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" Even in the rough Hexameters of I full of pathos and dignity; but when wonds, it must charm all who read it."- PUBLISHED BY GRIFFITH F. AND LEE & SHEPARD lo AND PICKEN AUSTRAl Second Edition, in " The best thing in the volume is un( true love toM in ringing measure!> T J€» ttW #•»••• I genuine lover of poetry. bi Tht Graphic APOETRl Second Edition, in | " With as much freshness of subject vious productions, they have mure varie tive writing which we want."— TA; Acat A SUMMEB In green cli " Mr. Sladen tell his story in a vigoroi stories from the lips of his friend. He do a novel in verse : but certainly su'.h piec4 which is dramatic in the most exacting s truly lyrical, may lay claim to being p lay claim to communicate something 5 For ourselves, we have read the latter pii the music and delicate fancy which ma might well claim more exhaustive notice, commend the volume to all who care fot situation, for humour and sly satire, for ii IN CORNWALL AN In scarlet, black and "Mr. Sladen pays a tribute to the memi toria;' but that erratic and unfortunate e as many parts of Mr. Sladen's work. Tal be considered the best poet that Australia EDWARD THB : On thick antique paper, in scar covers, 41. S< "A aacceaafal aadcra aMmpW of the oM I,' juti BobliilMd iff OriAth and iieatal, «f which hi* previous effort* bn to say that his treatment of th« feet, and hi* style unaiTectcd yet is remarkable, and we cordially Barrett at the earliest opportunity. mt length, it wouM make an acting fi reviewer reads through a volume |e can conscientiously aver that w« Od ourselves arriving at the last : nor appreciates such literary , and author and reviewer have )1 ponder over the want of taste lunnoticed a work of such infinite he compendious story of a reign Hsart, to whom Mr. Sladen cordi- |i Review. jtMADA. >6d. Second Edition. I & Co., LONDON, AND JEW YORK. OETS. Ids 3/6. lone a real service to Literature." Literary World. |d and pathetic verse." , Daily Telegraph. ^n (Mass) Advertiser. issued shortly. JX POETS. » & Co., LONDON. AND LEN, NEW YORK. Series. ^ND RHYMES. tnt contribution to our poetical Public Opinion. plasgow Herald. $ty produced in recent years in '« Chiel (Glasgow). Ung peoples."— £uro^Mn Mail. \.Series." lUANSONa. PtSfiMmUGMetH^y wTwwn o»xr.,'3s; wt. VI, LESTER THE LOYALIST. A ROMANCE OF THE FOUNDING OF CANADA BY DOUGLAS SLADEN. AUTHOR OF "AUSTRALIAN LYRiCS," "EDWARD THE BLACK PRINCE" "THE SPANISH ARMADA" Etc., Etc. - AND EDITOR OF "A CENTURY OF AUSTRALIAN SONG," "YOUNGER AMERICAN POETS" Etc., Etc. v> MADE IN JAPAN AT THE HAKUBUNSHA GINZA 4 CHOME, TOKIO. i8go. DEDICATED TO TWO SISTERS, Mrs. Robert Reid and Mrs. Qeorge Waahington Stephens of Montreal. To whose HospitaUty and Introductions I ODM my wide and delightftil experience of the Great Dominion. TO THE READER. TT is strange that while the sufferings of the French Acadians have drawn so many tears from English and Americans, the self-sacrifice of the Amencan Loyalists, who founded the Canada of today, should almost have been forgotten, both in England and the United States. Canadians of course cherish the memory of their Founders with the devotion characteristic of that loyal race. The Founders of Canada were, not Cartier, not the builders of Quebec and Montreal, not Wolfe, but the fifty thousand of the best blood in America, who went to face the frosts and the forests a hundred years ago. While other Americana fought to be free from England, these chose exile to be tvue to England, when they were denied liberty of opinion in their homes. The Founders entered Canada in three immigrations; into Western Acadia, since called New Bruns- wick, into Eastern Acadia, since called Nova Scotia, and into Upper Canada, since called Ontario — now happily all united in one great Dominion. They were composed, \nrgtiy, of Judges, Lawyers, Merchants, Divines Offi- cials, in fact of the upper classes before the Revolution; and therefore their sufferings in pioneering were toe more severe. This poem deals with the first immigration. Its scene opens in New York just before the War of Inde- pendence. Canto II is laid in New York at the conclusion of the war. The scene then shifts to that part of Acadia which was shortly afterwards erected into a separate Colony as " New Brunswick :" and from this, .without any further break in time, it alternates between Parr-town, since called St. John from the magnificent waterway on which it stands, and Clearwater lake, some forty miles back. Every incident in the poem is based on fact, the historical data being drawn from the histories of Sabine, Ryerson etc., and the valuable pamphlets of Lawrence, Russell Jack etc., Parkman's great work and Hannay's Macaulay-Iike history, unfortunately, not yet being carried down so far. The sufferings of Jonathan Sherwood in New York are selected from outrages actually perpetrated upon this or the other Loyalist at the hands of the mob du bitter feeling at the close of the war. And his sufferings in the forest are based partly upon Susannah Moody's descriptions, partly upon what had actually happened to the gentleman with whom I was staying up in the backwoods to acquaint myself with Canadian forest life and scenery. I have received so much kindness and have so many friends in the United States, that I should not have liked to write this poem had I not felt that the scars of the War of Independence were so thoroughly healed that Americans could hear without displeasure a statement of the case from the opposite side. They will remember too that these sturdy Loyalists were Americans themselves, who exchanged home and position and affluence for hardship and exile rather than resign their liberty. ^ - The names are not mythical. Jonathan Sherwood and several Lesters were amons th9 oi%inal grantees of Parr-town (St. John). ^/. i I have chosen hexameters for my metre because the genius of Longfellow ha» ItooUmatised in them American domestic terms, which continue exotic in Iambics. And also, because it ' icemed to me Ihat after Longfellow, rather led astray in his facts, had invested with undying romance those ungrateftil Acadians, [of whom King George might have said, literally '• Forty years long was I grieved of this generation, and said : it is a people that do err in their hearts, for they have not known my ways."] it was only right for me to use the same metre for my attempt to draw sympathy to these Loyalist settlers in