Memories of Canada and Scotland, Speeches and Verses | Page 6

king in Huron's isles.
THE MYSTIC ISLE OF THE "LAND OF THE NORTH WIND."
(KEEWATIN.)
A land untamed, whose myriad isles?Are set in branching lakes that vein?Illimitable silent woods,?Voiceful in Fall, when their defiles,?Rich with the birch's golden rain,?See winging past the wildfowl broods.
Blue channels seem its dented rocks,?So steeply smoothed, but crusted o'er?With rounded mosses, green and grey,?That oft a Southern coral mocks?Upon this Northern fir-clad shore,?'Neath tufted copse on cape and bay.?Here sunshine from serener skies?Than Europe's ocean-islands know?Ripens the berry for the bear,?And pierces where the beaver plies?His water-forestry, or slow?The moose seeks out a breezy lair.
The blaze scarce spangles bush or ferns,?But lights the white pine's velvet fringe?And its dark Norway sister's boughs;?At eve between their shadows burns?The lake, where shafts of crimson tinge?The savage war-flotilla's prows.
Far circling round, these seem to shun?An isle more fair than all beside,?As if some lurking foe were there,?Although upon its heights the sun?Shines glorious, and its forest pride?Is fanned by summer's joyous air.
For 'mid these isles is one of fear,?And none may ever breathe its name.?There the Great Spirit loves to be;?Its haunted groves and waters clear?Are homes of thunder and of flame;?All pass it silently and flee,
Save they who potent magic learn,?Who lonely in that dreaded fane?Resist nine days the awful powers:?And, fasting, each through pain may earn?The knowledge daring mortals gain,?If life survive those secret hours!
WESTWARD HO!
Away to the west! Westward ho! Westward ho!?Where over the prairies the summer winds blow!
Why known to so few were its rivers and plains,?Where rustle so tall in their ripeness the grains??The bison and Red-men alone cared to roam?O'er realms that to millions must soon give a home;?The vast fertile levels Old Time loved to reap?The haymaker's song hath awakened from sleep.
Away to the West! Westward ho! Westward ho!?Why waited we fearing to plant and to sow?
Not ours was the waiting! By God was ordained?The hour when the ocean's grey steeds were up-reined,?And green marshes rose, and the bittern's abode?Became the Lone Land where the wild hunter strode,?And soils with grass harvests grew rich, and the clime?For us was prepared in the fulness of Time!
Away to the West! Westward ho! Westward ho!?For us 'twas prepared long ago, long ago!?There came from the Old World at last o'er the sea,?The bravest and best to this land of the free;?And, leal to their flag, won the fruits of the earth?By might that has given new nations a birth,?But found in our North-land a bride to be known?More worthy than all of the love of the throne.?Away to the West! Westward ho! Westward ho!?God's hand is our guide; 'tis His will that we go!
To lands yet more happy than Europe's, for here?We mould the young nation for Freedom to rear.?Full strongly we build, and have nought to pull down,?For, true to ourselves, we are true to the Crown;?The will of the people its honour shows forth,?As pole-star, whose radiance points steadfastly north.
Away to the West! Westward ho! Westward ho!?Where rooted in Freedom shall Liberty grow!
Right good is the loam that for five score of days?Its rolling lands show, or its plains' scented ways:?Nor used is the pick, if the earth has concealed?The waters it keeps for the house and the field;?The spade finds enough, until burst on the sight?Our Rocky Sierras' sweet rivers of light.
Away to the West! Westward ho! Westward ho!?From mountains and lakes there the great rivers flow!
If told of Brazil or great Mexico's gold,?Of Cotton States' warmth and of Canada's cold,?Go say how we prize, like the ore of the mine,?The snows sapphire-shadowed in winter's sunshine;?--Our gayest of seasons! which guards the good soil?For races who won it through faith and through toil.
Away to the West! Westward ho! Westward ho!?Bright sparkles its winter, and light is its snow!
There gaily, in measureless meadows, all day?The sun and the breeze with the grass are at play,?In billows that never can break as they pass,?But toss the gold foam of the flower-laden grass,?The bright yellow disks of the asters upcast?On waves that in blossoms flow silently past.
Away to the West! Westward-ho! Westward ho!?Where over the prairies the summer winds blow.
The West for you, boys! where our God has made room?For field and for city, for plough and for loom.?The West for you, girls! for our Canada deems?Love's home better luck than a gold-seeker's dreams.?Away! and your children shall bless you, for they?Shall rule o'er a land fairer far than Cathay.
Away to the West! Westward ho! Westward ho!?Thou God of their fathers, Thy blessing bestow!
THE SONG OF THE SIX SISTERS.
[Manitoba, Assiniboia, Saskatchewan, Athabasca, Alberta,?and British Columbia.]
At a feast in the east of our central plains,?Girt with the sheaths of the wheaten grains,?Manitoba lay where the sunflowers blow,?And sang to the chime of the Red River's flow:?"I am child of the spirit whom all men own,?My prairie no longer