E.J. Pratt: Complete Poems 9781442674165

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EJ. PRATT: COMPLETE POEMS PART 1

E.J. Pratt, 1939, by Barker Fairley

EJ. PRATT

Complete Poems Parti

Edited by Sandra Djwa and R.G. Moyles

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS Toronto Buffalo London

www.utppublishing.com University of Toronto Press 1989 Toronto Buffalo London Printed in Canada ISBHN 0t8020-5775-6

Printed on acid-free paper

Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Pratt, E.J. (Edwin John), 1882-1964 Complete poems (The Collected works of E.J. Pratt) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-8020-5775-6 (set) I. Djwa, Sandra, 1939. II. Moyles, R.G. (Robert Gordon), 1939. III. Title. IV. Series: Pratt, E.J. (Edwin John), 1882-1964. The collected works of E.J. Pratt. ps8531.R3A171989 c811'.52 PR9199.2.P73A17 1989

c88-093068-3

This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Publication has also been assisted by the Canada Council and the Ontario Arts Council under their block grant programs.

To Claire Pratt and in memory of Viola Pratt

THE COLLECTED WORKS OF EJ. PRATT GENERAL EDITORS: SANDRA DJWA and R . G . MOYLES

The aim of this edition is to present a critical annotated text of the collected works of E.J. Pratt - complete poetry; selected prose and correspondence - fully collated and with a textual apparatus that traces the transmission of the text and lists variant readings.

EDITORIAL COMMITTEE

Robert Gibbs, Susan Gingell, Lila Laakso, David G. Pitt ADVISORY BOARD

Claude Bissell, Robert Brandeis, Peter Buitenhuis, Northrop Frye, Douglas Lochhead, Jay Macpherson, Claire Pratt, Malcolm Ross

Contents

October, 1918 43 Amerongen 44 NOTES ON THE TEXT xlix ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS liii The Hidden Scar 45 BIOGRAPHICAL CHRONOLOGY lv In Memoriam 45 Overheard by a Stream 46 'Blow! Winds, and Roar!' 47 A Poem on the May Signals 48 Examinations 3 Carlo 49 The Wind of the West 7 In Absentia 52 The Secret of the Sea 8 The Flood-Tide 53 Unseen Allies 9 Evening 9 The Pine Tree 53 Sea Variations 54 The Sacrifice of Youth 10 Dead on the Field of Honour 10 The Ice-Floes 58 The Seed Must Die 11 The Ground Swell 63 The History of John Jones 63 The Greater Sacrifice 12 For Valour 14 A Student's Prayer at an The Great Mother 17 Examination 65 In Lantern Light 65 The Sea-Shell 18 Rachel: A Sea Story of The Shark 66 Newfoundland in Verse 20 The Decision 67 The Largess of 1917 37 The Toll of the Bells 68 Dawn 39 Magnolia Blossoms 69 The Dear Illusion 40 The Fog 70 Invocation 40 The Big Fellow 70 The Wooden Cross 41 The Morning Plunge 71 INTRODUCTION XI

viii Contents Loss of the Steamship Florizel 72 The Drowning 72 Overheard in a Cove 73 The Passing of Jerry Moore 84 The Bird of Paradise 90 The Epigrapher 91 Ode to December, 1917 93 Newfoundland 99 A Coast 101 Morning 102 Great Tides 103 The After-Calm 103 Scenes from Afar 104 A Dirge 106 Come Not the Seasons Here 108 On the Shore 109 Before a Bulletin Board 109 Before an Altar no Snowfall on a Battlefield no In a Beloved Home 111 Fragment from a Story 112 Comrades 125 The Frost Over-Night 126 The Lie 127 One Hour of Life 127 The Last Survivor 128 The Drag-Irons 128 Tokens 128 The Ritual 129 To an Enemy 130 The Witches'Brew 131 The Cachalot 150 Tatterhead 165 The Sea-Cathedral 167 The Great Feud 168

Cherries 203 The Lee-Shore 204 The Iron Door: An Ode 204 An Awakening 213 Old Age 214 A Prairie Sunset 215 The Convict Holocaust 216 Whither? 216 The Lost Cause 217 Blind 217 Sea-Gulls 218 The Child and the Wren 218 The Roosevelt and the Antinoe 219 To Angelina, an Old Nurse 249 The Fugitive 252 Doors 252 For Better or Worse 253 Time-Worn 253 Erosion 254 At a Sanitarium 254 Water 255 Dreams 255 The Highway 256 The Armistice Silence 257 The 6000 257 From Stone to Steel 260 The Depression Ends 261 Putting Winter to Bed 268 A Reverie on a Dog 273 Bereft 281 The Man and the Machine 282 The Mirage 282 The Way of Cape Race 283 Out of Step 284 A Puzzle Picture 284 The Parable of Puffsky 285

ix Contents A Legacy 286 A Feline Silhouette 287 Frost 287 A November Landscape 288 Magic 288 Horizons 289 Jock o' the Links 289 The Pursuit 290 The Empty Room 291 Like Mother, Like Daughter 292 A Prayer-Medley 293 The Text of the Oath 297 To Any Astronomer 298

The Mystic 299 The Seer 299 Fire 300 The Prize Cat 301 The Weather Glass 302 The Titanic 302 TEXTUAL VARIANTS AND EMENDATIONS 339 ANNOTATIONS 365 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 405 INDEX OF TITLES IN PARTS 1 AND 2 410

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Introduction

E.J. Pratt is widely acknowledged as Canada's most influential modern poet, yet until now we have lacked a complete text of his poems and much of the biographical and literary background helpful for a full understanding of his work. When Pratt retired from the University of Toronto in the fifties a selection of his poems was generally available; Macmillan in 1944 had published the Collected Poems, basically a selected edition, containing the poems by which he wished to be remembered. This edition was reissued in the United States by Alfred Knopf in 1945 with an introduction by William Rose Benet. A decade later in 1958 Northrop Frye edited The Collected Poems of E.J. Pratt, again a selected edition, and wrote a fine introduction which has led our generation to Pratt's work. The poet's reputation, achieved in the 1940s and 1950s, has been consolidated in the last thirty years. Widespread popular acceptance, and obvious echoes of Pratt's voice in the work of younger poets, have created a demand for the publication of the complete poems - a call for such an edition was made at the 1976 Pratt Symposium at the University of Ottawa. The demand, however, has come when Pratt's poetry is almost unavailable. Not only are all editions, including both editions of Collected Poems, out of print, but most existing copies of the original limited editions are confined to rare book rooms. This edition of E.J. Pratt: Complete Poems has been prepared in response to this need and is intended to provide a definitive reading text for both the general reader and the specialist, supplemented by an introduction and appendices

xii Introduction offering additional information. It is part of The Collected Works of E.J. Pratt, a project undertaken in 1982 to celebrate the centenary of the poet's birth. I

Edwin John Pratt was born on 4 February 1882 in Western Bay, Newfoundland, to the Reverend John Pratt, an English Methodist, and Fanny Knight, the daughter of a Newfoundland sea captain. Because his father moved frequently from charge to charge, the boy grew up in a succession of small Newfoundland Outports. Life in these small villages by the sea was then incredibly harsh, not very different from the conditions prevailing when the Elizabethans first colonized Newfoundland. Like their forebears, the men of the outports were fishermen, surviving a barter economy where codfish and seals were exchanged for flour, sugar, and tea. It was a precarious existence, or so it seemed to the boy, a life in which the winds along that coast brought not only the 'bread of life' but also the ' waters of death.' As he later wrote: Tide and wind and crag, Sea-weed and sea-shell And broken rudder And the story is told of human veins and pulses, of eternal pathways of fire ...

('Newfoundland,' p 101)

The 'broken rudder' is synecdoche for a broken ship (and broken bodies) and 'fire' a metaphor expressing both the vigour of man's struggle against the elements and the energy of life itself. It is this saga of death at sea and its opposite, the struggle for life, to which Pratt returns again and again in the early verse collected here. He is, above all, a story-teller, and the story which he tells is an increasingly bleak one: the loss of an only son in Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland in Verse, the loss of sixty sealers in The Ice-Floes,' the loss of faith in The Toll of the Bells.'

xiii Introduction Pratt comes naturally to his role as a public poet, for the record of Newfoundland outport life is oral rather than written and the vehicle's folk song or folk tale. The folk song chronicles the vicissitudes of community life - its tragedies, as in The Wreck of the Steamship Florizel' (on which Pratt also wrote), and its 'sprees,' as in The Kelligrew's Soiree': O, there was birch rind, tar twine, cherry wine and turpentine, Jowls and cavalanches, ginger beer and tea, Pigs' feet, cats' feet, dumplings boiled up in a sheet Dandelion and crackie's teeth at the Kelligrew's soiree.1 To judge from Pratt's later reminiscences and the semi-autobiographical Rachel (1917), he quickly internalized the rollicking measures of the Newfoundland ballad and, from his grandfather, Captain William Knight, he absorbed 'Sagas of the Gulf of Labrador,' stories of the sea with their superstitious lore of 'sun-hounds' and 'sea-shags.' This oral and topical impulse towards verse was to be augmented by current history, especially the events of two world wars, and by the poet's conviction that a modern 'realist,' for so he considered himself, must document his subject. As glimpsed in Victorian photographs, Pratt is a small, squarefaced boy with a head far too large for his body. Subject to rheumatic fever, he was frequently ill, a willing truant from the cramped, one-room schools. But whether at home or reading and dreaming by the sea, his imagination found outlet in books. Through texts like the old Royal Readers he developed a taste for romantic poetry and for rousing sea poems and ballads like 'Drake's Drum,' The Chesapeake and the Shannon,' and The Battle of the Baltic.' In his father's library, he studied the Bible, Shakespeare, Milton, Bunyan, and Carryle.2 In 1893, when the family moved briefly to St John's, he attended the Methodist College for two years. A bright but indifferent student, he distinguished himself only by writing some doggerel about one of his teachers.3 Two years later he returned to the outports of his father's new charge and attended the village school.

xiv Introduction There may be a fair amount of biographical humour - an older Pratt looking back at a younger self - in the Old Salt's memories of young Pedley in 'Overheard in a Cove': Pedley, for so his old man thought, was quite A brainy boy when growin' up. He'd shirk Any and every job that looked like work. He wouldn't run, he wouldn't walk; he'd fetch A book, and then for hours at a stretch He'd squat down on the wharf - takin' the air, I said it was. He wouldn't read. He'd stare, Then drowse, then stare again, just like a sheep ...

(p82)

Unfit for normal outport life, Pratt returned to St John's in 1897. There he spent three miserable years as an apprentice in a drygoods store. But with the turn of the new century, his life changed dramatically. His father, now seriously ill, came to the same conclusions as had young Pedley's father: Well, when the old man finally understood He could do nothin' with him, for the good Of his soul - the last thing left - he thought he'd send Him off to join the Church ...

(Ibid)

The Reverend Pratt proposed to finance a college education if his son would follow him into the ministry.4 The young man returned to the Methodist College in 1900. There, in the library of the college principal, Robert Holloway, he encountered the theory of evolution in books by T.H. Huxley and Herbert Spencer and began to wrestle with its implications. If science could prove that man had evolved over thousands of years, how then could one accept Genesis, which said that the universe (and man) had been created in seven days? This opposition between Christianity and Darwinism was to become a central theme in Pratt's poetry. In 1904, with his college studies completed and two years as a school master at Moreton's Harbour behind him, Pratt began his

xv Introduction probationary candidacy for the ministry at Clarke's Beach and Cupid's Cove. It was a difficult first charge for a frail and sensitive young man. He sometimes preached as many as three times on Sunday to congregations separated by fifteen miles or more of rough terrain, travelling from place to place on foot and frequently without adequate food. His duties also included performing marriages, ministering to the sick, and burying the dead. Not surprisingly, at the end of his first year, he had a physical and a nervous breakdown.5None the less, he persevered. From the memories of these years came anecdotal verse such as The History of John Jones' and The Passing of Jerry Moore.' Two years later, at the less arduous charge of Portugal Cove and Bell Island, he successfully completed his probation, becoming eligible for formal study in theology. In 1907 he left Newfoundland for Victoria College, part of the University of Toronto. Evolution was then the newest and most encompassing scientific theory, and in philosophy determinism prevailed. "I went to study philosophy, and in those days they were all fatalists,' he later recalled. Thirty years ago - all determinists. Lectures all had it - you couldn't alter anything in life.'6 Psychology, still part of Philosophy, had not yet emerged as a separate field of study. However, Freud's works were just coming into prominence and, as references to 'dream interpretation' in Pratt's MA thesis indicate, he was taught by Ernest Jonesh, Freud's disciple and biographer. At Victoria College he also read German criticism in translation, including Strauss's Das Lebenjesu(1835-6), which applied the 'myth concept' to the life of Jesus and treated the Bible like any other historical document. Even in this new approach to theology the prevailing interpretation was evolutionary - the human Christ viewed as the highest expression of man's ethical development. Once established at the University of Toronto, Pratt found his vocation. He completed a BA in 1911, an MA in 1912, a BD in 1913, and a PHD in 1917. As his Master's thesis was written on the subject of demonology and his doctoral dissertation on Pauline eschatology, his graduate studies encompassed the two poles of

xvi Introduction primitive and Christian belief; this range is not surprising for a product of the Newfoundland outport, where faith can broaden into Christianity or narrow into superstition. Although ordained as a Methodist minister in 1913, he did not take up a pastoral charge, but supported himself by occasional supply preaching, working as a laboratory instructor demonstrating the determinist stimulus-response psychology of Wilhelm Wundt at University College, and coaching students in philosophy. In 1918, he married a fellow graduate of Victoria College, Viola Whitney, who shared his interests in religion and poetry. At his instigation she was soon translating Hegel 'on the idiocy of believing in Christianity.' 7 A year later, Pelham Edgar, head of the Department of English at Victoria College, engaged Pratt as an instructor, giving him, as a contemporary quipped, 'a favourable stance from which to survey a situation most unfavourable to poetry.' 8 The Toronto of those days, like Canada itself, tended towards a gentlemanly philistinism in the arts. To be sure, there was a small group of enthusiasts at the University and at the Toronto Arts and Letters Club, but, generally speaking, poetry was recognized by its British accent and considered 'dilettantish. ' It was not until 1919 that the pendulum began to swing. World War I convinced many Canadians of the need for political and cultural independence. And evidence of this new nationality, so the argument ran, would be the emergence of a distinctly Canadian art and literature. The founding of The Canadian Forum in 1919, and of the Canadian Authors' Association in 1920, and the first Exhibition of the Group of Seven in 1921 were all, to some degree, cultural responses to a basically political movement. A large part of Pratt's immediate appeal to a wide national audience was that his first collection of poems, Newfoundland Verse (1923), even more so than Lawren Harris's earlier painting, 'Newfoundland Coast' (1920), depicted an unmistakably North Atlantic landscape: Here the tides flow, And here they ebb;

xvii Introduction Not with that dull, unsinewed tread of waters ... But with a lusty stroke of life Pounding at stubborn gates, That they might run Within the sluices of men's hearts ... ('Newfoundland, ' p 99) For Canadians in the twenties it was the indigenous image - Tom Thomson's 'Jack Pine' rather than T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land which provided 'the shock of recognition.' Pratt's first poems, like the canvasses of the Group of Seven, provided that living sense of place so important to a nation establishing its own mythology. Despite his Newfoundland birth (the province did not join Confederation until 1949), Pratt soon became and long remained Canada's national poet. Barker Fairley, then literary critic of The Canadian Forum, in reviewing Titans (1926) observed shrewdly: 'Best of all, we recognize, almost for the first time in Canadian poetry, the existence, behind and around the narrative, of a mental climate which is not Anglo-Canadian, but which truly belongs to the uncivilized world. Take any previous Canadian poet and you have to admit that an Englishman residing in Canada might have written his work. No Englishman could have written Titans ... [For seeing] with primal freshness ... the Newfoundlander has it.9 Fairley has put his finger on the essentials - Pratt's vision of nature and his original poetic voice, both important qualities in a decade characterized by a persistent call for an authentic Canadian poetry. Pratt's reputation steadily increased in the thirties, forties and fifties with poems such as 'The Depression Ends' (1932), The Titanic (1953), Brebeufand His Brethren (1940), Dunkirk (1941) and Towards the Last Spike (1952). As professor of English at Victoria College from 1920 to 1953, as one of the six poets contributing to the influential manifesto of the new poetry in Canada, New Provinces (1936), and a founder of the Canadian Poetry Magazine and its editor from 1936 to 1943, Pratt more than any other individual helped to create a favourable climate for poetry. As a transitional poet, bridging the romanticism of the older poets of the Confederation movement and

xviii Introduction the realism of the younger moderns, he appealed to the large Canadian audiences developed by Charles G.D. Roberts and Bliss Carman, audiences which the younger and more avant-garde poets could not reach, thus consolidating a national poetry. Then too, through his epics of national life, Brebeufand His Brethren and Towards the Last Spike, he showed that the Canadian historical past could be transformed into a 'usable myth' for the present, a lesson to be learned by succeeding generations of poets such as Earle Birney, Al Purdy, and Margaret Atwood. More importantly, Pratt showed his successors how the vast, northern nature of Canadian landscapes in the art of the twenties might be transplanted to poetry through metaphor and symbol. In poems such as The Ice-Floes, ' 'Silences, ' and The Titanic (with its glistening iceberg which is half sea cathedral, half paleolithic face) he evoked that fearful demonic aspect of nature that later poets and critics have identified as central to a Canadian tradition. II

Pratt was equipped for this task as national mythmaker by his Newfoundland background but, more importantly, by his personal experience. His poetic sensibility was wide, encompassing folk humour at one extreme and the profoundly tragic and ironic at the other. The quality that first shaped his poetry - his perception of the tragic - had been conditioned by what he later called 'the ironic enigma of Nature and its relation to the Christian view of the world.'10 By this, Pratt seems to have meant the difference between the Christian (or for that matter romantic) view of nature as a manifestation of a beneficent God and the brutal reality of his experience of Newfoundland life. His favourite metaphors for the gulf between the two concepts of nature emphasize the fact that he found it unfathomable: it was a Hardyesque 'enigma' or a 'riddle,' but one he felt impelled to penetrate. As a boy, Pratt often had accompanied his clergyman father when bringing the news of shipwreck and death at sea to unsuspecting outport families. In 1898, when he was sixteen, he

xix Introduction attended the mass funeral services for sealers from the Greenland who had become lost on the ice during a blizzard; he never forgot the frozen bodies stacked like cordwood on the deck, the mournful tolling of the bells. 'Sorrow / Has raked up faith and burned it like a pile / Of driftwood' (p 68). Other instances of the 'ironic enigma' followed. In 1904, his father died after a long and painful battle with cancer, but affirming, almost with his last breath, his Christian faith. In 1912, the 'unsinkable' Titanic, considered by many the epitome of twentieth-century progress, hit an iceberg off Newfoundland and went down with an appalling loss of life. That same year, 1912, Pratt lost two of the closest members of his personal circle: Lydia Trimble, a young woman he had planned to marry, died of tuberculosis and was buried on the day she was to have graduated from university; George Blewett, a professor and friend at Victoria College, who had been working on a new synthesis demonstrating a unity between science and religion, drowned while on a holiday.11 Pratt's early sensitivity to death, now intensified, became still more acute during a 1916 visit to Newfoundland, when news came of the almost complete annihilation of the First Battalion of the Newfoundland Regiment - the 'Fighting Newfoundlanders' - at Beaumont Hamel. Nearly 700 men, a whole generation of his younger contemporaries, had been killed within forty minutes of the start of the Battle of the Somme. Many of his friends were among those who died, and a brother was listed among the missing. Then in 1918 a number of his classmates were drowned when the Florizel went aground near Cape Race. In that year also a close friend, Robert LeDrew, who was to have been best man at Pratt's wedding, died suddenly in Toronto. This litany of death reached a climax in 1924 when Pratt received the devastating news that his oldest brother, William, had committed suicide.12 This news was withheld by the family to spare their mother, then blind and ill, who died a year later. The full effect of this series of tragic deaths on Pratt's poetic sensibility has not been generally known. Nor has the poet himself, who cultivated a plain tale in verse and a gregarious social persona

xx Introduction to match, been fully recognized as a tough-minded intellectual responding in his poetry to the contradictions of his age. Consequently, it is helpful for today's reader to understand some of the relations between his personal life and the public events which shaped his poetry. Spanning as he did the Victorian and the modern periods, Pratt experienced the traumas common to both: not just the Victorian crisis in faith but also the modern crisis in sensibility engendered by two world wars. In this context his personal tragedies intensified the angst of two generations. Simply put, he was caught between the traditional religious belief of his childhood which confirmed the inherent divinity of man and late nineteenth-century science which, by reducing man to physiology, accentuated his animal nature and offered no comfort in the face of death. It was the omnipresence of death that generated Pratt's greatest fears; indeed, many of his poems seem to have originated in his attempt to resolve them. On the iron door of the puzzling twenties poem of that title are juxtaposed a skull and a cross, and the sailors of the Roosevelt (in The Roosevelt and the Antinoe) struggle To outstare Death to his salt countenance' (p 232). One of his most characteristic poems on this subject is 'Come Away, Death, ' written at the start of World War n. There he evokes a personified, almost Elizabethan, Death: Willy-nilly, he comes or goes, with the clown's logic, Comic in epitaph, tragic in epithalamium, And unseduced by any mused rhyme. However blow the winds over the pollen, Whatever the course of the garden variables, He remains the constant, Ever flowering from the poppy seeds. (Part 2, p 111) This fine poem is highly allusive and ironic. As shown in the Annotations included with this edition, Pratt was a scholarly poet whose work reveals a wide reading in classical mythology, the Bible, Western literature, and current history. He frequently alluded to the work of other poets, often in the manner of T.S. Eliot, to make ironic comparisons between past and present.

xxi Introduction The title, 'Come Away, Death,' for example, alludes to a song in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night in which a clown sings of love as the cause of 'sweet' death. However, this initial allusion is subverted by the first words of the poem, which direct us to Hamlet and the phrase, 'wil he, nil he/ spoken by another clown, a grave-digger, over a 'pit of clay' which is to contain the drowned Ophelia. As the clown sings, he unearths a skull. This trope of statement and subversion is repeated throughout the metaphors of the poem. Ultimately, a series of allusions with secondary references prove the paradox that despite man's attempts at disguise, death (and its emblem, the skull) rather than love, remains the generating or 'constant' principle in human life. This equation, and the belief informing it, makes it clear why Pratt developed a poetic structure of myth and metaphor in order to control through his own 'mused rhyme' his great fear that Death ends all. Or, to use a more common nineteenth-century metaphor, one suggested in The Iron Door: An Ode (1927), his fear that the universe was little more than a great uncaring machine from which God, the artificer, had withdrawn. in

Pratt's mythopoeic imagination, ultimately a fusion of Christianity and Darwinism, developed rapidly in the decade between 1914 and 1924. His response to the series of personal tragedies already described was the traditional Miltonic attempt 'to justify the ways of God to men' through the study of theology, philosophy, and psychology. He was also sensitive to the treatment of death by Shakespeare, the romantics, and the early moderns, especially Hardy. Determinist philosophy and Hardy's pessimism seem to have accentuated his own tendency to see man's struggle against nature from an ironic and fatalistic perspective, largely, as he told an interviewer, 'because [Hardy] says over all coincidents, there is a universal will determining the outcome.'13 By 1918 Pratt had absorbed Hardy's sense of cosmic irony and was questioning the mechanical universe in which it was embodied. The poems 'Dawn,' The Shark,' and The Fog' also indicate that he was simultaneously aware of the imagist movement. That he continued to write the long poem, incorporating elements of imagism, is indicative of modern

xxii Introduction practice and the fact that his cosmic vision, his eschatology in fact, required a larger vehicle. That the attempt to grapple with death remains primary is indicated by the fact that during the twenties he also participated in a number of seances: a record of one remains in which he is identified as 'Doctor X,' a well-known authority in philosophy and psychology.14 Initially, the romantics had the greatest influence on Pratt's poetic sensibility. In 1914 he took part in an English honours reading group at the University of Toronto led by Pelham Edgar, a Shelley enthusiast, known for his sonorous voice and his pleasure in declaiming 'O Wild West Wind ...'As part of this group, Pratt read Shelley's Julian and Maddalo and Prometheus Unbound, and Byron's Manfred and Cain, as well as their original, Shakespeare's Hamlet, which he continued to appreciate (see 'In a Beloved Home,' pp 111-12). This reading was reflected almost immediately in his verse. In the first occasional poems, reprinted here in chronological order, we can see the apprentice poet in transition. He begins in 1909 with an undergraduate parody, the Byron-inspired 'A Poem on the May Examinations,' moving from eighteenth-century diction with rhyming couplets and personification to the florid, Shelleyesque, 'Wind of the West' and the more sober Wordsworthian dignity of the privately printed Rachel (1917). It is apparent from the intervening poems, 'Unseen Allies' and 'For Valour,' that the impulse to write poetry was generated by World War i and reinforced by his pride in the long tradition of British seamanship inherited by Newfoundlanders. In Rachel, he sets himself the task of chronicling an equally heroic Newfoundland tradition 'not charactered indeed by History's pen' (p 27). With Rachel, The Ice-Floes,' and 'The Ground Swell' Pratt finds his true subject - man's struggle against a primitive sea. However, in the first of these narratives the form and content are at odds; the reflective, meditative qualities of the pentameter are inadequate for describing a rugged Newfoundland nature. Rachel, in fact, is a seafaring version of Wordsworth's Michael in which the building of a sheepfold, that mainstay of English rural life, is transmuted into gathering one's daily bread from the wild Atlantic.