Acadia, whe sacrificed so much for England, and were the ancestors of the Dominion of Canada. DOUGLAS SLADEN. '«SK< LESTER THE LOYALIST, Haughty was Jonathan Sherwood, well-born, an opulent merchant ; None in New York stood higher — his friends the highest officials, Aye and the Governor too, till the recent troubles with England. Goodly in stature was he, with resolute clear-cut features. Heavily tm>wed and eyebrowed, and eyes which made strangers uneasy, Blue as the sea when the sky is clear, but deep in them lurking Signs of a gathering stonn or tracks of a dragon in ambush ; — Eyes, which said " the Ship of the State is right on ^-he quick sands ; You, Sir, and you, are knave or tool ; and the good ship must perish, Utterly now at this present, if it be not for Jon9tlian Sherwood." Happy was he in his home, his beautiful home by the Hudson, High on a hill, and deep in trees with the river looped round it, Square, wide-spreading, two-storied, with three of its faces verandahed And all its front a porch, vast-columned like Rome's Pantheon, Crowning the river for miles from its vantage of headland and highland. All of wood was the house, save the bountiful kitchen chimney, Fit for an abbot or earl, in the days when convents and castles Housed their hundreds n' cowls or helms ; and the panels hid priest-holes Guarding no longer priestb, but massive plat« and cut crystal. Almost as precious as plate. Not a chamber but boasted its secret, And the porch opened into a hall that pierced to the rear of the mansion, Rising high as the roof, and spanned with a gallery archwise Hridginf two mighty stairways, whose broadening, circular bases Cleft the hall into two, each hung with its portraits and weapons, And its trophies of wealth. Without, were gardens — the vineyard — the pleasaunce. Where lovers were screened — the stables and men's homes — almost a hamlet. Happy was Jonathan Shei'wood, as he stepped on his chariot, or often, When the wind blew up from the bay, on a swift-winged boat. For his mansion, More than its wealth, than its ease, held a wife and a womaning daughter. More than his wife, who moved like a queen, unconsciously haughty, Gracious at heart, and received his guests, and sat at his table Sweet with a grace of her own, he loved this womaning daughter, Dorothy Sherwood, the last of his race, whom seventeen Aprils Had dowered with their tender sunshine, as witness the gold in the auburn Of that delicate bead, and the soft, fresh blue, like sky after shov/ers. Of the eyes in that high-bred face, with the beauty that makes an hundred, Dimple chin, pleading lip, fine nose with quivering nostril. And maidenhood's Mayflower cheek, that should shame the wild roses thereafter. Unseared by the summer of fashion, she danced through her life, a June zephyr. Fresh, bright, sweet as spring, with her gentleness thrice-over gentle From her pure patrician grace ; — of all Manhattan's daughters Daintiest in brocade, and sweetest in simple muslin. Dorothy walks in the garden. A footfall nears ; and a shimmer Lights up the blue of her eyes, and rose tints deepen, and laughter Trills between mischief and joy. She is caught, a conspirator captive, Fain to fall in with the foe, and betray the defence, and take service. As daughters with lovers are leagued to conquer their sires the world over. Fair headed student, with form and face like the Hercules David Grim Michel Angelo made to stand in the heart of his Florence At the door of the Palace Old, which was built to endure forever, David with brow and feature of Egypt's Monolith giants, But limbs of athletic Greece — Youth with the eye of Minerva, Large and sage and grey, what seekest thou here in the garden ? Boy, were thy Father alive, with his silvery tones of persuasion, Resistless as truth in the Courts — thy Father, the Advocate Lester, Thou hadst no need in the bushes to lurk, but wouldst drive to the porchway. Ring up Jonathan Sherwood, and bid for thine happiness boldly. But now, young dreamer at King's, with the map of thy life after college Blank, though dazzlingly white, not even the latitudes ruled yet. Thou art no prize for the hand of Jonathan Sh. rwood's daughter. Thou art no prize for the hand of exquisite Dorothy Sherwood, Thou art a thief and a robber, that enterest not by the gateway. .-e^- And now the hour draws nigh when the echo of wheels, or a footfall 8 Down on the water-stair, like the crow of the cock to a vision, Bids thee away, and Dorothy learns that love, like the roses, ] Has his handful of thorns for every bloom on the briar. but today is gold and crimson, for Jonathan Sherwood lingers Till the woods of the further shore have drunk up the glory of sunset. ■^ Dorothy, lean thine aureoled head on a stalwart should' r! And, if arden'i: lips should press its silkiness proudly. Aye or the shapely neck, or the veiny ingenuous eyelids, Or the soft white brow embayed in gold, or the velvet ani peach bloum Of Youth's fruit-rivalling cheek — aye, even the ruby chalice Drained by the revellers of love — why yield thee and sign surrender ! Strong hands pinion thy wrists with loving pressure, and armed words Beat at the door of t^iine heart. O lovers, and lovers, and iovers, This same old atory of siege, and parley, and sudden surrender. Belongs to eaeh age atld clime. It sailed in men's hearts with Columbus, And, soon as the first light foot had rested in Hispaniola, The seed in the New V/orld's soil was rooted to bloom forever. Meanwhile Jonathan late in his Club — a Whig Coffeehouse parlour. Soared irascibly on, acidressing his fellow merchants. Most heard and most laid to heart by the hangers-on in the doorway, Unnoticed and unejected in storm and stress of opinion. ""•"•'*«;».. *. J He began with the masts of Maine and its fishers and waterfalls wasted, And so through the whole Thirteen, till he came to the merchants of Boston, Most cruelly wronged of all — although in the matter of customs Their conscience was somewhat lax — this importing of tea as molasses. And smuggling with Holland and Spain was little enough to his liking, Grasping, hard man that he was — his trade was in buying cheaply And selling at cruel credit. The law was his friend and accomplice ; He broke not its veriest tittle or jot — ^good Pharisee, narrow. Merciless, proud, selfrighteous. But, nathless, a farseeing merchant, He groaned at the channels for trade which the laws for the Colonies muzzled, And, seeing himself in a dream with his wealth