rillet laughed and shone.

Then, too, on me that loved so well
The world, despairing in her blight,
Uplifted with her least delight,
On me, as on the earth, there fell
New happiness of mirth and might;
I strode the valleys pied and still;
I climbed upon the breezy hill.

I watched the gray hawk wheel and drop,
Sole shadow on the shining world;
I saw the mountains clothed and curled,
With forest ruffling to the top;
I saw the river's length unfurled,
Pale silver down the fruited plain,
Grown great and stately with the rain.

Through miles of shadow and soft heat,
Where field and fallow, fence and tree,
Were all one world of greenery,
I heard the robin singing sweet,
The sparrow piping silverly,
The thrushes at the forest's hem;
And as I went I sang with them.

JUNE

Long, long ago, it seems, this summer morn,
That pale-browed April passed with pensive tread
Through the frore woods, and from its frost-bound bed
Woke the arbutus with her silver horn;
And now May, too, is fled,
The flower-crowned month, the merry laughing May,
With rosy feet and fingers dewy wet,
Leaving the woods and all cool gardens gay
With tulips and the scented violet.

Gone are the wind-flower and the adder-tongue,
And the sad drooping bellwort, and no more
The snowy trilliums crowd the forest floor;
The purpling grasses are no longer young,
And summer's wide-set door
O'er the thronged hills and the broad panting earth
Lets in the torrent of the later bloom,
Haytime, and harvest, and the after mirth,
The slow soft rain, the rushing thunder plume.

All day in garden alleys moist and dim,
The humid air is burdened with the rose;
In moss-deep woods the creamy orchid blows;
And now the vesper-sparrow's pealing hymn
From every orchard close
At eve comes flooding rich and silvery;
The daisies in great meadows swing and shine;
And with the wind a sound as of the sea
Roars in the maples and the topmost pine.

High in the hills the solitary thrush
Tunes magically his music of fine dreams,
In briary dells, by boulder-broken streams;
And wide and far on nebulous fields aflush
The mellow morning gleams.
The orange cone-flowers purple-bossed are there,
The meadow's bold-eyed gypsies deep of hue,
And slender hawkweed tall and softly fair,
And rosy tops of fleabane veiled with dew.

So with thronged voices and unhasting flight
The fervid hours with long return go by;
The far-heard bugles, piping shrill and high,
Tell the slow moments of the solemn night
With unremitting cry;
Lustrous and large out of the gathering drouth
The planets gleam; the baleful Scorpion
Trails his dim fires along the drousëd south;
The silent world-incrusted round moves on.

And all the dim night long the moon's white beams
Nestle deep down in every brooding tree,
And sleeping birds, touched with a silly glee,
Waken at midnight from their blissful dreams,
And carol brokenly.
Dim surging motions and uneasy dreads
Scare the light slumber from men's busy eyes,
And parted lovers on their restless beds
Toss and yearn out, and cannot sleep for sighs.

Oft have I striven, sweet month, to figure thee,
As dreamers of old time were wont to feign,
In living form of flesh, and striven in vain;
Yet when some sudden old-world mystery
Of passion fixed my brain,
Thy shape hath flashed upon me like no dream,
Wandering with scented curls that heaped the breeze,
Or by some hollow of some reeded stream
Sitting waist-deep in white anemones;

And even as I glimpsed thee thou wert gone,
A dream for mortal eyes too proudly coy,
Yet in thy place for subtle thoughts employ
The golden magic clung, a light that shone
And filled me with thy joy.
Before me like a mist that streamed and fell
All names and shapes of antique beauty passed
In garlanded procession, with the swell
Of flutes between the beechen stems; and, last,

I was the Arcadian valley, the loved wood,
Alpheus stream divine, the sighing shore,
And through the cool green glades, awake once more,
Psyche, the white-limbed goddess, still pursued,
Fleet-footed as of yore,
The noonday ringing with her frighted peals,
Down the bright sward and through the reeds she ran,
Urged by the mountain echoes, at her heels
The hot-blown cheeks and trampling feet of Pan.

SEPTEMBER

Now hath the summer reached her golden close,
And, lost amid her corn-fields, bright of soul,
Scarcely perceives from her divine repose
How near, how swift, the inevitable goal:
Still, still she smiles, though from her careless feet
The bounty and the fruitful strength are gone,
And through the soft long wandering days goes on
The silent sere decadence sad and sweet.