xxiii Introduction Pratt's discovery of Shelley and Byron seems to have been soon augmented by details of their lives as depicted in EJ. Trelawny's Recollections of the Last Days of Shelley and Byron (1858). One of the most powerful scenes in this book is the depiction of the bodies of the drowned Shelley and his friend Edward Williams, washed up on the beach. No closer analogue to Pratt's own childhood memories of maimed and broken bodies, hastily buried, could be found. (See the poem 'Morning/ pp 102-3.) Ironically, when one of the bodies was later unearthed for formal burial, it was found that although a decomposing limb fell from the trunk, the owner's silk handkerchief remained intact. Trelawney reports that Lord Byron, present at the scene, commented that 'the entrails of a worm hold together longer than the potter's clay, of which man is made,'15 and that at a later funeral, Shelley's heart remained unconsumed despite a blazing pyre. Allusions to 'potter's clay' and a 'heart' figure prominently in Pratt's first attempt at longer narrative verse, a closet drama entitled Clay, most of which was written between 1918-19 (see 'Unpublished Drama,' Appendix B). Here, Pratt begins to describe his subject much more effectively by breaking up the blank verse with lyrics and choruses, much in the manner of verse dramas like Shelley's Prometheus Unbound and Hardy's The Dynasts. This poem, not published in its entirety until this edition, is a good introduction to Pratt because it reveals his uneasy position as an early modern and provides a framework for reading his poems. When Clay is read as a whole rather than the excerpts 'Fragment from a Story' and 'Ode to December: 1917,' which appeared inNewfoundland Verse (1923), it is apparent that a personified 'Death' is the primary concern of the poet: death brought about through storm at sea and death through war. Moreover, Clay establishes the basically romantic myths and symbols which characterize Pratt's later poetry. Asserting man's dual nature and questioning his relation to the universe, Clay is clearly in the tradition of Shakespeare and the great romantics. Hamlet had acknowledged man's duality when he spoke of him as 'the paragon of animals ... this quintessence of dust' (2.2.307-12)

xxiv Introduction and Byron's Manfred, echoing Hamlet, describes man as 'Half dust, half deity' (1.11.36-47). If man is merely dust (the 'clay of Isaiah') his end must be the 'pit of clay' over which Hamlet stands or 'the caves of death' alluded to in Manfred and echoed in Pratt's late lyric, The Truant.' These are, of course, religious issues^nd, in fact, Clay embodies a debate on the theological argument from design, posing the question: How can man believe that the universe has order and that God is beneficent when death, the ravages of nature, and war point to an uncaring deity? The rebel Julian, like his namesake in Julian and Maddalo, is a transparent persona for the poet. As such he asks the primary question: What Father, this, Who cares so little for his children's fate, That though he holds the sea within his hands, He pours its floods upon their heads ... God? No. Rather a Potter with some clay. (Appendix B, p 324) The spectacle of bodies piled one upon another, appearing to reach to the gate of heaven itself, seems to Julian to deny both Christ's sacrifice and the possibility of Christian hope. The inner courts are thronged with multitudes, And crosses - Ah! In cluttered heaps they rise, Stacked pile on pile, until they twist and sag The rivets on the bolted doors of God. (Appendix B, p 335) The metaphors central to this passage - the dead bodies (later in the poem transformed into a skull), the cross, and the locked iron door - become key symbols in the later poems. Characteristically, they develop from Pratt's own experience. The reference to 'the rivets on the bolted door of God,' like the door in his 1927 poem The Iron Door: An Ode appears to be a fusion of the homely imagery of the Newfoundland outport where a door was always open

xxv Introduction (because the latch was on the outside to be lifted up by a stranger in need) with St John's iconography of the door as Christ. The mechanical opposite to this welcoming door is perhaps a ship's iron hull, a monolith, made impervious to the sea by rivets. Given this context, a bolted iron door might well symbolize the Godless, mechanical order so dreaded by the late Victorians. For Pratt's generation, as G.J. Romanes remarks in Darwin, and After Darwin (1892), man's view of nature had become so transformed by the naturalist Darwinian viewpoint that 'the mechanical interpretation [had become] universal.' So it is no wonder that 'the religious mind [had] suddenly awakened to a new and terrible force ... Where is now thy God?'16 This fear of a mechanically determinist universe, so all-pervasive that it even controls instinctive human action, is echoed in the diction and imagery of the poem. Julian, after confronting bodies broken by a storm at sea, holds up 'the model of a heart' (Appendix B, p 319), recalling both Trelawny's reference to Shelley's heart and a mechanical model like those used in Pratt's laboratory experiments when he was an instructor of Wundt's psychological theories. Wundt held that human behaviour is automatic, for once a nervous impulse is given the organ must respond. The heart, traditionally considered the seat of human love and compassion, is described in Clay as dominated by the automatic response of the vagus nerve and thus is reduced to a physiological mechanism. It is apparent that Pratt, then ordained, could not have taken up a position as an orthodox Methodist clergyman. This was not because he lacked the religious vocation, as has sometimes been suggested, but rather because he possessed it too strongly to profess a faith which did not allow for honest doubt. Groping for a language to express what he sees as an ironic turnabout in human perspective, Pratt subverts a primary statement of romantic philosophy. To Julian, who demands 'What wayward laws! Whose codes? Whose fond caprice?' (Appendix B), he ascribes the rhetorical patterns of John Keats's 'Ode on a Grecian Urn' ('What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?'). But ironically he reverses the conception that' "Beauty is truth, truth

xxvi Introduction beauty - that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know"/ Rather, Pratt asserts that the world and the times are out of joint when nature and man strive to bring forth death rather than life. The heart symbolizes not a romantic race for love but rather a tragic race for survival in which 'the one who wins / Must watch the many fall' (Appendix B, p 320). Critics who accuse Pratt of failing to deal with romantic love in his poetry fail to recognize a Victorian reticence and the fact that his sensibility was so transformed by personal tragedies and World War i that love could no longer be so resonant a subject as death. This particular strain of anti-romanticism is one indication of Pratt's modernism. Unlike most of his contemporaries represented in J.W. Garvin's Canadian Poems of the Great War (1918), who associate war with chivalry and romance, Pratt is realistic in his description of the battlefield. Not only was he influenced by the new realism in subject and diction of poets like John Masefield and Carl Sandburg, but he probably also saw the war canvases of his friend, the artist Frederick Varley. ... pallid faces, blue strained lips, And eyes that stared, amazed, through open lids That had no time to shut - that looked and asked But one eternal question. Then the moon Grew dimmer as the mist increased, and showed In hazy outlines hurrying forms that moved In twos and threes, from place to place, and laid Upon the stretchers, one by one, the dead, Torn, jagged, mud-smeared and crumpled, carrying them To rows of damp deep trenches newly-dug, Where they were placed in groups of eight or ten, In order, side by side, and face to face And the moon shone full again - the harvest-moon. (Appendix B, p 333) This passage is in strong contrast to the quintessential Canadian war poem, John McCrae's In Flanders Fields' (1915). Pratt's

xxvii Introduction originality is apparent; he evokes the horror and pity of war at the same time as did the new British war poets. What first grips his imagination is why such slaughter should occur, coupled with a Hardyesque awareness of the terrible ironies involved. Not only does man slaughter brother man but the harvest moon appears before springtime.17 This sense of man's moral dualism and the unnaturalness of such conflict pervades Pratt's later presentation of these themes. Ultimately, however, Clay offers a cautious affirmation of a regenerated nature and the possibilities of the human spirit. Julian proclaims 'a knocking in this clay - / A restless flame' (Appendix B, p 355). This sense of the intuitive human spirit, a Christian concept, also has overtones of Manfred's 'the Mind - the Spirit - the Promethean spark' which, 'shall not yield ... though cooped in clay.' As such Clay foreshadows The Truant,' Pratt's most explicit affirmation of the human imagination. Prometheus, that primary romantic rebel and saviour (a Christ figure in turn-of-the-century theology), recurs throughout Pratt's poems, notably in The Titanic, 'A Prairie Sunset,' and 'Fire.' Around this crimson source of human fears, Where rites and myths have built their scaffoldings, With smoke of hecatombs upon her wings, And chased by shadows of the coming years, Our planet-moth tries blindly to survive Her spinning vertigo as fugitive. But stronger than its terror is the deep Allurement, primary to our blood, which holds Safety and warmth in unimpassioned folds, Night and the candle-quietness of sleep; With the day's bugles silent, when the will, That feeds the tumult of our natures, rests Along the broken arteries of its quests. So, let the yellowing world revolve until The old Sun's ultimate expatriate

xxviii Introduction On this exotic hearth leans forth to claim Promethean virtue from a dying flame, His fingers tapered - less to mitigate The chilling accident of his sojourn Than to invoke his ultimate return.

(Tire/ pp 300-1)

These stanzas evoke not only Prometheus, the firegiver of myth, but a whole atomic world view in which Pratt's atoms, like those of Heraclitus and Lucretius, are the animating principle of the universe, giving life to all matter and, ultimately, to man. As the impulse carried along the nervous system through the bloodstream to the heart (the 'eternal pathways of fire7 described in 'Newfoundland'), it has affinities with the Promethean spark that is the mind or soul, and with Wundt's nervous impulses. As the energy of life it is associated both with man's origins and with his (and the universe's) inevitable slide towards the disintegration of energy or entropy. As these metaphors suggest, Pratt possesses a highly synthesizing imagination. He begins to write poetry from the biblical perspective of man as 'clay,' a 'flower that fadeth' within a seasonal cycle. Hence, perhaps, Pratt's delight in all flowers - the hepaticas, trilliums, bloodroots, and anemones of his poetry - and, more importantly, his tendency to express his dismay through fertility myth as The Seed Must Die' when man's allotted cycle is unnaturally interrupted. This interruption, death, is most often explained through a fusion of Christian and Darwinistic terms. Man, dual by nature, inheriting the 'sins of the fathers/ is always in danger of reverting to earlier and more aggressive forms of behaviour. When man turns Cain to kill his brother Abel, 'the taint is in the blood' (p 11). Alternatively, man may develop an ethical consciousness and choose to sacrifice himself for another in emulation of Christ. For, as Pratt writes in The Highway/ he sees the great cycles of prehistoric, biblical, and Western history as an evolutionary highway bounded at its beginning by the Void' (see The Ground Swell') and at its end by Christ - 'Oh star! O rose! O Son of Man!' - the culmination of the evolutionary process.

xxix Introduction IV

Pratt is, above all, a poet of ideas; one for whom metaphors such as fire, the iron door (with its skull and cross), the iceberg of The Titanic, and the Grand Panjandrum of The Truant7 symbolize philosophical concepts, concepts more familiar to an earlier religious generation than they are to ours. In his impulse towards romantic mythmaking, and in his insistence upon the primacy of the human imagination (especially on the function of poetry in creating the world we live in), Pratt can be seen as a new or modern romantic. Yet, like most of the transitional moderns, he rejected romanticism in favour of realism. This he variously attributed to the influence of Thomas Hardy,18 the new science, and the devastating events of the first third of the twentieth century. In The Decay of Romance/ an essay written for Canadian Comment at the height of the Depression, he explains that the shift from romance to realism by modern poets is intelligible 'when one considers the stern background of life for the past eighteen years: the four years of the War; the decade following, with the crash of hopes for world reconstruction and the present economic blight. One would not expect Romance to take root in such soil. So we have adopted a phrase which describes two-thirds of our literature today post-war disillusionment/19 Despite this avowal, Pratt continued to write romantic poetry, romantic in its obsession with the relation between man and nature, in its use of organic form and symbol, in its belief in the primacy of the imagination and the capacity of the poet to make his world. However, an ironic sensibility both qualifies and asserts Pratt's romanticism. Like Byron, and many moderns, especially Hardy, his sensibility is characterized by an acute perception of the discord between the world of reality and the world that the poet 'half createfs]' and 'half perceivefs]' - the world of the poem. As Lord David Cecil observed of modern British poets, what was once known as the romantic dilemma became, after World War i, the modern predicament.20 In fact, 'the post-war disillusionment' of which Pratt writes about

xxx Introduction is, in itself, a romantic response. But it was not recognized as such by many practising poets of the day because they had been convinced by critics like Irving Babbitt in the United States and T.H. Hulme in England that it was not possible to be modern and romantic. Babbitt, the author of Rousseau and Romanticism (1919), had given the celebrated Alexander Lectures at the University of Toronto in January 1931, two years before Pratt's article was written. At that time, Barker Fairley, then teaching at Victoria College, had taken Babbitt to task in the pages of The Canadian Forum, claiming that Babbitt was not a student of literature but a moralist using literature for his own ends.21 It is not surprising that some aspects of Babbitt's ethical and conservative thought, waggishly described by one of Pratt's colleagues as The Higher Babbitry,' would be attractive to Pratt and to influential members of the faculty at the University of Toronto. Babbitt's new humanism, despite its emphasis on the modern critical spirit and the right use of the imagination, was accurately tagged by the American writer George Santayana in The Genteel Tradition at Bay (1931) as a 'genteel' view of literature which rejected extreme naturalism and post-war cynicism. It represented that stream of American modernism most acceptable to Canadian conservatism and served much the same function for Canadian intellectuals as had the ethical idealism of John Fiske, Babbitt's predecessor at Harvard, for Roberts and Carman some fifty years earlier. Elements of Babbitt's Rousseau and Romanticism filtered into Pratt's poetry. In Babbitt's view, man's dualism was the struggle between the egoism of 'natural' man and the moral sense (or conscience) of a civilized, ethical, humanistic man. Arguing that romanticism and Freudian psychology are alike in that they excuse man of conscious purpose and so deprive him of his humanity, Babbitt contends that 'man becomes human in so far as he exercises moral choice. He must ... enter upon the pathway of ethical purpose if he is to achieve happiness.'22 This whole complex of what Babbitt called 'the civil war in the cave' and the necessity for ethical choice appear to have provided additional terms of refer-

xxxi Introduction ence for Pratt's own sense of man's evolutionary dualism. His most explicit treatment of this theme is given in two lyrics: The Highway/ published some six months after Babbitt's visit, and 'From Stone to Steel/ published a year later: The snarl Neanderthal is worn Close to the smiling Aryan lips, The civil polish of the horn Gleams from our praying finger tips. Between the temple and the cave The boundary lies tissue thin: The yearlings still the altars crave As satisfaction for a sin. The road goes up, the road goes down Let Java or Geneva be But whether to the cross or crown, The path lies through Gethsemane.

(pp 260-1)

In this poem, as in The Highway/ Pratt suggests that man's ethical progress is along an evolutionary road, but one informed by specifically Christian values rather than Babbitt's humanist ethical values. Although Pratt believed he was responding to Babbitt's modernism, in practice he adapted Babbitt's theoretical framework into a romantic myth. Larger-than-life figures (such as Brebeuf or the Truant) or man's surrogate like the ape are set against the vast history of evolutionary time. Here, as in his earlier poetry, nature is allegorized and identified with the primitive monsters of prehistory. Such creatures are frequently man's antagonists for not only does Pratt possess an apocalyptic imagination but he also genuinely believes that man - Nature's 'youngest, feeblest, blindest child' (p 97) - faces such elemental forces in his struggle for life. Each of his heroic protagonists, now abstracted into symbol, has the capacity of moving forward (to the temple in

xxxii Introduction emulation of Christ and Prometheus) or, alternatively, backwards (to the cave of war or mere survival). The ultimate test - a kind of laboratory experiment constantly set up in Pratt7s poetry - is man's response when faced with death. Is he willing to sacrifice himself like Brebeuf or the captain of the Carpathia, or is he, like the stoker on the Titanic, willing to kill another to save himself? At such crucial stages Pratt introduces the familiar epic calls to action - the fife, bugle, drum, and flag - but he does so in the context of Wundt's stimulus-response psychology. Some passengers on the sinking Titanic, for example, Wavered a moment with the panic urge, But rallied to attention on the verge Of flight as if the rattle of a drum From quarters faint but unmistakable Had put the stiffening in the blood to check The impulse of the feet, leaving the will No choice between the lifeboats and the deck.

(p 334)

In that what is required is the sacrifice of self for others - and the greatest example of such sacrifice is Christ - in Pratt's mythology Christianity contains evolution. This is one of the simpler examples of the way in which Pratt's religious beliefs organize all his poetry, a fact Northrop Frye perceptively identified in his introduction to the Collected Poems. v

Working from the premise that Pratt shared the romantic disillusionment of his age, and developed a mythology to express it, we can examine his major poems in order to define his response. That response, which to a large extent is what makes him such a complex writer, is sometimes comic, sometimes tragic, more frequently a mixture of both. In his first collection, Newfoundland Verse, the comic and tragic voices are in evidence, the latter particularly in the title poem, 'Newfoundland.' However, Newfoundland Verse also

xxxiii Introduction contains a series of poems, including 'Carlo/ and 'Overheard in a Cove/ in which parody and broad comedy are used as a framework for ironic comments on issues such as Darwinism, the 'higher criticism/ and Wordsworthian romanticism (as in Pratt's parody of the 'primrose by the river's brim'). A revealing aspect of Pratt's situation in 1923 is that when he was excerpting sections of Clay for inclusion in Newfoundland Verse he did not include passages which expressed his condemnation of war or his more serious religious doubts, in particular a description of an ape grinning through the human face. As a clergyman about to publish with Ryerson, the United Church publishing house, he moderated his views in order to have his work published. Douglas Bush, a former University of Toronto colleague of Pratt's, in a mid-twenties comment in The Canadian Forum accused Toronto audiences of worshipping the twin muses of 'prudery' and 'insipidity.'23 Such an audience would not have tolerated Pratt's radicalism. However, in his next book, The Witches' Brew (1926), the poet asserted his independence and, not incidentally, changed his publishers. The title poem, a Byronic satire on original sin, complete with three water witches and an alcoholic apple, was likely prompted by Bush's essay advising Canadian writers to eschew prudery and 'sin gladly.' Pratt does both.24 The poem attacks the hypocritical Methodist morality as well as the Toronto temperance movement. Indeed, the relish with which this ordained Methodist minister presents his catalogue of liquor brands 'Budweiser, Guinness, Schlitz (in kegs), / Square Face Gin andGordon's Dry' (p 133) - provides a clear sense of his revolt against organized piety. In effect, Pratt turned the fall of man into the broad comedy of a drunken 'spree' and all with overtones of the Newfoundland ballad. He sustained a predominantly boisterous mood in his next major work, Titans (1926), which consists of two companion pieces, The Great Feud' and 'The Cachelot.' In The Great Feud/ the subject is internecine war, but war comfortably distanced from reality. The battle is between the creatures of land and sea. Pratt applies Darwin to Genesis and develops a parodic version of the beginning

xxxiv Introduction of life in which an ape becomes man's surrogate. Not surprisingly, considering that he had been taught by Ernest Jones, he expresses the belief that aggression and the perversion of human reason accompany man's evolutionary development. In The Cachelot/ which despite his disclaimers is partially modelled on Melville's Moby Dick, Pratt returns to the struggle between man and nature. But now he reverses the equation, so that the reader identifies with the great whale rather than with man; thus we share the exaltation of victory rather than the despair of man's defeat. Much of the exuberance of these companion poems is generated by Pratt's delight in language, his whimsy, and the pounding rhythms of his lines. In The Iron Door: An Ode (1927), long considered his most puzzling poem, Pratt returns to his serious, philosophical manner. Written shortly after the deaths of his brother and mother, the poem is based on a dream in which a series of allegorical figures (a young boy, a master mariner, a young man, and two mother figures) come before a great cliff and stand in front of an iron door. There they ask eschatalogical questions about the nature of the universe. The door itself is ambiguous - bolted and strongly riveted, it bears on its surface the juxtaposed symbols of the cross and a skull. Here, as in Clay, the great iron door appears to be the embodiment of the alien determinist universe and of man's uncertain position in it. Though the general tone of the poem is dark, the final resolution is optimistic. For the latchless, knockerless door can, or so the poem affirms, be forced to open despite the omnipresence of death. In effect, the poem implies that human will yoked with faith and hope could force open the iron door. All the poems written up to this point are increasingly depersonalized as Pratt appears to move further away from the surface of the narrative form. This depersonalization is somewhat deceptive. The doubts about death and the possibility of eternal life raised in The Iron Door query not only orthodox Christianity but also more personal deaths. It seems that after writing Clay Pratt came to the conclusion that the serious treatment of metaphysical subjects in verse produced rather dull poetry. He therefore turned to a new

xxxv Introduction mode, the comic extravaganza, in which the Miltonic fall of man was metamorphosed into the 'grand spree' of The Witches' Brew and World War i absorbed into the animal past in The Great Feud. Conscious of this new direction in his poetry, Pratt described it as 'the expression of a grand binge, making for healthy physiological releases where the world for a time is seen backside-up and the poet becomes gloriously emancipated from the thraldom of day-byday routine/25 At the same time Pratt learned to treat painful subjects in light verse he began to create a boisterous public personality to cover a more serious inner core. This persona was that of the hearty raconteur, the Newfoundlander who rejoiced in stag dinners, 'tall tales/ and whiskey. As the frail young man had become a large, robust figure, red-faced and exuberant, the mature poet fitted this image. There was, however, as E.K. Brown speculated and later critics concurred, another Pratt: a quieter and more introverted self who seems to have written his poetry in solitude in a room detached from a carousing self below.26 To use a Shakespearean parallel, it is as if Hamlet had put on the mask of Falstaff. The intriguing question remains - why? We can speculate that his sense of being trapped by an implacable determinism, what he calls in The Iron Door 'a grave-stone and iron monument' (p 140), is so basic to his beliefs that it is almost as if in early extravaganza he has to reinvent himself (and man) through the creation of a number of large and powerful personae in order to even the odds against nature and objectify the problems posed. By treating serious subjects flippantly, or by placing them within a dream vision as in The Iron Door, Pratt was distancing and controlling them. From this perspective truth could be found and a measure of poetic judgement given. Although he had symbolically refuted some troubling aspects of the mechanistic universe in The Iron Door, Pratt had not disposed of his lingering fears. His next major work, The Roosevelt and the Antinoe (1930), begins with a factual description of the crew and of the ship's movement into the Atlantic - 'Thursday morning rose without a sun, / Sleet in the air: the wind was westerly' (p 221) - but

xxxvi Introduction the reader quickly moves into a troubled and primitive seascape 'Of mastodons asleep in polar snows/ where 'it seemed the world / Was carried with the last gust to the void' (p 223). The Roosevelt's crew must struggle through storm, sleet, and with the continued threat of death to rescue the crew of the Antinoe. The wild power of the storm - 'a wild antiphonal / Of shriek and whistle from the shrouds broke through, / Blending with thuds as though some throat had laughed / In thunder down the ventilator shaft' (p 236) breaking through the Service for the Dead, threatens to break not only the form of the poem, but also belief in the ordered, Christian universe which it represents. The discomfort generated by this fragmentation indicates that for Pratt a poem is a world built to withstand such elements. Often when he introduces an amoral order in the later poems like 'A Prayer-Medley' or 'Silences,' the form of the poem begins to break down. On the whole, however, unlike most moderns, Pratt rejects discontinuous form and turns instead to the stability of the older heroic and romantic narrative. Ultimately, The Roosevelt and the Antinoe affirms man's struggle for life against nature's appetite for death. In contrast to the dominant tendency in twentieth-century writing to portray man as an anti-hero, Pratt, the Newfoundlander, insists on his capacity for heroism. It should be recalled that the anti-war, anti-heroic sentiments of the United States and Great Britain had much less effect in Canada between 1920 and 1940 because, for Pratt's generation, the Canadian heroes of World War i had laid the foundation for Canada's independence. VI

For the great romantics, there was no questioning 'the holiness of the Heart's affections and the truth of Imagination/27 but for Pratt, influenced as he was by twentieth-century science, the issue was not so straightforward. The question raised by Hardy's poem, 'The Convergence of the Twain, Lines on the Loss of the Titanic/ regarding the possibility of a malignant Fate directing the iceberg, needed rational investigation. As a trained experimental psycholo-

xxxvii Introduction gist, Pratt attempted to extract the 'truth' from the available data. He was obsessive about research and the individual word (the logos), which reflected his efforts to find the truth that lay beyond physical phenomena. His attempts to come to terms with what nature represented to the modern sensibility led him ultimately in the direction of symbol and allegory, but now informed by Freudian psychology. In this sense, Pratt's romanticism expressed the modern sensibility. Thus there are usually two dimensions found in his major epics. The first involves a realistic description of some scene and action - a narrative which presents a plain tale directly told and which immediately engages the reader. Then, beneath the narrative surface, there is a second dimension involving a symbolic statement of man's position in the universe. The Titanic is Pratt's most obvious rebuttal of Hardy's poetry and its implacable universe. Though the poem begins with the primary assumption of Hardy's poem, particularly implications of a mechanistic fatalism regarding the inevitable fusion of ship and iceberg, Pratt invokes Hardy's poem in order to differ with its assumptions. It is not that he sees man as a vainglorious creature doomed to become one with the sea worms, 'grotesque, slimed, dumb, indifferent,' but rather that 'human mind and will' can challenge 'fate.' If man fails, as he does in the microcosmic world of the Titanic, it is not primarily because of fate but because of hubris: he has chosen to do so. The ship, recapitulating the history of civilization in its period decor, becomes a symbol of modern man's unjustified pride in technological progress. On the Titanic, 'judgment stood in little need / Of reason' (p 309), an ironic statement that is a telling comment on twentieth-century man's race towards self-destruction. As 'reason' is abandoned, the ship metaphorically becomes an animal. Since the berg is also described in animal imagery, the collision between the two becomes a brutal consummation in which the ship is ripped apart by the 'claw' of the berg. Pratt also uses a second set of metaphors to describe this conflict: a 'flint' berg strikes against the 'steel' of the ship. As this reversion from steel to stone implies a betrayal of man's Promethean capacity for progress,

xxxviii Introduction The Titanic can be read as an ironic parable on the questionable nature of twentieth-century technology. In Dunkirk (1941), Pratt's metaphors indicate that he has rid himself of his fears regarding the universe's mechanistic nature and man's inability to transcend it. No longer is there an iron door between man and God, for the rescued Allied soldiers find 'a hold on the latch of the heart of God7 (Part 2, p 123). Despite the tragedies of World War n, Dunkirk represented for Pratt a kind of argument from design affirming man's capacity for heroism. By 1952, when he wrote his last major work, Towards the Last Spike, he seems to have adopted a beneficent, holistic vision of nature and human progress. His old fears regarding a brutal nature (symbolized in this poem by the reptile of the Pre-Cambrian Shield) are transcended through a more optimistic reinterpretation of evolution, perhaps by way of T.H. Huxley and J.C. Smuts. Because all parts of evolutionary nature are composed of the same elements, it is possible for the railway builders to metamorphose themselves into the natural elements they oppose; thus 'foreheads grew into cliffs, jaws into juts' (Part 2, p 203). The successful spanning of the continent by the railway is simultaneously a conquering of nature and a vindication of man's technological progress. In Brebeufand His Brethren (1940) Pratt again explores both nature and human nature. The tragic elements of the narrative - Brebeuf's suffering and eventual martyrdom - are somewhat modified by mystic interludes and by lyrical passages describing New France: Strawberries in July, October beechnuts, pepper roots for spice, And at the bottom of a spring that flowed Into a pond shaded by silver birches And ringed by marigolds was water-cress In chilled abundance. So, was this the West? The Wilderness?

(Part 2, p 95)

The somewhat halting rhetoric of the early narratives has modulated into a fluid, sinewy blank verse. There is also a degree of

xxxix Introduction irony in Pratt's perspective on the Jesuits, as for example in his description of converting Indians to Christianity by terrifying them with pictures of dmes damnees. Pratt was perfectly aware of this incongruous mixture of elements. Writing to F.R. Scott in December 1940, he noted that the poem contained 'doctrinal errors or ambiguities from the ecclesiastical point of view' for, as he continues, 'when I bring Cardinal Villeneuve [Archbishop of Quebec] and the Grand Master of the Orange Lodge of British North America together arguing points I think I have achieved something in comedy/28 Although Pratt's portrait reflects twentieth-century scepticism as well as an older faith, he viewed Brebeuf's mysticism with the sympathy of a fellow believer. The gallant soldier-priest, enduring the fires of torture for his beliefs, is ultimately triumphant and so was a resonant symbol for a nation then at war. It is no longer fashionable to talk of poetry as that essence which helps us to live our lives. Yet there is no question that The Truant (1943) had this effect on its listeners when it was first read aloud. As Frye later remarked, 'to write and teach in Ned's generation meant defending the values of the imagination through a depression and a war, and this took courage of a kind that he not only celebrated but, very unostentatiously, possessed.' In this sense, the poet provided for him and others an example of moral leadership that they had failed to find in mentors like T.S. Eliot. The sense of outrage and betrayal that I felt when I first opened [Eliot's] After Strange Gods is something I hope never to feel again. But during the war, at an evening in Earle Birney's apartment in Toronto, I heard Ned read The Truant, and felt not simply that I had heard the greatest of all Canadian poems, but that the voice of humanity had spoken once more, with the kind of authority it reserves for such moments as the bombing of London, when the powers of darkness test the soul and find once more that 'the stuff is not amenable to fire/ 29 Frye, at that point, 'was nearly running around blind in circles

xl Introduction trying to figure out what life was all about. And I could just feel things coming into focus. It [The Truant]was the kind of confrontation that's very central to Blake as well/ Not only did The Truant prove to be an entry into Fearful Symmetry, Frye's book on Blake, but it was a revelation to him that 'not only another poet but a fellow as close to me personally as Ned could think along Blake's lines/30 The Blakean confrontation in The Truant pits man and his evolved vision against the determinist force of the universe. In 1943, about the same time Pratt was writing the poem, he also gave a lecture on romanticism at Cornell, where he admitted that for him the influence of Wordsworth and Shelley was soon weakened by Thomas Hardy, and added, 'We look upon life with the eyes of Thomas Huxley who saw the ethical and the cosmic in perpetual struggle/31 As we have seen, it was this implacable cosmos embodied in Hardy's poetry to which Pratt objected and the tendency of man under stress to revert to being an automaton, concerned only with resisting death, which he feared. To counter both, he called upon the solution first proposed by Huxley in 'Evolution and Ethics' (1893), that man must pit his evolved mind and heart against cosmic process, the mindless, mechanical, self-preserving operations of the universe. Huxley, in fact, proposed a trial in which man would confront this mechanical force of the universe and wrote that 'brought before the tribunal of ethics, the cosmos might well seem to stand condemned. The conscience of man revolted against the moral indifference of nature, and the microcosmic atom should have found the illimitable macrocosm guilty/32 Pratt dramatizes a similar play of forces in The Truant. The mechanical force of nature is personified in the Grand Panjandrum. As such this force is opposed to generic man, genus homo, 'six feet high' (Part 2, p 128), equipped with vision, courage, and will. The Panjandrum, engaged in a 'flyting' match with man, threatens palsy, death, and finally disintegration. 'Backward in dust I'll blow you till / You join my spiral festival of fire' (ibid.). Man, however, asserts his independence or 'truancy' from the forces of nature. It

xli IntrTTTTTTTT was huTTTTTTTTman imagination alone, he reminds the Panjandrum,tha conceived all religious myths: We turned a human page And blotted out a cosmic myth With all its baby symbols to explain The sunlight in Apollo's eyes, Our rising pulses and the birth of pain, Fear, and that fern-and-fungus breath Stalking our nostrils to our caves of death That day we learned how to anatomize Your body, calibrate your size And set a mirror up before your face To show you what you really were - a rain Of dull Lucretian atoms crowding space,

(Part 2, pp 129-30)

The allusion to Lucretian atoms is functional. Lucretius in De Rerum Natura had written that man need not fear the gods or death. His proof, based upon the so-called 'atomic theory' of the ancients, holds that all things are made up of atoms. Thus the laws of nature control all, but because the soul is material, consciousness ends in death and there is no immortality. Like Lucretius, Pratt accepts the concept of energy or fire as the animating principle of man and the universe, and, like Lucretius and Huxley, describes man's gradual development in scientific knowledge. However, he rejects materialism and denies that man is helpless in confronting the universe. Nor will he agree that death ends all. The 'caves of death' passively accepted by Byron's Manfred are here energetically denied. In Pratt's version of the struggle between man and his finite circumstances, this personified force is a mere pretender to power, a comic Grand Panjandrum. Man is equipped by consciousness and will to endure, and indeed defy the worst that nature can inflict upon him: 'You oldest of the hierarchs Composed of electronic sparks,

xlii Introduction We grant you speed, We grant you power, and fire That ends in ash, but we concede To you no pain nor joy nor love nor hate .. /

(Part 2, p 130)

It is because of his intelligence, a later stage in the evolutionary process, that man can be a truant from nature. There is irony in Pratt's conception, for man's truancy is only temporary; ultimately he must return through age and death to the elements from which he emerged, yet his vision can remain triumphant. The Truant' is Pratt's strongest affirmation of the human imagination and his repudiation of the threat posed by a determinist universe that now included not only Darwin's science but also Fascist and Nazi totalitarianism. These poems struck a resonant note in the early and late thirties, signalling as they did the events that led up to World War n Mussolini's attack on Ethiopia, the Spanish Civil War, the attack on Poland, and the start of war (see 'Come Away, Death'), followed by the blitz on London. Above all was the overwhelming fear throughout the Western world in the fall of 1940 that the Nazis would overrun England. If they did so, Western civilization as men knew it would also succumb. In this context Canadians read 'A Prayer-Medley' (1933), where Pratt finds 'no remedy for the deep malaise in the communal heart of the world' (p 297), and The Fable of the Goats and Other Poems (1937), where he predicts war. The title poem, transparently allegorical, concerns two opposing factions of Aryan and Semite goats and the establishment of world peace through passive non-resistance. It is also with reference to the fear of inevitable war that Canadians read and interpreted parables like The Prize Cat,' The Baritone,' 'Summit Meeting,' and The Truant.' Similarly, Brebeuf, a figure of great courage from the Canadian past, was perceived as a symbol of a nation's capacity for endurance. Pratt continued this national theme with Dunkirk (1941), They Are Returning (1945), and Behind the Log (1947). During these years the poet and his poems became part of the fabric of a developing Canadian culture.