centupled, when smuggling. Having no duties, shoaid die and the smugglers — their calling discounted. Wither like weeds without soil from the path of the honest merchant. He raged and moaned that the King was coxened and deafened and blinded. And, lashing himself in his wrath like the sea in a tempest, he thundered At Great Britain and all her works ; and raved at the House of Commons, Ever, and now-thrice corrupt : and his voice was lost in his passion At the Tory misgovemment, Tools and Traitors and Tyrants and- -Tories. Hot resolutions were passed ; and a sturdily worded remonstrance, " Drawn at request of the club by the patriot Jonathan Sherwood," Sent by next ship to the King— /row the merchants a faithful remonstrance, To the idlers, who listened unnoticed, an incitement to arms and resistance. Then he went home in his pride — he thought of the Seven Bishops — But with anger slumbering lightly — a Jephthah — for lo at his threshhold, 10 In the hour of his triumph his daughter, his beautiful Dorothy, met him, With her girlish softness and rh3rthmic grace and the smile of pathos. Which made the glint of one golden head the visible presence Of rapture at ffete or rout, — and stood like Queen Esther before him, Waiting the outstretched sceptre to open her heart to her master. But lo ! too one, whose advent was gall in the goblet, beside her — Lester ! the fathers heart, with its wakeful dreams of ambition, . Read in an instant the warning, and closed his ears like an idol's, Deaf because made of stone. She fled from his presence, like Vashti, And wept in her chamber apart, refusing to glow in her fairness To the lords whom his fancy chose, — after sobb'ng aloud to Lester, Before her sire in his wrath, that him would she wed and none other, Though she were lone as long as Penelope, lorn of Ulysses, Aye — ^till the Lions of England waved no longer o'er New York City. And Lester went forth with a vow on his lips to conquer her father. By dazzling that hsug'ity ambition, like knights in the days of olden. II. War was over ; the King knew now that, though he might vanquish In a hundred battles by land the armies of French and Revolters, And a hundred fights in a hundred bays the navies of Europe, Hurled at the navy of England, French, Dutch, Swede, Spaniard and Russian, The half of his colonists' hearts were lost beyond reach of recapture. Though, while they were faithful to England, nigh half of England was bunring — 'tt II That they should be healed of their wrongs — and had the>|r but stajred for it, Jus'iice Was their's, without shedding of blood or rending the child from the mother. War was over ; and Jteace was declared ; and the friends of resistance, Whose watchword was "freedom the birthright of all," were yelling that freedom Meant but freedom fr^pm England, and that any desirous of freedom To be true to the land of his Fathers, was deserving of death, or outlaw. Charlatan Liberty, despot at heart, thy.clamour for freedom Is claptrap for change of power, and when lordship lays down his sceptre. Thou seizest it, cheering hoarsely, and usest thy sceptre in club wise, Most mer^i^SS, most malici:)us, because most minute of despots. Jonathan Sherwood, Whig, stood right in the path way of Vengeance, He wh(f1iad raised in New York the first strong voice of remonvStrance. For had he not, after petitioning the King as his faithful servant, In tones of usher to scolded child, continued his service, Steadfast, refusing to draw his sword, or disclaim his allegiance. Causing by one example more hindrance than hundreds of foemen To the Freedom which claimed for itself, the rights it denied to others? Jonathan Sherwood, when war burst forth, to his utter anguish, Drew no weapon and joined no side : — his King and his Country Fought less, the fewer who fought. He loved both his King and his CdutffeY* 12 r Others there were, who j^eathed their SMDcds, with the cry that resistance Of their few to the might t)f England must end in o'erwhelming disaster, Not dreaming of English States calling the ancient foe, from whom Ei||[land f J Had so lately secured their homes, to arm them against their Mother, / Or of France sending fleets and armies more glibly than EagHihd, or Einrope,-?- France, Spain, Holland, and Sweden and Russia hurling {ildir. naVies ; ' In one vast onslaught on England, with the ocean twixt her and her^ {i|*ii|>iii9. ; Others there were, great merchants, who dreamed they might Avin, b^^y^iii^rtg, Winning, what would they be? a race of respectable bumpki^f; ' ' * Cut off from the civilized world and doomed to go down to £m^ages ii^'^%4 Degenerate year by year — with the wharves of New York^Aicaying. ^O^* Bitter was hate against all : but it waxed and waxed against Sherwood, Their best — in hfe Pharisee way. For that one, who had led the remon* strants, j J Fought not, when ^j^iM^^jame, was a falling away. " An apostate v Weakened the 8acr^>lcuth of the cause. If the cause was sacred Why should:8tft«arnest naan lose faith at its baptism, straightway. But the cause w«i« sttcred : ahdliey^ho desecrates that which is sacred, Sacred in his.own c^eed, is a parricide — venemous reptile." While the war was waged, in New York, a Loyalist stronghold, Insult, hands refused, backs turned, a significant silence. Sudden, emphatic, scornful, a feud to all meetings and dealings On 'change or at home, were all that hatred could bare against him. ,^sii»»*»i,j»^,. tin »3 But when Peace was declared, and New York given up, the Revolters ^ '^'\ Waxed bold, ere the troops were withdrawn, and, now in authority, trampled The rebellious knaves who maintained that the right of every free man Was to hold what opinions he pleased. That Judges, Divines, and great Lawyers The shrewdest and wealthiest Merchants, the Masters, who taught their children, r* Were worthy, dr h^'th^ wit to think for themselves — and should cherish The faith th^ had treasured from youth, and their fathers' fathers before them, Was monstrous, and worthy of pains-M)f death. And if confiscation, With bare liffe, humbled, ill-treated, and watched like thieves, was allowed tl .:m. Out of the bountiful mercy and graee of their brothers, triumphant, Happy w6re they, in good case, and much to be envied. Malignants, Faint-hearted Whigs like Shervw>od, were marks above all for malice. The day saw him bi uised with foul eggs, tar-scalded, half smothered in feathers, The night saw his warehouses wrecked and his home invaded by maskers, Who tore