The kingbird and the pensive thrush are fled,
Children of light, too fearful of the gloom;
The sun falls low, the secret word is said,
The mouldering woods grow silent as the tomb;
Even the fields have lost their sovereign grace,
The corn-flower and the marguerite; and no more
Across the river's shadow-haunted floor
The paths of skimming swallows interlace.

Already in the outland wilderness
The forests echo with unwonted dins;
In clamorous gangs the gathering woodmen press
Northward, and the stern winter's toil begins.
Around the long low shanties, whose rough lines
Break the sealed dreams of many an unnamed lake,
Already in the frost-clear morns awake
The crash and thunder of the falling pines.

Where the tilled earth, with all its fields set free,
Naked and yellow from the harvest lies,
By many a loft and busy granary,
The hum and tumult of the threshers rise;
There the tanned farmers labor without slack,
Till twilight deepens round the spouting mill,
Feeding the loosened sheaves, or with fierce will
Pitching waist-deep upon the dusky stack.

Still a brief while, ere the old year quite pass,
Our wandering steps and wistful eyes shall greet
The leaf, the water, the beloved grass;
Still from these haunts and this accustomed seat
I see the wood-wrapt city, swept with light,
The blue, long-shadowed distance, and, between,
The dotted farm-lands with their parcelled green,
The dark pine forest and the watchful height.

I see the broad rough meadow stretched away
Into the crystal sunshine, wastes of sod,
Acres of withered vervain, purple-gray,
Branches of aster, groves of goldenrod;
And yonder, toward the sunlit summit, strewn
With shadowy boulders, crowned and swathed with weed,
Stand ranks of silken thistles, blown to seed,
Long silver fleeces shining like the moon.

In far-off russet corn-fields, where the dry
Gray shocks stand peaked and withering, half concealed
In the rough earth, the orange pumpkins lie,
Full-ribbed; and in the windless pasture-field
The sleek red horses o'er the sun-warmed ground
Stand pensively about in companies,
While all around them from the motionless trees
The long clean shadows sleep without a sound.

Under cool elm-trees floats the distant stream,
Moveless as air; and o'er the vast warm earth
The fathomless daylight seems to stand and dream,
A liquid cool elixir--all its girth
Bound with faint haze, a frail transparency,
Whose lucid purple barely veils and fills
The utmost valleys and the thin last hills,
Nor mars one whit their perfect clarity.

Thus without grief the golden days go by,
So soft we scarcely notice how they wend,
And like a smile half happy, or a sigh,
The summer passes to her quiet end;
And soon, too soon, around the cumbered eaves
Shy frosts shall take the creepers by surprise,
And through the wind-touched reddening woods shall rise
October with the rain of ruined leaves.

THE GOAL OF LIFE

There is a beauty at the goal of life,
A beauty growing since the world began,
Through every age and race, through lapse and strife,
Till the great human soul complete her span.
Beneath the waves of storm that lash and burn,
The currents of blind passion that appal,
To listen and keep watch till we discern
The tide of sovereign truth that guides it all;
So to address our spirits to the height,
And so attune them to the valiant whole,
That the great light be clearer for our light,
And the great soul the stronger for our soul:
To have done this is to have lived, though fame
Remember us with no familiar name.

MARY JANE KATZMANN LAWSON

THE FACE IN THE CATHEDRAL

It was one of those grand cathedrals,
"A poem in wood and stone,"
Fashioned by master-builders,
For the glory of God alone.
The sound of hammer and chisel
From morning till night was there,
As it rose in its Gothic grandeur,
A temple so vast and fair!

Workmen from every nation
With skill and craft had planned
Column and nave and chancel,
All wrought with cunning hand.
Strength was inlaid with beauty--
A goodly sight to see
The rainbow light through the mullioned panes
Of that glorious sanctuary!

One day past the crowd of watchers
Came a man with silver hair,
And asked of the master-builder
For leave to labor there.
The workmen stood in wonder,
For the stranger's eyes were dim,
And the hands so thin and nerveless
Ne'er told of work in him.

The master smiled as he answered,
"Our men must be strong and true,
Able, as well as willing,
For the work they have to do;
Your skill and your strength are over."
"Try me," the old man said,
"Let me but work in the windowed niche
Of the turret above my head."

