The Arctic Queen

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Title: The Arctic Queen
Author: Unknown
Release Date: January 21, 2006 [EBook #17568]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
0. START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ARCTIC
QUEEN ***
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The Arctic Queen.
To
DR. ELISHA KENT KANE,
COMMANDER OF THE GRINNELL EXPEDITION
IN SEARCH OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN--
THIS POEM IS DEDICATED:
WITH SINCEREST ADMIRATION OF HIS ENTERPRISE,
COURAGE AND HEROIC SELF-DEVOTION,

AND OF HIS SUCCESS AS DISCOVERER
OF THE
OPEN POLAR SEA.
THE ARCTIC QUEEN.
PART FIRST.
OENE, of all the chilly Arctics, queen,
Ascended to her everlasting
throne
Built on the steadfast centre of the world,
And waited for the
middle hour of night,
Now swiftly coming, to convene her court.

Set in an ocean of perpetual calm
Was the fair island honoured by her
reign;
Slowly around her rolled the Frigid Zone,
Dim in the mystic
moonlight far away,--
A silvery ring, circling her nearer realm
With
the pale lustre of its snowy walls,
Defending from all storm and
sudden change
The sea which bathed the island's level shores.
She
sat upon her throne, and none might tell
Whether her limbs the
lambent lustre cast
Upon the pearls of which it was composed,
Or
they cast beauty on her glowing form.
Around her feet a pavement
spread, inlaid
Of squares of roseate sea-shells, set about
With
purple gems, unknown in other lands;--
Thence, winding paths,
sprinkled with golden sand,
Ran out, through bowers of flowers and
fields of green
To meet the sea.
Low in the South the Moon
Shone full against the island. The
North-star,
Sparkling and blazing like a silver sun,
Stood at the
Zenith, as a lamp hung out
From heaven to charm the endless Arctic
night;--
And thus a soft profusion of pure light,
More exquisite than
sunshine, fell abroad.
Unnipped by daintiest frosts, in every field

Flowers crowded thick; and trees, not tall nor rude,
With slender
stems upholding feathery shade,
Nodded their heads and hung their
pliant limbs
In natural bowers, sweet with delicious gloom.

Queen OENE sent her luminous glance afar:
Fine rays of tintless light
played round her head,
Crowning her beauty with mysterious glory.

She gazed away, beyond the tranquil sea,
To distant mountains of
unchanging snow,
And still beyond, to where full many a tower

And fortress reared their walls of gleaming ice
On the dim verges of
her vast domains.
Scarcely had she in silence throned herself,
Ere from the trees, or
flower-coves of the shore,
Or gliding in from idling on the sea,
Her
maids of honor came, a virgin train,
Like a bright constellation
clustering round
The central star, most glorious of them all.
One, in
a crimson blossom, torn away
From its far moorings, nestled at her
ease,
Was seen slowly to skim the silver lake;
While the huge
flower seemed of itself propelled,
Save that, by chance, a flushed and
saucy face,
Peeped from the waves, showing a little imp
Who
tugged at its stout stem with willful toil.
KOLONA's limbs and
bosom roseate glowed
As the slant moonlight through the crimson
flower
Bathed her with blushes; but, when on the strand
She lightly
sprang, flinging her tresses back,
A southern maiden would have
deemed her pale.
Too rich for pallor was the polished glow
Of her
lithe figure; while, in either cheek,
The red veins glimmered; dark
blue were her eyes;
Her tresses, like deep shadows, made more fair

The light which they enhanced, glancing within.
The first to touch the white feet of the Queen
And place herself at her
right hand, was she.
Others came soon; all bright, all beautiful,

With deep blue eyes, and sweet mouths set in smiles.
Long chains of
jewels rare were, round their necks,
Twined many times; these,
flickering, rose and fell
With the soft breath their full, graced bosoms
drew.
From waist to knee of each a tunic dropped
In many folds,
woven in changing hues
Of birds' gay plumage, and fringed deep
with gems,
Which they with artless and unenvying pride,
Would
fain have made, each, most magnificent.

They gathered round their Queen, as midnight neared.
Suddenly, with
the hour, there came a change
Over the moonlight and the courtly
scene.
OENE upon the pavement pressed her feet,
And out the
North-Lights sprang, to do her will,
From secret caverns underneath
its pearls.
O'er all the land she bade them come and go;
Each
battlemented iceberg on the deep
Of other seas, and every snowy hall,

And every citadel by frosts upreared,
Were lighted with wild
splendors, as the troupes
Of messengers rushed swiftly to and fro.

The people of the Arctics knew their Queen
Summoned her subjects
to the Presence then
By wavering tints which played beneath the Star,

And the great speed with which the North-Lights flew.
They
hurried even to the Temperate Zone.
A band of phantom spirits took
wings and flew
Far