xliii Introduction VII

When he retired from Victoria College in 1953 Pratt's work was known and read from one end of the country to the other. Various honours had been bestowed on him over the years: the GovernorGeneral's Award for Poetry in 1937 for The Fable of the Goats and Other Poems, in 1940 for Brebeuf and His Brethren, and in 1952 for Towards the Last Spike. Also, in 1940, he was awarded the Lome Pierce Gold Medal for distinguished service to Canadian literature. On his seventy-fifth birthday in 1957 Tamarack Review published a special edition on his poetry and he received one of the first Canada Council awards. This recognition had come late in life. By then, although he still came to Victoria College for the occasional lunch, it was apparent that Pratt had suddenly aged. Severe attacks of tachycardia, and then neuritis, limited his movements until ultimately he was confined to a wheelchair in his apartment. A few years before his death in April 1964, a group of younger writers posed with the now failing Pratt. Earle Birney recalls a group photograph which showed the four generations of Canadian poetry - Pratt, himself, Irving Layton, and Leonard Cohen. Of these, Birney might have acknowledged his affinity with Pratt's tradition while Layton and Cohen might have ranged themselves with A.M. Klein, products of a different stream. Yet there was a sense in which Pratt's poetry had influenced them all. In the thirties Klein had followed Pratt's allegorical direction in 'Barricade Smith: His Speeches' (1938), and in the forties with The Hitleriad (1944). This role of the public poet was also one which Layton and Cohen followed. And the connections were closer still. The death of the god in the 'slow, green water' of Cohen's early poem 'Elegy' (1956) owes something to the drowned god in Layton's 'cold, green element' (1955), while this poem, in turn, owes a great deal to the drowned man of Pratt's 'cold, green lure of the waters' (p 72), republished in the 1944 Collected Poems. Such connections, however, were not noted in the poet's lifetime. Pratt's dominance, his romanticism, and his Christianity barred the way. The critic John Sutherland, objecting to 'Dr E.J. Pratt' in an introduction to a new anthology of poetry, Other

xliv Introduction Canadians (1946), remarked that the 'other7 poets of the forties took as their subject urban life rather than nature. Moreover, 'if God still talks to these poets in private, he carries less weight than Karl Marx or Sigmund Freud/33 Sutherland was to change his mind, but his arguments were continued two decades later. Cohen, in his 'Elegy for E.J.P./ rejects Pratt's romantic modes, his God, and his conviction that poetry can help change the world: Who can trace the canyoned paths cattle have carved out of time wandering from meadowlands to feasts Layer after layer of autumn leaves are swept away Something forgets us perfectly.34 It seems appropriate that this disavowal should come from one of the most promising of the sixties poets. In the forties and fifties Scott had felt impelled to quarrel with Pratt in verse and in the sixties and seventies Frank Davey and Margaret Atwood did so. Precisely because Pratt loomed large - mythic, ancestral - younger poets felt obliged to deny his influence and rewrite his poems: Scott in 'Brebeuf and His Brethren' (1941) and 'All the Spikes but the Last' (i954)/ Atwood in 'A Descent through the Carpet' (1966), and Davey in The Clallam (1973). This, as Harold Bloom speculates in The Anxiety of Influence (1973), is perhaps one of the surest sign of the dominance of a strong poet on following generations. As a poet, critic, and mentor to younger poets, Pratt did more than any other individual to encourage the development of a Canadian poetry. In the early twenties, before Smith and Scott had published, Pratt was writing imagist verse and bringing the work of Roberts and Duncan Campbell Scott to contemporary audiences through the Canadian Authors' Association. As he later explained, 'I believe I share Eliot's creed of a developing tradition which... can embrace Dryden and Kipling as well as Webster and Donne. Duncan Campbell Scott, Carman and Roberts did their job for their

xlv Introduction generation and did it well, and the fact that some of us have pursued other paths does not lessen the importance of their journeys/35 It is indicative of his own direction as a poet that he understood that although the Confederation poets had created a nature poetry which, for the first time, reflected a national consciousness, they had not developed 'the larger human currents, the democratic visions, the creative impulses at work on myths and national origins/36 Pratt took on this role himself in Brebeuf and His Brethren and Towards the Last Spike. He was in this sense the 'Whitman/ or founding national poet, that Birney in his satiric poem 'Can Lit' said that Canadian poetry 'wanted/ In the thirties Pratt provided practical assistance to a younger generation of poets, overseeing publication of Leo Kennedy's The Shrouding (1933) and encouraging Scott, Birney, Roy Daniells, and Robert Finch. At the same time he served as editor for the Canadian Poetry Magazine, teaching his assistant, Northrop Frye, when a poem was 'worth money/37 It was Pratt who ensured that Birney's David found a publisher and Pratt, also, in an article, 'Canadian Poetry: Past and Present/ in The University of Toronto Quarterly in 1938, who suggested the possibility of developing an anthology of good Canadian poetry.38 Smith took up the challenge and edited The Book of Canadian Poetry (1943). This anthology established a poetic canon for the future study of English-Canadian poetry and led to Frye's comment that Canadian poetry was characterized by a garrison mentality and a dominantly cruel nature. This analysis, which provided the basis for much criticism of Canadian poetry for at least three decades, may have developed from looking back at earlier Canadian poetry through Pratt's major narratives. Pratt was a major exemplar for Canadian poets of the 19605 and 19703, not in spite of his romanticism but because of it. His stance as a public poet was continued by the major poets of the fifties, and his use of the long poem, once considered old-fashioned, has been vindicated by twentieth-century practice and modern, as opposed to post-modern, Canadian poetry. Most importantly, Pratt's concept of a dualistic and evolutionary nature shaped subsequent Canadian poetry. The description of the iceberg in The Titanic, for

xlvi Introduction example, is literally transferred to that of the mountain peak in Earle Birney's David (1940). The iceberg's reversion from a 'crystal peak' to a 'claw' which rips through the Titanic is the same as that from Birney's 'sunlit spire' to the 'cruel fang' which pierces David. Similar, too, is the use of structural allegory in each poem. Just as Pratt's The Titanic becomes a larger comment on the hubris of twentieth-century man, so Birney's tale of man killing man upon a mountain where only the fittest survive is a transparent parable of the poet's, and a generation's, emotions on going to war.39 This psychological perspective on nature, verging on allegory, was carried into the work of younger poets such as Al Purely and Margaret Atwood. In their work, as in that of Pratt, Birney, and Scott, man is most often a human animal set against eons of evolutionary time. Pratt, who showed his successors how the poet could use the Canadian landscape as a symbol for human experience, also left a moral legacy, the romantic belief that the poet in today's culture can still aspire to be 'the unacknowledged legislator of mankind.' Pratt's memory is kept green in Victoria College, where he worked and taught for so many years. The library of the college, now renamed the E.J. Pratt Library, houses a full collection of his poems, letters, and working papers. Its reading room is dominated by a portrait of the public poet by Kenneth Forbes. Pratt stands solidly, macintosh flapping, but for the book of poems in one hand he might be a typical master mariner from Newfoundland. There is, however, another painting of the poet as private man which hangs above Northrop Frye's desk. This portrait, as its painter Barker Fairley observed, does not look like Pratt but like the man who wrote the poems. It is this portrait which introduces the present edition of the Complete Poems of E.J. Pratt. NOTES

1 John Burke, The Killigrew's Soiree/ Old Time Songs of Newfoundland,3rd ed. ed. Gerald S. Doyle (St John's: Gerald S. Doyle 1955) 36 2 See Sandra Djwa, E.J. Pratt: The Evolutionary Vision (Montreal / Toronto:

xlvii Introduction McGill-Queen's University Press and Copp Clark 1974) and 'The 19205: E.J. Pratt, Transitional Modern/ The E.J. Pratt Symposium, ed. Glenn Clever (Ottawa: University of Ottawa Press 1977) 55-68 3 Viola Pratt to Sandra Djwa, interview, 19 January 1976 4 David G. Pitt, E.J. Pratt: The Truant Years 1882-1927 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press 1984) 88-9 5 Viola Pratt to Sandra Djwa, interview, 19 January 1976 6 E.J. Pratt to Ronald Hambleton, interview, E.J. Pratt Collection (EJPC), E.J. Pratt Library, Victoria University, Toronto, Box 12 7 Viola Pratt to Sandra Djwa, interview, 19 January 1976 8 Roy Daniells, The Special Quality' in Northrop Frye and Roy Daniells, 'Ned Pratt: Two Recollections,' Canadian Literature 21 (Summer 1964) 10 9 Barker Fairley, The Canadian Forum 7 (February 1927) 149 10 E.J. Pratt, 'Memories of Newfoundland,' in The Book of Newfoundland, ed. J.R. Smallwood (St John's: Newfoundland Book Publishers 1937) 11:57 11 David G. Pitt, E.J. Pratt: The Truant Years 1882-1927 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press 1984) 88-9, 114-16 12 Viola Pratt to Sandra Djwa, interview, 19 January 1976 13 E.J. Pratt Manuscript Collection, Box 12 14 See Jenny O'Hara Pincock, The Trails of Truth (Los Angeles: Austin Publishing Co. 1930) 66-80. Viola Pratt's recollection is that she and her husband ceased to attend seances because of their perception of 'a sense of evil.' 15 E.J. Trelawny, Recollections of the Last Days of Shelley and Byron (Boston: Ticknor and Fields 1858) 133 16 G.J. Romanes, Darwin, and After Darwin (Chicago: Open Court Publishing Company 1892) 412 17 His ironic 'harvest moon' may echo Byron's Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, in, xvli. 'How that red rain hath made the harvest grow,' a reference to the aftermath of the Battle of Waterloo. 18 Speech given by E.J.P. on Wordsworth at Cornell University, post-1945. Box 10, 75.3, EJPC 19 'The Decay of Romance,' EJPC 20 Lord David Cecil, 'Introduction to British Poetry,' Modern Verse in English, ed. by David Cecil and Allen Tate (London: Eyre & Spottiswoode 1958) 32 21 Barker Fairley, 'An Open Letter to Professor Irving Babbitt,' The Canadian Forum 11 (January 1931) 136-8 22 Irving Babbitt, Rousseau and Romanticism (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company 1957) 262 23 Douglas Bush, 'Letter to the Editor,' Canadian Forum (June 1922) 24 Sandra Djwa, 'The Canadian Forum: Literary Catalyst,' Studies in Canadian Literature \ (Winter 1976) 17 25 Introduction, The Collected Poems of E.J. Pratt, ed. William Rose Benet

xlviii Introduction 26 E.K. Brown, "The Originality of E.J. Pratt/ Canadian Accent, ed. Ralph Gustafson (London: Penguin 1944) 39,44 27 John Keats to Benjamin Bailey, letter, 22 November 1817 in The Selected Letters of John Keats, ed. Lionel Trilling (New York: Farrar, Straus and Young 1951) 88 28 E.J.P. to F.R. Scott, letter, 4 December 1940, EJPC 29 Frye, 'Ned Pratt: Two Recollections' 9 30 Northrop Frye to Sandra Djwa, interview, 23 August 1983 31 Box 10, 75.3, EJPC 32 T.H. Huxley, 'Evolution and Ethics' in T.H. Huxley and Julian Huxley, Evolution and Ethics 1893-1943 (London: Pilot Press Ltd. 1947) 68 33 John Sutherland, 'Introduction: The Old and the New,' Other Canadians, ed. John Sutherland (Montreal: First Statement Press 1947) 15 34 Leonard Cohen, 'For E.J.P.,' Selected Poems 1956-1968 (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart 1964) 124 35 E.J. Pratt to F.R. Scott, letter, 7 December 1944, F.R. Scott Papers, National Archives, Ottawa. 36 E.J. Pratt, 'Canadian Poetry: Past and Present,' University of Toronto Quarterly 8 (October 1938) 1-10 37 Frye, 'Ned Pratt: Two Recollections' 7 38 Sandra Djwa, 'Earle Birney,' Essays in Canadian Writing 21 (Spring 1981) 32-52

Notes on the Text

This edition of £./. Pratt: Complete Poems presents a critical text prepared in accordance with modern editorial theory and procedure. It represents as nearly as possible the author's final intentions, arrived at after a thorough collation of all versions of the authoritative text (those published in the author's lifetime), and a reasoned choice of copy-text. A textual apparatus, listing all variant readings and providing information regarding all editorial emendations, gives the evidence of textual transmission and editorial decisions. The textual history of Pratt's poetry is, like that of many modern poets, complex. And the diversity and rarity of the many sources required patient and diligent search. Most of the shorter poems were published initially in magazines and journals - Acta Victoriana, Canadian Poetry Magazine, Saturday Night, Poetry (Chicago), The Journal of Religious Thought, and Vox. Subsequently, many of these, along with unpublished poems, appeared in small collections such as Newfoundland Verse (1923), Many Moods (1932), and Still Life and Other Verse (1943). Pratt's longer poems, from the privately printed Rachel in 1917 to Towards the Last Spike in 1952, were usually published in limited editions whose runs, like those of the collections, rarely exceeded 500 copies. In 1944 Macmillan of Canada produced the Collected Poems (Knopf published an American edition, with an introduction by William Rose Benet, in 1945). Selected and supervised by Pratt, this edition contained those poems which he wished to retain; it excluded

1 Notes on the Text approximately one-third of his previously published work. He was most severe with his early poems, omitting Rachel, more than 50 per cent of Newfoundland Verse, and almost 40 per cent of The Fable of the Goats (1938), including the title poem of that collection. In 1958, Pratt's own authorized collection of poetry appeared in a second edition of Collected Poems. This edition, with an introduction by Northrop Frye, recognized Pratt's growing influence but perpetuated his preferences. It is, basically, a duplication of the 1944 Collected Works with several new poems. As such, it excluded more than a third of Pratt's published work. Pratt's authoritative text, therefore, is not only widely dispersed, necessitating an investigation of many remote and unlikely sources, but exists in many versions. While a few poems such as The Last Watch' exist in but a single version in a single source (Canadian Poetry Magazine, 1949), most exist in four or five, and some, like 'The Sea-Gull,' in as many as eleven versions. A complete transmission history of Pratt's poetry, as is offered in the bibliography included with this edition, reveals a multiplicity of versions which delights and challenges the modern editor. A sight collation of these variant versions, carried out by two independent collators, provided ample evidence of progressive revision. From manuscript to printed version, from early version to latest, Pratt was a prolific reviser of his poetry. In The Witches' Brew, for example, we find him refining his list of dainty morsels from 'in-grown toe-nails from Shanghai' (manuscript) to 'braided rattails from Shanghai' (1925,1926) to 'filets mignons from Shanghai' (1958). With that fact established, therefore, it seemed reasonable to adopt the latest-revised authoritative version of each poem as the copy-text, unless it could be shown (as with Here the Tides Flow and certain poems published in newspapers) that Pratt did not supervise the selection or printing. This meant that, for nearly two-thirds of the text, the 1958 Collected Poems became the basis for the final edited version. Adoption of that policy, and the decision to adopt a conservative approach to emendation (emending only where the text was obscure or in error), resulted in a minimum of textual

li Notes on the Text interference with the copy-text. In only ten instances, in a text which contains 153 poems (many of epic length), was the copy-text emended, nearly all of these involving the correction of compositorial error (briray to briny, Rachel 142; thing to things, The Witches' Brew 468). On only three occasions, from among several hundred variants, did editorial judgement decide in favour of a non-copy-text variant (e.g. caparison was preferred over comparison, an early variant in Tuck Reports Back'). Even when a non-copy-text variant possessed a great deal of credibility, the copy-text reading was preferred unless evidence weighed against it or the text was hopelessly obscured by its retention. If such was not the case, the variant was relegated to the textual apparatus. Indeed, whenever the decision was made to use a variant from a version other than copy-text, the reason for doing so was recorded in the textual apparatus. That apparatus also records all substantive variants in all other versions, thus allowing the reader to assess the full extent of the variant states and judge whether the accepted reading seems reasonable. The only other editorial control concerned the spelling. Consistency was the primary objective, which involved anglicizing considerable numbers of Americanisms, but a special effort was made to retain idiosyncratic spellings preferred by Pratt for humorous purposes (gnoo instead of gnw, for example). The text of each poem in this edition, therefore, approximates as closely as possible a fair copy of that poem, a copy which Pratt would have presented to the public. The chronology for the whole canon has been established and the textual history shown. Included in this edition are approximately thirty-five lyrics never before published in book form, and approximately seventy-eight poems not reprinted since their original appearance. Also included are a selection of Pratt's unpublished poetry and his unpublished verse drama Clay. The main text contains the published poetry, arranged in chronological sequence, with the date of first publication assigned. This is followed by a list of Textual Variants and Annotations. Annotations are provided for biblical, classical, literary, and political allusions, nautical terms, archaisms, and

lii Notes on the Text Newfoundland dialect words. The appendices contain a small section of published ephemera, Clay, and a carefully edited selection of unpublished poems which exist in a state approximating a fair copy. The edition concludes with a comprehensive primary bibliography, with quasi-facsimile title-pages for all books of poetry, which describes the transmission and publication history of Pratt's poetry.

Acknowledgements

The editors are happy to acknowledge the preliminary bibliographical work undertaken by Marilyn G. Flitton with Sandra Djwa before this project began. R.G. Moyles was assisted in his editorial work by Shannon Murray, and Sandra Djwa was aided in hers by Perry Millar, Frances Hord, Alan Dawe, and Marilyn G. Flitton. Without the capable assistance of these individuals, this project could not have been successfully completed. We are also grateful to the staff of the Pratt Library, Victoria University, Toronto, which was especially helpful, as were the staff at Special Collections, the University of British Columbia Library, and Douglas Library, Queen's University. Without the generous financial support of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, which made available a research grant to the editorial team, the project could not have been begun. It was brought to completion with a grant from the Publications Committee of Simon Fraser University. This has been a team project, and we are particularly grateful not only to the members of the editorial team - Robert Gibbs, Susan Gingell, Lila Laakso, and David Pitt - but to members of the Advisory Board as well. We would also like to thank our colleagues in Canadian literature who have come to our assistance from time to time, especially D.G. Stephens of the University of British Columbia, who supervised Sandra Djwa's first work on Pratt.

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Biographical Chronology

1882

Born at Western Bay, Newfoundland, 4 February; third child of eight of the Rev. John Pratt, Yorkshireborn clergyman, and Fanny Pitts Knight, daughter of a Newfoundland sea captain 1888-1902 Educated in outport schools and at the Methodist College, St John's with a three-year intermission, 1897-1900, as a clerk in a dry-goods store 1902-4 Teacher at Moreton's Harbour, a fishing village in Notre Dame Bay 1904-7 Probationary minister in the Methodist ministry at Clarke's Beach-Cupids and Bell Island-Portugal Cove 1907-11 Student in philosophy, Victoria College, University of Toronto, BA 1911 1912 Received MA degree, University of Toronto 1913 Received BD degree; ordained into the Methodist ministry 1913-20 Demonstrator-lecturer in psychology, University of Toronto; assistant minister in a number of churches around Streetsville, Ontario 1917 Received PH D from University of Toronto - thesis, Studies in Pauline Eschatology and Its Background, published in Toronto; Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland in Verse printed privately in New York

Ivi Biographical Chronology 1918 1920

1921 1923

1925 1926 1927 1930

1930-52 1932 1935 1936 1937 1938 1940

1941 1943 1944 1945

Married Viola Whitney (BA Victoria College 1913), 20 August or: An Ode published in Toronto Birth of only child, Mildred Claire Newfoundland Verse, first commercially published book of poems or: An Ode published in Toronto oor: An Ode published in Toronto Toronto Door: An Ode published in Toronto or: An Ode published in To r o n t o toria College; elected fellow of the Royal Society of Canada; The Roosevelt and the Antinoe published in New York; Verses of the Sea, with introduction by Charles G.D. Roberts, published in Toronto Taught summer school at Dalhousie, Queen's, and the University of British Columbia Many Moods published in Toronto The Titanic published in Toronto the founders and first editor, from January 1936 to August 1943, of Canadian Poetry Magazine The Fable of the Goats and Other Poems published in Toronto, winner of the Governor-General's Award Appointed senior professor, Victoria College Brtbeufand His Brethren published in Toronto, winner of the Governor-General's Award; awarded the Royal Society's Lome Pierce Gold Medal for distinguished service to Canadian literature Dunkirk published in Toronto Still Life and Other Verse published in Toronto Collected Poews,published in Toronto Collected Poems, with introduction by William Rose Ben£t, published in New York; They Are Returning published in Toronto; received D. Litt. from University of Manitoba, first honorary degree (others: LLD, Queen's 1948; DCL, Bishop's 1949; D. Litt.,

Ivii Biographical Chronology

1946 1947 1952

1953 1955 1957 1958 1959 1961 1963 1964

McGill 1949; D. Litt., Toronto 1953; D. Litt., Assumption 1955; D. Litt., New Brunswick 1957; D. Litt., Western Ontario 1957; D. Litt., Memorial 1961) Created Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George in the King's Honours List Behind the Log and Ten Selected Poems published in Toronto Towards the Last Spike published in Toronto, winner of the Governor-General's Award; awarded the University of Alberta Gold Medal for distinguished service to Canadian literature; member of the editorial board, from 20 December 1952 to 13 September 1958, of Saturday Night Retired from Victoria College; appointed professor emeritus of English Elected honorary president of the Canadian Authors' Association Received Canada Council award on 75th birthday The Collected Poems of E.J. Pratt, edited by Northrop Frye, published in Toronto Received Civic Award of Merit from the City of Toronto Received the Canada Council medal for distinction in the field of literature Elected honorary member of the Empire Club of Canada; elected first honorary member of the Arts and Letters Club Died in Toronto, 26 April

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EJ. PRATT: COMPLETE POEMS PART 1

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3 A Poem on the May Examinations The year was just about to close, the Arts' Exams were on, The faces of the students had become so pale and wan, The ordeal was upon them; how they wished that it was past! For strength was quickly sinking, and the nerves were breaking fast. A year of mental strain had gone, its fruit was being gauged By quantitative tests; a great array of doctors aged In wisdom as in years, were chosen arbiters of Fate Reverend, hoary sages, Heaven-born to educate. All preparations were completed, open wide were thrown The doors; the old grey tower in solitude from his high throne Looked down in wonder, mixed with pity, that again the rack And slaughter of the Innocents had to this land come back.

10

Into the halls the students poured, each clamouring for a seat, All wise directions lost amid the uproar of the feet, But that excitement had a cause, for they were well aware That failures oft resulted from a noisy, creaking chair. But soon the boisterous clamour ceased, the papers were passed round, Deep silence fell. Within those walls, the ear heard not a sound, Except the sighing of a student here and there whose brain Not formed for such surprises, now was softening 'neath the strain. 20 Thus recommenced the Annual Test; for three short weeks it ran, But mighty revolutions lived and died within that span; Indeed, the world in generations never brought about Such eras as came in within those weeks, and then passed out.

4

Vast strides were made in Science - new discoveries every hour, Ideas brilliant were advanced on Energy and Power, Examined were the Laws of Motion, Newton's long-held claim To greatness was disproved by minds as yet unknown to fame. Amazing views were held on Electricity and Light, Amongst the spectrum's rays was classed an element of White; 30 In Heat and Hydrostatics fundamental Laws were changed, New compounds formed in Chemistry through atoms rearranged. Geometry and Algebra as humble suppliants came, To have their range of application broadened was their aim, Full conscious of the charge that oft against them is preferred, That they were only meant for children, but for men absurd. Their humble claims were granted - a revision going deep Into the subject carefully was made; such was the sweep Of criticism that beat on the paper like a storm, One could identify no more the science by its form.

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Those things that are deductions termed - not easily defined, Because they proved disastrous to the students' peace of mind And caused bad use of language, were considered Darkness-born, Therefore in pious negligence, they were passed by in scorn. Next Greek and Latin stood before the bar, and both received Tremendous punishment: Their modern relatives bereaved, And stricken by the blow, suffered in turn, heart-pained to see Their parents grey insulted by a young examinee. For centuries there had been instilled within the youthful brain The fallacy of History; a solid, age-wrought chain 50 Of eras, crises, causes and results, and tempered well In a millennium's furnace, now was shattered like a shell.

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The Greek Chronology was altered; dates which long had been Established, were proven false, and aeons were shown to intervene Between events once thought to be consecutive; such acts Destructive of the Past were made, but one must face the facts. At Cannae Alexander fought - a fearful, bloody fight, And forced the Spanish rebels back in wild, disordered flight, He drove old Caesar's veterans from the frontier to their home, Then pushed right on, until he battered at the gates of Rome. 6o The fiery Plato, when a boy, was by his father sworn That he would sober be, until the standards which were torn From Carthage by proud Rome recovered were, which pledge he kept, Until Italia's power had died, unhonoured and unwept. The noble poet Phidias for writing verse which stung The Spartan tyrant into fury, was condemned and hung, Together with his brave and fearless cousin, Xenophon, Who won for Greece her freedom on the plains of Marathon. The base of operations changed; the critic's hand was seen Next in the realm of English, the analysis was keen And justified the spirit of the age in its attempt To treat the laws of Spelling with derision and contempt. A radical departure from poetic thought was made When on Macaulay, Goldsmith, Scott and Keats was gravely laid The charge, that they with Browning made their meaning so obscure That the decay of Time would overtake them, slow but sure.

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But still the storm of Change increased and louder roared the blast, As if it would uproot the strong foundations of the past, Another victim it required its wrath to satisfy, One more and that the greatest one must now prepare to die.

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Predestined was the fate to which this sinner was consigned For all the patient, gentle temper he had undermined With Jewish tricks; notorious Hebrew answered to his name And to his doom, full-merited, with trembling footsteps came. Dire was the punishment imposed for conduct mean and base, Beghadkhephaths and Dagheshes were thrown right in his face, Around his neck the Athnak yoke was tied secure and fast, The paper with the crimes was read before he breathed his last. No tear was shed, no sigh was raised, save only of relief; No pitying theologue gazed on with tear-stained handkerchief, 90 No groans came forth, but from the prisoner crouching in full dread As Pe Nun verbs and gutturals were aimed straight at his head. More threatening still became the anger of the mob, the cry Was raised, 'Destroy him, root and branch, change not, nor modify The system which reveals him, but let Justice take its course, And hence of students' many sins blot out so vile a source.' Across the scene let fall the curtain, spare the cultured eye The sight of such destruction, with this blast the storm will die, Then glad Reform will reign, and to the mind give welcomed rest, Inspiring cheer, renewing hope within the student breast. April 1909

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The Wind of the West Thou Wind of the West, beloved of the Ocean, Shepherd of peace to her wild-wandering fears, Claimant of Heaven to maidens' devotion And sweetest of music to mariners' ears! Today does thy chorus ring Soaring on azure wing As homeward the sailor his ship proudly steers. This morning I woke at the Dawn's tender breaking, And sped to the window that fronts on the lea 'To hear thy soft pinions all-tremulous, shaking The silver ringed tassels from clover and tree; In a rose scented aisle Thou didst linger awhile To vow to fulfilment this message from me. Chase far that wild child of Nereus whose tresses Were woven by tempests in caves of the east, Appease her fierce anger with silken caresses In the green vaulted temple of Neptune's High Priest; With persuasion divine Bid her pledge at his shrine With such bonds as withhold her from being released. That never again her war-chariots urging Shall she visit these scenes in her hurricane sweep, Nor shod with the thunder-brand's desolate scourging Shall she ride o'er the heart of the agonized deep, And with clamorous breath Of convulsion and death Disturb the home-dreams of the fisherman's sleep.

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But stay thou winged healer of life's agitation And guide to their haven the pilgrims of Lea, Bestowing on lovers a fond restoration Rejoicing the mother with the babe at her knee. Remain, oh forever! Leaving us never, And glad will our songs float to heaven and thee.

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October 1914

The Secret of the Sea Tell me thy secret, O Sea, The mystery sealed in thy breast; Come, breathe it in whispers to me, A child of thy fevered unrest. It's midnight, and from me has sleep Flown afar, like a bird on the wing, All tired is my heart as I weep Through a winter that knows not a Spring. Why dost thou respond to my plea With only a minor refrain? Thy voice in a moan floats to me, As an echo sobbed from my pain.

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Hast thou a grief, too, like mine, That never heals with the years; A bosom entombing a shrine Bedewed with the waste of thy tears? Where lies my loved one tonight Beneath thy grey mantle so wide? I would that his slumber were light, To wake with the flow of the tide.

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Should he not wake, bear him this, An amaranth plucked from my heart; Wreathe it soft in his dreams with a kiss, Then return, and ere I depart. On the flood of my soul's overflow, Borne on by my grief from the wild Of this storm-beaten life, let me know How he slept; let me know if he smiled.

