Introductory material

The Coming of the Princess

Bird Song

An Idyl of the May

The Burial of the Scout

Questionings

Pansies

November Meteors

Pictures in the Fire

A Madrigal

The Ploughboy

The Voice of Many Waters

The Death of Autumn

A Farewell

The News Boy's Dream of the New Year

The Old Church on the Hill

The Burning of Chicago

The Legend of the New Year

By the Sea-Shore at Night

Resurgam

Written in a Cemetery

Marguerite

The Watch-Light

New Year, 1868

Thanksgiving

Miserere

Beyond

The Sabbath of the Woods

A Valentine

Snow-Drops

Easter Bells

In the Sierra Nevada

Summer Rain

A Baby's Death

Christmas

My Garden

River Song

The Return

Voices of Hope

In the Country

Science, the Iconoclast

What the Owl said to me

Our Volunteers

Night: A Phantasy

A Monody

Minnie

The Golden Wedding

Verses Written in Mary's Album

The Woods in June

The Isle of Sleep

The Battle Autumn of 1862

In War Time

Christmas Hymn

Te Deum Laudamus

A November Wood-Walk

Resignation

Euthanasia

Ballad of the Mad Ladye

The Coming of the King

With a Bunch of Spring Flowers

The Higher Law

May

Two Windows

The Meeting of Spirits

George Brown

Forgotten Songs

To the Daughter of the Author of "Violet Keith"

A Prelude, and a Bird's Song

An April Dawn

ENVOI

A little bird woke singing in the night, Dreaming of coming day, And piped, for very fulness of delight, His little roundelay.

Dreaming he heard the wood-lark's carol loud, Down calling to his mate, Like silver rain out of a golden cloud, At morning's radiant gate.

And all for joy of his embowering woods, And dewy leaves he sung,— The summer sunshine, and the summer floods By forest flowers o'erhung.

Thou shalt not hear those wild and sylvan notes When morn's full chorus pours Rejoicing from a thousand feathered throats, And the lark sings and soars,

Oh poet of our glorious land so fair, Whose foot is at the door; Even so my song shall melt into the air, And die and be no more.

But thou shalt live, part of the nation's life; The world shall hear thy voice Singing above the noise of war and strife, And therefore I rejoice!

THE COMING OF THE PRINCESS

I.

Break dull November skies, and make Sunshine over wood and lake, And fill your cells of frosty air With thousand, thousand welcomes to the Princely pair! The land and the sea are alight for them; The wrinkled face of old Winter is bright for them; The honour and pride of a race Secure in their dwelling place, Steadfast and stern as the rocks that guard her, Tremble and thrill and leap in their veins, As the blood of one man through the beacon-lit border! Like a fire, like a flame, At the sound of her name, As the smoky-throated cannon mutter it, As the smiling lips of a nation utter it, And a hundred rock-lights write it in fire! Daughter of Empires, the Lady of Lorne, Back through the mists of dim centuries borne, None nobler, none gentler that brave name have worn; Shrilled by storm-bugles, and rolled by the seas, Louise! Our Princess, our Empress, our Lady of Lorne!

II.

And the wild, white horses with flying manes Wind-tost, the riderless steeds of the sea. Neigh to her, call to her, dreadless and free, "Fear not to follow us; these thy domains; Welcome, welcome, our Lady and Queen! O Princess, oh daughter of kingliest sire! Under its frost girdle throbbing and keen, A new realm awaits thee, loyal and true!" And the round-cheeked Tritons, with fillets of blue Binding their sea-green and scintillant hair, Blow thee a welcome; their brawny arms bear Thy keel through the waves like a bird through the air.

III.

Shoreward the shoal of mighty shoulders lean Through the long swell of waves, Reaching beyond the sunset and the hollow caves, And the ice-girdled peaks that hold serene Each its own star, far out at sea to mark Thy westward way, O Princess, through the dark. The rose-red sunset dies into the dusk, The silver dusk of the long twilight hour, And opal lights come out, and fiery gleams Of flame-red beacons, like the ash-gray husk Torn from some tropic blossom bursting into flower, Making the sea bloom red with ruddy beams.