And the master in pity yielded
To the pleading of voice and eye.
The old man climbed the minster stairs,
To the window aslant the sky;
And there where the sunrise glory
Fell first through the diamond pane,
And pillar and arch and chancel
Were bathed in golden rain,

Day after day on the panel
He had won from the builder's grace,
His trembling hands were busy,
Carving a single face;
Silent, and always keeping
From watchers and workers aloof,
There by the oriel window,
Under the fretted roof.

But once when the sun was setting,
And the minster's walls were dim,
The workmen waited and listened--
What had befallen him?
He stood not before the panel,
Nor came down the lofty stair,
Yet the light of the turret window
Was shining upon him there!

For he lay in the quiet shadow
That follows the setting sun;
His tired hands were folded,--
The old man's work was done!
And fresh from the shining panel,
Finished with perfect grace,
Looked down on the pale dead artist
A pure, young, tender face,

Fresh in its dewy softness,
As a rose in the light may glow,
The face that had made the sunshine
Of his life in the long ago;
And the love, through whose perfect fulness
Our nature becomes divine,
Had transferred from his faithful keeping
That face to this holy shrine.

There in its place of beauty,
Eyes turned to the rising sun,
He had made her face immortal,--
He died, for his work was done!

In that grand old English temple
There are marvels of wondrous skill,
Where the brain and hand of the craftsman
Have worked with a perfect will;
But naught has the grace and beauty
Of the face in the niche above;--
Their work was for gain or glory,
But his was done for Love!

SOPHIA V. GILBERT LEE

THE BROOK

Ripple, ripple, ripple,
Goes the little brook,
Ripple, ripple, ripple,
Backward casts no look;
On through vale and woodland,
And flowery meadows green,
Staying not its progress
To see or to be seen.

Ripple, ripple, ripple,
Bubbling on its way,
Ripple, ripple, ripple--
Hark! I hear it say:
O foolish man, why dwellest thou
On themes of long ago?
Pass by the old, take up the new,
Time's fleeting--let me go!

LILY ALICE LEFEVRE

IMPRISONED

Within, a panic stricken throng
That sudden fear appals,
In blindest fury crashing close
Wide doors to rigid walls--
A wild fierce struggle, life or death,
Each holding ground with gasping breath
Until the weaker falls,--
Each inch of room a battle-field
Where one exults and one must yield.

Without, the boundless earth and air,
The depths of starry space,
Vast oceans that the strong white moon
Uplifts to her embrace;
Free winds of heaven blowing light,
Far planets wheeling through the night
To their appointed place,--
Marvels unseen to captives there,
Imprisoned by their own despair.

Within the gloomy walls of Doubt
Fierce factions wage their war;
Fair Hope lies slain where they have set
Negation's iron bar.
Pent in their narrow bounds they cry,
"No stars, no sky,--we struggle, die,
And know not why we are."
Oh, self-immured! ye cannot see?
Stand back!--your brother shall be free.

Stand back!--from 'neath your trampling feet
The young, the weak shall rise.
Their white lips breathe in silent pain
The prayer your pride denies;
Their pale hands clasp the faded flowers
Of faith that bloomed in happier hours
Beneath their childhood's skies.
Oh, still for these within your walls
May justice, truth and self-control
Set wide the gateways of the soul
To where, beyond, God's glory calls
Man's spirit to its goal.

INSPIRATION

A lark sprang up to greet the dawn
Close to a rose one day,
The tears upon her glowing cheek
His light wing brushed away,
Her fragrant beauty fresh and fair
He kissed in passing by,
And wove her name into his song
Of rapture in the sky.

The lonely rose sighed, "Ah, my love,
I cannot follow thee;
Far, far above in golden light
Thou hast forgotten me.
Yet am I blest for evermore
Though but an instant dear,--
Thou singest now a sweeter song
For all the world to hear!"

R. E. MULLINS LEPROHON

THE HURON CHIEF'S DAUGHTER

The dusky warriors stood in groups around the funeral pyre;
The scowl upon their knotted brows betrayed their vengeful ire.
It needed not the cords, the stake, the rites so stern and rude,
To tell it was to be a scene of cruelty and blood....

O lovely was that winsome child of a dark and rugged line,
And e'en 'mid Europe's daughters fair surpassing might she shine:
For ne'er had coral lips been wreathed by brighter, sunnier smile,
Or dark eyes beamed with lustrous light more full of winsome
wile....