December 1914

Unseen Allies Watchful our statued dead! With calm divine Facing the front where British troops have gone Sydney, Cromwell, Marlborough, Wellington, Steadying old England's shell-scarred battle-line; And from the chiselled marble bust or shrine Glow deep those eyes which victories oft have won; Drake, Grenville, Hawke, and Nelson looking on Flashing their deathless signals o'er the brine. Firm base of hope! The present issue stands In aim confederate with the gallant Past: Across the bourne of Time we join our hands With serried hosts. Behind our lines are massed Battalions of a memorable age, Whose deeds emblazon Freedom's valorous page. Evening So calm the air; the sunset's dying beat Wafts slowly to me from the distant brim Of silent waters; evening shadows dim Press close the day's spent hours, loath to greet

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March 1915

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The veiled advance of night; slumbering sweet The stillness as the purple threads the rim Of yonder crimson, preluding a hymn Of choral wavelets silvering at my feet. O restful solitude! Here life's frail trust Grows, nurtured near the heart of mystery, Expands into fruition, from the clod Of cynic trappings, orbs to symmetry The place where light strikes through Time's circling dust, MMMMMMFGSDFLDSFLDGJDGLKL;KHGFGGGGJUKKK

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And hush atnds the tread of God. October 1915

The Sacrifice of Youth How sweet the stream of life which calmly flows Through verdurous blooms, and Spring's fair woodland ways, Ere yet the sun with full meridian rays Paints rapture on the cowslip and the rose; That life upon whose banks Youth smiling sows Her seed, in glorious promise of full days The happy tribute Peace to Fortune pays, Yielding to far-off age a sunset-close. But nobler if less calm the life that sweeps Through ragged hollows torn by strife of winds, By grinding griefs, fierce eddyings of pain, That through the bleak defiles of duty, leaps Into the wild-flung sea of death, and finds From Time's sad forfeiture a vaster gain. Dead on the Field of Honour 'Dead on the field of Honour.' Came the words In slow pulsation on the printed page, And April with her buds and happy birds Became November, with her ash and age.

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December 1915

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'Dead on the field of Honour/ Pale the face That gazes on me in my fitful dreams, And alien forms within the gloom I trace Beside the hallowed body, as it seems. 'Dead on the field of Honour/ Let it be. With Glory's paeans sounding let us part, Tis meet that Honour's tribute should be free, But cloistered grief keeps tolling in my heart.

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June 1916

The Seed Must Die Ye meadows, groves, your birth renew; ye orchards, vineyards, grow! Where fast the wastrel waters of the Marne and Yser flow; On the plains bestow your verdure, to the hills your odours fling, Before the smile of Ceres, let your golden censer swing. For never since great Nature ran her sluices to the sea, And opened up her flood-gates at the Rain-God's first decree, Have richer tides flowed round your rooted hidings in the clay, Than these which seek quite other veins from those of yesterday. Bring forth the fruitage of your loins in deep, impurpurate stain; Ye vines, that sprang to life from out the throes of British pain; 10 Gird on your strength, ye pines that shade the dead on yonder height; Re-knot your tissues with the stubborn fibre of their might. And let the rose its crimson darken towards the purple shade, Full-flushed with blood imperial - the price that Britain paid, The lily and the jonquil greet once more their native hills, Companioned by anemones and sun-crowned daffodils.

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Command the earth its seed receive, in rare profusion sent, Pledged to high increase in the wine of life's last sacrament; For when sowed Nature seed like this since Time in cycles ran, Or bade the soil accept so strange, so stern a harvest plan? March 1917

The Greater Sacrifice Characters: A Mother of France An Unseen Messenger MOTHER Strange throbbings in my heart tonight, Those distant thunders - will they never cease? That sputtering light far-off there to the north Gives augury of tomorrow's list of dead. My boy of nineteen years caught in that belt Of fire! Tell me O God, how fights he now? Remains he scatheless in the battle's tide? Shall he return with body sound, with limbs Unscarred by shell? In strength return to me, With medalled honours clasped upon his breast, His face alit with Joffre's kiss, his eyes A-flaming with Nivelle's soul-shaking words? MESSENGER

Mother of France, attend! Canst thou yield up His limbs? MOTHER

Wouldst ask me that? His father's limbs Are scattered in the tunnels of Verdun, Where limed scoriae and sightless ash Lie mingled with the dear sweet soil of France.

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And so dismembered must the son return? Well... Yes, I yield that up ... The cause is great.

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MESSENGER

Mother of France, list! Give you up his life? MOTHER

His life as well as health and strength and limbs? 0 grant me but his face to cheer my toil, To smile upon my nursing care and love. Must he then with his father die for France? MESSENGER

For France. MOTHER

Then let my challenged heart say yes. MESSENGER

Mother of France, again! His stars, his cross, His outward signs of bravery recognized Upon the field of action? Yield you these? MOTHER But grant you not some token of his deeds, Some badge of flashing courage when he died, Nivelle's proud words of praise that I may wring Their patriot music from my hearted chords? MESSENGER

This too, for France. Her life demands e'en this. MOTHER

1 yield though I am sick in soul, and crave A medicine denied to mortal grief. And this ends all?

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No, sad one, no, not all, For though within the darkened stealth of night, His back on Paris, and his face hard-set Upon the foeman's parapet ahead, No human eye gazed on him when he fell, Caught in the wire's mesh, a lurid arc Of red painting his breast, yet once I turned To watch the onset of an angel's wings Beating the storm above him, and I saw By the bright light of some supernal torch That pierced the clouded glory of God's throne, An angel hand that stole within the wound, And clasped upon the pulseless heart a cross Of fairer worth than that of bronze or gold.

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For Valour

To sail life's inland lakes with flowing ease, Before the gentle airs of summer's heaven, To enter port before the tempest falls, To leave it when its frown has passed, and smiles Light up the crystal vault; to run the voyage With steady keel along a charted course, By day the faithful sun, and in the night The beacon-fires of moon and firmament; To make the journey like the rivulet, That issuing from the mountain's silver springs, Takes on the gladdening energy of morn, Calls to its mates, the nurslings of the hills, To celebrate with confluent harmonies The April festival of life, then leads

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The sinuous race throughout the summer's noon Tasting the winged leap of waterfall, The rainbow wine of mist and beaded foam, Then over wide-spread plains with slumberous motion Gliding, through the valleys laden with the haunts Of men, until in fulness of its days, Rich with the tribute of a thousand streams, It feels the hand of the October sun, In lambent reach beyond the crimson West, Putting the scarf of purple on the tides, And moves in peace towards the eternal sea. Thus to complete life's course, its fluent curves Throb with its symphonies, its concert tones Unmarred by fret of discord and rent strings; To make the end the achievement of the promise, To go from strength to strength, and of old age To take painless inheritance: Indeed This is to enter into others' labours, Receive from the great Father's gracious hands His double bounty, his fourscore of years, To taste his wine without the bitter lees. To sail with thrice-reefed canvas, chartless gulfs, When stars have left their spheres, and the moon's rays Are swallowed up i'the void; when chaos broods, When rising seas have swept away the stanchions, When spars and bulwarks crash, and in the night Hoarse voices tell the mariner at the wheel His barque will never reach its haven; then, To brace the heart's great sinews for the plunge To stand beneath black clouds that overcharged With their dread-slaying bolts reck neither place Nor time to strike, and with uplifted head

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Bared in the pride of honour's rectitude, To scorn the unleashed wraths of shaft and flood To fight the rearguard: To brave the first fierce shock, When truth and faith are reeling neath the blows, When freedom, virtue, God's Invisibles, Which, fondly did we boast, could never fail, Whence, in the architecture of our dreams, Arose and fashioned strongholds of our race. The marble synthesis of all our struggles, Gains and loss, the net balance of our smiles Struck with our tears, the veined residuaries Of strife 'twixt hope and ever-seething doubt, The lifted highways of the world's advance, Its peaks of conquest, and its glories won Through sorrows cancelled by the importunate price Of blood, and all the marshalled monuments Of Love's emblazoned feet since Calvary, When these are straining neath the urged assaults Of Time's fell battery, when ideals of life In age august, in origin divine, Slip from their lofty station in the world, Then still to face the foeman's murderous might, Shake off his deadly, overweening clutch, Repulse his war-plumed gods, his scabbard faith, And with the certitude of death at hand Cover the vanguard of retreat, make safe The fold, and then outside the bolted gates, With the last comrade fallen in his pain, To share the triumph of his fall, to wrest Success from failure, and to find one's soul Emerging from the clod, redeemed -

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17 This, This! Is to bring forth refined gold, nay more. 80 Create a metal rarer than the gold, Disdain the laggard fires of those tests By which stern nature in her chastening moods Evolves her favoured ones, surpassing these, To star a gem of nobler alchemy, The birth-stamp of the human spirit - This Is to outstrip the angel, put on God, Stand in His presence, share His name's great might, Be heir of His estate, glean from His mind The Stature of His plans, of His vast love, 90 Its depths unplumbed, its length, its breadth, its height, The compass-round of its infinity, To take assured title; yea, to be The co-artificer of His creation, This, under His clouds, is to prove the faith That dwells alone in human majesty. October 1917 The Great Mother Where meet the streams from the earth's many fountains, That part from each other with myriad aims The Danube that springs from its far-distant mountains, The Tiber, the Seine, the Rhine, and the Thames Far from each other, independent and free, Yet do not all of them flow to the sea? Loud do their cataracts fling out their thunder Through the deep gorges that lead them along, Hundreds of leagues divide them asunder; Yet, see how resistless their dark waters throng, In whirlpool and rapid, with agonized motion, Until they find rest in the world's level ocean.

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And from the world's frontiers came the world's races, Diverse as their colours and languages run; Life bade them stand with alien faces, With wrongs to requite, till Death made them one With the silence that broods on his passionless land, By the call of his voice and the seal of his hand. Repose now their ashes in earth's tender keeping Dust unto dust, as the autumn leaves fall; 20 Peace, peace at last to tired eyes sleeping, To Saxon, and Teuton, to Latin and Gaul; Back to the great Mother - thus must it be, As their home-rivers flow to the sea. December 1917

The Sea-Shell Thou silver shell that liest near The pebbled margin of the sea, Bidding sunbeams reappear In opal-cinctured tracery! What wondrous artist wove those lines Of ivory flamed with green and gold, And bordered thee with blue designs Of Heaven's pencil, fold on fold? Whence came that myriad-voiced stream Within those coral veins - that flow Of murmurous melody whose theme Swings round a rapture, and a woe?

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They tell us that the Ocean's birth Is anthemed in thy hidden strings, That every choral song of Earth Still to thy sculptured gateway clings; That from thy sweet-tongued numbers rise The herald notes of distant stars, Awaking slumber-laden skies Across the Morn's soft opening bars;

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That centuried thunders darkly dwell Somewhere within thy curled retreat, Lulled by yon sapphire-bosomed swell That steals to shore on zephyred feet. But list! What notes are those that fall In broken music wildly strange, Like Autumn answering Winter's call To seared embrace, that soon must change Her mellowed hours to barren days, To shadowed union with the tomb, And close her harvest songs of praise With threnodies of blighted bloom!

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Do these reflect thy mother's moods, Pearled miniature of troubled years! Her sombre-suited solitudes, Her cadences of wailful fears? Or, is it thus alas! too true, Thou tellest to the listening ear Its own sad stories, old and new, Its coming sorrows, distant, near?

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If so thou singest, then how soon Frail warden of Life's chambered past, Seer of its yet-to-be - my Noon Of days with grey is overcast.

1917

Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland in Verse Piercing the rugged coastline for a depth Of sixty miles inrolled the giant bay, Forming small harbours in its winding course With narrow inlets, creeks and shallow coves, Here following a rough unyielding shore That broke amain the Atlantic's power, and there Curving with widened sweep into a mile Of rising headland where, with favouring winds A ship might ride at anchor, but so slight The shelter in the heavier seas when gales From contrary quarters raged upon the land, That human hands by dint of arduous toil Had countered Nature's sternness with long lines Of shielding ramparts pushed out from the beach: In such a place for many years had come Sailors from distant Britain, voyagers Of faith and strength that ploughed broad belts of foam, Wresting their harvests from reluctant depths. Four generations here had found a home, Each in its turn re-trod the self-same paths, Fought the same storms, the ice-floes and the floods, Hailed the same Springs, their sunshine and their hopes, The Summer-trade winds with their genial power; These lived and toiled and died, and now a fifth Assumed the challenged heritage of life. Down to the harbour line two rivers ran, Dividing thrice the arc-curve of the beach.

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About the larger one there had been built The village. A few furlongs to the west, Hard by the other stream which slowly moved In devious, lonely ways, a cottage stood. More prosperous days had fallen to its share. A man's strong hands had wrought there once, and placed Upon the building and the grounds the mark Of diligent husbandry. Now this was gone, For Death had snatched the strong one from the home, And left a widow with an only child. Some years had passed since Henry Lee was drowned, His ship lost in the fog zones off the Banks, A gallant seaman in the prime of life, Inured to rigorous blasts, scornful of fear And Death's white hazards in the sweeping waves. Where other men more ripe in age, more tamed By adverse shocks to parley with the winds, Tempered with caution and reluctant mood The seasoning of adventure, Lee would weigh His anchor, and with canvas proudly spread Before a threatening storm would gaily tempt The fortunes of a voyage. Thus the sea Jealous, imperious to exercise Its right to nourish or to slay, had slain. To Rachel Lee the blow at first had come With more than usual weight. Not that such news Was rare to women's hearts, for Nature's claims In stern exaction for her favoured hand Had yearly swelled the registry of dead. No village home had failed to learn the price Of life, but in that school the strong may pay The cost, and walk with steady, upright step, Shouldering the future, while the frailer soul Staggers beneath the burden, growing faint.

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Orphaned in maidenhood, the girl had felt The sharper pangs that come to youth bereft Of guarding care, but the bright hopes that bud And blossomed with the years outlived the grief, And when the sailor love of Henry Lee Broke in upon her heart, and to their joy Of wedded union there was born a child Who took his father's name, her days increased With strength of life, its promise and its dream. Then came the news; swiftly it came, but slow The meaning of it all - the shattered dream. The widow struggled hard. Her husband's store Of savings had been slight. The tossing sea Strange bargains made. At times with lavish hand It opened up its treasures, then withheld, And then the ship, the master and the crew It gathered to itself. So what remained From its precarious bounty soon was spent In clothes and schooling for the boy. In him, In filial answerings to her widowed love, She found the thrill of rediscovered life The fond remembrance of earlier joys. His steady, virile growth awakened hopes, Twice crushed, that yet a hand of firm support Might stay to guide her in those shortening days When human eyes get dim and steps grow slow. It was not long before the household needs Called for the day's full labours, taxed her strength From early morning to the dusk of eve. But from her busy fingers at the loom, And flake, and from the garden's modest yield She kept the home supplied, but all her work Though heavy, still was lightened by the sound Of pealing laughter and the racing feet Let loose from school. Each movement of the lad,

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His glance and upward turning of the head, Each crisp of curl that frolicked with the wind, Each burning question lilting from his lips, Or hung in wordless wonder on his face, And every stirring of his restless limbs, Were charged with memories that could not fade. Her husband buried in the deep yet seemed To live again within the boy's caress; And often in her work would Rachel pause, Caught by some tone that almost made her start, So strange and yet so natural did it sound, That she would go, and bending o'er his head Would watch the father mirrored in his eye, And find around the mobile, playing mouth, The radiant windings of a vanished smile. Then after dusk throughout the calmer hour That intervened 'twixt supper time and sleep, With slate and pencil in his hand, the boy Would hurry through the sums the teacher set, Write out his copy for the morning class, While Rachel, with her knitting placed aside, Would make him read his lessons, hear him spell The words that at the bottom of the page Were grouped in lists according to their length. That done, she harkened with a mother's pride To her young hero's exploits through the day, In school room and on playground. Less was said Of boyish pranks and mischief that outlived The pickled strap and hickory stick, of deeds Of truant muscles feebly held in leash. When such reports came to the mother's ears, In playful hints dropped by the boy himself, Or through his playmates eager to recount The exciting annals of some holiday, She took her son to task with serious looks, And words that while they left no sting yet brought

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The promise made with solemn vows and signs Of good behaviour for the following day. Not many years had fled ere Rachel found Within the spirit of the growing youth Impetuous cravings for the restless sea. Its strong and boundless heavings lured his eye, Quickened his pulse, and swept ungoverned power Into his limbs. He loved to stand and watch The white sea-horses racing down a storm, Hoofing with maddened glee the briny plains, Or after, when the wind had died, the flood Tumbling its waters through the narrow gulch That steamed and panted in the long embrace. And then the raptures of the morning swim, The feel of slushing sand tingling the feet, The pungent tang of sea-kelp in the air, The loud shout of defiance to the waves That rolled in rhythmic thunders to the shore, The healthful sting of foam tanning the skin, And speeding up the heart's young blood, the zest Of battle in the breakers. First in skill Amongst a score of swimmers, Henry Lee Knit with his father's sinews ventured far Into the deeper channels, tried the stress Of surface current and of undertow With lusty breast or side-stroke, or in view Of gazing mariners on a schooner's deck, He sprang from boom or bowsprit, diving full Into the azure bay with agile curve, As some lithe salmon leaping from a pool Hangs, instant poised, then arches for the plunge, Cutting with dexterous fin a speedy path Down to his haunts, and leaves a lustrous trail Of garnet sunbeams chasing amethysts.

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And scarcely less of keen delight was his, Than when at first, the school term at an end, He donned his father's oilskins cut in shape, Fitting his size, drew on three-quarter boots Trimmed scarlet at the top, and with his head Half buried in the famed Sou'Wester cap, He rowed out to the local fishing grounds, In care of some old weather-beaten salt Whose age and prudence had commended him To Rachel's choice. The anchoring of the skiff, The first dead tug that sank the tautened line Into the well-grooved gunwale of the boat, The slow six-fathom pull, the yawning mouth Of cod were memorable events replete With wonder and excitement. Then the trip Home, when the veteran placed within his hands The tiller, taught him how to belay a sheet, Forestall a dangerous gibe, closely to watch The squall's fast shadow fretting up the waves, To run hard to the wind in chopping seas, Or leisurely recline against the stern With wing-a-wing before a spanking breeze. As time advanced, and youth began to glide Slowly into the stature of the man, New visions dawned, and widened into view. The horizon's curve had caught, and held his eye With fascinating gleam. The shore-line shrank Before the expanse unmeasured. Far away The Atlantic thralled his soul with mystery, Beckoned him on, and called him by his name. The sagas of the Gulf of Labrador, The stories of the Banks, the travel lore Of Ocean tracts, and European marts Had cast their spell upon him. Shorter trips From port to port along the coast or straight

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Across the bay showed what a world of grace Could lie within the symmetry of a sail. No sea-gull ever took the air with wing Of shapelier beauty than his ship the sea, When under cloud of canvas she careened, With wind abaft the beam, while the white foam Broke o'er the taffrail. This to him was life, With all its morning ecstasy and hope. But fiercer still the bounding, living stream That coursed within him as he listened rapt With high recital of heroic deeds Wrought out upon the Ocean's troubled face. A thousand years of British seamanship Were paged upon the floods, or sung in gales That stormed the epic and the lyric line. Not only in the battle's fiery test Where Empires rose and fell, were triumphs scored; Nor at the Equator's line, nor through the wastes Of Polar blizzards where explorers drove, Shattering the teeth of tempests, belting worlds; Not there alone, but in the starless hours Of night when breakers beat against the bows, And leaks out-raced the pumps - 'twas here that men Their laurels won, when each with other vied For pride of place in saving weaker life: Twas here when women waved their last farewell, That sailors on the listed deck took on The dignity of dying, and strong arms, The task of love and duty done, the boats Pushed off, in folded majesty sank down, To rest forever from the Atlantic's moil, With love's leave-taking of the gains of Time.

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This long tradition growing in its worth, As mighty names are added to the roll Of valorous action, gave to Newfoundland, Whose heritage it was, ancestral pride. This he accepted as his birthright - his, Never to be relinquished while the sea Hurled its wide billows on an unknown shore, Or ran the one great highway to a land Where freedom built her homes, and reared her sons, As glorious a chapter in that scroll Of fame as any did his island write; Not charactered indeed by History's pen, The world's great eye had never cast its light Upon the volume, for the deeds were writ On worthier parchment than the inked screed On memory-woven tissues of the heart, Light-flooded with the altar fires that burn Within the templed souls of resolute men. These stories handed down in noble words From father to the son told how on floes Of drifted ice when March had brought the seals From the far north, a number of the crew Outpanning all the rest, and labouring late, Had lost their bearings in a sweeping storm That sudden blotted out the vessel's lights, Smothered her signals, drowned her whistle shriek; And how when morning came, the rescuers found A lone survivor of the little band, Who gave with feeble pause the night's account Of aimless steps that eddied with the blast, Of men who clustered into groups, and shared With each the last few biscuits that remained, Cheering their weaker comrades with their hymns Of praise and prayer that rose above the winds, Flouting the sleeted agonies of death With heaven's scorn, until the deadening cold Laid each in peace upon the Northern ice.

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Such records of devotion fed his soul With quenchless aspiration, fired his will With stern resolve. Nor had he far to search For evidence of conduct nearer home Which, though of lesser magnitude, still bore The deep and sovereign stamp of chivalry. It was the common mould of men - the love That warmed the cramp of penury, and rained Its benedictions on a sailor's home. But everywhere the sea appeared to him The sanctuary of faith and sacrifice; The waters were its organ notes that swelled With pomp of peal, and died with murmurous sound. The wide extremes of hurricane and breeze That swept the mighty key-boards of the main, With grounded gutturals of the reef and cape, Or drew with soft caress and lingering ease The lovely linguals of the coves, expressed The seaward passion of his bone and blood. Not so the widow. On the sea's wide brow She read the darker lines. In girlhood days, Her joys were those of winter and late fall, For then her kin were home. The solid earth Was safe; it could be trusted in the storm As well as calm. Twas true November brought The chilly rains, and January the cold That froze the bay, but then they also filled The living room with comfort, gathering all Around the hearthstone where the rosy gleams Leaped laughing from the pine-knot and the birch. The supper board became an evening scene Of festival, where yarns and tea both flowed With equal strength of stream, and after that, When hours grew late, the rest of heavy sleep That heard not, cared not for the winds that blew.

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This was the joy of harbour and of land, The sheltering contentment of a roof Pillared and based upon the faithful rocks. But ah, the sea: Was it not rough and wild? Did it not with its cruel hands break up Her home, and flood her heart with dark suspense, And make her long for summer months to pass? Was not its fateful summons heard one day Tolling its dirges o'er her father's head? Which made the fall and winter drag more slow Than spring and summer. Still again, the worst Of treachery. It stole with vandal haste The boldest and the truest heart that beat Within the village, giving her in place A widow's solitude ere half her life Had sped. The ravage of the sea she knew, Was fearful of its fury, of its peace Distrustful. Never did it speak, but sounds Of peril smote her ear, and in its smile There lurked a hidden gloom. The gentle calm That lulls at eve the billows to their rest, Pales down the sun's red glow, closing the round Of Nature's daily tasks seemed to her mind The stealthy portent of a treacherous morn. The murmuring of wavelets on the shore, The crested waters singing in the breeze, The dull and hoarse recession of the tides That sucked the salted pebbles on the beach All these together with the thunderous roar That voiced with riving phrase the Ocean's might, Were but the variant emblems of her moods, As fickle as the myriad hues that come And go with dawn and sunrise, noon and night.

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Now Henry as he grew had oft declared By stated word, by feeling half-expressed In signs his mother readily perceived, His life's vocation. For a time she felt She would dissuade her son from enterprise Fraught with such risk. Presentiment of dread Had settled in her breast. She knew the past, And feared the future. She had hoped to find For him employment on the land, in store Or office, and with this in view had kept Him at the village school a year or so More than was usual with fisher boys. But if this failed, there yet remained the trade Of local ports, the fishing near the shore That older folks were daily wont to ply. But well she knew how little Henry cared For less than what the deep sea gave. The land Afforded compensation ill for toil Of hands or brain. The nearer fishing grounds Less fruitful than the distant haunts of cod Were meant for age, not youth and life's full prime. Besides, the boy had understood that years Had wrought great changes in his mother's home. The father while he lived had nothing spared To beautify his cottage, making it A place of quiet charm and sweet repose That grew as seasons fled. Dim memories Of days of plenty to his mind returned, As he beheld how many comforts known In childhood had slipped gradually away; So to his mother he had urged his plea That he should take his father's place, restore That which was lost, and to the future bring By daring skill abundant means to live. To this did Rachel give her slow consent.

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That summer from the Banks, Henry returned On his first trip. The catch fell far below The average voyage, and his share was less Than what the home required to meet the needs Of coming winter, but it chanced that fall, The fishery at an end, a vessel named The Swallow had been chartered for the trade Direct with Portugal. The ship was short Of hands, and Henry with two other lads As eager as himself for Ocean routes Contracted for the voyage. This would swell The summer earnings, and fulfil a dream Till now unrealized of worlds unseen. At length the morning came that he should leave; The week before had Rachel done her work With heavy hand, and gathered up the store She thought the lad would need for three months' trip Together with such dainties as would spice The ship's rough fare, and as she worked she tried To cloke the old misgivings that the sea Had long engendered, with a cheerful face. Likewise had Henry through the shortening days Dwelt on the parting scene, and blended thoughts Of travel with the feelings of farewell; Had planned what he would say, what message give Of buoyant faith and hope of quick return, Suiting the phrase, 'Goodbye' to lighter moods, Lest undue fears visit his mother's heart. But when upon the threshold of the door, He gazed towards the sea, pausing for words Which recreant to the hour refused to come, A tear stole from his eye, and falling caught The ampler drops that bathed the mother's cheek, And choked the language-utterance of farewell. Then loosening the arms about his neck, He shouldered high his pack, and downwards strode

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To where a boat lay moored beside the quay. And on the doorstep, Rachel lingering watched The double furrow following the ship Until the headland closed it from her sight. The breeze that with the morn had freshened up, Now with the mid-day died. Far to the east, The horizon clear at dawn slowly withdrew, Its lines dissolving moodily in mist. The after hours grew still in sullen peace, Save where the ground-swell uttering a weird note Broke the thick silence. High within the West A sun-hound, as the sailors term it, formed, Trailing the sun's red path. The day declined, And with it deepening to a noiseless calm The glassy ocean slept. A sphere of fire Behind a bank of smoke that thickened fast Against a dull circumference of grey, The moon arose, and tongueless vapours stole Heavily athwart the sea. Within her home The widow sat alone, peering afar Through the raised window at the distant point, Round which the vessel in the morning sailed. She sat, her long thin fingers intertwined And resting in her lap, and now and then With drooping head she prayed or seemed to pray, Though neither words nor sound escaped her lips. There she remained till late, nor to her bed Retired until the smaller hours had passed, And then more from the habit of the night Than from weary willingness of sleep. Later than usual did the morning break, The drops were splashing on the window-pane, A heavy fog came drifting down the shore, Shrouding both sea and land. The dread North-East Was hoisting forth the signals of her power

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In scurrying fog, and intermittent gusts Of rain. Anon the wind increased, and showed Through momentary liftings of the mist, The sea replying to a vaulting storm With foaming bit and fiercely shaking mane. The shoremen hurrying along the beach Pulled high and dry their boats, and ran their skiffs To safer moorings well inside the bar. Night fell, and yet with heightening roar the blast Continued, smiting hard the cottage roofs, Awakening fears which women dared not speak. But nowhere did the storm more ruin make Than in the heart of Rachel. By the light Of a small lamp she watched the weather glass, And saw how as she tapped it every hour The dark line sank. 'Twas now, she thought, the ship Has reached the weltering tide-rips off Cape Race. Would the frail timbers stand the shock of waves? And how avoid the reefs when neither moon Nor stars gave to the compass friendly aid? There seemed no limit to the rising scale Through which the tempest climbed. At times it paused To speak with tragic whisperings that clutched The widow's pulse, and then with fearsome shriek It filed her nerve, while from the distant seas There came long whistling interludes of death. Another morning came. The fog had blown Away, and through the rift of clouds that massed The Eastern vault, the fitful sunlight gleamed Upon white billows that a thousand leagues Had come, and now with jealous leap sought heights Unscaleable, save to the petrel's wings. Thus for three days the tempest ran its course, And then with breath abating died away.