him, cursed, from the arms of his terrified wife and daughter. Scared in belief of murder, and failing his oath to Congress, Left him tied up like a dog, by the neck, half hung, in the market. Helpless with cord-cut wrists to loose himself, and well guarded From the aid of the tender women, who alone would have dared, till the morning, That the market-folk might flout him. And lists of proscription proclaimed him Outlawed, stripped of all. Then at last, with his wife and daughter, H He left his home, his all,.and.Ked to tbe^roops for protection, Thankful for life and limb, till the ships sailed forth with the exiles To found a new nation with English hearts mid the frosts of Acadia, p^^ III. - After the voyages'perils, the tides and the fogs of Fundy, Tempests and merciless coasts, they came to the harbour majestic Scooped by the royal St. John from the forested rocks of Acadift* And, sailing under the islets, they breasted the Public han^jiag. And here the Loyalist exiles, THE FATHERS OF CANADA, landed, ' Resting eight days in the ships. A few log huts in the forest, Such was the city^hat greeted their eyes, their own habitations ^ Tents — later sheds ofthuts — then stout log-cabins — no framed house Saving the House af 'Oa4> A city of rock and forest. Hewn down in s»taj6t«i**(ftere strips for the tents — and with wild men and wild beasts, Yet in its depths. The rock and the forest have moulded the settlers, Staunch, bold men, defiant of &iorm, with the awe of the forest And its sheltering nature their own, who have made of the rock and the foreut Cities of men, that feed the hungry and house the homeless, Sent from less generous lands. At the birth of the Loyalist City, 1 •"*'((*ft«w.i»*«i.' >.» There were strange sights to pass, learned Judges, eloquent Lawyers| Merchants once housed like princes, Physicians of souls and bodies, Ragged or coarsely clad, felling trees or laying their log huts, Carrying or dragging burdens. There were stumps in the street, and of trading, Saving in labour or logs, there was none. One thought was in all minds, To live in stout huts well-lined, ere the anger of winter o'ertook them, Five thousand human souls, nigh all of them gently-nurtured. For the man who abandons all, for the sake of an oath or his conscience, Is not lie who has little to lose in goods or repute, but the highest !iT roBk^ ceptite and wealth, (as witness the Jacobites — chieftains. And men of oavalier birth). Pride thinksi and to Pride it is torture, To live in its own contempt, for the purchase of ease, and safety. Poverty tbkiks not, but worksi and freedom to labour in -safety. Freedom ta work at its natural-work, is its '^ed-^nd its rcuntry. This was in early days, ere the bounty of Britain had rendered His losies to each, and chosen the men who, bred Judges and Lawyers, Had marched at her regiments heads, the fathers of law in the new land. While the former rich and the formtjr poor were receiving their rations In food and clothing, and boards for roofs, and tools for the building. And Sherwood, erst voice of the Whigs, groaned that he, a principal merchant, Should be toiling with common men, the life of a peasant before him. f Was it for this he had stirred men's souls, and championed grievance, ' And written wild words to the King, that his words should recoil on.^j^>own head, - .^-n-™^^^^. ..y / jf^^9% i6 d **./^1 /s And the King be swept awAy with the'^^wroogs, and the tempest he'd wakened Tear his own roof from his head ? This life with all things in common, With all that makes life gentle and sweet swallowed up in the earthquake, ' This life, as a peasant mid peasants, was Hell. It were bttter to wandor Forth in the forest alone than to have these witnesses glaring Full in one's face, and so he hired an Indian to guide him To a place where a man might live by the fruits of the earth./ . jPi^arwater, : ' With its bounty of fish and berries, and the deer and the^liMt in the win^r, Was a whilom Melicetes' camp, abandoned for huntings more distant When the white men thronged to the river-mouth : and here the guide led hi A lake of glass-clihr water, the heart of a mountainous forest. With satellite lakes §{|ld a grassy peninsula, facing an island To break the storn:^:^f Jt^w kike. Vast treco, and the fairest of field-flowers ! The season wan Jufic^ji^d the land wore its summer smile; and the sad heart Of the fallen JDiv^ yeathe^llpr the rest of the place, and its barrier, A dozen leagues of dark forest tVtHIxt Pride, and all that reminded. % 1 ^ Grants were free to the asker, and the money concealed on his person. When he fled from his warehouse and home, sufficed to pay for the cartage Of the stores, tools and nails the Government gave, and for aid in the building Of the rude backwoodsma^s hut, with its one low room and an attic Stolen from the height of the roof; — for thus much Jonathan Sherwood • *7 Beyond the wont of backwoodsmen demanded, for wife and daughter. Of logs was the house, laid crosswise with turf-filled chinks ; and the doorway Narrow and low-; and the windows mere port-holes. I'he kitchen ceiling, Where they cooked and ate and lived, w..» barely the height of i's master. The daylight streamed through this ceiling — the floor of the attic, divided Into two dens, with a port-hole each, by a screen of birch bark. One for his d»U|;hta', and one for themselves, with a ladder for stairway. Just such a ci^V^ ohis ae^s in the depth of the Maskinonge forest With a'SWilrt.-bfetffbooted Canuck, his wife, grandm^re and a dozen Or score of l^refooted children, one born to a year. It was hither In the shining Canadian August, when days are fierce, and young children And delicate ladies yearn to the hills and the shore for shelter. They drove with what Governmtot gave, not a relic of all their abundance. Naked came they into the world, and almost as naked Went forth from their native land for freedom and life in Acadia. IV. Peaceful was Sherwood now, at his home in the beautiful forest. After the peril from hate, and the hardship and toil of removal, It was enough, when labour was o'er to sit where the sunset Bathed in its mellow warmth the grassy knoll, which the forest Left on one cape of the lake, a break in the mountain-rampart Bastioned round and heavily treed from the ridge to the water. i8 : 1, .,*... i':'^ i Here would he sit and review the storm^.whieh had burst on his country, And how he had helped to gather the thunder, forgetting what Scripture Foretells