And, yet it was not wonderful, that haughty, highborn grace--
She stood amid her direst foes a Princess of her race;
Knowing they'd met to wreak on her their hatred 'gainst her name,
To doom her to a fearful death, to pangs of fire and flame....

One moment,--then her proud glance fled, her form she humbly
bowed,
A softened light stole o'er her brow, she prayed to heaven aloud:
"Hear me, Thou Great and Glorious One, Protector of my race,
Whom in the far-off Spirit Land I'll soon see face to face!

"Pour down thy blessings on my tribe, may they triumphant rise
Above the guileful Iroquois--Thine and our enemies;
And give me strength to bear each pang with courage high and free,
That, dying thus, I may be fit to reign, O God, with Thee."

Her prayer was ended, and again, like crowned and sceptered Queen,
She wore anew her lofty smile, her high and royal mien,
E'en though the chief the signal gave, and quick two warriors dire
Sprang forth to lead the dauntless girl to the lit funeral pyre.

Back with an eye of flashing scorn recoiled she from their grasp,
"Nay, touch me not, I'd rather meet the coil of poisoned asp!
My aged sire and all my tribe will learn with honest pride
That, as befits a Huron's child, their chieftain's daughter died!"

She dashed aside her tresses dark with bright and fearless smile,
And like a fawn she bounded on the fearful funeral pile;
And even while those blood-stained men fulfilled their cruel part
They praised that maiden's courage rare, her high and dauntless
heart.

WILLIAM DOUW LIGHTHALL

THE ARTIST'S PRAYER

I know thee not, O Spirit fair!
O Life and flying Unity
Of Loveliness! Must man despair
Forever in his chase of thee!

When snowy clouds flash silver-gilt,
Then feel I that thou art on high;
When fire o'er all the west is spilt,
Flames at its heart thy majesty.

Thy beauty basks on distant hills;
It smiles in eve's wine-coloured sea;
It shakes its light on leaves and rills,
In calm ideals it mocks at me.

Thy glances strike from many a lake
That lines through woodland scapes a-sheen;
Yet to thine eyes I never wake:--
They glance, but they remain unseen.

I know thee not, O Spirit fair!
Thou fillest heaven: the stars are thee:
Whatever fleets with beauty rare
Fleets radiant from thy mystery.

Forever thou art near my grasp;
Thy touches pass in twilight air;
Yet still--thy shapes elude my clasp--
I know thee not, thou Spirit fair!

O Ether, proud, and vast, and great,
Above the legions of the stars!
To this thou art not adequate;--
Nor rainbow's glorious scimitars.

I know thee not, thou Spirit sweet!
I chained pursue, while thou art free.
Sole by the smile I sometimes meet
I know thou, Vast One, knowest me.

In old religions hadst thou place:
Long, long, O Vision, our pursuit!
Yea, monad, fish and childlike brute
Through countless ages dreamt thy grace.

Gray nations felt thee o'er them tower;
Some clothed thee in fantastic dress;
Some thought thee as the unknown Power,
I, e'er the unknown Loveliness.

To all thou wert as harps of joy;
To bard and sage their fulgent sun:
To priests their mystic life's employ;
But unto me the Lovely One.

Veils clothed thy might; veils draped thy charm;
The might they tracked, but I the grace;
They learnt all forces were thine Arm,
I that all beauty was thy Face.

Night spares us little. Wanderers we.
Our rapt delights, our wisdoms rare
But shape our darknesses of thee,--
We know thee not, thou Spirit fair!

Would that thine awful Peerlessness
An hour could shine o'er heaven and earth,
And I the maddening power possess
To drink the cup,--O Godlike birth!

All life impels me to thy search:
Without thee, yea, to live were null;
Still shall I make the dawn thy Church,
And pray thee "God the Beautiful."

THE SWEET STAR

The sweet Star of the Bethlehem night
Beauteous guides and true,
And still, to me and you
With only local, legendary light.

For us who hither look with eyes afar
From constellations of philosophy,
All light is from the Cradle; the true star,
Serene o'er distance, in the Life we see.

MY NATIVE LAND

Rome, Florence, Venice--noble, fair and quaint,
They reign in robes of magic round me here;
But fading, blotted, dim, a picture faint,
With spell more silent, only pleads a tear.
Plead not! Thou hast my heart, O picture dim!
I see the fields, I see the autumn hand
Of God upon the maples! Answer Him
With weird, translucent glories, ye that stand
Like spirits in scarlet and in amethyst!
I see the sun break over you; the mist
On hills that lift from iron bases grand
Their heads superb!--the dream, it is my native land.