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A week passed by with heavy-shodden feet, The hours seemed weighted with unnatural calm, So different from the lightsome, freshening stir That follows in the usual wake of gales. Summer had taken leave, and yet the air Seemed bashful of the fall, for every day Mirrored the one before, as if the storm Had over-wrought its ends, and paralysed The will of nature for the season's change. The village-folk again commenced their work, Rebuilding stages which the wind had wrecked, And littered round the beach, but work was done By hands scarce conscious of the task, for thought Was dazed, and eyes saw nothing but the sea. So Rachel moved within her home. Some friends Had come to see her, and had gone away, Saying among themselves how old she looked, How wan her face, and how her hair had turned Within so short a time to ashen grey. No sleep had visited her eyes ere since The Swallow round the headland sailed that morn. A picture of her son hung on the wall, A boy of three within his father's arms. How often had she in the earlier years, Following her husband's death gazed on his face, And mused upon the likeness of the two. And now each night she from her bed arose, Lighted the lamp and held it near the frame, While questionings beat sorely at her heart, Notes of despair unuttered by the lips; Was this then after all, the goal of years The end for which the lad was born, had lived, Had grown, for which by night and day she strove, The guerdon of life's vigils, and the crown Of Love's recordless givings? Nor was left The mother's ancient right, inalienable,

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To challenge death within the last great hour, And from his hands to wrest the life she loved. Now flashed there through her mind as on his face She looked, the memory of the night long past, When croup had racked the frame, and fever tossed The head upon the pillow. Then it was That with a woman's courage born of heaven, She fought against the Shadow, as it watched The cradle's tiny heavings, till the dawn Revealed the cooling moisture on the brow, And told her she had won. In that high test, She well remembered how her rising strength Could pit itself against the Adversary, Emerge, though weakened with the night's long fight, Triumphant, glad, rejoicing with the morn. Now with the picture and the past absorbed, She gazed so long that now and then the boy Seemed to her wondering eye to stir, and smile, And move his lips as if he wished to speak. And for a passing moment did a hope Flicker its feeble path across her breast, That the black menace of the past few days, Might prove the hideous phantom of a dream, When, sudden, through the night's dull gloom, a moan Escaping from the swell smote on her ear, And brought her thoughts back to the Eastern storm. At length one morning, into port there sailed A vessel from the harbour of St John's, Rounding the cape, she picked up here and there Tidings of wreckage all along the shore, Remnants of spars and cordage, casks and planks, And canvas rent in shreds. A tale she brought That bore direct upon the village homes. A naiad's head carven in wood was found, Thrown high upon the reef, the self-same head That marked the Swallow's prow, and lying near,

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A plank that had the vessel's name inscribed. Thus had the North-East worried with its fangs Its timorous prey, then flung it on the rocks. There dwelt among the villagers a man Endeared to all for kindliness of heart And called of natural instinct and of God To comfort stricken ones. To break the news' Was ever his high duty when the storms Had spent their fury on the coast. To him Was given this last story of the waves To bear to Rachel. Going to her home, He saw her seated in a kitchen chair, While strewn around her were the many toys Of Henry's childhood. She had gathered them All in one place, and standing in their midst His cradle. Mute she sat and motionless. And when the good man touched her arm, and spoke In low, assuaging tones of death at sea, In words that often had relieved the heart Of its own tragic overflow, she rose, Uttered a hollow laugh and strangely fled. Throughout the days and weeks that followed by, In solitary places was she seen, Wandering as if some object of her love Upon the moor had strayed, or on the beach. At times, she stood awhile and gazed with eyes That, seeming, had forgotten how to weep, Far out to sea. At times she made her way Along the shore to where two beetling crags Rose from their slippery base, and darkly frowned Upon the advancing waves. There in the cleft, With arms outstretched, she would implore the sea Give up its dead, while the resurgent tides, Upbraided would creep guiltily away.

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37 One evening, when the East winds blew, and rain Fell chill upon her, there had come a friend Who led her gently to her cottage home, And through a long and restless night had stayed In watchful ministry close by her bed, Soothing the urge of hectic on her brow, And answering with a voice instinct with peace, The breaking, wayward fragments of her lips. Another morn, and sleep! With what strange hand Was day thus ushered in. The seams of pain And arid loss which each awakening light Had freely veined, now reappeared no more. The fall's loud blast that whirled the senile leaves Above the trees was heard not. Neither sound Of breaking seas, nor swirl of surge and foam; Only the placid requiem of death, The stirring of new notes, tranquil and free, Pulsing their way into a deathless life.

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1917

The Largess of 1917 Our eyes were open but we did not see, Our ears unstopped, and yet we did not hear; The thunders of the world's great agony, The lightnings of its dread unmeasured fear, Had made us blind and deaf, and though our hand Had often touched the satin of a flower, In the June splendour of a noon-tide hour, We could not feel: we could not understand. Three years had drifted by, and we were old, The crust had fallen; how? we could not tell. The pulse had slowed, the heart was strangely cold,

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Youth disenchanted long had lost its spell; Yet children told us what they saw and heard With blue-orbed wonder in their open eyes, Before the lifted wand of heaven's skies In blush of flower, and in song of bird. And older ones and wiser far than we, Whose steps had turned to childhood paths once more, Whose feet had neared the marge of that great sea Where tideless waters bathe a crystal shore, These - pilgrims near God's shrine - had told us too, Of rays with which the sun the clouds had lined, Of fragrance and of music in the wind, Of glories bursting as the seasons flew; Of winter fashioning some sunlit palace, Chiselling the spires of some marble fane, Pouring rich sunlight from a golden chalice, Or frosting petals on a window-pane; Of virginal white of firs ere rough winds shake The trembling vesture of their limbs of snow; Of stars, the bright moon's crescent underglow, Beneath the silver panels of a lake. Come spring; and life, they said, in myriad form Arose, buoyant, effulgent, crowned with light, Life issuing from darkness, death and storm, Dawn floating from the bosom of the night; Life's colours all unfurled upon the land, Life's music beating on the resonant air, Life - sandalled on the waters everywhere; And yet, we did not see, nor understand.

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39 The summer called. 'Twas answered by the thrush, The dance of daisies in their matchless grace, The gold of buttercup, the passionate blush Of damask rose, the lily's chastened face. This did they see, which yet was but a part Of what they saw - they could not tell the whole The rose had whispered something to the soul, The lily sent a challenge to the heart. Autumn! and sunrise on the mountain-steep, The wine of morning, sweet and brimming cool, The stainless fleece of cirrus-clouds that sleep In the hushed beauty of a dreaming pool, The molten amber of a sea becalmed, When eve draws nigh, and in the star-swept nights, The mystic archery of Northern lights, God's martial hosts advancing, angel-psalmed. And when the fall's last petals had been shed, When the last robin's song had taken wing, When colours faded, and life's glories fled, They told us that they saw a fairer thing; - Those pilgrims toiling on earth's dusted sod The beckoning home-lure of the Westering ray, Heaven's candle lighted at the close of day, The hearth-fires of their Father and their God. Dawn Dawn! Gold-minted The monarch of the morn, Awake Shadows withdrawn, A sheet of glass rose-tinted The lake!

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Splash! A coral ring Studded with rubies and agates and gold, Finely wrought out. A vision of a silver flash. Lost! Was it a grayling, Or a rainbow-trout?

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March 1918

The Dear Illusion Dusk - with a grey and silent sea, The fading outlines of a shore, A bittern's cry, and evermore The lonelier cry of memory. Night - and the lifted clouds afar, And yonder near a little hill A cross, above a form so still, Holds vigil with one raying star. Sleep falls, and lo! the gift of dreams He comes again, I clasp his hands, Death's bars are broken, and he stands As once he stood; - or so it seems. Invocation

Infinite Sea! encompassing all lands That mark the bounds of earth's sore stricken ones; Commit we now into thine outstretched hands, This night, our husbands, lovers and our sons.

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March 1918

4i

Grey foster-mother of our hopes and fears! Thou givest us our raiment and our bread, We give to thee the brine of salter tears Than those thou weepest o'er our faithful dead. How changed thy face from that of yesterday! Then didst thou smile upon our humble life, The sun danced in thy ripples blithe and gay, Undimmed by prescience of a coming strife.

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Yet now within the thresh of iron shocks, Swung in the vortex of a lightless fate, Thy billows stumble helpless on the rocks, And thou - a wild and stark inebriate. Tomorrow comes and thou art changed once more, Thy shadowed face betrays the penitent, And from the weary tides along the shore, Falls the low utterance of a hushed lament.

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Great mothering sea! Our years are edged with pain, Our hearts are flowerless for their leaves are old, The comradeship of life is rent in twain, And lonely are the graves of earth, and cold. The Wooden Cross Tread softly here. Beneath this rough-hewn cross That weaves the moon's dim shadow on the clay, There sleeps a lad who gave his years away, Ere scarce he knew the meaning of Life's loss.

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I loved him well. But yesterday it seems I caught the riot-clasp of his warm hand, Felt how the pulses of his spirit fanned The leaping ardours of his wild young dreams. Buried perchance without a comrade's tear To pay a tribute to his sacrifice, But yet I know who paid more sterling price Than tears; a woman's heart lies anguished here.

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But see! God's hand-prints lie around the grave, The wild-rose and the trillium dewy-clad, No dark-robed mourners these, prostrate and sad, But Spring's full-faithed evangels; these God gave To show that in His beauty He could dress The sodden forms of Flanders bleak and wild, And wreathe around the body of a child, Incarnate emblems of His loveliness.

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How soft the moonlight falls upon the dew! So sweet the liquid ritual of its kiss, And here, what gift of Spring so choice as this, A violet, with a touch of heaven's blue. Now let me pluck this flower from its bed, The violet alone - the others stay To breathe their fragrant incense while they may, Nor need I crave the pardon of the dead; For she who sits tonight in tears apart Will know when it arrives, that grass grows green In Flanders yet, and mystic hands unseen Are raising flowers above her riven heart.

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Then hush! In sacred peace let him remain Within the tender silence of this cross, The symbol of the world's triumphant loss, Of love that blossomed from a greater pain.

June 1918

October, 1918

The Spring has come and gone; the Summer's hand Led in the blossom where the bud was seen, Now fruit and Autumn flowers deck the land, And on the hills the red where once was green. There's laughter yet within the wind's wild glee, Rich and resplendent still the sunset's glow, The blue of heaven's arch falls on the sea, As fell it there a thousand years ago. The lengthening shadows through the hastening day Lead but to rest; they wear no garb of grief; And Beauty dwells as regnant as in May Within the deep vermilion of the leaf.

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Soon night steals on with hushed and printless tread, Sweet legatee of slumber - mystic night; Parent of stars and dews and dreams unread, Infolded in its darkness and its light. And thus the oft-trod cycles of the past Return. The rosy-mellow months complete The promise of the earlier, and this last Of years does but the former's tale repeat. Does Nature share with man his deepest woe? And with her sea-and-forest music toll His nameless sorrows, as his head sinks low Above the crucifixion of his soul?

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Her seed-time and her harvest, sun and ram, Her drought, her floods, her season's fluent change; Do these keep pace with human joy and pain, Or gaze they on man's life with aspect strange? Now drinks the race its full, its bitterest cup, With undrugged throes passing Gethsemane. And when its suppliant hands are lifted up, Are Nature's winged ones near with sympathy?

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May yet the isolation of the dark Be broken by the tread of angel feet? May airs of Spring, and raptures of the lark, Once more the wintered world's bleared vision greet? Behold! Upon the springing mountain's height, The orange rays of daybreak freshly born; Those tonic harbingers of heaven's light, Thrilling the world with ecstasy of morn.

October 1918

Amerongen

Dead leaves were thick upon the hills and plains, The year seemed branded with some nameless sin, Fields sere and flowerless in November rains Greeted the exile as he entered in. Death threw his festal shadows on the walls, Gave to the chambered glooms a deeper hush, Stalked with slow footsteps through the ancient halls, Mocking the sculpture and the master's brush. Battalions that no marshal ever led, Dark myrmidons of terrors and of hates Grew hourly on the parapets overhead, Or ranged themselves outside the castle gates.

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Forms as of old men stricken to their knees, Of women grey - but not through length of days, Of children sinking under cruel seas, That slew them faster than the lightning slays. The night was silent with a deadlier hush Than Nature's preludes to her floods out-poured; God's finger traced the jags on heaven's laws An angel leaned upon a smoking sword.

January 1919

The Hidden Scar No blow, no threat, no movement of the hand, No word burst from the leash of calm control, Betraying passions slumbering in the soul; But friendship's added years could not withstand A curve that rose unbidden and unplanned From the flexed silence of the lips - a dart That struck, rending the texture of the heart, And, entering deeper, seared like a brand. Some years have passed. Today, no lure of mine Restores the confidence he gave of old; The outer court of strangers with its forms Of soulless exchange - there we meet. The shrine Within where sacred fires once burned is cold, And love no more the ashen altar warms. In Memoriam i

The Dead! Upon a purple-bordered scroll We wrote their names; then gazed awhile, and said: 'These are the fallen; these, our honoured dead, The silent ones in Death's vast muster roll.

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June 1919

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This one was strong and ruddy; that one frail, Though fleet of foot and keen. The first one met His fate in that fierce fight at Courcelette; The other died of wounds at Passchendaele/ And thus we mused, pointing from name to name With sad, slow count. We spoke of things like grass, And withered leaves, and faded flowers, birth, Old age, decay and dust, glory and fame, And other strange mortalities that pass At length into the all-insatiate earth.

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Then, suddenly, through the mist that wrapped our sight, An utterance fell, as of great waters flowing Slow, but with mightier accent ever growing Around a blazing shaft of central light: 'Fallen! There is no downward plunge. The estate Is high. Go! - roll thy plumb-line up, and ask 20 Thy Master for His measures, as the task Is one that would the heavens triangulate/ And so were compassed life's fine agonies; By ranging hopes, and longings cut adrift From earth's unstable shores; by faiths that spanned Illimitable wastes and wrecking seas; By noble strands of nature, scattered swift From the white fingers of God's spacious hand. December 1919 Overheard by a Stream

Here is the pool, and there the waterfall; This is the bank; keep out of sight, and crawl Along the side to where the alder clump Juts out. Twas there I saw a salmon jump,

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A full eight feet, not fifteen minutes past. Bend low a bit! or else the sun will cast Your shadow on the stream. Still farther; stop! Now joint your rod; reel out your line, and drop Your leader with the 'silver doctor7 on it, Behind that rock that's got the log upon it.

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There's nothing here; the water is too quiet; You need a pool with rapids flowing by it; Plenty of rush and motion, heave and roar, To turn their thoughts from things upon the shore; The day's too calm - I told you that before. Just mind your line! I tell you that he's there. I saw him spring up ten feet in the air Twelve pounder, if an ounce! Great Mackinaw! Look! Quick! He's on! The 'doctor' in his jaw... 20 Snapped! Gone! You damn fool: worse than any fool! What did you think to find here in this pool A minnow or a shiner - that you tried With such a jerk to land him on the side Of this high bank? That was a salmon - fool! The biggest one that swam within this pool; The one I saw that jumped twelve feet - not lower; Would tip the scale at fourteen pounds or more. Lost - near that rock that's got the log upon it, Gone - with the leader and the 'doctor' on it. December 1919 'Blow! Winds, and Roar!'

Blow! winds, and roar! Along the sea's deep hollow, And lash ye waves the shore!

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As the wild hurricane follows; And scream! ye birds of night, Weird phantoms of the rocks How well your pinions light Shake off the storm's grey shocks, And the rude surge: - Blow! winds, and roar! Along the tide-swept shore The mornings break, the evenings fall, Night comes, and in the cliffs above, The sea-gull answers the fledgling's call But he - who was my life, my love Returns no more.

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January 1920

Signals (A man speaks) Was that a cry you say you heard? Where? No. The winds would drown it quite. No sound would reach the shore tonight, Except the scream of some wild bird. A flash, you say, that cut the rain Like a red knife? It could not be; There's nothing living in this sea. Don't look so frightened. What - again? The lifeboat! They are hailing me. They need a man for the stern oar; The wind drives dead upon this shore, A rudder's helpless in this sea. (A woman speaks) No. That was not a scream I heard; One could not hear so far away. That flash was but the breakers' spray, That cry, the note of some wild bird.

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March 1920

dg 49 Carlo

'The dog that saved the lives of more than ninety persons in that recent wreck, by swimming with a line from the sinking vessel to the shore, well understood the importance as well as the risk of his mission.' -Extract from a Newfoundland paper. I see no use in not confessing To trace your breed would keep me guessing; It would indeed an expert puzzle To match such legs with a jet-black muzzle. To make a mongrel, as you know, It takes some fifty types or so, And nothing in your height or length, In stand or colour, speed or strength, Could make me see how any strain Could come from mastiff, bull, or Dane. But, were I given to speculating On pedigrees in canine rating, I'd wager this - not from your size, Not merely from your human eyes, But from the way you held that cable Within those gleaming jaws of sable, Leaped from the taffrail of the wreck With ninety souls upon its deck, And with your cunning dog-stroke tore Your path unerring to the shore Yes, stake my life, the way you swam, That somewhere in your line a dam, Shaped to this hour by God's own hand, Had mated with a Newfoundland. They tell me, Carlo, that your kind Has neither conscience, soul, nor mind; That reason is a thing unknown

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To such as dogs; to man alone The spark divine - he may aspire To climb to heaven or even higher; But God has tied around the dog The symbol of his fate, the clog. Thus, I have heard some preachers say Wise men and good, in a sort o'way Proclaiming from the sacred box (Quoting from Butler and John Knox) How freedom and the moral law God gave to man, because He saw A way to draw a line at root Between the human and the brute, And you were classed with things like bats, Parrots and sand-flies and dock-rats, Serpents and toads that dwell in mud, And other creatures with cold blood That sightless crawl in slime, and sink. Gadsooks! It makes me sick to think That man must so exalt his race By giving dogs a servile place; Prate of his transcendentalism, While you save men by mechanism. And when I told them how you fought The demons of the storm, and brought That life-line from the wreck to shore, And saved those ninety souls or more, They argued with such confidence Twas instinct, nature, or blind sense. A man could know when he would do it; You did it and never knew it. And so, old chap, by what they say, You live and die and have your day, Like any cat or mouse or weevil That has no sense of good and evil

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(Though sheep and goats, when they have died, The Good Book says are classified); But you, being neuter, go to - well, Neither to heaven nor to hell. I'll not believe it, Carlo; I Will fetch you with me when I die, And, standing up at Peter's wicket, Will urge sound reasons for your ticket; I'll show him your life-saving label And tell him all about that cable, The storm along the shore, the wreck, The ninety souls upon the deck; How one by one they came along, The young and old, the weak and strong Pale women, sick and tempest-tossed, With children given up for lost; I'd tell him more, if he would ask it How they tied a baby in a basket, While a young sailor, picked and able, Moved out to steady it on the cable; And if he needed more recital To admit a mongrel without title, I'd get down low upon my knees, And swear before the Holy Keys, That, judging by the way you swam, Somewhere within your line, a dam Formed for the job by God's own hand, Had littered for a Newfoundland. I feel quite sure that if I made him Give ear to that, I could persuade him To open up the Golden Gate And let you in; but should he state That from your legs and height and speed He still had doubts about your breed,

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And called my story of the cable 'A cunningly devised fable/ Like other rumours that youVe seen In Second Peter, one, sixteen, I'd tell him (saving his high station) The devil take his legislation, And, where life, love, and death atone, I'd move your case up to the Throne.

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November 1920

In Absentia Erect and motionless he stood, His face a hieroglyph of stone, Stopped was his pulse, chilled was his blood, And stiff each sinew, nerve and bone. The spell an instant held him, when His veins were swept by tidal power, And then life's threescore years and ten Were measured by a single hour. The world lay there beneath his eye; The sun had left the heavens to float A hand-breadth from him, and the sky Was but an anchor for his boat.

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Fled was the classroom's puny space His eye saw but a whirling disk; His old and language-weathered face Shone like a glowing asterisk! What chance had he now to remember The year held months so saturnine As ill-starred May and blank September, With that brute tugging at his line?

June 1921

53

The Flood-Tide He paused a moment by the sea, Then stooped, and with a leisured hand He wrote in casual tracery Her name upon the flux of sand. The waves beat up and swiftly spun A silver web at every stride; He watched their long, thin fingers run The letters back into the tide. But she had written where the tide Could never its grey waters fling; She watched the longest wave subside Ere it could touch the lettering.

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June 1921

The Pine Tree I saw how he would come each night and wait An hour or more beside that broken gate Just stand, and stare across the road with dim, Grey eyes. Nothing was there but an old pine tree, Cut down and sawn in lengths; and absently He answered questions that I put to him. He spoke as if some horrid deed was done Murder - no less - it seemed to be; A week before, under his very eyes, A gang of men had slain a tree. The pine was planted seventy years ago To celebrate his birth.

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It had a right, he said, to live and grow, And then into the earth, By a mild and understanding law, To pass with nature's quiet burial. But they had come, those men, with axe and saw, And killed it like a criminal, And with the hangman's rope about its neck, It swayed a moment, then with heavy sound, Dropped with a crash of branches to the ground.

June 1921

Sea Variations MORNING

Old, old is the sea today. A sudden stealth of age Has torn away The texture of its youth and grace, And filched the rose of daybreak from its waters. Now lines of grey And dragging vapours on its brow Heavily are drawn; And it lies broken as with centuries, Though yesterday, Blue-eyed and shadowless as a child's face, It held the promise of a luminous dawn; Though through its merry after-hours It bade the sun to pour Its flaming mintage on the ocean floor That by a conjuror's touch was turned To rarer treasure manifold, Where jacinth, emerald and sapphire burned A fringe around a core of gold... Old, old is the sea today, Forsaken, chill and grey,

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And banished is the glory of its waters; Though through the silent tenure of the night It bade the sterile moon to multiply A thousand-fold its undivided light, Within the nadir of a richer sky; When every star a thousand cressets glowed That, caught in wider conflagration, sent Vast leagues of silver fire wherever flowed The waters of its shoreless firmament. But old and grey Is the sea today, With the morning colours blanched upon its waters.

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MASKS What hidden soul residing Within these forms, O sea! Should, every hour changing, To time yet changeless be? What masks hast thou not worn, What parts not played, Thou Prince of all the Revels In Life's Masquerade? Light-hearted as a jester, The motley fits the mood, As the gold and purple, Thy statelier habitude. At dawn A trumpeter preluding a day's pageant. At noon A dancer weaving new measures around the furrows of ships with white sails. Later A courier with sealed tidings hastening towards the shore. At sunset -

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A dyer steeping colours on a bay. Again A sculptor teasing faces out of the moonlit foam on a reef, Or carving bric-a-brac upon a beach, Or fashioning, with age-toiled hands, a grotto out of limestone. The wind blows And a master puts a flute to his lips. It blows again 6o And his fingers take hold of organ stops ... THE DESTROYER

Once more, the wind And thou dost go on an old familiar way In tragic fashion, As a corsair, pursuing his prey With the lust of passion, Falls like a burst of hail On an autumn yield, Till every reach and gulf and bay Is left with the stubble of life and sail, With the face of the waters like unto the face of the field.

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IN RETREAT

Now like a fugitive, who, on the desert sand, A moment broods upon the life he spilt, And, with averted gaze, Circling the dusky ruin of his hand, Surveys The Arab measure of his guilt Before a Presence standing there that calls His name; in cloud and shadow and in whirlwind reads The inviolate scripture of the fates; Then full across the desert speeds, Until he falls, Caught by the Avenger near the City Gates -

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So underneath the heavens' lighted scroll, Ablaze with cryptic tokens of the slain, Headlong to shore thy spiral waters roll Swept by the besom of the winds; by rain And thunder driven in flight Along the galleries of the night, Until upon the surge-line locked in strife With reef and breaker thou art shattered, soon In fang and sinew to be strewn Around the cliffs that guard the ports of life. O wild, tumultuous sea! Thy waters mock our liturgy, For thou dost take the threads of faith apart, Wherewith the cables of our life are spun, Strand upon strand unravelling; - thou dost hear, Recited from a tide-wet shore, Our creeds. Each hope and fear Filtered from life's confessions - one by one, Out of the dumb confusions of the heart, Are spread before thy sight - thou Arch-Inquisitor! How in a ruthless moment dost thou strip The veilings from our eyes, and bid us cast Our glances on a labyrinthine past, Stirred by a flash that on a wave's white lip Gleams for an instant, or by some dark sign Within thy fearful hollows where night flings Her crape of shadow on a tossing line Of jetsam, will our years turn back, To gather from a weed-grown track A bitter tale of dim rememberings. RE-BORN

As to its end the tempest drags Its way, thou art re-born

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58 To strength of body and beauty of face; And thou dost cover with a tranquil grace Those whom the winds had buffeted, And laid upon the waters - dead. In darkness dost thou cover them, As some white-winged mother of the crags, That daily gathering food From sea-weed and from tide-wash, brings, At fall of night, to her rock-nurtured brood The drowsy silence of her wings.

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THE DEAD CALM

How like a Pontiff dost thou lie at last, Impassive, robed at Death's high-unctioned hour With those grey vestments that the storm, In the dread legacy of its power, Around thy level form Majestically has cast In the pale light of the moon's slow tapers burning, All-silent in the calm recessional Of the tide's turning; All-passionless, though on the distant sands Where the wreathed lilies of the spray, keen-sifted By the late winds, are strewn, thy children call, Their patient hands In prayer, to thee, uplifted. The Ice-Floes Dawn from the Foretop! Dawn from the Barrel! A scurry of feet with a roar overhead; The master-watch wildly pointing to Northward, Where the herd in front of The Eagle was spread!

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January 1922

59

Steel-planked and sheathed like a battleship's nose, She battered her path through the drifting floes; Past slob and growler we drove, and rammed her Into the heart of the patch and jammed her. There were hundreds of thousands of seals, I'd swear, In the stretch of that field - 'white harps' to spare For a dozen such fleets as had left that spring To share in the general harvesting. The first of the line, we had struck the main herd; The day was ours, and our pulses stirred In that brisk, live hour before the sun, At the thought of the load and the sweepstake won. We stood on the deck as the morning outrolled On the fields its tissue of orange and gold, And lit up the ice to the north in the sharp, Clear air; each mother-seal and its 'harp' Lay side by side; and as far as the range Of the patch ran out we saw that strange, And unimaginable thing That sealers talk of every spring The 'bobbing-holes' within the floes That neither wind nor frost could close; Through every hole a seal could dive, And search, to keep her brood alive, A hundred miles it well might be, For food beneath that frozen sea. Round sunken reef and cape she would rove, And though the wind and current drove The ice-fields many leagues that day, We knew she would turn and find her way Back to the hole, without the help Of compass or log, to suckle her whelp Back to that hole in the distant floes, And smash her way up with her teeth and nose. But we flung those thoughts aside when the shout Of command from the master-watch rang out.

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Assigned to our places in watches of four Over the rails in a wild carouse, Two from the port and starboard bows, Two from the broadsides - off we tore, In the breathless rush for the day's attack, With the speed of hounds on a caribou's track. With the rise of the sun we started to kill, A seal for each blow from the iron bill Of our gaffs. From the nose to the tail we ripped them, And laid their quivering carcasses flat On the ice; then with our knives we stripped them For the sake of the pelt and its lining of fat. With three fathoms of rope we laced them fast, With their skins to the ice to be easy to drag, With our shoulders galled we drew them, and cast Them in thousands around the watch's flag. Then, with our bodies begrimed with the reek Of grease and sweat from the toil of the day, We made for The Eagle, two miles away, At the signal that flew from her mizzen peak. And through the night, as inch by inch She reached the pans with the 'harps' piled high, We hoisted them up as the hours filed by To the sleepy growl of the donkey winch. Over the bulwarks again we were gone, With the first faint streaks of a misty dawn; Fast as our arms could swing we slew them, Ripped them, 'sculped' them, roped and drew them To the pans where the seals in pyramids rose Around the flags on the central floes, Till we reckoned we had nine thousand dead By the time the afternoon had fled; And that an added thousand or more Would beat the count of the day before. So back again to the patch we went

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To haul, before the day was spent, Another load of four 'harps' a man, To make the last the record pan. And not one of us saw, as we gaffed, and skinned, And took them in tow, that the north-east wind Had veered off-shore; that the air was colder; That the signs of recall were there to the south, The flag of The Eagle, and the long, thin smoulder That drifted away from her funnel's mouth. Not one of us thought of the speed of the storm That hounded our tracks in the day's last chase (For the slaughter was swift, and the blood was warm), Till we felt the first sting of the snow in our face. We looked south-east, where, an hour ago, Like a smudge on the sky-line, someone had seen The Eagle, and thought he had heard her blow A note like a warning from her sirene. We gathered in knots, each man within call Of his mate, and slipping our ropes, we sped, Plunging our way through a thickening wall Of snow that the gale was driving ahead. We ran with the wind on our shoulder; we knew That the night had left us this only clue Of the track before us, though with each wail That grew to the pang of a shriek from the gale, Some of us swore that The Eagle screamed Right off to the east; to others it seemed On the southern quarter and near, while the rest Cried out with every report that rose From the strain and the rend of the wind on the floes That The Eagle was firing her guns to the west. And some of them turned to the west, though to go Was madness - we knew it and roared, but the notes Of our warning were lost as a fierce gust of snow Eddied, and strangled the words in our throats.

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Then we felt in our hearts that the night had swallowed All signals, the whistle, the flare, and the smoke To the south; and like sheep in a storm we followed Each other; like sheep we huddled and broke. Here one would fall as hunger took hold Of his step; here one would sleep as the cold Crept into his blood, and another would kneel Athwart the body of some dead seal, And with knife and nails would tear it apart, To flesh his teeth in its frozen heart. And another dreamed that the storm was past, And raved of his bunk and brandy and food, And The Eagle near, though in that blast The mother was fully as blind as her brood. Then we saw, what we feared from the first - dark places Here and there to the left of us, wide-yawning spaces Of water; the fissures and cracks had increased Till the outer pans were afloat, and we knew, As they drifted along in the night to the east, By the cries we heard, that some of our crew Were borne to the sea on those pans and were lost. And we turned with the wind in our faces again, And took the snow with its lancing pain, Till our eye-balls cracked with the salt and the frost; Till only iron and fire that night Survived on the ice as we stumbled on; As we fell and rose and plunged - till the light In the south and east disclosed the dawn, And the sea heaving with floes - and then, The Eagle in wild pursuit of her men. And the rest is as a story told, Or a dream that belonged to a dim, mad past, Of a March night and a north wind's cold, Of a voyage home with a flag half-mast; Of twenty thousand seals that were killed

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To help to lower the price of bread; Of a muffled beat... of a drum ... that filled A nave ... at our count of sixty dead.