for the digger of pitfalls, and chide himself how in the lightning His home and his fortunes were blasted. > How he yearned, like the fallen Satan, For the heaven he hated and lost — the good days of Kingly oppression, Tory misgovernment, monstrous abuses, and — general welfare. So he would muse at eve, or resting mid toil, and then seizing - His axe, cleft like one possessed, or listlessly leaned on its handl^. ,: v'i Not so Dorothy ; little she recked of Whig or Tory, ^ Save that steel flashed out, and pistols rang, and old friendships , .. Ended in murderous words, and death by friends' hands thereafter ; %j Nor did she probe the loss of home and wealth like her father. Life to her so friendly^^had been, and care such a stranger. That she knew not 4he looks of want, when he came and stood naked before her. Jjfe^ And all in thl't^nsport had striven to lighten the hardships and forecasts Of one so lovely and young, and unsoiled by the sweat of trouble. \ Little she heeJed their straitened home with its three little chambers, Its peasants' fare ; for oft she had dreamed of the forestlife camping Friends less wealthy enjoyed, when the sun-blasted New York summer Drove forth the women and children and wealthier men, and her father , Felt that wealth was good, and his summer-home by the Hudson. -^ X^t Oft had she dreamed of escape from the ravening round of fashion, Which rolled with its Juggernaut wheels on the daily life of the Sherwoods, And envied her friends in the free wild life which wakens the body Out ot its city trance, and gives to the mind exhausted Change, called rest. , >sillilK»% To her it was rest — no changing of garments, Neither obsaPRftue^ time. Tho'oft she was downcast, beholding Her father bent with hts-wxies — her mother too poor for a servant. Toiling harder ^han servants, with none but herself as a helpmate, And, whites, for the brave boy-lover, who marched into life's stern battle With a smile and a tear and a bounding heart to make fortune his captive. And when her toils were done, or her Mother, with pulses of pity. Opened the bars, the forest and lake were a land of enchantments. Over all loved' she the lake with its walls of rock, in their vesture Of royal pifies and spruces and maples and silvery birches, Made g^, where a tree had fallen and its neighbours shared in its ruin. With flower and fruit festoons and draping of lichen and fungus. Right in the midst, that the lake might not lose its beauty in distance. Rose a noble isle, in shape like a slumbering lion Maned with pines — its flanks and paws of tawny-hued granite ; While on each side, as far as an active eye could wander. Cape and bay disputed the banks like the shores of the ocean. '^ J! ?iW SO "^ i .^ HeiftA Summer for better and worse! there was more.in the garden, more ccmf( Hewn with the axe by ingenious hands from spruce-wood and birch barkl But flour and pork were low, and money was none for the cartage^ X I .,.« 24 Of stores, which the Gov^rnwrSHt jgpl^e, to the distant wilds of Clearwater. And the clothes they tad \Moni £MM|iR»«r York— their all, for hatred had hurled them, Naked of all they possessed, save what their bruised hands could carr]^^ j And the clothes they receivea as settlers were rags for the hill-winds |o%pfl^ with. ... And Dorothy found htr rapture a butterfly, dead in one summer. - Forest and lake were a wilderness now, not a garden of Nature ' * Lost by the waters, blindfolded with woods, and jailed in by |||Si^eiiltfltafiAa, , . From all things \vhich make a home, would they die as;|l||ilf! children Of Israel ,^"' Who died in the forty years of their wanderings after Canaan ? Autumn dismayed^ them, the red Mephistopheles guise of the fcrest, The sickle-edged bx^th of the morning frost, and the wild whirr of duck's wings at foretold the return of the ravening winterfi'^ ' ^t hO^ to fii^^ wife and thy daughter, ri^ril^c^l^yself, than to see this monster devour them Par bH^ter to die by the hands of Revolters, Burnt ill' thy house or?4{p|)ed in the streets, or murdered in darkness, Than these torments culiii|iec^'ying Hell. S, Already three months in midwinter, Were signs Winter ! wi And die o: Inch by MBMliliiwwiiiii- 1 ill •;^^i*>f r .., And March and April to drag ere merciful May could unloosen The fetters of frost and snow ! Three months ! They were dead already. Had not the Indian braves, the magnanimous Melicete hunters Brought them Caribou-meat and dug a hole in the lake-ice. Five feet thick this vear, and schooled them in k' cping it open. V > But seldon^the Indians passed— and when the fish failed them, starvation Leered and gJipkujres. Now as the fourth day faded the wanderings of Israel ^l^tfe guerdoned And the Land of Promise was footed, and Jericho's ramflarts had fallen. But slowly these read the good things ; for Hunger had won in the battle. And when the twilight fell, they knew they should never wake, living, So they piled the logSrOn the fire that Death might slay only with hunger, And praying, at fitjMt .^ imni tones — then unheard — though their lips kept moving, Farewen:^.^48^y side^ihejr lay down to die in the darkness. • * At VI. Wild raeed the winter waves, and a great gale blew from the seaward. But the coastguard, pacing the fort which stands where the tides of Fundy And the mighty river wrestle and swirl round the Loyalist city, Made out a noble ship, that rose from beneath the horizon W 99 w Swift as the harvest moon, and waxed and waxed in her splendour. Nearer and nearer she flew, and tore through the threatening billows Fourteen knots to the hour. And, seen through his spy-glass, the streamer Fathoms long, blown out stiff as a sprit from her main-top gallant, And the b^utiful flag at her gaff, that spread like a sail in the tempest, Told the lynf** ^ip i and as closer she charged with her double-reefed topsails , !; Stretched :0ie #idnimrJKid:;-foaring, and making her creak and tremble, By tlife^nQiC>iiid iatift pawecl figure-head, he kn&tn Che world-famous Sea-lion, Ere the salulif : btichtd lorth from her Mack -and white sides to the fortress. Fearlessly ia ahe flew, tfaeaaen on tkft:ii»*crd> tiadaufited Furling vrith lightning speed i mid lastly m^ib' and a trysail Fell on the deck with a crash, as the anchors ran out from the hawseholcs, And thQ >beautiful frigate stopped and heaved, as a generous race-horse, Which has won the race of the year by the speed of its beautiful sinews, Stands a-quiver with foam-flecked sides. ."ii But aoon the quick heaving and plunging, Quietened to rise and sink, and the barge was lowered, and, bounding, Pulled to the Public Landing, where the Fathers op Canada landed. Last to step into the barge was one who sat in the stem-sheets. Bronzed, broad-shouldered and tall, all Hercules now, and no David. Troublous he seemed, and striding straight to the house of the Mayor,. . Asked ' for one Jonathan Sherwood — late Merchant of New York City?