STUART LIVINGSTON

THE VOLUNTEERS OF '85

Wide are the plains to the north and the westward;
Drear are the skies to the west and the north--
Little they cared, as they snatched up their rifles,
And shoulder to shoulder marched gallantly forth.
Cold are the plains to the north and the westward,
Stretching out far to the gray of the sky--
Little they cared as they marched from the barrack-room,
Willing and ready, if need be, to die.

Bright was the gleam of the sun on their bayonets;
Firm and erect was each man in his place;
Steadily, evenly, marched they like veterans;
Smiling and fearless was every face;
Never a dread of the foe that was waiting them;
Never a fear of war's terrible scenes;
"Brave as the bravest" was stamped on each face of them;
Half of them boys not yet out of their teens.

Many a woman gazed down at them longingly,
Scanning each rank for her boy as it passed;
Striving through tears just to catch a last glimpse of him,
Knowing that glimpse might, for aye, be the last.
Many a maiden's cheek paled as she looked at them,
Seeing the lover from whom she must part;
Trying to smile and be brave for the sake of him,
Stifling the dread that was breaking her heart.

Every heart of us, wild at the sight of them,
Beat as it never had beaten before;
Every voice of us, choked though it may have been,
Broke from huzza to a deafening roar.
Proud! were we proud of them? God! they were part of us,
Sons of us, brothers, all marching to fight;
Swift at their country's call, ready each man and all,
Eager to battle for her and the right.

Wide are the plains to the north and the westward,
Stretching out far to the gray of the sky--
Little they cared as they filed from the barrack-room,
Shoulder to shoulder, if need be, to die.
Was there one flinched? Not a boy, not a boy of them;
Straight on they marched to the dread battle's brunt--
Fill up your glasses and drink to them, all of them,
Canada's call found them all at the front.

TO E. N. L.

Thou sweet-souled comrade of a time gone by
Who in the infinite dost walk to-day,
And lift thy spirit lips in song, while I
Lift up but lips of clay--

Oft do I think on thee, thou steadfast heart,
Who, when the summons dread was in thine ear,
Didst raise thy calm brow up and challenge death,
As one that knows no fear.

And I have wondered if thy passionate lips
Now voice the songs that surged within thy heart;
By the great alchemy of mighty death
Freed to diviner art.

And didst thou find a welcome on the shore
That rims the vastness of that shadow land?
Did those sweet singing prophet bards of yore
Stretch thee a greeting hand?

And did they gather round about thee there,
With faces gray against the coming day;
And, with wan fingers on thy trembling lips,
Teach thee their mighty lay?--

Till thy enraptured soul, by thine own lips,
Was filled with such great harmony of song
As gave thee place among their matchless selves,
A brother of the throng.

THE KING'S FOOL

In sooth he was a mighty King,
And ruled in splendid state,
Surrounded by a haughty band
Of nobles small and great;
And he was good to one and all,
Yet they were plotting for his fall.

For though a king be good and great
And generous, I trow
His nobles yet will envy him,
And seek his overthrow;
For so hath been the ancient strife
Since man first took his sovereign's life.

And thus, to gain their foul design,
They planned to lie in wait,
And drop a deadly poison in
The golden flagon great,
That never more the King should rule;
And no one heard them but the fool.

So when the King came down that night
Into his hall to dine,
He found his flagon in its place,
And at its side the wine--
The blood-red wine--at which he said,
"Such wine should put life in the dead!"

Then poured he full the poisoned cup,
And, raising it on high,
O'er all his courtiers in the hall
He ran his noble eye:
"Oh, I would drink," he said, with zest,
"Unto the man that loves me best!"

Then mute they sat around the board,
And each looked to the other,
Till rose, with mocking reverence,
The fool, and said, "Good brother,
All round this board, of every guest,
I am the man that loves thee best."

Then wrothful was the King, and said,
"Thou art no man, I wis,
That makest such a silly jest
At such a time as this.
Give us a better jest," he said,
"Or pay the forfeit with thy head."

Then quoth the fool, "My good liege lord,
I'll give another jest,
But after it, I tell thee now,
That I will take my rest,
No more to be thy jester," and
He snatched the flagon from his hand.