April 1922

The Ground Swell Three times we heard it calling with a low, Insistent note; at ebb-tide on the noon; And at the hour of dusk, when the red moon Was rising and the tide was on the flow; Then, at the hour of midnight once again, Though we had entered in and shut the door And drawn the blinds, it crept up from the shore And smote upon a bedroom window-pane; Then passed away as some dull pang that grew Out of the void before Eternity 10 Had fashioned out an edge for human grief; Before the winds of God had learned to strew His harvest-sweepings on a winter sea February 1923 To feed the primal hungers of a reef. The History of John Jones

The sun never shone The rain could not fall On a steadier man than John. A holy man was John, And honest withal. His mates never heard Drop from his guarded lip An idle word, But twice - first, while on board his ship, When he had lost his pipe, he swore, Just a mild damn, and nothing more;

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And once he cursed The government; but then he reckoned The Lord forgave him for the first, And justified the second. And he was temperate in all his ways, Was John; He never drank, but when Thanksgiving days Came on; Never in summer on a fishing trip Would he allow the smell on board his ship; Only in winter or in autumn, When a cramp or something caught him, Would he take it, for he prized it, Not for its depraved abuses, But for its discreeter uses, As his Church had authorized it. The sun had never shone On a kinder man than John, Nor upon A better Christian than was John. He was good to his dog, he was good to his cat And his love went out to his horse; He loved the Lord and his Church, of course, For righteous was he in thought and act; And his neighbours knew, in addition to that, He loved his wife, as a matter of fact. Now, one fine day it occurred to John, That his last great cramp was on; For nothing that the doctor wrote Could stop that rattle in his throat. He had broken his back upon the oar, He had dried his last boat-load of cod, And nothing was left for John any more, But to drift in his boat to the port of God.

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January 1923

65 A Student's Prayer at an Examination

Thou knowest, Lord, my term is brief, Vouchsafe a small request, Before I leave this place of grief, And enter into rest. Somewhere or other I have heard A kind professor mention Maybe he read it in Thy Word That honours the intention, I know not - that Thou wilt not weigh Within Thy balances, Such failures as are mine today That spring from weariness.

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Heed Thou the impulse of my mind Which led me into College, That Thou wouldst help Thy servant find A substitute for knowledge. And when, my course on earth being run, And my ambition spent, I go with all my work undone To join Thy firmament; I crave to shine among Thy stars, Chief of the luminaries, And note Professors, Registrars My humble lapidaries. In Lantern Light

I could not paint, nor could I draw The look that searched the night; The bleak refinement of the face I saw In lantern light.

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January 1923

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A cunning hand might seize the crag, Or stay the flight of a gull, Or the rocket's flash; or more - the lightning jag That lit the hull. But as a man born blind must steal His colours from the night By hand, I had to touch that face to feel Its marble white.

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January 1923

The Shark

He seemed to know the harbour, So leisurely he swam; His fin, Like a piece of sheet-iron, Three-cornered, And with knife-edge, Stirred not a bubble As it moved With its base-line on the water. His body was tubular And tapered And smoke-blue, And as he passed the wharf He turned, And snapped at a flat-fish That was dead and floating. And I saw the flash of a white throat, And a double row of white teeth, And eyes of metallic grey, Hard and narrow and slit.

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Then out of the harbour, With that three-cornered fin Shearing without a bubble the water Lithely, Leisurely, He swam That strange fish, Tubular, tapered, smoke-blue, Part vulture, part wolf, Part neither - for his blood was cold.

January 1923

The Decision (To L.R., a college athlete who died May, 1923) You left the field and no one heard A murmur from you. We, With burning look and stubborn word, Challenged the Referee Why he forbade you to complete The run, hailing you back Before your firm and eager feet Were half-way round the track; Unless he had contrived, instead, To start you on a race, With an immortal course ahead, And daybreak on your face.

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November 1923

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The Toll of the Bells i

We gave them at the harbour every token The ritual of the guns, and at the mast The flag half-high, and as the cortege passed, All that remained by our dumb hearts unspoken. And what within the band's low requiem, In footfall or in head uncovered fails Of final tribute, shall at altar-rails Around a chancel soon be offered them. And now a throbbing organ-prelude dwells On the eternal story of the sea; Following in undertone, the Litany Ends like a sobbing wave; and now begins A tale of life's fore-shortened days; now swells The tidal triumph of Corinthians.

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But neither trumpet-blast, nor the hoarse din Of guns, nor the drooped signals from those mute Banners, could find a language to salute The frozen bodies that the ship brought in. Today the vaunt is with the grave. Sorrow Has raked up faith and burned it like a pile Of driftwood, scattering the ashes while Cathedral voices anthemed God's Tomorrow. Out from the belfries of the town there swung Great notes that held the winds and the pagan roll Of open seas within their measured toll, Only the bells' slow ocean tones, that rose And hushed upon the air, knew how to tongue That Iliad of Death upon the floes.

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1923

69 Magnolia Blossoms

i The year's processionals mocked her as they streamed Across the earth with proud, unsullied grace; Each flower in its appointed time and place, And the unfolding of each leaf had seemed To brand the hope on which her heart had dreamed That spring should drive the winter from her face, And summer with a broken covenant trace How spring's indentured pledges were redeemed. Slowly they came, those blown maturities, In chaste, irenic order, leaf and bud And blossom, and red fruit upon the trees, Pale blue and yellow in spring flowers, blood Of peony and rose - she knew them all From the crocus to the aster in the fall.

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ii But when the autumn frost had stripped each tree, And every garden of the earth lay bare Of leaf and flower and fruit, she turned to where The sun's immaculate hand was on the sea. He touched the waves and from them magically Lilies and violets grew, and jonquils fair As those of spring - all in November air, In fine reversal of earth's irony.

in Then a wind from the land sprang up and whipped The waters till the flowers grew acid-etched Upon her heart; but other blooms, rose-lipped,

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Out of the fresh autumnal foam were fetched By the sun's hand - strange harvest that achieves Its seasonal fruit before the time of leaves.

1923

The Fog

It stole in on us like a foot-pad, Somewhere out of the sea and air, Heavy with rifling Polaris And the Seven Stars. It left our eyes untouched, But took our sight, And then, Silently, It drew the song from our throats, And the supple bend from our ash-blades; For the bandit, With occult fingering, Had tangled up The four threads of the compass, And fouled the snarl around our dory. The Big Fellow A huge six-footer, Eyes bay blue, And as deep; Lower jaw like a cliff, Tongue silent, As hard and strong as a husky. A little man, In a pressed suit, Standing before him,

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1923

7i Had dug a name out of the past, And flung it at him Under cover of law. The big fellow Leaned over him, Like a steel girder, Just for a moment, Then swung around on his heel Without striking. And I thought of the big Newfoundland I saw, asleep by a rock The day before, That was galvanized by a challenge, But eyeing a cur, He turned, Yawned, Closed one eye, Then the other, And slept.

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1923

The Morning Plunge Clean-limbed and arrowy he shot his way Into the crystal waters of the bay; Full thirty-feet below the derrick's beam, As a lithe salmon, leaping from a stream Hangs, instant-poised, then arches for the plunge, Driving with lightning fin a dexterous lunge Down to his haunts, and trails, enwreathed in mists, A flock of garnets chasing amethysts.

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Loss of the Steamship Florizel What changed thy face from that of yesterday, Great Sea! that with thy mothering hands outspread And smiling on our common life, didst lay The table covers for our daily bread? Today, held by the thresh of iron shocks Within the vortex of a lightless fate, Thy hands are tearing seaweed on the rocks, And thou - a stark and wild inebriate.

1923

The Drowning The rust of hours, Through a year of days, Has dulled the edge of pain; But at night A wheel in my sleep Grinds it smooth and keen. By day I remember A face that was lit With the softness of human pattern; But at night It is changed in my sleep To a bygone carved in chalk. A cottage inland Through a year of days Has latched its door on the sea; But at night I return in my sleep To the cold, green lure of the waters.

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1923

73 Overheard in a Cove (The Old Salt Talks Back) THE SCHOLAR (recovering from heroic seizures) Existence in this little town I find Much too constricted for an ample mind; Unheeded on these vain and deafening shores Might Wisdom cry aloud her precious stores Wisdom for whom the Universe unseen An illustrated page has ever been; Who but initiates may understand The forms and pressures of her amorous hand! Her thoughts that wander through Eternity Would perish here beside this muddy sea, For no divine afflatus ever reaches The men who dry their fish upon these beaches.

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THE SALT

Your poor old dad and granddad, long since dead God rest their weary souls - were born and bred Upon this shore, as fine God-fearin' sort As ever brought a leaky ship to port. They never put up any braggin' claims To learnin' - couldn't more than write their names, And yet, no dealer born could take 'em in, In things of common sense, like figurin' Accounts, or show them any solid reason Why number one prime cod might any season Drop in price, while the fish remained as good As ever, and a quintal always stood A quintal; and there never was a strait Or gulf or cape they couldn't navigate; And fair or foul it made no difference. They had no learnin', but the chunk of sense The Good Lord gave 'em for their calculation,

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While other men who learned their navigation From books, got drowned; so you for all your letters Have got no call for sneerin' at your betters. THE SCHOLAR (with condescension) But, my dear man, I feel I must admit To such a native modicum of wit, By this, plus luck, if such a thing there be, A man may wrest his living from the sea; But on the troublous sea as on the land, Note what we owe the scientific hand. The world's dark secrets have been opened out By men who forged their faith from honest doubt. Who rounded out the universe for us But Galileo and Copernicus? Who gave us chart and compass, sextant, log, And apparatus for detecting fog And wind and currents? Who gave us thermometers? Again, I ask; who, prisms and barometers?

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THE SALT (snortingly) A man that owns a hand can use a log, An idiot with one eye can see a fog When it is comin'. THE SCHOLAR

But no wit surmises The calculated way the wind uprises; The place it comes from, whereunto it goes, Nor tell you to the mile the rate it blows, A full seven days ahead. But Science draws Exact determination of the laws That govern wind and waves; though, to be sure, In charting atmospheric temperature She may, for uninformed mentalities, Use terms like unexplained contingencies.

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But still, when all her facts are massed together, Unerring is her forecast of the weather; In our metropolis we have a man Who plots it every day. THE SALT (fired by reminiscence) Like hell he can. Whenever that fool bulletin comes out, With cock-sure talk about the heat and drought That's bound to last a week, I always ask The missus for me flannels and a flask Of gin to keep me goin' through the day. And when it says - 'Look out for frost, 'twill stay Three days or more/ I know we'll have a spurt Of heat would boil a man inside his shirt. Its everlasting fable - 'Fair and warm' Means 'brewin' for the devil of a storm/

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THE SCHOLAR (with righteous warmth) This open and unshamed prevarication Perturbs my soul with moral agitation. A votary of Truth I shall abide, That Wisdom of her child be justified. THE SALT

And let me tell you this: a half a brain Can tell a nor7-east wind will bring a rain. A sun-hound in the evenin' or a ring Around the moon - there is no safer thing For prophesyin' weather; as for cold, You boasted that your man up yonder told That frost was comin'. Why, sure, a skunk knows That and more; three months ahead he grows A chunkier tail.

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THE SCHOLAR

Your language, my good sir, Is rank; but, waiving that, I must aver With emphasis that human life is longer, As knowledge grows from more to more, and stronger, With every age, the race. How shall I begin To glorify that heavenly art enough, Since Aesculapius.

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THE SALT

I calls it bluff, This doctorin' business. There's Jim Hennessey's lad. When he was young his father thought he had The makin's of a doctor in him. I, Inquirin' like, asked him the reason why. He said the lad was handy with a knife, The way he'd carve a rabbit up alive, Or a young robin, maybe, just to see What the innerds were like. THE SCHOLAR

A subject of minute research.

Anatomy!

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THE SALT

Then Jim Put no less than six years expense on him. When he came back, some said it was decline; He called it asthma, but he had the sign Of a gone man; the neighbours were afraid To have him in; their children, so they said, Might catch the wheezin' off his chest. One case His dad got for him - more to save his face, I said, but let that bide - Jim got his son A case of Jack spavin - a wicked one

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I will allow it was - in Hazzard's mare. The boy put on an apron, then a pair Of rubber gloves, and then he said he'd freeze The leg and dose her up with fumes to ease The pain; and afterwards he'd operate, Then sew her up and leave the rest to fate. He did his honest bit - at least he tried; The mare kicked down the stalls before she died. THE SCHOLAR

But your example only serves to show What dire results from ignorance may flow. He had no skill for equine malady No special training.

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THE SALT

Just what Hennessey, His father, thought, So the old man, grown wise, Gave him another year to specialize This time in spavins. THE SCHOLAR

How does this impugn The Science by which man is made immune From all those fearsome, devastating ills, From cholera morbus to domestic measles, That swept the cosmos? Tell me, has not man Added by this to his allotted span Two decades? THE SALT

I don't see it with my eyes. This generation's dyin' off like flies; And why? Each mother son of them and daughter Are bred on arrowroot, with milk and water. They're all a scraggy lot; too much spoon-fed;

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Wants water bottles when they go to bed; Smokes cigarettes and drinks vile, home-made wine. Rhubarb will corn 'em; so will dandyline. Tis not the same as what it was. I know, Away back in the sixties, when our crew Was home from swilin' and a regular streak Of thirst had struck us, how, one night a week, And after lodge was out, each man would take a Good, long and steady swig of old Jamaica, And never feel the worse on it. 'Twould blow A colony like you to Jericho. As tough as staragons, they had no call For other medicine. A swig was all They asked for, and a swig was all they got. It cooled them off when they were dry, and shot Them up, when they were cold. And, say, what can, Within a lifetime, come to any man, Except a burnin' fever or a freezin'?

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THE SCHOLAR

Your argument is void of rhyme or reason; Your observation on disease, mere chatter. THE SALT

Maybe 'tis so; but I looks at the matter Quite different wise. I holds that not in strength, Nor muscle, nor in gumption, nor in length Of days, are young folks like they used to be. I minds how in a blindin' storm at sea, When both the captain and the mate were drowned, Under a double reef we had to round The Cape, on a lee coast, and, undermanned, And the taffrail blown to bits, the youngest hand On board, Sam Drake, took his turn at the wheel. He couldn't see the mainmast - had to feel The schooner's course, yet brought her down the bay, With every shred of canvas swept away.

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79 THE SCHOLAR

Is not the clamant menace of the sea Silenced by steam, by electricity, By gasoline?

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THE SALT

My notion's still the same, That folks were better off before they came. More swiles were taken in the spring; more fish Were dried upon the flakes, and if you wish To get my views on gasoline, I think The racket of the engine and the stink Is drivin' all the cod out of the bay. 'Tis gettin' hopeless quite - no fish, no pay. But there's a worse account I feel like makin' Against new-fangled notions. They are takin' The backbone from the lads - initiation You called it -

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THE SCHOLAR

No. Allow my emendation Initiative] However, I understand. THE SALT

Maybe you're right; maybe you're not. Tis sand, I calls it; but no matter what 'tis called, With any kind of little snag they're stalled. They'd starve and die with plenty all around 'em. I minds when our supplies ran out we found 'em, Sometimes when we were in the bush, with tea And baccy gone - no drink or nothin' - we Would fetch a kettle full of juniper And boil it for an hour or so, and stir Barbados black-strap with it -

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THE SCHOLAR (in deep spiritual reflection) Do I see, In its archetypal form, Zymology, That most potential art? THE SALT

Yes, sir, the brew Would grow a jumper on your chest. We'd chew The dried sap of the spruce, and then we'd take Dried tea-leaves with the chips of bark and make A powerful, fine smoke. You never saw, I suppose, a man rig up a lobster claw With quid, to get a drag when he had lost His pipe? I needn't ask. That never crossed Your mind. I'd like to see a good round score Like you, a-headin' for Labrador, Stowed in a fore-and-after with the sea, A-ragin' through the scuppers. It would be A sight for Satan, every time the ship, With not too much of ballast, took a dip To come right up again with soakin' jibs To watch your queasy stomachs and your ribs In need of oilin'.

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THE SCHOLAR

Trivial your words, Your passions bestial. The irrational herds Roaming the plains would scorn such thoughts as these; The ox, the zebra and the ass appease Their several hungers, earth-born as they are Without afflatus, without mind - with far More worthy satisfactions. What care you (recurrence of symptoms) For the primrose by the river's brink, the blue Within the violet's eye, in fine, for flowers? Eating and drinking you lay waste your powers,

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The world being too much with you. Have you felt A presence that disturbs you? Have you knelt At Nature's shrine, bathed at her crystal fount, And found her central peace? Say, do you count By figures or by heart-throbs? Have you never Listened to brooks that babble on for ever? Sermons there are in stones; alas, they stir You not. THE SALT

Shame on you, you idolater, For worshippin' stocks and stones. I see you took All your religion from a bot'ny book, And a dry, small lump it is, by every sign That I can see, you heathen. I gets mine From another kind of book. You don't need learnin' Neither, the kind that kills the soul's discernin' Of spiritual things. That's what our parson said, And he had learnin', too. It killed him dead Before he gave it up, like a dry rot That puts the blight on damson plums -that's what It is. Give me what makes a critter whole, And pours the blazin' glory on his soul, And saves him from the horrors. THE SCHOLAR (on the verge of a paroxysm) A most rude Conception of the spirit's growth - mere food For sucklings, for the race at those low stages Of history that form the world's Dark Ages. From your contentions, then, must I assume That in your mind's horizon is no room For formulae that dominate our times; For laws that tell how by successive climbs Our common human nature has become The paragon magnificent for dumb

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And erring brutes? Millions of years have passed Between the first crude cycle and the last, In which, despite the bludgeonings of chance And fate, has man his own deliverance Wrought out; survived the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to. In the eternal rocks Engraven is the epic. THE SALT

Pedley's lad, When he came back from learnin', was as bad As Hennessey. I might say worse, for he Lacked any bit of skill that Hennessey Might seem to own if he got started right. Pedley, for so his old man thought, was quite A brainy boy when growin' up. He'd shirk Any and every job that looked like work. He wouldn't run, he wouldn't walk; he'd fetch A book, and then for hours at a stretch He'd squat down on the wharf - takin' the air, I said it was. He wouldn't read. He'd stare, Then drowse, then stare again, just like a sheep, Whose brains the wise God only gave for sleep, When Jeff, his younger brother, might be seen Shapin' the model of a brigantine, Or doin' something handy, steepin' bark, Or renderin' out the liver of a shark. Well, when the old man finally understood He could do nothin' with him, for the good Of his soul - the last thing left - he thought he'd send Him off to join the Church; thought if he'd spend Ten years wearin' a collar or a satin Gown, and got crammed right to the neck with Latin, And the seven tongues, and all the other learnin', He'd be a thumpin' wonder on returnin'. He was. As bad as you for gall, he'd chin

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The Lord out of his job, on points like sin, Damnation and the rest of it. He told Us how the world - I can't just mind how old, He said it was; but just to illustrate His point, he took a pencil and a slate, Marked five in the left-hand corner near the top, And added zeros till he had to stop For want of room, and added more by tongue, Then ended, claimin' that the world was young, Just like a mushroom, so to speak; and when He thought he'd finished his explainin', then Our pastor put a poser to him straight. Just how, he asked him, did he calculate It out? - the parson, I'll allow, was rough On questions - Was the slate not big enough? Did he run out of zeros? Was he sure He had the tally right? A zero more, What mattered it, and how did he arrive By any kind of reckonin' at that five? It looked so lonesome by itself. Would not Another zero do instead? And what Do you allow his answer was? I've heard Some blasphemy against the Livin' Word Within my time - the Livin' Word that says The world's bin waggin' now, omittin' days, Six thousand years; but Word and Church and Lord, The evidence of the Fathers and the Sword Of the Spirit, everything - he cast them out With one deliberate, sacrilegious clout. He told us - and it sounded like a boast He told us - are you listenin'? - that the most Of all his facts he got from skulls; from graves Of savages that one time lived in caves; From skeletons of serpents, elephants; I think he mentioned bugs and bees and ants And frogs' backbones and such, but most of it

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He got from skulls so old that not a bit Of chop was left upon the jowls. He said Grantin' the man who owned the skull was dead So long, the crown had rotted - yet he'd tell The story from the jaw-bone just as well. THE SCHOLAR (delivering le grand coup) Thanks to the scientist's imagination, The point is proven to a demonstration, Your patriarchal history is a fable, A groundless fiction like your Tower of Babel, Your Samson or your Jonah. Had you sense To follow while I forge the evidence, How from the void of dancing vortices, The human mind has wrought its destinies, You'd gather what the Universe discloses. THE SALT (with profound disgust) I'm done with you, my lad - I stands by Moses.

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The Passing of Jerry Moore (Jumper Hall answers the critics) Did Jerry get through the gates of gold, To join the white-robed saints, that basked In the glory of the Father's fold? That was the question each man asked, As Jerry lay with his cold feet And his cold hands under the sheet. The last man, known as Juniper Hall, The life-time pal of Jerry Moore, Spoke - as soon as he had thefloorAnd said he disagreed with them all. He thought the judgment of Doran,

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That sanctified and solemn man, Put altogether too great store Upon the words of Jerry's speech, As Jerry sat in the rain and swore At the fish that rotted on the beach. Why shouldn't a man, who day by day Had seen the clouds wipe out the sun And botch the work his hands had done, Pour out his soul in a natural way, On the chance of ridding his chest of it, And tell the Lord what he thought of it all The rain, the fog and a hungry fall, The rotten fish and the rest of it? Then Juniper asked why Solomon Rowe (Who handed out to sinners gratis Timely advice such as might flow From him, a saint of ten years' status) Should so denounce what occupied Old Jerry's mind the night he died. He had spent the day in mending a net And splicing a rope; without a thought About the way a sinner ought To make eternal peace, he ate His three good hearty meals and went To bed. He took no Sacrament; He had no dying pains; he gave No groans; nor called the Lord to save His soul; but in his dreams he talked, With a sort of chuckle in his speech, Of a shoal of caplin on the beach, And of the punt that he had caulked, And other things that he had done. The case was proved, for Jake, his son, Who lay beside him on the bed, Had vouched for all that Solomon said.

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But Jerry's life from the day of his birth Was only meant for the jobs of earth, Like caulking punts and mending nets, And catching fish to pay his debts. He would shout like a man with gospel soul At the saving news of a herring shoal, That swarmed down the bay in the spring, And no louder than Jerry could sing As he'd barrel 'em up or smoke 'em, His rough, red hands a-reeking with brine, And his clothes with a mixture of turpentine, Of tar and cod-liver oil and oakum; What wonder then that in his sleep, As he dreamed about that caplin shoal, The thought should so have tickled his soul And made him laugh, instead of weep, Like the saints that get so short of breath In the last hour before their death? Besides, it's claimed he had not met, For want of savings, a just debt He owed to Rowe before he died. But, then, as he had often said, The reason why he had not paid It off - the Lord had never dried His load of cod; but Solomon Rowe Had owed a hundred dollars or so For years, though the sun had always shone Upon the fish of Solomon. Then Juniper thought that Watchnight Percy The one who spoke of the Lord's great mercy Though his heart was right, yet, on the whole, Was over-anxious for Jerry's soul. Was Jerry's chance, like that of a thief, Merely the miracle of belief, That in the final midnight hour

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Springs from the Lord Almighty's power And heavenly grace? Juniper could Not argue this point for want of light So left the question as it stood, To deal with the claim of Christopher Wright. Much that was spoken by Christopher Had a measure of truth, said Juniper. It was true that Jerry, with his mind So bent on worldly things, might find Beyond those gates of pearl and gold, Within those heavenly pavilions, Where white-robed angels by the millions Bask in the glory of the fold, No angel who would undertake To wean his thoughts from earthly things, And fit him up with a pair of wings; Or - still more hopeless job - to make Him change his manners and his speech, So that those lordly potentates Might not be shocked, as Jerry's mates Were often shocked upon the beach. All this, he said, and more beside May yet be true of men that died (Jerry, who swore when the mood was on, And worried the soul of Solomon; Jerry, the most consistent liar That ever told a fish-yarn when, On a wintry night, a crew of men Were gathered around a tamarack fire!) 1 do not care,' said Juniper, Looking direct at Christopher, 'What Gabriel may think of Jerry, Or (turning around to stare at Joe) What the sins were that Doran might know; Or whether he laughed in his sleep and was merry

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In the hour of death, as Jake, his son, Who lay beside him in the bed Reported the news to Solomon Of what the dying man had said/ Thus Juniper spoke, his eyes aglow, His bony fingers pointing at Rowe. Then we felt a deep hush fall Upon the room, as Juniper Hall Spoke to the dead man under the sheet, Just as a common man might greet A living friend. 'Well, Jerry, old mate, They may talk as they like - now that you're cold Of those who enter the Father's fold, Through mercy and grace. They may talk of the fate Of your soul. They may shake their heads and groan For fear God's mercy was not shown To you before you died. I know Nothing of what the angels do, Or where the souls of dead men go; But I'll take my chance in saying that you, Who always did your day's work well, Had far too good a soul for hell. I do not know the kind of luck That came to Christopher and Joe And saved from the fire the soul of Rowe, Nor how the balances are struck At death; but I'd like to state If things like contra accounts are stored On the shelves of the upper Courts of the Lord, Who judges the hearts of men, that your slate, Jerry, should tell by a clean score How you were head of a life-boat crew, With no one as good at the stern oar, And always on hand when a storm blew; And tell how you pulled young Davey Cole,

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(Who sits on that bench) out of a hole In the slob ice one bitter night In March when Davey was frozen through And lugged him ashore with his face as white As the lip of a ghost, and brought him to, With no one around to lend you a hand. Yes, Jerry, old mate, if you never reach For want of faith the angels' land, Without a sea, without a beach, Maybe the Lord in His good grace, May find close to the boundary Of heaven and the outer place, A strip of shoreline by the sea, Where the winds blow and where you, As skipper of a life-boat crew, May throw a line across the deck Of many a crowded, foundering wreck. And on fine days when not aboard Your skiff, but lying up, the Lord May find odd jobs, perhaps a sail To mend, that in a Galilean gale Was torn, or one or two old punts That He and Simon Peter once Used on the lake; or say, 'Here's bark And oakum, oil and pitch, all that You need; go - caulk that leaky ark That went aground on Ararat.' And when you call your gang together, Some night in raw December weather (The gang made up of your life-boat crew, And other spotted saints of God, Exiled to that shore with you Because, while on the earth, they trod On both the broad and narrow ways) To tell your yarns before a blaze Of balsam piled on tamarack -

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That night, I swear, I will come back (As stoker from the outer land On special leave from Lucifer) To start your fire with my brand; I swear it now/ said Juniper.

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The Bird of Paradise Answer my riddle, will you? Nay, Do not toss your head that way, With such a ruffle of passion. I merely asked you who was fleeced To pay the jeweller and modiste For this last word in fashion. I have a right, if you only knew, To put this delicate point to you Those sapphires dancing on your crest, That cluster of rubies on your breast, That necklace there, those pearls! The price? Who paid it? Bird of Paradise! And the only kind of reply that came Out of the vision of tropical flame Was that little ruffle of passion. A tango of colour from scarlet to green Evolved as I watched the beauty preen Her plumes in that maddening fashion. So I left the Bird of the Garden to call, This time, upon the Bird of the Hall; For my temples beat with the throb of fire, And I could not find in that land of Desire A cooling wind, or water, or ice To quench a fever in Paradise.

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And the only answer I got in the Hall Was a glance of repulse from the Belle of the Ball, With a little ruffle of passion; Though I had a right to ask, I am sure, Who sent that tiara for her coiffure, And that latest corsage of fashion. Not those the jewels I gave her to wear, Not those the drops that hung from her ear; And my fever burned like a thirst in Sahara, When that osprey swung above the tiara, And I knew no wind, nor water, nor ice Might cool this hell in Paradise.

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The Epigrapher His head was like his lore - antique, His face was thin and sallow-sick, With god-like accent he could speak Of Egypt's reeds or Babylon's brick Or sheep-skin codes in Arabic. To justify the ways divine, He travelled Southern Asia through Gezir down in Palestine, Lagash, Ur and Eridu, The banks of Nile and Tigris too. And every occult Hebrew tale He could expound with learned ease, From Aaron's rod to Jonah's whale. He had held the skull of Rameses The one who died from boils and fleas.

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Could tell how - saving Israel's peace The mighty Gabriel of the Lord Put sand within the axle-grease Of Pharaoh's chariots; and his horde O'erwhelmed with water, fire and sword.

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And he had tried Behistun Rock, That Persian peak, and nearly clomb it; His head had suffered from the shock Of somersaulting from its summit Nor had he quite recovered from it. From that time onward to the end, His mind had had a touch of gloom; His hours with jars and coins he'd spend, And ashes looted from a tomb Within his spare and narrow room.

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His day's work done, with the last rune Of a Hammurabi fragment read, He took some water spiced with prune And soda, which imbibed, he said A Syrian prayer, and went to bed. L'Envoi And thus he trod life's narrow way His soul as peaceful as a river His understanding heart all day Kept faithful to a stagnant liver. When at last his stomach went by default, His graduate students bore him afar To the East where the Dead Sea waters are, And pickled his bones in Eternal Salt.

