The Call of the Mountains Part 2

But still was left the little Saxon church, Unchanged save that the Norman owner gave New consecration in his patron's name, St. Martinus of Tours, a warrior saint Who guarded through the centuries his race.

Then in the War of Roses came the crash That brought extinction to the feudal name And desolation to its crumbling home.

And yet, though scarred by time and gray with age, The little church of Saxon days remained The emblem of a never-dying faith.

The years rolled by and then there came a day Which gave a new possessor to the place, A n.o.bleman in favour with that queen Who loved a witty tongue and ready sword When coupled with good looks and brave attire.

He built a great Elizabethan pile, The ground-plan shaped to form the royal E, Conforming to the fashion of the times When loyalty spoke even from silent stone.

And he, to please his lady's pious whim, (Though ten years wed, he called her Sweetheart still) Forbore to raze the chapel to the ground, But stayed with flying b.u.t.tress either side, Repaired the roof and made it to her mind.

And there they lie, both in one marble tomb On which their effigies with clasping hands Bear witness to an everlasting love.

And when vacation brings its hours of rest I sometimes sit within the Saxon church And muse upon the changes time has brought Save to the faith that reared the little shrine, And still builds churches "in Fayre Jesu's name."

Winter

'Tis winter and the darkening skies Awake regretful memories Of wooded hill and sunlit plain, Ringing with anthems to the sun Until his arching course was run And nightingales took up the strain.

The trees, then dense with leaves and flowers, Stood through the long and smiling hours, Housing an honest little folk, Throbbing with life by day and night, Whose voices, vibrant with delight, Of happy labour ever spoke.

The trees now spread their haggard arms, Bared of their pristine, leafy charms, To cold and unresponsive skies That neither smile nor weep, but chill With cold indifference, and kill Hope that all nature underlies.

A dreary moan floats on the wind From the gaunt oaks, that, ill defined, Show spectral shapes against the sky From which the fleeting day has flown While dead leaves on the earth are strown To mark the summer's mortuary.

Where are the thousand things of life That erstwhile made the place all rife With busy hum and restless wing And turmoil of a world of love?

The blackbird on her nest above, Below, the beetle tunnelling.

Gone with the happiness I knew Because the heavens were always blue, While the sun shone from day to day And winter was not. 'Twas as far And nebulous as yonder star That throws its cold and sickly ray

Where once a glorious flood of light Ceased only with the falling night.

Gloom hovers where triumphant joy Beatified each pa.s.sing hour, For Winter now with ruthless power Fulfils its mission to destroy.

_The Voice of Winter._

"I bring not death but rest to flower and tree, "And nurse the flame divine, Vitality, "That burns immortal since primeval night "When the Creator said: 'Let there be light!'

"And loosed the sun upon his blazing way "To roll for ever through an endless day."

Pain and Death

Amid the fields of Asphodel Musing one day by chance, Imperious Jove Let memory rove And turned his gaze austere To where Arcadian shepherds dwell, The land of song and dance, Where Death was not And Time forgot To send the rolling year: Where man, untried by trouble's test, Found the supreme of life in rest.

Immortal man without a care Rivalled the G.o.ds above: Free, effortless, In sheer idlesse Aping divinity.

So he was made by Jove to share A mortal life and love By anguish tried And purified For Death's cold sanct.i.ty.

Thus 'twas ordained that Death and Pain Should raise man to a n.o.bler plane.

Switzerland

Land of mountain, lake and river, Waterfalls, and rushing streams By the wayside where the cattle Gather with their bells a-ringing, In the day's departing beams.

Land of glorious dawns and sunsets, Glowing shades of every hue, Mists enchanted, floating, rising, Fine-spun softness, tints Olympian, Regal purple, virgin blue.

Tinkling zither, echoing jodel, Horns that loudly hail the morn From the upland's stony pathways Where the snowline meets the outposts Of the forest, spa.r.s.e and lorn.

Nether tracts by sunlight heated, Show the vines in serried rows, Basking through the drowsy summer Till their rich and generous vintage From the wine-press redly flows.

Land of mountain peaks stupendous, Lakes that fade to meet the sky!

Land for G.o.ds, for dreaming poets, Fit for men of soaring greatness, Sons of gifted ancestry.

G.o.ds I found not, neither poets, Only little men who toil To supply the pa.s.sing stranger, Bound upon the wheel of pleasure, With the produce of the soil.

What would Bonivard or Calvin Think of you, my little men, With your minds on money turning, While you strain with itching fingers Fast the golden calf to pen?

Yet I love your honest peasants Dwelling on the mountain slope, Slow and stolid, yet the children Of the spirit born of freedom, Of the patience born of hope.

For among these humble toilers, From the grasping instinct free, Still we find the cheerful-hearted, Earnest, honest Switzer people With the old simplicity.

Burial at Sea

'Twas midnight in the southern seas And windless. On the placid deep Flashed sparkling phosph.o.r.escences, While moonbeams, bright in silver bars, Lay like a pathway to the stars.

Tireless, our engines, day and night, A month had throbbed their endless round Without a pause to mark time's flight.

We heard it all unconsciously Till suddenly it ceased to be.

For now the slowing pulse that beat, Stopped in the vessel's iron breast And quickly changed my slumber sweet To wandering and uneasy thought Of what the midnight might have brought.

Gaining the deck, I looked around With drowsy eyes and half asleep, And saw a something wrapped and bound And weighted. I was standing near Some hapless seaman's simple bier.

A shapeless form in canvas lay, Stretched on a wooden grating low, Waiting the word to pa.s.s away Into the silent depths of sea And boundless realm of fantasy.

Before the bulwark's opening stood A group about a lantern's light Moveless like figures carved in wood, Whilst one with gruff solemnity, Read prayers for those who die at sea.

Then at the end, with sudden leap, That sent the sparkling water high, The body plunged into the deep Amid a million points of light That glittered as it sank from sight.

Scarce had a moment pa.s.sed, before The men with silent haste had gone: The engines plied their task, once more, The ship her steady course pursued Across the moonlit solitude.

The morning dawned, the hours pa.s.sed by And life on board from day to day Was changeless as the sea and sky.

And so unreal the memory seemed I wondered if I had not dreamed.