John Campbell

From our Dominion never Take Thy protecting hand, United, Lord, for ever

Ah! must we part, my darling? O let the days be few, Until your dear returning

"Are hearts here strong enough to found A glorious people's sway?" Ask of our rivers as they bound

We stood, as the helmeted horsemen Formed up in the light of the sun; We knelt, stretching bayonets towards them

Lo, a castle, tall, lake-mirrored, Ringed around by mountain forms, Roofless, ruined, still defying

"Did earth ever see On thy prairie's line Tribes older than thine,

Spake one upon the vessel's prow, before The sinking sun had kissed the glittering seas: "'Twas here Columbus with his Genoese

Oh, dear to old Dunolly's heart His darling daughter seemed, Yet when she fled, how pitiless

Oft the savage Tale in telling Less of Love than Wrath and Hate, Hath within its fierceness dwelling

(From The Gaelic) The Hern at early morning cries, Where at Sleve-gail the meadow lies.

Does death cleanse the stains of the spirit When sundered at last from the clay, Or keep we thereafter till judgment,

(Translated From The Gaelic. Taken down in Gaelic by Dewar.) King Arthur on a journey went, His men and he on hunting bent.

Is it Man alone who merits Immortality or death? Each created thing inherits

Part I. Dark, with shrouds of mist surrounded. Rise the mountains from the shore,

Yon vale among the mountains, So sheltered from the sea, That lake which lies so lonely,

Cherry bloom and green buds bursting Fleck the azure skies; In the spring wood, hungering, thirsting,

A ceaseless, awful, falling sea, whose sound Shakes earth and air, and whose resistless stroke Shoots high the volleying foam like cannon smoke!

With their deep voice, monotonous and slow, The cannon's thunders roll along the sea; But 'tis in reverence, and to work no woe

Among white peaks a rock, hewn altar-wise, Marks the long frontier of our mighty lands. Apart its dark tremendous sculpture stands,

[This Province was called after the Princess, one of whose Christian names is Alberta.] In token of the love which thou hast shown For this wide land of freedom, I have named

Best beloved of ancient stories Are our Diarmid's woes to me. Like a mist, by breezes broken,

A moment's pause before we play our parts, To speak the thought that reigns within your hearts.-- Now from the Future's hours, and unknown days,

O fortress city, bathed by streams Majestic as thy memories great, Where mountains, floods, and forests mate

1. We have poled our staunch canoe Many a boiling torrent through;

Wet, cheerless was our bivouac last eve, but still we spoke Of fighting and of winning, to-morrow, when day broke: That day the thundering echoes of cannon in our front

Grey-cowled monk, whose faith so earnest Guides these Indians' childlike hearts, As their hands to toil thou turnest,

[Note: The Gaelic spelt as by Dewar.] Do reir beulaithris ann an linn Righ Artair bhi ann an Duneidean, bha Triath urramach Eirinneach a chuir tigh d'dean air

Here Rose and Magnolia Our dearest enshrine, The prayer of the south wind

Not home to land and kindred wast thou brought, Nor laid 'mid trampled dead of battle won,-- Nor after long life filled with duty done

Morning, lighting all the prairies, Once of old came, bright as now, To the twin cliffs, sloping wooded

An ancient cannon, finely cast. Of bronze, all smooth and green with age, A by-gone actor on the stage,

I. Where the snow-world of the mountains Fronts the sea-like world of sward,

[Taken from "Leabhar na Feinne," and a prose version written down from oral recitation by J. Dewar.] OSSIAN. This vale of Peace, this glen close by,

For strife against the ocean tribe The Mohawks' war array Comes floating down, where broad St. John

Now of the hard strait of the Feinne this legend's verse shall tell: When Fionn's men had fought and won, and all with them was well, And victory on Erin's shores had given spoil which they

Look not for me at eventide, I cannot come when work is done; I go to wander far and wide,

"They sow in tears who reap in joy," Was truly said of old: We wandered far, but round us still

Bright are the countless isles which crest With waving woods wide Huron's breast,-- Her countless isles, that love too well

A brother's eye had seen the grief That Duart's lady bore; His boat with sail half-raised flies down

(Keewatin.) A land untamed, whose myriad isles Are set in branching lakes that vein

Colin, Chief of Diarmid's kin, Strode alone to Ederlinn. Night, and heath, and deep morass

The Noon-Sun prayed a prairie rose To blanch for him her blossom's hue, But to the Plain all love she owes;

[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,

There's a warrior hunting o'er prairie and hill, Who in sunshine or starlight is eager to kill, Who ne'er sleeps by his fire on the wild river's shore,

In the vapour and haze on the ocean, Where the skies and the waters meet, There's a form that drifts, phantom-like, onward

For a while the salt brine leaves me O'er my terraced rocks to fall, And my broad swift-gliding waters

Milicete Legend Of The Ouangond', Or River St. John. Though the ebbing ocean listens To Ugond''s throbbing roar,

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,