The Coming of the Princess and Other Poems | Page 2

no straining of
expression in the poems nor is there any loose fluency of thought.
Throughout there is sustained elevation and lofty purpose. Her least
work, moreover, is worthy of her, because it is always honest work.
With a quiet simplicity of style there is at the same time a fine
command of language and an earnest beauty of thought. The grace and
melody of the versification, indeed, few readers will fail to appreciate.
Occasionally there are echoes of other
poets--Jean Ingelow and Mrs.

Barrett Browning, in the more
subjective pieces, being oftenest
suggested. But there is a voice as well as an echo--the voice of a poet in
her own right. In an age so bustling and heedless as this, it were well
sometimes to stop and listen to the voice In its fine spiritualizations we
shall at least be soothed and may be bettered.
But I need not dwell on the vocation of poetry or on the excellence of
the poems here introduced. The one is well known to the reader, the
other may soon be. Happily there is promise that Canada will ere long
be rich in her poets. They stand in the vanguard of the country's
benefactors, and so should be cherished and encouraged. Of late our
serial literature has given us more than blossomings. The present
volume enshrines some of the maturer fruit. May it be its mission to
nourish the poetic sentiment among us. May it do more to nourish in
some degree the "heart of the nation", and, in the range of its influence,
that of humanity.
CANADIAN MONTHLY OFFICE,
Toronto, December, 1880
TABLE OF CONTENTS
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 Lome,

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