IV

Still nearer and nearer it comes, the swift sharp prow Of the ship above and the shadow ship below, With the mighty arms of the Titans under, All bowed one way like a field of wind-blown ears, Still nearer and nearer, and now touches the strand, and, lo, With the length of her bright hair backward flowing Round her head like an aureole, Like a candle flame in the wind's breath blowing, Stands she fair and still as a disembodied soul, With hands outstretched, and eyes that shine through tears And tremulous smiles When the trumpets, and the guns, and the great drums roll, And the long fiords and the forelands shake with the thunder Of the shout of welcome to the daughter of the Isles.

V

Bring her, O people, on the shoulders of her vassals Throned like a queen to her palace on the height, Up the rocky steeps where the fir tree tassels Nod to her, and touch her with a subtle, vague delight, Like a whisper of home, like a greeting and a smile From the fir-tree walks and gardens, the wood-embowered castles In the north among the clansmen of Argyle. Now the sullen plunge of waves for many a mile Along the roaring Ottawa is heard, And the cry of some wood bird, Wild and sudden and sweet, Scared from its perch by the rush and trample of feet, And the red glare of the torches in the night. And now the long facade gay with many a twinkling light Reaches hands of welcome, and the bells peal, and the guns, And the hoarse blare of the trumpets, and the throbbing of the drums Fill the air like shaken music, and the very waves rejoice In the gladness, and the greeting, and the triumph of their voice.

VI.

Under triumphal arches, blazoned with banners and scrolls, And the sound of a People's exulting, still gathering as it rolls, Enter the gates of the city, and take the waiting throne, And make the heart of a Nation, O Royal Pair, your own. Sons of the old race, we, and heirs of the old and the new; Our hands are bold and strong, and our hearts are faithful and true; Saxon and Norman and Celt one race of the mingled blood Who fought built cities and ships and stemmed the unknown flood In the grand historic days that made our England great When Britain's sons were steadfast to meet or to conquer fate Our sires were the minster builders who wrought themselves unknown The thought divine within them till it blossomed into stone Forgers of swords and of ploughshares reapers of men and of grain, Their bones and their names forgotten on many a battle plain For faith and love and loyalty were living and sacred things When our sires were those who wrought and yours were the leaders and kings.

VII

For since the deeds that live in Arthur's rhyme Who left the stainless flower of knighthood for all time Down to our Blameless Prince wise gentle just Whom the world mourns not by your English dust More precious held more sacredly enshrined Than in each loyal breast of all mankind, Men bare the head in homage to the good, And she who wears the crown of womanhood, August, not less than that of Empress, reigns The crowned Victoria of the world's domains North, South, East, West, O Princess fair, behold In this new world, the daughter of the old, Where ribs of iron bar the Atlantic's breast, Where sunset mountains slope into the west, Unfathomed wildernesses, valleys sweet, And tawny stubble lands of corn and wheat, And all the hills and lakes and forests dun, Between the rising and the setting sun; Where rolling rivers run with sands of gold, And the locked treasures of the mine unfold Undreamed of riches, and the hearts of men, Held close to nature, have grown pure again. Like that exalted Pair, beloved, revered, By princely grace, and truth and love endeared, Here fix your empire in the growing West, And build your throne in each Canadian breast, Till West and East strike hands across the main, Knit by a stronger, more enduring chain, And our vast Empire become one again.

BIRD SONG.

Art thou not sweet, Oh world, and glad to the inmost heart of thee! All creatures rejoice With one rapturous voice. As I, with the passionate beat Of my over-full heart feel thee sweet, And all things that live, and are part of thee!