Then dark became the King's great brow,
Amazed was every guest,
While with the flagon at his lips
The fool quoth, "This sweet jest
That man, I trow, will best divine
Who poured such strength into this wine"--

Then drained the goblet at a draught,
And set it down anon,
While round the board each face grew pale,
And strange to look upon;
Then sank the fool into his place,
And on the table laid his face.

Amid the silence stood the King,
As if perplexed with doubt;
He looked upon his poor dead fool,
And then looked round about;
And then in thunder called the guard
That near him kept their watch and ward.

He bid them take the traitors forth
And put them all to death.
"Would God," he cried, "their lives could give
My poor fool back his breath--
My poor dead fool, whose silent breast
Doth show, too late, he loved me best!"

This is the legend of a fool
Who died his king to save,
And to its truth a monument
Was built above his grave;
And on it in gold this wording ran,
"He lived a fool, but died a man."

KEATS

A young-eyed seer, amid the leafy ways
Of Latmos' groves, sacred to mighty Pan,
Afar from all the busy marts of man,
Content to seek the beautiful, he strays;
With mild eyes lifted in their starry gaze
Of ravishment divine, a priest, he stands
Before the altar builded by his hands,
And on his pipe, with pallid lip, he plays.

This night, O god-like singer, have I knelt
Before that altar listening to thy strain,
Till off my soul mortality did melt,
Dissolvëd from all weariness of pain;
And at thy magic melody I felt
All life were mine, could I such rapture drain.

ARTHUR JOHN LOCKHART

ACADIE

Like mists that round a mountain gray
Hang for an hour, then melt away,
So I, and nearly all my race,
Have vanished from my native place.

Each haunt of boyhood's loves and dreams
More beautiful in fancy seems;
Yet if I to those scenes repair
I find I am a stranger there.

O thou belovëd Acadie,
Sweet is thy charmëd world to me!
Dull are these skies 'neath which I range,
And all the summer hills are strange.

Yet sometimes I discern thy gleam
In sparkles of the chiming stream;
And sometimes speaks thy haunting lore
The foam-wreathed sibyl of the shore.

And sometimes will mine eyes incline
To hill or wood that seems like thine;
Or, if the robin pipeth clear,
It is thy vernal note I hear.

And oft my heart will leap aflame
To deem I hear thee call my name,--
To see thy face with gladness shine,
And find the joy that once was mine.

THE WATERS OF CARR

O do you hear the merry waters falling,
In the mossy woods of Carr?
O do you hear the child's voice, calling, calling,
Through its cloistral deeps afar?
'Tis the Indian's babe, they say,
Fairy stolen; changed a fay;
And still I hear her, calling, calling, calling,
In the mossy woods of Carr!

O hear you, when the weary world is sleeping
(Dim and drowsy every star),
This little one her happy revels keeping
In her halls of shining spar?
Clearer swells her voice of glee,
While the liquid echoes flee,
And the full moon through deep green leaves comes peeping,
In the dim-lit woods of Carr.

Know ye from her wigwam how they drew her,
Wanton-willing, far away,--
Made the wild-wood halls seem home unto her,
Changed her to a laughing fay?
Never doth her bosom burn,
Never asks she to return;--
Ah, vainly care and sorrow may pursue her
Laughing, singing, all the day!

And often, when the golden west is burning,
Ere the twilight's earliest star,
Comes her mother, led by mortal yearning
Where the haunted forests are;--
Listens to the rapture wild
Of her vanished fairy child:
Ah, see her then, with smiles and tears, returning
From the sunset woods of Carr!

They feed her with the amber dew and honey,
They bathe her in the crystal spring,
They set her down in open spaces sunny,
And weave her an enchanted ring;
They will not let her beauty die,
Her innocence and purity;
They sweeten her fair brow with kisses many,
And ever round her dance and sing.

O do you hear the merry waters falling,
In the mossy woods of Carr?
O do you hear the child's voice, calling, calling,
Through its cloistral deeps afar?
Never thrill of plaintive pain
Mingles with that ceaseless strain;--
But still I hear her joyous calling, calling,
In the morning woods of Carr!

THE LONELY PINE

I

Remote, upon the sunset shrine
Of a green hill, a lonely pine
Beckons this hungry heart of mine.