- >fc. ^^'' x:: 30 ,>":f. .4»-' ■-*'^- Parr-Lown grantee.' Bttttthc^ answer smote cruelly " Jonathan Sherwood Took up land in the forest a year last summer — not heard of Since he came down in the early Fall for his stores for the winter, V Settled at Clearwater lake, some forty odd miles in the backwoods, ' *? ., If indeed living at all, for the Carter who took his provisioos," Six months back in the fall, was, poor as he was, so dishestrtan^ - v By the poverty, loneliness, awe of the place, that he spent a day over .'^--f^s. ; Urging them back to the town. And the last four days have beMiN>iM|H(> "'->'' The cruellest days that the Hazens, the oldsst settlers, remeifi|||i^,,^/<^^ The bitterest frost, and the fiercest wind and the longest sndlMlnfki^** Lester bit his lip through, that no start could be made till4lM!i ^ming. I, But the hiring of men and sleighs and the packing of stetes for the journey Took much time, though the Mayor for the famous commander, Lester, Worked with a wiH himself and offered the hero sea captain Rest neath his rciof iof the night. §:» At dawn on the morrow morning. Forth they fardlt«nfi^E&||^oumey of toil, with its promise of peril. There stoo4 ft^j^ii^hr-sfel^ imth three horses and four stout spademen And a cariofe gJl^tiywith atfeilirtMns, the horses in Indian fashion. One in front cjliiicrodier. The sleigh had great stores for the journey. Food for titt lourney, Mid food for the Sherwoods, and drugs for the the ailing. The slei^ led the wajipto trample the track, the men in their deerskins. Moccasins, trousers and"fftnics, caps pulled over ears, and with mittens Made of skin without fingers for warmth, and with snowshoes slung on their shoulders, .:1 \ ^^^ 3^ Which soon as they left the city they bound on their feet, and leaping Forth on the snow, outpaced the sleigh as the hunter in wintrr Runs down the Caribou, sunk at each step to its fetlocks or belly. Lester, equipped like the rest, left the Cariole empty, his spirit Loved the front of the fight, and he wished to work with his spademen, Guiding, encouraging, forcing advance at best speed : so they started Just as tim clock struck eight, and by noon were three parts through their journey. For as Heaven ordained it» the Scotsmen who moved up the river After tke samiQer-fire, the veteran Forty-Seconds, Met thienk hard by the town, with a French train seeking provisions : And the Cleemilftter road, three parts, waa the road to the Highlanders' village : Therefore the track was ao plain, so dear of drifts, ao well trampled. That sldi^ and cariole flew with a merry chime of their stoigh-bells. The snowriieers darting, like lizards on wallls that were ancient ere Caesar Sailed to the savage isle, which has filled the Earth with its grandeur Of humanity, progress and power, and has built up great civilised nations In continents Rome never dreamed of. The sleighs and snowshoers glided Over the pure white snow that rose beside them in ramparts. Topped with brush like the temple walls in the marvellous cities Built by a byegone race, and lost ere historical ages In the forests of Yucatan. The air was chill as an iceberg, Glittering as ice, for the storm had passed and the heavens were doodiess. i i w m I 32 At noon they halted fbr food. It was here that the tracks divided, And theirs was hid in a watt of snow, and ' twas best for the spademen To work with good Hoarts and iuH stomachs. And then they started in earnest> The lumber sleigh trampling a road, and the spademen digging out horses Oft as they sank in the snow ; and when they plunged tn a anow^ft, Where a fire had swept the forest and the wind could ravage unhinderf^. Tunneling cuttings through. Now the clouds were beginning to daiken* While they were eating their food ; and the storm blew up ; and the snow fcll Thicker and thicker, the wind, which cut through their coalt like an ice Made, Blinding them with its flurries, and piling the snow ; and Ul# men's hearts Threatened to fail, but Lester leapt forth and reheartened them, working, A. One with the strength of three in dra^^ng out sunken horses And digging through drifts, that rose like hills in the track before them. Encouragement f orders ! threats I and the feats of a giant ! but seemed it Beyond the enduraflee of man to reach this hut in the forest. Three leagues yct;:a0iiRi hour had lapsed and lot they had traversed Barely one iii^<-"and the storm was undoing their labour behind them, Leavinf* tilt %lit to km lemgKt afresh, if their task was accomplished. And the wteter'#qr And yourig, atrt- the night grew bitter and wrathful. And houft aiirce suflked for miles — 'twas a miracle sure that the carter Who todk up the stores the to lake, and had come as the lumber-sleighs' driver, Cunning backwoodsman that he was, should scent the direction. Only the instinct that leads the horse, unridered in battle, 33 Home to his barrack afar, and the stolen dog to his master, Told him the road that night : for the trees were uncut save a stray one Standing midway in an opening that Nature had left for a roadway ; And the Stars were, muffled in storm, and the wheel-ruts lost in the snow- drift ; And strong men bogan to murmur " we have lost the road ! we have passed it ! We have oof ^^tm s^ad children ! for us too life has its promise." But the carter swore ** not yet have we traversed the distance, and surely Thii ia the w*y." :i«r-* And Lester, his great love burning within him. The love which had been his beacon for ten long years on the waters, Through all hit battles and storms, had pictured the love of his boyhood Buried aKve in a snow-whelmed house with her eoft cheeks paling With terror and harsh, coarse- food — the pork amd the beans and potatoes, — And swore that the sleighs should go on ; and that he who would forward no further Must stop in the snow — swift, certain death — and when he, who was loathcst Snatched the reins in an open place from the carter, to turn them. Seized him with one strong hand, and swung him into the snowdrift, Twelve good feet from