Light, light as a cloud Swimming, and trailing its shadow under me I float in the deep As a bird-dream in sleep, And hear the wind murmuring loud, Far down, where the tree-tops are bowed,— And I see where the secret place of the thunders be

Oh! the sky free and wide, With all the cloud-banners flung out in it Its singing wind blows As a grand river flows, And I swim down its rhythmical tide, And still the horizon spreads wide, With the birds' and the poets' songs like a shout in it!

Oh life, thou art sweet Sweet—sweet to the inmost heart of thee! I drink with my eyes Thy limitless skies, And I feel with the rapturous beat Of my wings thou art sweet— And I,—I am alive, and a part of thee!

AN IDYL OF THE MAY.

In the beautiful May weather, Lapsing soon into June; On a golden, golden day Of the green and golden May, When our hearts were beating tune To the coming feet of June, Walked we in the woods together.

Silver fine Gleamed the ash buds through the darkness of the pine, And the waters of the stream Glance and gleam, Like a silver-footed dream— Beckoning, calling, Flashing, falling, Into shadows dun and brown Slipping down, Calling still—Oh hear! Oh follow! Follow—follow! Down through glen and ferny hollow, Lit with patches of the sky, Shining through the trees so high, Hand in hand we went together, In the golden, golden weather Of the May; While the fleet wing of the swallow Flashing by, called—follow—follow! And we followed through the day: Speaking low— Speaking often not at all To the brooklet's crystal call, With our lingering feet and slow— Slow, and pausing here and there For a flower, or a fern, For the lovely maiden-hair; Hearing voices in the air, Calling faintly down the burn.

Still the streamlet slid away, Singing, smiling, dimpling down To a mossy nook and brown, Under bending boughs of May; Where the nodding wind-flower grows, And the coolwort's lovely pink, Brooding o'er the brooklet's brink Dips and blushes like a rose.

And the faint smell of the mould. Sweeter than the musky scent Of the garden's manifold Perfumes into perfect blent. Lights and sounds and odours stole, In the golden, golden weather— Heart and thought, and life and soul, Stole away, In that merry, merry May, Wandering down the burn together.

Ah Valentine—my Valentine! Heard I, with my hand in thine, Grave and low, and sweet and slow, As the wood bird over head, Brooding notes, half sung half said,— "In the world so bleak and wide, Hearts make Edens of their own; Wilt thou linger by my side,— Wilt thou live for me alone, Making bright the winter weather, Thou and I and love together?"

"Yea," I said, "for thee alone,"— Shading eyes lest they confess Too much their own happiness, With the happy tears o'erflown.

Gravely thou—"The world is not Like this ferny hollow— Through a rougher, thornier lot Wilt thou bravely follow?" Still the brook, with softer flow, Called, "Oh hear! Oh follow!" "Aye," I said, with bated breath, "Where thou goest, I will go; Holding still thy stronger hand, Through the dreariest desert land, True, till death."

Silence fell between us two, Noiseless as the silver dew; Hearts that had no need of speech In the silence spoke to each; And along the sapphire blue, Shot with shafts of sunset through, Fell a voice, a bodiless breath— "True, till death"

Through a mist of smiles and tears, Doubts and fears, and toils and dreams, Oh! how long ago it seems, Looking back across the year Silver threads are in my hair And the sunset shadows slope Back along the hills of hope That before us shone so fair.

Ah! for us the merry May Comes no more with golden weather; Fields, and woods, and sunshine gay, Purple skies, and purple heather. We have had our holyday, And I sit with folded hands, In the twilight looking back Over life's uneven track— Thorny wilds, and desert sands.

Weary heart, unwearied faith, In the twilight softly saith— "We have had our golden weather— We have walked through life together, True, till death!"

THE BURIAL OF THE SCOUT.

O not with arms reversed, And the slow beating of the muffled drum, And funeral marches, bring our hero home These stormy woods where his young heart was nursed Ring with a trumpet burst Of jubilant music, as if he who lies With shrouded face, and lips all white and dumb Were a crowned conqueror entering paradise,— This is his welcome home!