"Draw near," it always seems to say,
Look thither whensoe'er I may
From the dull routine of my way:

"I hold for thee the heavens in trust;
My priestly branches toward thee thrust.
Absolve thy fret, assoil thy dust."

II

Yet if I come it heeds not me;
The stars amid the branches see
But lonely man and lonely tree,--

And lonely earth that holds in thrall
Her creatures, while Eve gathers all
To fold within her shadowy wall.

Now, with this spell around me thrown,
Dreaming of social pleasures flown,
I grieve, yet joy, to be alone;

While whispering through its solitude,
Far from its green-robed brotherhood,
The pine tree shares my wonted mood.

It museth that felicity
Which, being not, we deem may be,
And mingles hope and certainty.

III

In starry senate doth arise
The lumined spirit of the skies,
Walking with radiant ministries.

Yet in my lonely pine tree dwells,
When 'mid its breast the warm wind swells,
A prophet of sweet oracles.

Like a faint sea on far-off shore,
With its low elfin roll and roar,
It speaks one language evermore;--

One language, unconstrained and free,
The converse of the answering sea,
The old rune of Eternity.

Then, from this lonely sunset shrine,
I turn to toils and cares of mine,
And, grateful, bless my healing pine.

BURTON W. LOCKHART

_From_ "THE RETROSPECT"

O brothers! thro' how many lands
We've sought the Holy Grail!
Lo, here is truth! Lo, there she stands!--
Bow down, and cry, "All hail!"

Still she looks on us far withdrawn,
With stars and clouds bedight;
The vision of our spirit's dawn,
The watch-fire of our night.

Trust thy soul's highest vision--trust!
Think not to touch or taste:
Time's ancient mystery--poor dust!--
For thee will not make haste.

The noble still must seek the light;
The doctrinaire still raves;
But Faith holds fast, while the long night
Shines o'er our fathers' graves.

LOVE AND SONG

Love sayeth: Sing of me!
What else is worth a song?
I had refrained
Lest I should do Love wrong.

"Clean hands, and a pure heart,"
I prayed, "and I will sing:"
But all I gained
Brought to my word no wing.

Stars, sunshine, seas and skies,
Earth's graves, the holy hills,
Were all in vain;
No breath the dumb pipe fills.

I dreamed of splendid praise,
And Beauty watching by
Gray shores of Pain:
My song turned to a sigh.

I saw in virgin eyes
The mother warmth that makes
The dead earth quick
In ways no Spring awakes.

No song. In vain to sight
Life's clear arch heavenward sprang.
Heart still, or sick!
--_I loved! Ah, then I sang!_

BY THE GASPEREAU

Do you remember, dear, a night in June,
So long, so long ago,
When we were lovers, wandering with the moon,
Beside the Gaspereau?

The river plashed and gurgled thro' its glooms,
Slow stealing to the sea,
A silver serpent; in the apple blooms
The soft air rustled free.

And o'er the river from afar the sound
Of mellow tinkling bells
From browsing cattle stirred the echo round
In gentle falls and swells.

No sound of human sorrow, nor of mirth,
Streamed on that peace abroad,
And all the night leaned low upon the earth
Like the calm face of God.

And in our hearts there breathed, like life, a breath
Of most delicious pain:
It seemed a whisper ran from birth to death,
And back to birth again,

And bound in airy chains our shining hours,
Past, present, and to come,
In one sweet whole, strong to defy the powers
Of change, till Time be dumb.

Yes, you remember, dear, that night in June,
So long, so long ago,
When we were lovers, wandering with the moon,
Beside the Gaspereau.

JOHN E. LOGAN

THE INDIAN MAID'S LAMENT

A blood-red ring hung round the moon,
Hung round the moon. Ah me! Ah me!
I heard the piping of the Loon,
A wounded Loon. Ah me!
And yet the eagle feathers rare
I, trembling, wove in my brave's hair.

He left me in the early morn,
The early morn. Ah me! Ah me!
The feathers swayed like stately corn,
So like the corn. Ah me!
A fierce wind swept across the plain,
The stately corn was snapt in twain.

They crushed in blood the hated race,
The hated race. Ah me! Ah me!
I only clasped a cold, blind face,
His cold, dead face. Ah me!
A blood-red ring hangs in my sight,
I hear the Loon cry every night.