the sleigh, and, drawing a well-primed pistol, "This" he said "for the next who lays hands on the reins, or the carters." ^ So they toiled against hope, and hoped against Fate, until midnight ^ ^^m Slipped past them toiling still, and barely three leagues from their hallin^v -^^m Though the storm had passed, and the sky was unclouded amethyM^ii^wkness. Still they toiled — then joy — for, shading his eye, the ship-captain, >iki I^x. lit ', 34 With a glance, that hight watches at aea fur friends ur fues in the darkncvSB, As perilous one well nigh as the other — descried in the distance, Spark faintly following spark, and he knew that their quest was accomplished. Not so his mayhap — ^for the fearful heart of a lover > ' Dreams a thousand mishaps that shall wither his joy, as he grasps it. Even then an hour had well nigh passed ere they reached it, And tore down the snow from the door, while the mighty heart, thtH in battle And peril of reef or storm, faced death like a pastime, w|l 'ArunuBing The trembling ribs of a coward at the stillness of death ^B the house-hold. Bolted fast was the door from the weather's wrath, tmd the summons' Rapped out once, twice, thrice, brought no answer ; and batter the door down None dare on siieh a night for they knew they should need it thereafter. Rap on, thunder, Despair 1 and thunder again ! Then listen ! Listen for all youff.livei^ not so much as a shiver to rustle, Lest ye shouI# ffiM^.tlle stir that tells of the half-aroused sleeper! Listen I jhiiwftcr t listen I Ah )(^ ! for a trembling footstep, — These be wcnk ^ande tlM^4»» >tM). weak for drawing a doorboltl Hark! ano^er tremble 1 Another tremulous footstep — The creak of a wooden bolt — then bliss — and dread — and a meeting! An old man swaddled in rags — he had slept in his rags to foster The spark of vital warmth that starvation and stinting of blankets Sucked from his veins, a spectre with wild blue eyes, and its features, The resolute clear cut features of Jonathan Sherwood, crumpled \ 3S Out of all shape, and lost in a grizzled-red tangle of eyebrow Beard and hair matted together — the eye flashing out of the tangle, Like the eyes of the grizzly bear in the dark, whom the Indian hunter Braves in his den for the necklace of claws — his Order of Valour. And see two hollow-cheeked women, one aged ere old, and the other Shrink to a shadow of youth, like a seedling drawn up by the sunlight, Trembling with hunger and terror and cold, and pale as a victim Waked in a burning garret to find the last stairway has fallen. But Dorotbyf Dorothy living 1 A shriek of You — She is lying Still and dead in his arms. Ah I Lester, undaunted hero Of a hundred hand-to-hand fi^ts, hast thou courage lor this ? O Courage, Strange thy caprices 1 the man, who trembled in doubt, when the answer. Coming not, held him in doubt, when he holds her dead, is as steady As though he were fighting his ship. " Quick, brandy ! " he cries, and unloosens The strain on Jier throat, and refuses the snow, which kind hands offer swiftly To thrust down her back for the shock. " Nay, bring the chain from the waggon The chain is cold as the snow, and wets not." The freezing iron Burning the warmth of her spine, the scorch in her throat from the brandy Open the faint blue eyes — she lives, thank Heaven ! and tenders Feeble hands to her lover. Meanwhile her father and mother, ... *,*r™JK-.Hi.- .. [JI-UI^ , Li ^M^ Hill's, 36 Sat like corpses themselves, stunned prey in the fangs of starvation. Seeing Jonathan Sherwood, steek, purse-proud, satisfied merchant. Ten years ago, could a poet dream such an irony ? Look you, The Sherwoods starving in rags in a peasant's hut in the fore«?t. The threshold half filled with snow, and by the light of a sleigh-Ir.mp, Wild men, muffled in skins, reviving their worshipped datightcr And they too listless or feeble to stir ? ^ But Dorothy, called btek. Clasped in the arms of her lover and kissed, and kissed, but so ge»tly Lest he should bruise the frail life, as a child with too eager ftaj^erli Crushes the beautiful moth, which he covets, and catches triumphant, Dorothy, felt the flood of life surging up in the channelar, Late like low-tide in Fundy, and leaning on Lester besought him, " Save my father tnd mother, or Hunger will slay them ere morning." Lester, ten years biribved by sieged soldiers and castaway sailors. Came with his Mtiiillitfrteady. Meanwhile, without, the two carters Had loosed ^Am tMrna^ftsiBt thjs sleighs that the horses* animal instinct Might be free to save them alive, till they threw up a shelter. * The horses Followed them loose to the wood, where sharp axes and skilful woodsmen Swiftly made screens of boughs, with the natural screen of t^? forest, Sufficient to keep them alive, while their masters tramped back to the cabin. And, dragging their stores inside, fast bolted the door on the weather. Finding the fire replenished, and the starved folk feeding by inches, tifmmm 3; And their fellows eating like giants, [they had none of them eaten since noonday, Fifteen hours well nigh : so long had three leagues with the snowdrifts Fought their advance.] All night they rested, and slept like sailors Three days and nights in a storm, each man with each muscle defending The ship against wind and wave, when they reach their desired haven. The sun shone brightly in, ere they woke, and found a blue heaven And the wind calmed down to a breeze. Then breaking their fast, the ^ three saved ones [Saved from themselves, as it seemed by cruelty, Lester restraining, With a doctor's inflexible will, the wolves which clamoured within them For food, food, food;] apportioned their doses of liquid, And the sturdy, skin-clad woodsmen, once more, devouring like giants. .,.