Along the reedy marge of the dim lake, I hear the gathering horsemen of the North, The cavalry of night and tempest wake,— Blowing keen bugles as they issue forth, To guard his homeward march in frost and cold, A thousand spearmen bold!

And the deep-bosomed woods, With their dishevelled locks all wildly spread, Stretch ghostly arms to clasp the immortal dead, Back to their solitudes While through their rocking branches overhead, And all their shuddering pulses underground shiver runs, as if a voice had said— And every farthest leaf had felt the wound— He comes—but he is dead!

The dainty-fingered May with gentle hand shall fold and put away The snow-white curtains of his winter tent, and spread above him her green coverlet, 'Broidered with daisies, sweet to sight and scent and Summer, from her outposts in the hills, Under the boughs with heavy night-dews wet, shall place her gold and purple sentinels, And in the populous woods sound reveille, calling from field and fen her sweet deserters back— But he,—no long roll of the impatient drum, for battle trumpet eager for the fray, From the far shores of blue Lake Erie blown, shall rouse the soldier's last long bivouac.

QUESTIONINGS.

I touch but the things which are near; The heavens are too high for my reach: In shadow and symbol and creed, I discern not the soul from the deed, Nor the thought hidden under, from speech; And the thing which I know not I fear.

I dare not despair nor despond, Though I grope in the dark for the dawn: Birth and laughter, and bubbles of breath, And tears, and the blank void of death, Round each its penumbra is drawn,— I touch them,—I see not beyond.

What voice speaking solemn and slow, Before the beginning for me, From the mouth of the primal First Cause, Shall teach me the thing that I was, Shall point out the thing I shall be, And show me the path that I go?

Were there any that missed me, or sought, In the cycles and centuries fled. Ere my soul had a place among men?— Even so, unremembered again I shall lie in the dust with the dead, And my name shall be heard not, nor thought.

Yea rather,—from out the abyss, Where the stars sit in silence and light, When the ashes and dust of our world Are like leaves in their faces up-whirled,— What orb shall look down through the night, And take note of the quenching of this?

Yea, beyond—in the heavens of space Where Jehovah sits, absolute Lord, Who made out of nothing the whole Round world, and man's sentient soul— Will He crush, like a creature abhorred, What He fashioned with infinite grace

In His own awful image, and made Quick with the flame of His breath,— Which He saw and behold it was good?— Ah man! thou hast waded through blood And crime down to darkness and death, Since thou stood'st before Him unafraid.

My life falls away like a flower Day by day,—dispersed of the wind Its vague perfume, nor taketh it root, Ripening seeds for the sower, or fruit To make me at one with my kind, And give me my work, and my hour

No creed for my hunger sufficed, Though I clung to them, each after other, They slipped from my passionate hold,— The prophets, the martyrs of old,— Thy pitying face, Mary Mother,— Thy thorn-circled forehead, O Christ!

Pilgrim sandalled, the deserts have known The track of my wandering feet, Where dead saints and martyrs have trod, To search for the pure faith of God, Making life with its bitterness sweet, And death the white gate to a throne.

O Thou, who the wine-press hast trod, O sorrowful—stricken—betrayed,— Thy cross o'er my spirit prevails; In Thy hands with the print of the nails, My life with its burdens is laid,— O Christ—Thou art sole—Thou art God!

PANSIES.

When the earliest south winds softly blow Over the brown earth, and the waning snow In the last days of the discrowned March,— Before the silver tassels of the larch, Or any tiniest bud or blade is seen; Or in the woods the faintest kindling green, And all the earth is veiled in azure mist, Waiting the far-off kisses of the sun,— They lift their bright heads shyly one by one. And offer each, in cups of amethyst, Drops of the honey wine of fairy land,— A brimming beaker poised in either hand Fit for the revels of King Oberon, With all his royal gold and purple on: Children of pensive thought and airy fancies, Sweeter than any poet's sweetest stanzas, Though to the sound of eloquent music told, Or by the lips of beauty breathed or sung: They thrill us with their backward-looking glances, They bring us to the land that ne'er grows old,— They mind us of the days when life was young Nor time had stolen the fire from youth's romances, Dear English pansies!