AGNES MAULE MACHAR

WILLIAM EWART GLADSTONE

Sans peur et sans reproche!--our lion-heart
To whom we turn when other hopes betray,
When tyrant-might puts forth her power to slay
Young, struggling Freedom, with her poisoned dart,
And Britain hath forgot the nobler part
She played, as Freedom's champion,--that proud day
She led a world to break one despot's sway,--
And from her old traditions stands apart.

Milton hath gone, and Wordsworth,--but, through thee,
Still rings their hate of tyranny defied;
Still breathes the voice whose sound was "of the sea,"
And that one "of the mountains;"--far and wide
Their echoes roll, where'er true Britons be,
Or men for liberty have lived and died!

SCHILLER'S DYING VISION

("Many things are growing clearer.")

I

As the light beyond draws nearer,
Streaming from the farther shore,
Many things are growing clearer
I but dimly guessed before,--
How those legends quaint and olden
Veiled a truth beyond their ken,
In their tales of ages golden,
When immortals walked with men:

How, in symbol and in shadow,
Light through darkness dimly broke,
Poesy illumed the meadow,
And the woodland's music woke;
And the spirits, softly sighing
Through the forest, in the stream,
On the wind's swift pinions flying,
Were not all an idle dream!

Now I see how Faith immortal
Oft hath worn a fable's guise,
While she lingered at the portal
Of unfathomed mysteries;--
How the vague, half-conscious dreamings
Of earth's artless, questioning youth
Were but iridescent gleamings
From the inmost heart of Truth.

How the clear Hellenic vision
Read the soul in Nature's face,
And the gods of her tradition
Made the earth their dwelling place,--
Throned on peaks of hoary mountains,
Walking earth in form divine,
While, in spray of silvery fountains,
Naiads' gleaming tresses shine!

Dryads, in the forest-shadow,
Whispered light at eve and dawn,
And the fairies, on the meadow,
Danced a measure with the Faun:
Radiant forms to earth descending
In the moonlight, with the dew,--
Earthly grace with heavenly blending,--
Shone before the poet's view.

II

'Tis a truth profound that dwelleth
In these bright and broken gleams
Of the glory that excelleth
Noblest poet's fairest dreams!
For, with eyes no longer holden,
We may trace a presence bright
In the sunset's radiance golden,
In the dawn's pale rosy light;

In the beauty round us glowing,
And in Nature's wondrous course,
We may trace, with surer knowing,
Her eternal spring and source;
And, still more, the deathless story
Through the ages we may read,
How infinite Love and Glory
Bent themselves to human need,--

How the asphodel forever
Fades before the amaranth bright--
Light hath touched the Stygian river,
Dawn the Acherontian night!--
For we hear a voice supernal
Tell us Pluto's reign is o'er,
And the rays of Love eternal
Light our path for evermore!

Love and Hope and Truth and Duty
Guide the upward-striving soul,
Still evolving higher beauty
As the ages onward roll;
Till the light of consecration
Glorify earth's radiant clod,
And Life's highest Incarnation--
God in man--draw man to God!

LOVE AND FAITH

Faith spread her wings to seek the realms of day;
Unfathomable depths before her lay.
Hope drooped beside her, as there stretched afar,
Space beyond space, outreaching endlessly,
The faintest gleam of the remotest star.
Her heart grew faint, her wings flagged heavily;
Vain seemed the quest, and endless seemed the way.

Then Love cried out, with voice that pierced the night:
"Lo, I am here!" and straight all space was light;
Darkness had vanished, and the weary way
Was all forgotten in the vision bright--
For Faith had reached the glorious gates of day!

A MADONNA OF THE ENTRY

I

In a city of churches and chapels,
From belfry and spire and tower,
In the solemn and starlit silence,
The bells chimed the midnight hour.

Then in silvery tones of gladness
They rang in the Christmas morn--
The wonderful, mystical season
When Jesus Christ was born.
All thought of the Babe in the manger,
--The Child that knew no sin,
That hung on the breast of the mother
Who found no room in the inn!
All thought of the choir of angels
That swept through the darkness then,
To chant forth the glad evangel
Of peace and love to men!

II

In that city of churches and chapels
A mother crouched, hungry and cold,
In a bleak and cheerless entry,
With a babe in her nerveless hold.
Hungry and cold and weary,
She had paced the streets all night--
No room for _her_ in the city,
No food, no warmth, no light!
And just as the bells' glad chiming
Pealed in the Christmas day,
The angels came through the darkness,
And carried the babe away!