#R: They tramped to the shelter and saw their horses sound : and reharnesscd. Nought but their stores they took, then making all fast from the weather Packed the sleighs, the old folks in the woodsleigh, rolled up in sheepskins. Well watched by the valiant and kindly though rudely- visaged backwoodsmen, Lester with Dorothy, back in the cariole, tenderly watching. But ready if danger threatened to spring to the front, or if need were To outstrive all in the snow, though anxious in every free moment To watch the beloved one and bafHe the cold with a hundred devices. Ere he had wrapped her to bear to the sleigh, he had held her at hands-stretch, I! 38 With her wan cheeks wild-rosed with love, and the hair, which fingers enfeebled Dreaded to dress, hanging down — an arms length of tangled sunshine. In waves on sweet neck and sweet brow, and shrouding the tender glances Surrendered by timid blue eyes. It fell on the garments of buckskin, Daintily fashioned, embroidered with quills in ihe patterns most honoured, Ail choice skins, craftily tanned, and supple as French queen's-gauntlets. Wrought by the deftest squaws, and brought for the gentle and lovely By the pitying sons of the forest, beholding the tattery vesture Which the storms of the driving Fall beat through like dead leaves on the Maples. Tunic and huntress's skirt, fringed leggings and moccasins brought they, The daintiest each of their kind, the moccasins matched to the slight foot From its delicate print in the sand by the mouth of the brook, where she sported In the happy summer days through the limpid pools of the shallows. Graceful the moccasined feet, bound closely at instep and ankle For warmUi, as when stockinged in lace in their exquisite satin slippers 1 hey half hovered, half danced in the ffiinuet with a fairy's flower-lightness. So thought Lester that morn, and the soft free robes of the red men Showed the soft grace of her slender shape, as he whispered, more truly Than tb« costliest clinging silken dress she had worn in a ball-room. The child of the forest was his. Before her father and tyrant She had flung herself in his arms— had been kissed to life, and had hailed him As You, the one You in the world. ^«v. ^. 39 How tenderly back in the cari(^e, Under the sheepskin apron thrown over them both, he had wrapped her In the softest and thickest skins, and chafed her hands and revived her With sips and sips of broth, from a phial thrust in his bosom — The only warmth that defied the frost. Oh ! The way it was weary. Weary to Jom^llanp Sherwood, his wife, and the staunch backwoodsmen. For the snow kitbe Mght h$id drifted deep in the breaks of the forest Making toil for the^wooden ^lovels, or they had to dig out the horses. For the ne¥;<or«now was soft, and the track they had made half-buried. But to Lestef^e three leagues flew like racing, and ere he remembered They were striking the Scotsmen's f«4ad by the mif^y Acadian river. They halted < foi* four hours Ib^, and the MM, made hunger imperious. And the road was so heavily drifted, and deedwood was handy for firing, Needed to thaw their food : and they ate, after throwing their sheepskins Over the' horses, their saviours, to keep them alive while they halted But the drifts rose hillock-high, for this was the end of the forest, Since the river in years gone by had run through a lake, and vast meadows Held its dried bosom with hardly a tree, and the shovellers shuddered : — ^ Well-nigh ten leagues to be traversed ! and thre'^, when they all were fresher. Had cost them fifteen hours, and Lester, the hardiest toiler. Having no doul^ in his mighty heart of the sledges' safe-huming, 1 Doubted yet if the Sherwoods, the old above all, though his heart beat Loudest for her he loved, could endure the endless exposure Of a second day out in the cold ; and, inspired by his heart, ascended I- 4« Bit;; iii With swift sailor feet » pkie { when lo ! before him the river, The fair, Iake^sQ|ned St; John ; and he knew that the saow there was shallow, For where the ice was packed, it peaked through the crust, and where «ddies Kept the swirled waters unfrozen, the wall of snow round the edges Rose so low: then he clambered down, and, hailing the cajrtcn, Asked if they dared the river with its perils o ' -M currents^ *^ Oft roofed over with snow — sure death to all wh the trap caught. ^ And both, with accord, cried " Yes," and the shovellers, working like firemen. Cleft them a path to the river, and out with a cheer, half de%U)ce, And a cracking of whips, they leapt on the ice and swept ttfllfrMaward Racing, over the ice, as it seemed, after battling the snoAvififtft. And on and on they dashed, the ice oft cracking beneath them, When it arched over broken water, and the packed ice ready to fling them ^^ Out on this side (it that, as the hurrying runners struck it. And last, when the di»sk had deepened, they heard a low faraway thunder. Like the rush of a ct^gh^^JtH, and they knew they were nearing that portent. That dragon's fanr #itfeits walls of rock and its rock-ridge threshold, Over whi0itrtlni» in t&s^^y Iklis the flood of the sea on the river. And twice ia tiito-do forth, thus far and farther, to witness The giants' deeds of thp storm, and soon they were clattering bravely Over the forest of Portland and into the Mj^ets of the city ;;Up to the principal inn, where the bustle of sledges unloading And the spoken-out words of applause drew t eoncourse of citizens quickly. ■m Once in the inn, the old folks were straight in their beds and physiciancd. But Dorothy sat by the fire in the inn-keeper's parlour, blushing Half for her Indian robes and half for her sailor lover. Standing out there in the hall making glad the rescuers party With largess of foreign gold ; for while England was fighting together Her Colonists, French and Dutch and Swedes and Spaniards and Russians, There was many a prize afloat at sea for adventurous seamen, And Lester, a proverb for daring, in brig, then corvette, then frigate Had captured and captured and captured right under the enemy's fort-guns Till he was rich. And when peace was declared, he had sent in his papers. 43 Soon as his ship was paid eff last summer, and taken his passage, Straight for New York, wfurf the Sherwoods, staunch Whigs were enjoyinf^ their triumph. Judge of his grief when he found them proscribed, and in frozen Acadia! His Majesty's Frigate Sea-lion, the ^hip which had borne him from BngFand, Carried him down to St. John, to miss them, but, thanks be to Hi(iaren, Dorothy, safe at last, was awaiting the arms of her lover Blushing and smiling with happy tears. The long cold journey Had fled like a dream of delight — the cold had no mastcry-Hftronger And stronger each minute she grew, and between the imlled over frost-cap And the great cloak-collar turned up, two tender eyes had been sparkling, A pleading mouth told its mute tale, the pale face reflowered with pleasure. And a golden trtSs escaped as she hung on the words of her lover. '%" No need here to letount the bliss of the lovers, how Tester Won her to tdA liir' klire, and told his, and told her his story, How, wbea he left har tict night, he had gone to the friendly commander Of the Kin^^'a skip- moored ill the