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93 Ode to December, 1917

Was ever night so wild as this - this bleak December night! Veiled in the sombre shroud that sepulchred the day; Why thus bereft of heaven's beams, of moon and starry light, Are all its ancient charms in sorrow laid away? The year dies out with drifted leaves, with winds and floods of rain, Companions of the tempest with its brood of fears; And voices far above us echo back the world's great pain, In tongueless language inarticulate through tears. Why passed with such inevitable speed The eager splendour of the awakening spring? So little did it seem to know or heed Our outward cries, our hidden murmuring; It shone upon us shyly for some reason, Then flew into the summer's briefer season, And found, amidst its roses fully blown, A transient radiance fleeter than its own. How sweet the flowers grew in the woods last May! The trillium, splashed by sunlight, jauntily Awoke to match the whiteness of its ray With white of blood-root and anemone. Within the stray leaves on the humid ground, Beside the fallen trunks of trees, were found Numerous hepaticas whose lilac hue Seemed woven of heaven's purple and its blue, And, near at hand, a running streamlet told Of treasure hidden in the marigold.

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A little while they stayed; how short the space! We watched them as the hours went by, We looked again, and saw them die Thus did they pass away; but in their place, In meadow and in vale sprang up The daisy and the buttercup; Then on the creeping slopes of sunny hills, By winding dales and tortuous rills, Blue vervain rose to meet the sun, Ere half the summer's race was run; And in the fields and on the plains, By forest path, by country lanes, By wayside and in garden plot, The bluebell and forget-me-not; And fair the bottle-gentian grew Beside the wintergreen and rue. And everywhere around us from the throats Of joyous birds pealed forth ecstatic praise Glad hymns in which we heard no notes Of dim unrest and troubled lays. The heart had never taught them sorrows, Regretful yesterdays nor morrows; Each morning brought them its full boon of light, And in return they gave their gift of song Free utterance that had no tale of wrong Within the horizon of their life to right; And when the evening drew to twilight close, Fell the light mantle of their calm repose. Fled are they all; The flowers and the birds, In vain we call, With cries too dumb for words. The fragrance and the music gone, The fire of sunset, flush of dawn,

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The waterlily in the lake, The robin's love-song in the brake; All these are fled and gone, And with us now the night, The wild December night. Far, far away upon the seas The billows tell their agonies; The ocean in its frenzied roar Lashes the ramparts of the shore; The tempest with its shattering thunder Drives the iron bulwarks under; The furies, in their path advancing, Are seen around the breakers dancing; The sea-mews, blinded by the light Of mast-head signals, flaring bright, Are rent by blow of spar and sail Within the clutches of the gale, And sailors, drenched by salt and foam, Yearn for the fireside of their home. And thus upon the land Earth's ravage is laid bare; Slapped by the storm's fierce hand, The wildcat and the bear Lie huddled in the sand That marks their common lair; The trees in angry lurch That grew beside each other The hemlock and the birch Now strive with one another, In strangely human mood, Born of unnatural feud.

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Around the hoary mountain sides The storm hurls its impetuous shock, Is answered by the torrent's tides, The iron echoes of the rock. Gone are the woodland notes of spring, The airs of summer's short-lived breath, The autumn, too, has taken wing, The year has rushed into its death. Gone, like the memory of a dream, A rainbow hovering o'er a stream; And we, of nature's joys bereft, Are with her deepening shadows left, With grey upon the sea, And driftwood on the reef, With winter in the tree, And death within the leaf. Far, far away, across the distant deep, Heaven's lightnings flash from out a darker scroll; Midnight and darkness in the wild chaos keep A dawnless vigil, as slow thunders roll Over a world upon whose face the storm Breaks, and within the terrors of eclipse, Fall the swift strokes of Death, clothed in the form Of some dread angel of Apocalypse. There rides a tempest heedless of the check Of law, and with no mandate but its will, Whose function lies alone in power to wreck, That never hears the fiat, 'Peace, be still!' There, through deep winding valleys that had known The quiet haunts of peasants; through the green, Sweet-tufted verdure that the spring had sown; Through glens where only roe and fawn were seen In peace; through plains where once the sunset's brush Placed its soft crimson on the silent streams; There, through that land that often loved the hush

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Of evening and the tenderness of dreams, Rolls now the bugle with its alien blast, The cry of battle on the midnight air, The fiery summons to earth's legions massed Mid bayonets gleaming in the rockets glare; And streams that to the North Sea once had brought The dawn's white silver and the sunset's gold, Now pour such tides as Nature never wrought, The ruddier treasures of a wealth untold. O Nature! Thou that lovest life In herb and brute and feathered kind, Who leadest from the night's long strife The morn with rays of promise lined; Who bringest forth the vital glow To bathe the trees in glorious light, And bid the woodland flowers grow, Clothed spotless in their raiment bright; Who givest food to hart and hare Upon the snowy mountain's crest, And to the ravens everywhere, The storm-proof covert of their nest Hast thou within thy bounteous plan, So rich and measureless and mild, No boon wherewith to succour man, Thy youngest, feeblest, blindest child? Prostrate upon a formless field, Bedewed with unavailing tears, While the slow hours, faltering, yield This nameless triad of the years; What balm shall touch his stricken eyes? What hand shall drive away his dread? What tones shall quieten his cries? What voice shall resurrect his dead? O Winds! that sweep the surges from the bosom of the sea,

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98 Strong with a strength unmeasured, as the chainless lightnings free; Ye nether rivals of the thunders, as their voice your own, Yet theirs excelling in your major harmonies of tone; Ye mighty arbiters of light and shade, of hope and gloom, Who fashion for the morn its cradle, for the eve its tomb, Who garrison the towers of God with clouds in dark array, Marshalling their watch and slumber till their hidden fires play; All day ye played upon the forest pines a mournful strain, As if the slowly ebbing year were labouring its pain; 170 Upon the land ye tossed the aged leaves in aimless quest, And on the deep ye filled the sailor's heart with wild unrest. O Winds! that stir the ashes of our altars while our cries From hearthstone and from chancel in our agony arise, That drive us in our frantic hours to prayer upon our knees, While those we love drift shelterless upon the homeless seas; O lift us once again to God! this time on kindlier wings So weary are we of the strife and fear the tempest brings; Give us the vision of His gardens under skies of blue, We have lived-so long in shadow of the cypress and the yew; Sing through the swell that crowns the ocean when its rage has passed, 180 Resign the terrors of the gale, the furies of the blast; Then through the vibrant music of the lyre of sea and land Which our storm-sated world first heard when from the Creator's hand It rose at the Great Dawn, breathe soon that sweet, untroubled peace, That vista of life's cravings reared on hopes that never cease; Blow out upon the raven plumes of this December night, The world's unresting miseries, her shadow and her blight; The story of her passions, and her dark, unfathomed sin, The outward blow that slaughters, and the guilt that slays within; And deep from out the storm's last throes, peal forth in life re-born, 190

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The blazon of the future with the heralds of the morn; The anthem of a world re-strung to human love and grace, The full-toned orchestration of the heart-throbs of the race.

1923

Newfoundland Here the tides flow, And here they ebb; Not with that dull, unsinewed tread of waters Held under bonds to move Around unpeopled shores Moon-driven through a timeless circuit Of invasion and retreat; But with a lusty stroke of life Pounding at stubborn gates, That they might run Within the sluices of men's hearts, Leap under throb of pulse and nerve, And teach the sea's strong voice To learn the harmonies of new floods, The peal of cataract, And the soft wash of currents Against resilient banks, Or the broken rhythms from old chords Along dark passages That once were pathways of authentic fires. Red is the sea-kelp on the beach, Red as the heart's blood, Nor is there power in tide or sun To bleach its stain. It lies there piled thick Above the gulch-line. It is rooted in the joints of rocks, It is tangled around a spar,

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It covers a broken rudder, It is red as the heart's blood, And salt as tears.

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Here the winds blow, And here they die, Not with that wild, exotic rage That vainly sweeps untrodden shores, But with familiar breath Holding a partnership with life, Resonant with the hopes of spring, Pungent with the airs of harvest. They call with the silver fifes of the sea, They breathe with the lungs of men, They are one with the tides of the sea, They are one with the tides of the heart, They blow with the rising octaves of dawn, They die with the largo of dusk, Their hands are full to the overflow, In their right is the bread of life, In their left are the waters of death.

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Scattered on boom And rudder and weed Are tangles of shells; Some with backs of crusted bronze, And faces of porcelain blue, Some crushed by the beach stones To chips of jade; And some are spiral-cleft Spreading their tracery on the sand In the rich veining of an agate's heart; And others remain unscarred, To babble of the passing of the winds.

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Here the crags Meet with winds and tides Not with that blind interchange Of blow for blow That spills the thunder of insentient seas; But with the mind that reads assault In crouch and leap and the quick stealth, Stiffening the muscles of the waves. Here they flank the harbours, Keeping watch On thresholds, altars and the fires of home, Or, like mastiffs, Over-zealous, Guard too well. Tide and wind and crag, Sea-weed and sea-shell And broken rudder And the story is told Of human veins and pulses, Of eternal pathways of fire, Of dreams that survive the night, Of doors held ajar in storms.

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A Coast

Scaling where a hundred crags Disclose their high, precipitous walls, Up hidden clefts and burnished jags, The shoreline like a python crawls. Along a league of ridges overspread With the dead trunks of pine and oak, it drags A roughening path; around the head Of the last bluff it climbs, then falls, Spilling its folds on spur and boulder, Down a deep gulch where it rears and sprawls Upon the Cape's lean shoulder.

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102 Rolling dusks and vapours pour A turgid silence on the shore, Broken by a curlew screaming, And a low, regurgitant note Borne in from the labouring throat Of a wave along a line of basalt streaming; And, further off, where denser gloom The headland and a reef-curve hides, Falls the ground-swell's muttered boom From the belfries of the tides. Under a tattered curtain of fog A flaw of wind makes the waters start; They drift and scud and whirl; And, held a moment near the heart Of the eddy, a waterspout Or some wild thing with twisted shape, Compact of mist and wind and surge Hangs like a felon off the Cape.

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Morning I would not know him had I not Once marked for him that tattoo spot A ship with flying-jib and spanker, And underneath a chain and anchor. Nor I, but for that reefer flap Of moleskin, and this oilskin cap I found a gunshot from the shore, I'd know it from a hundred more. We cannot take him home this way. 'Twould kill the woman straight to lay The lad like this upon the bed, And fetch her in to see him dead.

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There is a chance she might not know It was her son - he's battered so. She'd know him by some canny trace, Such as that birth-mark on his face, And, what would smite her like a brand, This stumped, third finger of his hand. This coat and cap will tell her all; We'll get him buried by night-fall; There is no need to tell her more That we found the body on the shore.

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Great Tides

Great Tides! You fill the reaches up Under the North's wild blow; Yet could not spare this smaller cup Its salter overflow. Huge hands! You rear our bulwarks up With power to none akin; Yet cannot lift a door-latch up That a lad may enter in. The After-Calm

What is that colour on the sea, Dotted by the white sails of ships? It is blue, you say. We know it not, and yet We know the blue of violet, The hue of mid-day skies, And the sapphire of young children's eyes; But that we do not know - unless it be The pallor of dead lips.

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That band upon the sea? A sash of green that in a moment's time Becomes a girdle of wrought gold, Held by a silver clasp of surge. It cannot be. That green is now a belt of slime, And now - an iron-knotted scourge, And now - the form of some anguineal fold. That crimson core with sepia fringe, And orange tints between, Shows how the sun's white alchemy In vain attempt is seen To paint a pansy on the sea. That red is not the pansy's red, Nor what the garden poppy shows, Nor the vermilion that is spread Upon the pastel of the rose. But some deep smear that has its name In the sprawled characters of the flood, A splash of fire, a troubled flame, That takes it colour from the blood Of one who through the night had died, Breaking his body on the tide. Scenes from Afar (A Battlefield) Above the tottering ramparts of the day Massed clouds dissolve their lines; reform, and break Into a thousand fragments from the grey. Scattered, they drift awhile, then come to rest On some far shore like mariners marooned, While down the burning avenue of the west The sun drops, flaming, like an angry wound.

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105

A raven rises from the eastern skies, Mounts up the lifted causeways of the north, Winging an arc of shadow as she flies; And soon the broken fragments close again, The straylings of her brood flock to her wings Whirlwind and cloud, the thunder and the rain, And what is left of night's unuttered things. Now closed is every seam of sky and land, The air, the water and the sod are one, And every gulf of light and darkness spanned. O spirits that love the daylight and the sun, That with unerring fingers trace, When night's dark moments are outrun, The swarthy features of the morning's face; In whose involved weavings hour by hour Are fashioned forth the hues of nature's dress, In dew and rainbow, grass and tree and flower, And all the patterns of earth's loveliness; Whose iridescent splendours burn In vein of leaf, in curl of fern, And in the flame the summer throws Upon the poppy and the rose! Draw near with every voice that's heard In sound of cataract and bird, With every colour that the spring Sheds on a blossom, blade or wing; Come with your potencies that stir The sap of life in pine and fir That high along the mountains climb; Bring rosemary and thorn and thyme And heather - all that dawn distils Of fragrance from your clouded hills; From heath and glade and marge of lake, Draw near and watch the morning break!

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Wherefore should a daisy bloom, Or scent come from the thorn? What sun could penetrate this gloom, Made redolent this morn? The lark is banished from the sky, The thrush has fled the ground, Not heaven's chorus could outvie This bacchanal of sound That from the throat of fire and flood Would drown the voice of God, Answering the challenge of the blood That cries out from the clod.

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Where are the lilies that your valleys yield, Or those that in foul waters blow? May not the primrose of the field Bloom near the snow? Should not the clover in the meadows bare, The sweet-briar in the hedges there, Burst red and grow?

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They cannot bloom. Spring's gales have lost Their power the earth to leaven, For those dark vapours would exhaust The lavender of heaven.

1923

A Dirge

Now let the earth take Into its care, All that it travailed for, All that it bare.

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Leaves of the forest, Yellow and red, The drifting and scattered, The dying and dead; Grass of the hill-slopes, Sickled and dried, Vines that over-night Blasted and died;

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Blossoms and flowers Nipped with the cold, Trees that have fallen A century old; Moths of the candle-flame, Gnats from the stream, Wraiths from the moonlight, Spectres of dream;

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All that the earth gave, All that it bare With all its far kindred Of water and air. And in those rutted acres Which the heart's red blood has sown, Soon shall the bramble flourish Where the gentian had grown; And wherever ran the myrtle, Let the dust of thistles be shed, For these, with nightshade and burdock, Shall fast cover the dead.

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108

Come Not the Seasons Here Comes not the springtime here, Though the snowdrop came, And the time of the cowslip is near, For a yellow flame Was found in a tuft of green; And the joyous shout Of a child rang out That a cuckoo's eggs were seen. Comes not the summer here, Though the cowslip be gone, Though the wild rose blow as the year Draws faithfully on; Though the face of the poppy be red In the morning light, And the ground be white With the bloom of the locust shed. Comes not the autumn here, Though someone said He found a leaf in the sere By an aster dead; And knew that the summer was done, For a herdsman cried That his pastures were brown in the sun, And his wells were dried. Nor shall the winter come, Though the elm be bare, And every voice be dumb On the frozen air; But the flap of a waterfowl In the marsh alone, Or the hoot of a horned owl On a glacial stone.

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1923

109 On the Shore

Come home! the year has left you old; Leave those grey stones; wrap close this shawl Around you for the night is cold; Come home! he will not hear you call. No sign awaits you here but the beat Of tides upon the strand, The crag's gaunt shadow with gull's feet Imprinted on the sand, And spars and sea-weed strewn Under a pale moon.

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Come home! he will not hear you call; Only the night winds answer as they fall Along the shore And evermore Only the sea-shells On the grey stones singing, And the white foam-bells Of the North Sea ringing.

1923

Before a Bulletin Board

(After Beaumont-Hamel) God! How should letters change their colours so? A little k or m stab like a sword; How dry, black ink should turn to red and flow, And figures leap like hydras on the board? A woman raised her voice, and she was told That strange things happen at the will of God; Thus, dawn from midnight; thus, from fire the gold; Thus did a rose once blossom from a rod.

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But stranger things today, than that the rod Should flower, or the cross become a crown Stranger than gold from fire; else how should God Bring on the night before the sun go down.

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1923

Before an Altar (After Gueudecourt) Break we the bread once more, The cup we pass around No, rather let us pour This wine upon the ground; And on the salver lay The bread - there to remain. Perhaps, some other day, Shrovetide will come again. Blurred is the rubric now, And shadowy the token, When blood is on the brow, And the frail body broken. Snowfall on a Battlefield Compassion of heaven, From night's crystal bars, Falling so gently In wreaths of white stars; Petals of mystery Culled in far lands; Crosses of Calvary, Wrought by strange hands;

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1923

111

Gems from His mountains, Facets so rare, Foam from His fountain Eternally fair.

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Why do they lovingly Leave their fair home, These leaves of God's gardens, To stray on earth's loam? See how they hover Over faces so cold, How reverently cover The young and the old! Compassion of heaven, Tears from God's eyes, Falling so gently Out of the skies. In a Beloved Home (To W.H.G.) Without, the heavy vapours in an endless train Along the river's gorge drag wearily. Autumn has fled, and winter's mastery Takes votive tribute from his white domain; The Northern winds unleashed bring in the rain Which, blending at the night's austerity, Turns into hail and white-flaked fantasy That weirdly haunt the streaming window-pane.

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Within, a peace that only heaven sends To men who, pilgrims though they be, yet know Life's simple gifts - a home, the heart of friends, The company of the past; a fragrant briar; All these were ours, for in the hearth's rich glow Even Hamlet came and brooded on the fire.

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1923

Fragment from a Story

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(THADDEUS, a traveller, speaking to Julian, an old man) ... Fields far and near, Hills, ridges, valleys, lowlands, marsh and plain, Far to the horizon's utmost rim were filled With clashing millions. All earth's tribes Had by some common instinct gathered there, Peopling the shadows of the awful zone The forest shades, the fissures of great rocks, And caverns cut within the rotted mould; Each nation's youth, its lithest, strongest, best, Closed up the crimson rendezvous. The streams That ran their livid washings through the clefts Of spade or nature's highways, fouled and choked With drifted foliage of a year grown old, Too soon, with autumn's hectic leaves and limbs, And sheddings rare of dearer castaways. As leaves fall, so upon the plains fell men; Some tossed awhile within the gust of combat, High on the sweltered air, returned to earth As flesh and blood and bone unrecognized, And indistinguishable dust. Some swayed, Not knowing why they did, as if a breath

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Of unnamed pestilence had touched their senses, Robbed them of aim and guidance. Thus they drooped And fell; and others could not die till hours Wore into days and nights. Restless they moved, And shuddered; clutched convulsively at stones Or roots, and clenched their teeth upon their hands, Stifling their moans. And lads of growing years, Who pain or weariness had never known, Lay in strange sleep upon the fields, alone, Or huddled up in ghastly heaps where death Had flung them. Night winds gambolled with their hair, Golden and brown and dark - they heeded not. And far along the distant battle lines Movements as various as the tides, the rise The flow, the swift recessions of despair; Huge gaps that rendered void the toil of years. The lines re-formed and the price paid; strong men Who lunged and parried thrusts and lunged again, Struck and were struck, unknown to each the foes, Save in the general quarrel and its cause. And through the lulls of intermittent fight Was blown death's bitterest music - the low sob Of brothers mourning brothers dead, the curse Of fallen men that had not seen their foes, The unavailing moan that answers moan At night in the far comradeship of wounds. Then, strangest of all sights, the harvest moon A moment broke through the misty cloud, and shed Upon the fields a sickly, yellow light, Disclosing pallid faces, blue, strained lips, And eyes that stared, amazed, through open lids That had no time to shut - that looked and asked But one eternal question. Then the moon Grew dimmer as the mist increased, and showed, In hazy outlines, hurrying forms that moved In twos and threes, from place to place, and laid

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Upon the stretchers, one by one, the dead, Torn, jagged, mud-smeared and crumpled, carrying them To rows of damp, deep trenches, newly dug, Where they were placed in groups of eight or ten, In order, side by side, and face to face And the moon shone full again - the harvest moon.

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JULIAN Your words would tax the heart's belief. I thought That here along these shores when, at the close Of a week of storm, the gull alone remained Upon the waters, and the blinds were drawn Within a hundred homes, that there was left On earth nothing that might out-range the winds. THADDEUS

Death - Death stalked everywhere on land and sea, In clouds that banked the sun, in mists that hid The stars, or half-disclosed the swollen moon. No cavern sunk beneath the earth but bore His foot-prints. Deep below the waters' rim Great fish had trailed his scent. Earth's myriad forms Had felt the plague-spot of his rampant touch, From the small field-mouse, caught within the fumes Of sulphurous air that crept from knoll to knoll, Withering the grass blades, to the giant fighter Of storm and wave that, ribbed and sheathed with steel, Felt the swift scorpion in her sides, then rocked And plunged with bellowing nostrils till she sank In a wild litany of guns, with wind, And night, and flame. But busier was his hand With subtler workmanship. On eye and brow And cheek were delved the traces of his passing Blindness, that like a thunder-clap at noon,

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115 Closed on the sight; furrows that struck the veins, Turning the red sap from its wonted course; Sharp lines of pain and fury and quick hate That on the instant changed to graven stone, Callous and motionless. And deadlier still, With flying leap he strode a continent, Or the wide prairies of a sea, and snatched The cup from the wan fingers of a life That slaked its thirst upon the wine of hope; So sure his hand - light, as with finger-tips, He touched the hair and wove the grey and white Within the brown, or hard, with rough-spurred heel, He mauled the bosom till its heavings ceased.

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JULIAN Where ever in its course was this wide world So plunged in an unmeasured desolation? What tenders offered, save in a fool's faith, Would gamble on the chance of raising it From the complete involvement of its ruin? THADDEUS

Many there were who, clutching at a straw Of some dark saying of the past, some tone, Or flash of eye carrying strange emphasis, Sought for the battered remnants of their faith An anchorage; and around a clay-damp grave That buried hope with dust would stoop to tie Their heartstrings to a pansy, murmuring thus: 'Who bade this flower renew its own fair lease Of youth perennial? Springs it not this year From the same soil and root, with that same pride With which a year ago it lifted up Its face before the sun? Does not each year Declare its trumpet-pledges at the spring?'

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n6 JULIAN

Think they so to convince the heart with words Like those, to mesh it with a logic meet For bloodless ends? What though the winds of May Call to the springing rootlets, lure the bud From the rose-stem, and chase the resinous sap From the pine's trunk to branch and topmost twig Who yields to such delusion? Does the spring Forget November's hecatombs, the last Convulsion of the leaf, the gale-torn limbs Of trees scarred to the death, the flowers that danced Upon the fields scythed by the autumn's hands The written spectres of earth's quick decay Flashed out upon the winds? All these as dust Around the season's tombs - dust-heaps, no more; As sands that eddy in the desert, these: For these no resurrection. What amends Does summer make for winter's numbing stroke? It's death he gives, not slumber. His pale forms Breathe not again, and eyelids that have closed On the congealing air reflect no more The warm glance of the sun. The swallows build Their nests once more within the eaves; the thrush, The red-breast and the lark cover again Their young in bush and tree and meadow-grain They have not died. But weak ones that, impaled Upon the thorn, screamed out their notes of pain, Or dashed, wing-broken, by the wildering blast, Fell when their strength had failed them on far plains, On treeless hills, or dazed in homeward flight, Fluttered and sank in furrows of the sea Their song has ended; they return no more.

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117 THADDEUS

Yet, like a crocus in the swamps of spring, I saw life push its way through mire of death, Triumphant. JULIAN

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How?

THADDEUS

A ship lay motionless, Not anchored, nor becalmed, but held in spell Of some great shock. She listed heavily As though a hidden wound had gripped her loins, And in the rain and chill were lowered boats, So filled they lacked the margin of an inch To meet the water's edge. A law well known To men who live upon the sea here ran Its old and honoured course. The boats were few And small, and there was left upon the deck A sturdier throng who stretched out willing hands To save the weak. One boat hung yet suspended, Filled short of obvious risk, and a slim girl Stepped out, and gave an aged woman, left Unnoticed in the crowd, her place. Her lips Were closed, and her face pale, but yet a smile Made soft and sweet the pallor of her cheeks. Then out into the night the boat was rowed, Steadily and silently. No clamour broke The stillness on the deck, nor was there sound Of any voiced farewell, but here and there A hand was raised, and a white fluttering Answered the distant rhythm of the oars.

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118 JULIAN

Chaos indeed may well disclose a star Caught unaware within the tangled drift Of cloud and chasing glooms. Look on the plains Again. Charred ruins, not of nature's hand, Lie deep within unfathomable slime. How foul the wreckage stands - a spectacle So ill that it might seem to bar forever The lily's right to grow therein again.

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THADDEUS

And yet a few short hours before, when death Was taking in his most exacting toll Of this, his bloodiest year, were women seen, Fulfilling well their office. Lovingly Their hands were placed on the hot flush of wounds Made by the steel of surgeon and of foe. They beat the angels, at the angels' game, Those women. God might well His embassage Forego - His feudals of pure space - and take In chartered ministry those lovelier forms, They know the ravelled driftings of our life, And hence God's art of salvage all the more. JULIAN These are fine colours woven in a grey And tattered fabric. THADDEUS

Grant you not as well A value to a life that's lost! The lad That struck out in the storm without a star,

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Or faintest glimmer of a port, that took His orders with blanched cheeks, yet with a heart That pumped its resolution through young limbs, Untaxed till now by paths wherein the errand Failed by fore-doom of the sure goal - think you, That with his eyes made blind before he struck The highway, when his senses clouded fast With the delusions of ungoverned winds, That falling here, somewhere around the place Of starting, he should then be counted out, His life not worth the value of a smile? JULIAN This tangled, sacrificial thread has grown Till it has thickened to a scourge that bears No discipline in human fashionings.

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THADDEUS

Causes lost awhile on earth try out On new arenas fiercer qualities. They are re-born upon the air; they storm The souls of men; find homes in thunder peals; Are hitched to lightnings. Slain, they rise again With such forged temper that they turn aside The opposing edge of armouries of steel. Marks he the issue well, who sees here naught Save huge world-fires upon whose smouldering ruins Man's hand has lost its cunning to re-build, Or that the piles new-reared shall fall once more In the mad blasts that periodic run Their cycles of decay? May not the eye Range over those dun fields of death and see, From vile putrescence, beauty rise in light Unquenchable? May not the scar remind The sufferer of his healing as of wound?

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12O JULIAN

Look how in cluttered heaps the crosses rise, Stacked pile on pile, until they twist and sag The rivets on the bolted doors of God. This is a storm beyond imaginings, Unknown to land or sea. Were waves and gales The only agents of man's ruin, then The chance might fall upon his side - the fight With nature growing simpler every hour, Her ways being known; but when the struggle takes Its eddying fortunes in these blinded routes, Not once, nor twice, as though an incident Of casual kind had touched man's history, But as a baffling epidemic strikes A thousand times his life, failure of cure How strike this foul, insistent integer Clean from his life? ... The taint is in the blood.

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n A LATER SPRING

A flash of indigo in the air, A streak of orange edged in black! A bluebird skimmed the spruces there, A redstart followed in its track. The light grows in the eastern skies, The deeper shadows are withdrawn; From marsh and swamp the vapours rise In the cool cloisters of the dawn. What loom, a-weaving on the land, Such colour and fragrance fuses! Magenta and white on moss and sand, Azaleas, arethusas.

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And higher up along the steeps, The pink of mountain-laurel; While lower down the yellow creeps From celandine and sorrel.

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Sea-foam or snow-drift, flecked with spurt Of flame, upon the grasses spread. The snow is foam of mitre-wort; The flame, the ragged robin's red. Where sips the lily of the morning dew When light winds waken, And gems that the violets hold Gently are shaken To crystalline purple and blue, And emerald, crimson and gold From the heart of the rose unfold, And burst into view; There, at the dawn's first blush, The notes of a brown thrasher fall, And the importunate voice of the thrush Blends with a tanager's call; There, under a dragon-fly's wings, A stream carols by with sweet noise, And slowly a daffodil swings To a humming-bird's marvellous poise. (Thaddeus, walking through a field in the direction of Julian's home. The day is warm and sunny. A rapid stream, a short distance away, flows through a valley whose banks slope down from small hills covered with evergreen. Afar off, the land is high and forest-clad. At a bend of the stream he suddenly meets Julian.)

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122 THADDEUS

There is a quality in this air that stirs The blood as readily as the balsam sap. What brew, what chemistry; what hand is this That grips the pestle? Never was the grass So green upon the fields. A miracle! Throughout arterial nature, marble-cold And pale, are heard the joyous sounds of life Revived; earth's wells are opened in the vales; Through ice-clad mountains, chiselled by the hands Of northern blasts, the gurgling waters run In stream and torrent, and in the mad plunge Of cataract. Beyond the snow-capped ranges Lusty young rivers tear and strain at the dugs Of the foothills, and parting, force their pace Through gorge and valley to the open sea. Life, boundless, keen, ecstatic, uncontrolled! Vast, heaving, surging life, strung to great thews, Rapt in wide wonderments. Hail, life of Spring! Born of prophetic gales and plangent shocks, That rouse the torpor of earth's granite veins, And sluggard eyes. Glorious in resurrection! Thou peerless colourist of nature's life! With what unrivalled hands the lines are drawn, The shadows set, and the rich hues enwrought Upon how great a canvas! The far climb Majestic of fresh-foliaged ash and elm Along the mountain crags; the river banks Where the white spray falls softly on the iris, And violets creep along the sides; the gift Of minted treasure on the open fields, Where bloom those golden legions of the earth The daffodils and lowland marigolds; Cerulean tints that light our common paths, That bless our road-sides, cheer our vacant wastes;

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Bluets and harebells and the lilac bloom; Orchards aflame beneath a setting sun, And, trailing slow around moss-covered rocks, The flower of May superlatively veined. Come! Leave your tents, O mortals, gather here In Nature's high rotunda, crystal-domed, And offer praises. ... Julian, give me Your hand. We meet under new skies today. The times are changed; the earth renews her face; There is a fine contagion in the spring For heavy hearts. JULIAN Of an old man.