While still the hyacinth sleeps on securely, And every lily leaf is folded purely, Nor any purple crocus hath arisen; Nor any tulip raised its slender stem, And burst the earth-walls of its winter prison, And donned its gold and jewelled diadem; Nor by the brookside in the mossy hollow, That calls to every truant foot to follow, The cowslip yet hath hung its golden ball,— In the wild and treacherous March weather, The pansy and the sunshine come together, The sweetest flower of all! The sweetest flower that blows; Sweeter than any rose, Or that shy blossom opening in the night, Its waxen vase of aromatic light— A sleepy incense to the winking stars; Nor yet in summer heats, That crisp the city streets,— Where the spiked mullein grows beside the bars In country places, and the ox-eyed daisy Blooms in the meadow grass, and brooks are lazy, And scarcely murmur in the twinkling heat; When sound of babbling water is so sweet, Blue asters, and the purple orchis tall, Bend o'er the wimpling wave together;— The pansy blooms through all the summer weather, The sweetest flower of all!

The sweetest flower that blows! When all the rest are scattered and departed, The symbol of the brave and faithful-hearted, Her bright corolla glows. When leaves hang pendant on their withered stalks, Through all the half-deserted garden walks; And through long autumn nights, The merry dancers scale the northern heights, And tiny crystal points of frost-white fire Make brightly scintillant each blade and spire, Still under shade of shelt'ring wall, Or under winter's shroud of snows, Undimmed, the faithful pansy blows, The sweetest flower of all!

NOVEMBER METEORS.

Out of the dread eternities, The vast abyss of night, A glorious pageant rose and shone, And passed from human sight. We saw the glittering cavalcade, And heard inwove through all, Faint and afar from star to star, The sliding music fall.

With banners and with torches, And hoofs of glancing flame, With helm and sword and pennon bright The long procession came. And all the starry spaces, Height above height outshone, And the bickering clang of their armour rang Down to the farthest zone.

As if some grand cathedral, With towers of malachite, And walls of more than crystal clear, Rose out of the solid light, And under its frowning gateway, Each morioned warrior stept, And in radiant files down the ringing aisles, The martial pageant swept.

From out the oriel windows, From vault, and spire, and dome, And sparkling up from base to cope, The light and glory clomb. They knelt before the altar, Each mailed and visored knight, And the censers swung as a voice outrung,— 'Now God defend the right'!

On casque, and brand, and corselet Fell the red light of Mars, As forth from the minster gates they passed To the battle of the stars. Across moon-lighted depths of space, And breadths of purple seas, Their flying squadrons sailed in fleets, Of fiery argosies:

Down lengths of shining rivers, Past golden-sanded bars, And nebulous isles of amethyst, They dropt like falling stars: Till on a scarped and wrinkled coast, Washed by dark waves below, They came upon the glittering tents— The city of the foe.

Then rushed they to the battle; Their bright hair blazed behind, As deadlier than the bolt they fell, And swifter than the wind. And all the stellar continents, With that fierce hail thick sown, Recoiled with fear, from sphere to sphere To Saturn's ancient throne.

The blind old king, in ermine wrapt. And immemorial cold, Awoke, and raised his aged hands, And shook his rings of gold. Down toppled plume and pennon bright, In endless ruin hurled, Their blades of light struck fire from night— Their splendours lit the world!

And rolling down the hollow spheres, The mighty chords, the seven, Clanged on from orb to orb, and smote Orion in mid-heaven. Along the ground the white tents lay; And faint along the fields. The foe's swart hosts, like glimmering ghosts, Followed his chariot wheels.

With banners and with torches, And armour all aflame, The victors and the vanquished went, Departing as they came; With here and there a rocket sent Up from some lonely barque: Into the vast abysm they passed,— Into the final dark.