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You would infect the blood

THADDEUS

Come, Julian! In this life There is an unslain good that has outlived All floods and fires. There are undaunted spirits The age has not destroyed. I have seen them breathe Upon dry bones until they leaped with sinew; Even flotsam by their touch was salvable. No life, however craven at the face, But found a courage stirring at the core. The groundwork's there to build a structure on; The hand that yesterday tore like an eagle's claw Now pours in balm today, blesses and cures. There is a restoration in a smile We knew not of; we had forgotten it But wings unseen were flying in the night.

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124 JULIAN

I would there was a rock from which man's hopes Might never more be swept, or that his blood Might always bathe his heart with healthy stream. But those alternate currents, like the seasons, Have been our fateful legacy through all time. What power is this you speak of, that the dark May sudden blaze with light before the morn Is ushered in at nature's call? Is this The ultimate conquest of her will, that day Shall not know supersession by the night, With earth's diurnal axis overruled?

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THADDEUS

Have you not noticed, standing in the aisles Of some high-vaulted temple when the massed And reverent throngs were hushed in expectation, How a great organ poured forth like a flood Its spell of music as the master's hands Swept the wide boards? What power over the soul To lift its hopes, to plant its aspirations In the rich soil of heaven came from the touch! But let untutored fingers meet the keys, And the rapt ear is split by harsh discords. Are not the strings, the instrument, the same With either press? But how extremes depend Upon the craft of him who plays. Life's songs From baser jars and fretted failures range Along the gamut of their enterprise, In spiral movement to such high refrains As could, with buoyant amplitude of roll, Lift up the souls of sinking men, and float The world's grey cares on seas of evening calm ... Have you not heard such music when the winds

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Are given boundless space wherein to blow Upon the greenness of the earth? They pass, And from the meadows and the valley-slopes The latent rhythms of the daisies blend With the low rustle of the sedge. They pass Again, and lo, in grander orchestra, The pines lift up their voices on the hills. A blade of grass, a daisy or a pine, A wave, a waterfall, a heart-string, these, Tuned to the world's blood-rhythms, now await, As chords you touch, as reeds you breathe upon, The rising pulses of the morning air. JULIAN Dust gathers in my mouth. I cannot speak What I would say. Whether it is the drought Of age, or some strange filtrate of the past That sets a parched seal upon the lips, I do not know. It may be that from thistles I tried to gather figs, or where I looked Before I plucked, I said the vines were dry. Now I am old. I find the roadways blocked, And memory, ranging through the fungus years, Finds but the husks where it would take the fruit. And yet there is a knocking in this clay A restless flame - something that, if it could, Would leap these grammared confines of slow speech, And give the echo to your dancing words. Comrades

You - that could not stand the dust Of a day's dry weather, Nor in high winds

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126

Shoulder a load together, Without a faith that was broken, And a love consumed By the hot marl of words That were spoken Do you not know that a hemlock root Will enfold you together, Though fair be the sky Or foul the weather? To that same bed you shall come, When the ear shall be deaf And the lips be dumb; Where under the turf, Not a note shall be heard, From the cry of a wren To the thunder of surf.

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April 1924

The Frost Over-Night We rose and tracked the coast-line where it led Through slippery banks of sea-kelp, when the roar Of the storm had fallen to a dead And hoary calm along the ocean shore. Death wove his frosted patterns everywhere The last wave broke upon the sand, and stirred No more the silence of the sea or air By tide roll or by cry of man or bird. And we who had outwitted death by land, Felt his strange print of tidal weariness; For on our hearts' chilled leafage a white hand Had with the Master's cunning wrought no less A marvel than his own facsimile, That morning by the cold waste of the sea.

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April 1924

127 The Lie

Two words - when he was asked to tell Meant but the passage of a breath; One had the smack of truth but death Lay heavy in the syllable. The other though of darker shrift Had yet the power to stop the ring Of hammers on the scaffolding, And offer life the fairer gift. The sun that day was warm. Besides, He knew that no accusing sound Came from the body that was drowned, And cast up by the morning tides.

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April 1924

One Hour of Life

This little face will never know Cut of wind or bite of snow: The sea will never wind its sheet Around those pallid hands and feet. Nor shall its sleeping heart, grown cold After a pulse of life, unfold That futile challenge on the face Of one who with a last embrace Could only cheat the earth to save The plunder for another grave: But in that hour of battle she Forgot the patience of the sea.

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June 1924

128 The Last Survivor

Death played a merry hand that night With fifteen sailors on the floe, For every moment of the fight The luck was with the wind and snow. And fourteen of them staked that night Their bone and flesh and blood and lost; One threw his heart into the fight, With odds at dawn against the frost. But Death outplayed him the next night, And beat the partner at his side When, in the home, she joined the fight Against the wind and snow and tide.

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June 1924

The Drag-Irons

He who had learned for thirty years to ride The seas and storms in punt and skiff and brig, Would hardly scorn to take before he died His final lap in Neptune's whirligig. But with his Captain's blood he did resent, With livid silence and with glassy look, This fishy treatment when his years were spent To come up dead upon a grapnel hook. Tokens

The sea was as grey as a wild goose wing, And the wind like the sea was grey, When the bell at the Cape was heard to ring

July 1924

129

At the fog-blown hour of the dusk of day. A wave was seen to rise in a shroud, A token had passed by the window in white, A voice in her room had called aloud, A robin had pecked at the fan-light. And the call of the sea was heard In the wave and the shroud, and the warning That came from the wraith and the bird Was answered by morning. A while before, When the sea like the sky was blue, They might have brought to her door The buttercup's gold, Or a token of cool red wine From a rose or wild columbine, As her children had brought to the door, When the father had died A while before.

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But the winds that are true to the wastes of the sod, And to love that is spent in vain, Had stolen from the fists of God The last offerings of the fall November foam and rain, And frayed leaves from a dying oak, And had spattered them on sill and pane. September 1924 The Ritual i

She took her name beneath according skies, With ringing harbour cheers, and in the lee Of hills derived her birthright to the sea -

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The adoration of a thousand eyes. Each bulwark ran its way from stern to prow, With the slim tracery of a sea-gull's wing, And - happy augury for the christening The bottle broke in rainbows on her bow. Beyond the port in roll and leap and curl, In the rich hues of sunlight on the spray, And in the march of tides - swept down the bay The pageant of the morning, to the skirl Of merry pipers as the rising gale Sounded a challenge to her maiden sail.

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She left her name under revolted skies, Before the break of day, upon a rock Whose long and sunken ledge met the full shock Of an Atlantic storm, and with the cries Of the curlews issuing from dark caves, Accompanied by the thud of wings from shags That veered down from their nests upon the crags To pounce on bulwarks shattered by the waves. And the birthright that was granted for a brief, Exultant hour with cheers and in the lee Of hills was now restored unto the sea, Amidst the grounded gutturals of the reef, And with the grind of timbers on the sides Of cliffs resounding with the march of tides. To an Enemy Some passionate hour before my own deep stripe Has taken on its healing, I shall trace Him out, and with clean linen I shall wipe

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October 1924

131

The stain from that raw cut upon his face; And with the hand that smote him I shall turn The audit strong against him, offering Once more a wound for wound and burn for burn, Out of the heart's own codeless bargaining. And he, with wound adjuring wound, shall draw His equal measure to the sacrament 10 From an old well to which some mortals went When, with their thirsts ablaze, they looked and saw An Orient form uplifted in the skies, And quenched their hate in his forgiving eyes. January 1925 The Witches' Brew Perched on a dead volcanic pile, Now charted as a submerged peak, Near to a moon-washed coral isle, A hundred leagues from Mozambique, Three water-witches of the East, Under the stimulus of rum, Decided that the hour had come To hold a Saturnalian feast, In course of which they hoped to find For their black art, once and for all, The true effect of alcohol Upon the cold, aquatic mind. From two Phoenicians who were drowned, The witches three (whose surnames ran Lulu, Ardath, Maryan) Had by an incantation found A cavern near the coast of Crete, And saw, when they had entered in, A blacksmith with a dorsal fin, Whose double pectorals and webbed feet

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Proved - while his dusky shoulders swung His breed to be of land and water, Last of great Neptune's stock that sprung From Vulcan's union with his daughter. The sisters' terms accepted, he, Together with his family, Left his native Cretan shore To dig the witches' copper ore Out of their sub-aquaceous mines In the distant Carolines, And forge a cauldron that might stand, Stationary and watertight, A thousand cubits in its height, Its width a thousand breadths as spanned By the smith's gigantic hand, So that each fish, however dry, Might have, before the feast was through, His own demonstrable supply Of this Pan-Oceanic brew. A thousand leagues or so away Down the Pacific to Cape Horn, And Southwards from Magellan lay A table-land to which was borne This cauldron from the Carolines, For here, as well the sisters knew, The Spanish conquerors of Peru Had stored their rich and ancient wines, About the time the English burst Upon their galleons under Drake, Who sank or captured them to slake A vast Elizabethan thirst. With pick and bar the Cretan tore His way to the interior Of every sunken ship whose hold Had wines almost four centuries old. Upon the broad Magellan floors,

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Great passage-way from West to East, Were also found more recent stores, The products of a stronger yeast. For twenty years or thereabout, The Bacchanals of Western nations, Scenting universal drought, Had searched the ocean to find out The most secluded ports and stations, Where unmolested they might go 'To serve their god while here below/ With all the strength of their libations. So to the distant isles there sailed, In honour of the ivy god, Scores of log-loaded ships that hailed From Christiania to Cape Cod With manifests entitled ham, Corn beef, molasses, chamois milk, Cotton, Irish linen, silk, Pickles, dynamite and jam, And myriad substances whose form Dissolved into quite other freights, Beneath the magic of a storm That scattered them around the Straits; For this is what the blacksmith read, While raking up the ocean bed: Budweiser, Guinness, Schlitz (in kegs), Square Face Gin and Gordon's Dry, O'Brien's, Burke's and Johnny Begg's, Munich, Bock, and Seagram's Rye, Dewar's, Hennessey's 3 Star, Glenlivet, White Horse and Old Parr, With Haig and Haig, Canadian Club, Jamaica Rum, and other brands Known to imbibers in all lands That stock from Brewery or Pub. All these the Cretan, with the aid

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Of his industrious progeny, Drew to the cauldron, and there laid, By order of the witches three, The real foundations for the spree. OTHER INGREDIENTS

To make a perfect fish menu, The witches found they had to place Upon this alcoholic base Great stacks of food and spices too. Of all the things most edible On which the souls of fish have dined, That fish would sell their souls to find, Most gracious to their sense of smell, Is flesh exotic to their kind: Cold-blooded things yet not marine, And not of earth, but half-between, That live enclosed within the sand Without the power of locomotion, And mammal breeds whose blood is h< That court the sea but love it not, That need the air but not the land The Laodiceans of the ocean. So in this spacious cauldron went Cargoes of food and condiment. Oysters fished from Behring Strait Were brought and thrown in by the era Spitzbergen scallops on half-shell, Mussels, starfish, clams as well, Limpets from the Hebrides, Shrimps and periwinkles, these, So celebrated as a stew, Were meant to flavour up the brew. Then for the more substantial fare, The curried quarter of a tail

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Hewn from a stranded Greenland whale, A liver from a Polar bear, A walrus' heart and pancreas, A blind Auk from the coast of Java, A bull moose that had died from gas While eating toadstools near Ungava, One bitter-cold November day; Five sea-lion cubs were then thrown in, Shot by the Cretan's javelin In a wild fight off Uruguay, With flippers fresh from the Azores, Fijian kidneys by the scores, Together with some pollywogs, And kippered hocks of centipedes, And the hind legs of huge bull frogs Raked by the millions from the reeds Of slimy Patagonian bogs. Then before the copper lid Was jammed upon the pyramid, The sisters scattered on the top Many a juicy lollipop; Tongues from the Ganges crocodile, Spawn from the delta of the Nile, Hoofs of sheep and loins of goats, Raised from foundered cattle-boats Titbits they knew might blend with hops Might strengthen rum or season rye, From Zulu hams and Papuan chops To filets mignons from Shanghai. Now while volcanic fires burned, Making the cauldron fiercely hot, Lulu with her ladle churned The pungent contents of the pot, From which distinctive vapours soon Rose palpably before the view.

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Then Ardath summoned a typhoon Which as it swooped upon the stew, And swept around the compass, bore To every sea and every shore The tidings of the Witches' feast. And from the West and from the East, And from the South and from the North, From every bay and strait and run, From the Tropics to the Arctic sun, The Parliament of fish came forth, Lured by a smell surpassing far The potencies of boiling tar, For essences were in this brew Unknown to blubber or to glue, And unfamiliar to the nose Of sailors hardened as they are To every unctuous wind that blows From Nantucket to Baccalieu. The crudest oil one ever lit Was frankincense compared to it. It entered Hades, and the airs Resuscitated the Immortals; It climbed the empyrean stairs And drove St Peter from the portals.

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DEFENSIVE MEASURES

According to the witches' plan, All life whose blood did not run true Must be excluded from the brew; Each earthly thing from snail to man, And every mammal of the sea Was for that night an enemy. And so the smith from ocean hoards Had gathered masts and spars and boards Of ships, with cutlasses and swords,

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And countless pikes and spears, and made With them a towering palisade. And to the top thereof was sent, To guard the brew, a warrior The bravest of the ranks of war, And deaf to bribe or argument, To neither shark nor swordfish fell The honours of the sentinel, For of all fighters there, the star Was Tom the cat from Zanzibar.

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THE SEA-CAT

If s not for us to understand How life on earth began to be, How forms that lived within the sea Should leave the water for the land; Or how - (Satan alone may trace The dark enigma of this race) When feline variants, so far Removed as tabs and tigers are, Preferred, when they had left the shore, The jungle and the kitchen floor That this uncouth, primordial cat Should keep his native habitat. Yet here he was, and one might find In crouch and slink and instant spring Upon a living, moving thing, The common genus of his kind. But there were qualities which he Derived not from his family tree. No leopard, lynx or jaguar Could match this cat from Zanzibar For whiskers that from ear to chin Ran round to decorate his grin.

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And something wilder yet than that Lay in the nature of this cat. It's said that mariners by night, When near a dangerous coast-line, might Recover bearings from the light Of some strange thing that swam and gleamed; A Salamander it might be, They said, or Lucifer that streamed His fiery passage through the sea. But in this banquet place not one Of all the revellers could fail To solve the riddle when Tom spun A vast ecliptic as his tail, A fiery comet, and his fur Electrified each banqueter. So the three beldams there agreed No alien could invade the hall If one of such a fighting breed Were placed upon the fortress wall; For who, they asked, of mortal creatures Could claim more fearful derivation Than Tom with his Satanic features And his spontaneous conflagration?

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THE FLIGHT OF THE I M M O R T A L S

Close to the dunnest hour of night, Sniffing the odour of the brew, Their bat-wings oiled for water flight, The Devil and his legions flew, Smashing the record from Hell's Gates By plumbline to Magellan Straits. Far in their wake, but hurrying fast For fear the odour might not last Till morning, came a spectral band Weary from Hades - that dry land.

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139 INVENTORY OF HADES

1. Statesmen and apothecaries, Poets, plumbers, antiquaries, Premiers with their secretaries, Home and foreign missionaries, And writers of obituaries. 2. Medieval disputants, Mystics in perpetual trance, Philosphers in baggy pants, Puritans to whom the chance Had never come in life to dance Save when the dreadful circumstance Of death removed their maiden aunts.

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3. Scribes with wide phylacteries, Publicists and Sadducees, Scholars, saints and PH.D.'S. 4. Doctors, auctioneers and bakers Dentists, diplomats and fakirs, Clergymen and undertakers. 5. Rich men, poor men, fools and sots, Logicians, tying Shades in knots, Pagans, Christians, Hottentots, Deacons good and bad in spots, Farmers with their Wyandots. AN HOUR LATER

Not since the time the sense of evil Caught our first parents by surprise, While eating fruit in Paradise, One fateful morning, had the Devil,

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Used as he was to steam and smoke, Beheld such chaos as now broke Upon his horny, bloodshot eyes. Prince of the Power of the air, Lord of terrestrial things as well As subterranean life in Hell, He had till now not been aware How this great watery domain Might be enclosed within his reign; Such things as fish, cold-blooded, wet, Had served no end of his as yet. The serpent could be made to lie, And hence fit agent to deceive A trustful female such as Eve; But he, though cold, at least was dry. For all his wily strategy Since time began, the Devil saw No way to circumvent the sea. The fish transgressed no moral law, They had no principles, no creed, No prayers, no Bibles, and no Church, No Reason's holy light to read The truth and no desire to search. Hence from Dame Nature's ancient way Their fins had never learned to stray. They ate and drank and fought, it's true, And when the zest was on they slew; But yet their most tempestuous quarrels Were never prejudiced by morals; As Nature had at the beginning Created them, so they remained Fish with cold blood no skill had trained To the warm arts of human sinning.

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141 THE M I D N I G H T REVELS AS O B S E R V E D BY THE SHADES

The witches' device for the equitable distribution of the liquor consisted in the construction of tens of thousands of 320 stopcocks and bungs which were fitted into the perforations of the cauldron, and graded so nicely in calibre that every species of fish from a sardine to a shark might find perfect oral adjustment. To provide against all contingencies they had,in addition, furnished each amphibious member of the Cretan family with a ladle so that the weaker fish, unable to reach the taps and bung-holes, might be supplied at the surface of the water. But not withstanding all their powers of divination, the scheme came very near to being wrecked, first, by the tremendous congregation of fish, and secondly, by the advent of the wild horde from Hades. Now it 330 was not within the counsels of either the witches or the Devil that the test should be prejudiced by the Shades. If they arrived at all, their role would be severely restricted to that of an audience. But the momentum of their rush carried them up against the sides of the cauldron with such a terrific impact that a vertical crack, one hundred cubits long, was made near the top. Fortunately, however, for the experiment, the Shades were immediately driven back to the rear by a battalion of imps, and the crack served the purpose of allowing sufficient liquor to trickle through into the sea to account for the inebriation 340 of such fish as those whose nervous constitution could not stand the undiluted draughts/ Byron: Now what the devil can be hid In whiskey straight, or punch or sherbet, To give the doldrums to that squid, Or plant the horrors in that turbot? I never dreamed a calamary Could get so dead stiff on Canary.

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Wolsey: I've watched the effect of many a dram On Richmond and on Buckingham; And with good reasons have I mourned To see my Royal Henry corned; And many a noble prelate losing His benefice by one night's boozing. But till this hour I never knew What alcoholic draughts could do To change a salmon or a hake Into a paralytic rake; Or how a drunken sturgeon felt When fever burned inside his pelt.

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Campeggio: Now by my Hat and Clement's foot, What kind of devil must have dwelt Inside a liquor that could put Delirium tremens in a smelt? Pepys: What maddening impulse makes that shark, Which ought, by its own nature, choose a Mate of its kind, to spark With that gelatinous Medusa? Paracelsus: They say that mortals may go mad Beneath thy beams, Divinest Luna; But how canst thou debauch a shad, Create an epileptic tuna? Gulliver: 7 saw a sardine just now glut His hunger on a halibut.

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Samuel Butler: How could a thing like rye or hops stir The turgid corpus of a lobster? And thus induce an inflammation Within the shell of a crustacean? Samson: 7 saw a small phlegmatic mullet Holding a dogfish by the gullet.

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Saint Patrick: Such crimes as from the sea arise Beat out the days of old GomorrahHad I not seen it with my eyes I would not have believed, begorra! THE C H A R G E OF THE SWORDFISH

Now when, beneath the riotous drinking, The witches found the liquor sinking So low their ladles couldn't reach it, The blacksmith with a blazing larynx Organized a swordfish phalanx And charged the cauldron plate to breach it. Back from its copper flanks they fell, The smith had done his work too well. A Greek: From such a race of myrmidons Our heroes and our Marathons. Fabius Maximus: It's but the fury of despair. A French General: Magnifique! mais ce n'est pas la guerre.

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Napoleon: By some such wild demonic means My astral promise was undone. Nelson: By spirits like to such marines Trafalgar and the Nile were won.

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Carlyle: Full ten feet thick that plate was wrought, And yet those swordfish tried to ram it; Unthinking fools! I never thought The sea so full of numskulls, dammit! Satan: Now by my hoof, this recipe Is worth a million souls to me; But lol what mortal creature there Grins, haunched upon the parapet, Whose fierce, indomitable stare I long have dreamed of, but not met?

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Maryan: Most sovereign and most sulphurous lord! We, with the help of Cretans, made This circumambient palisade Of this great height and strength, to ward Off such invaders as might mar Our feast, and then as sentinel Chief vigilante out of hell We stationed HIM from Zanzibar. Satan: Good! From such audacious seed Sprang Heaven's finest, fallen breed, Maryan! Ardath! Lulu! Try out upon this cat, the brew.

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THE S U P R E M E TEST

Now it was clear to every Shade That some great wonder was before them, As Tom upon the palisade Emptied, as fast as Lulu bore them, The flasks upon the ocean wagon. And clear it was when Tom had cleaned The liquor from the hundredth flagon, The Shades then saw Hell's darkest fiend A sea-cat with an awful jag-on. Up to this time, he did not see Upon the wide expanse of grey A single thing approach his way Which he might call his enemy. He spent the hours upon the rim, Leaping, dancing, rarely sitting, Always grinning, always spitting, Waiting for a foe to swim Within his range, but through the night Not a walrus offered fight A most unusual night for him. But with the hundredth flagon drink, He spat at his inactive fate, And moving closer to the brink, Began more madly to gyrate. Upon his face, ironic, grim, A resolution was ingrained, If fish would not come unto him To offer battle, what remained But that his fighting blood would freeze Unless he were allowed to go, Ranging at will upon the seas, To fight and conquer every foe? With that, into the cavernous deep He took a ghastly, flying leap.

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Gaping, breathless, every Shade Watched the course of the wild-cat's raid; And never was an errand run With means and end so much at one. For from his birth he was imbued With hatred of his racial kind; A more inveterate, blasting feud Within the world one could not find. His stock were traitors to the sea, Had somehow learned the ways of earth, The need of air, the mystery Of things warm-blooded, and of birth. To avenge this shameful derogation, He had, upon his final flask, Resolved to carry out his task To wit: - the full extermination, First, of his nearest order, male And female, then the breed cetacean; Grampus, porpoise, dolphin, whale Humpback, Rorqual, Black and White; Then the walrus, lion, hood, Seals of all orders; these he would Just as they came, in single fight, Or in the fortunes of melee, Challenge as his lawful prey. The Blacksmith: I never knew an ocean steed Develop such demonic speed. Sir Isaac Newton: How he maintains that lightning rate, Now in air and now in water, And carries on such heavy slaughter, Is more than I can formulate.

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Blake: The tiger, though in stretch of limb And heft of bone is larger; still, For straight uxoricidal will Is but a lamb compared to him.

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Bottom: What humour is it makes him flail His tawny quarters with that tail? Owen Glendower: Did any electrician mark The explosive nature of that spark? Benjamin Franklin: I did in truth, but cannot quite See, on the basis of my kite, How such a flame should always sit Upon a wild-cat's caudal tip. Aesop: Or what blind fury makes him whip His smoking sides to capture it An ignis fatuus that eludes The cat's most sanguinary moods. Euclid: The reasons for the circle lie Within the nature of the thing; This cat must run around a ring If he would catch his tail But why So bloodily he chaseth it Is past the compass of my wit.

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Johnny Walker: Just why this wild-cat should resolve, Leaving his nether tip uncaught, And spend his energy for naught, The denser Shades will never solve; But (granting that the speed is quicker) All we discerning spirits know It's just the way a man would go, Grant the night and grant the licjuor. Calvin: If I had known that such mad brutes Had found, before the world began, A place within the cosmic plan, They would have dished my Institutes.

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THE RETURN OF THE CAT

Time: morning A half-point Nor'ard from the West, A bluish-tinted spot of light, Now deep below, now on the crest Of a high wave, hove into sight; And by the curves and speed it made, Conviction came to every Shade That here the monster was returning With all those inner fires burning That no destruction could assuage; Though through the hours of the night The floating victims of the fight Showed how the wild-cat could engage His foes; achieve his victories; For those he could not kill outright Had either died from heart-disease Or passed out through a haemorrhage. An unexpected wonder met

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His rolling, unabated eye For when he reached the parapet He found the witches' cauldron dry. And there was something which surprised Him even more; the drunken riot Was followed by a holy quiet; The fish lay dead or paralysed; No witch this time came forth to serve His inbred hunger for assault With either rum or wine or malt. The thing told heavily on his nerve, That near that massive banquet place Not tme lone member of his race, Outside the fortress or within, Survived to give him grin for grin, Or swish a tail across his face. And so this wild-cat, now bereft Of all of life's amenities, Took one blood-curdling leap and left Magellan's for the vacant seas. Sullen and dangerous he ripped A gleaming furrow through the water, Magnificently still equipped For combat with rapine and slaughter. Now with his tail electro-tipped, Swiftly but leisurely he made Around the steaming palisade A blazing spiral which outshone The fiercest glow of Acheron. Then suddenly, as if aware, By a deep ferment in his soul Or something psychic in his hair, Of some ulterior, mystic goal, He sharply turned, began a lonely Voyage pregnant of immortal raids And epic plunder. But the Shades

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Saw him no more in the flesh. Only To Satan and the witches three (In touch with his galvanic tail, By more occulted masonry) Appeared a phosphorescent trail That headed for the Irish Sea.

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The Cachalot i

A thousand years now had his breed Established the mammalian lead; The founder (in cetacean lore) Had followed Leif to Labrador; The eldest-born tracked all the way Marco Polo to Cathay; A third had hounded one whole week The great Columbus to Bahama; A fourth outstripped to Mozambique The flying squadron of da Gama; A fifth had often crossed the wake Of Cortez, Cavendish and Drake; The great grandsire - a veteran rover Had entered once the Strait of Dover, In a naval fight, and with his hump Had stove a bottom of Van Tromp; The grandsire at Trafalgar swam At the Redoubtable and caught her, With all the tonnage of his ram, Deadly between the wind and water; And his granddam herself was known As fighter and as navigator, The mightiest mammal in the zone From Baffin Bay to the Equator.

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From such a line of conjugate sires Issued his blood, his lumbar fires, And from such dams imperial-loined His Taurian timbers had been joined, And when his time had come to hasten Forth from his deep sub-mammary basin, Out on the ocean tracts, his mama Had, in a North Saghalien gale, Launched him, a five-ton healthy male, Between Hong Kong and Yokohama. Now after ninety moons of days, Sheltered by the mammoth fin, He took on adolescent ways And learned the habits of his kin; Ransacked the seas and found his mate, Established his dynastic name, Reared up his youngsters, and became The most dynamic vertebrate (According to his Royal Dame) From Tonga to the Hudson Strait. And from the start, by fast degrees, He won in all hostilities; Sighted a hammerhead and followed him, Ripped him from jaw to ventral, swallowed him; Pursued a shovelnose and mangled him; Twisted a broadbill's neck and strangled him; Conquered a rorqual in full sight Of a score of youthful bulls who spurred Him to the contest, and the fight Won him the mastery of the herd. Another ninety moons and Time Had cast a marvel from his hand, Unmatched on either sea or land A sperm whale in the pitch of prime.

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152 A hundred feet or thereabout He measured from the tail to snout, And every foot of that would run From fifteen hundred to a ton. But huge as was his tail or fin, His bulk of forehead, or his hoists And slow subsidences of jaw, He was more wonderful within. His iron ribs and spinal joists Enclosed the sepulchre of a maw. The bellows of his lungs might sail A herring skiff - such was the gale Along the wind-pipe; and so large The lymph-flow of his active liver, One might believe a fair-sized barge Could navigate along the river; And the islands of his pancreas Were so tremendous that between 'em A punt would sink; while a cart might pass His bile-duct to the duodenum Without a peristaltic quiver. And cataracts of red blood stormed His heart, while lower down was formed That fearful labyrinthine coil Filled with the musk of ambergris; And there were reservoirs of oil And spermaceti; and renal juices That poured in torrents without cease Throughout his grand canals and sluices. And hid in his arterial flow Were flames and currents set aglow By the wild pulses of the chase With fighters of the Saxon race. A tincture of an iron grain Had dyed his blood a darker stain;

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Upon his coat of toughest rubber A dozen cicatrices showed The place as many barbs were stowed, Twisted and buried in his blubber, The mute reminders of the hours Of combat when the irate whale Unlimbered all his massive powers Of head-ram and of caudal flail, Littering the waters with the chips Of whale-boats and vainglorious ships.

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Where Cape Delgado strikes the sea A cliff ran outward slantingly A mile along a tossing edge Of water towards a coral ledge, Making a sheer and downward climb Of twenty fathoms where it ended, Forming a jutty scaur suspended Over a cave of murk and slime. A dull reptilian silence hung About the walls, and fungus clung To knots of rock, and over boles Of lime and basalt poisonous weed Grew rampant, covering the holes Where crayfish and sea-urchins breed. The upper movement of the seas Across the reefs could not be heard; The nether tides but faintly stirred Sea-nettles and anemones. A thick festoon of lichens crawled From crag to crag, and under it Half-hidden in a noisome pit Of bones and shells a kraken sprawled. Moveless, he seemed, as a boulder set

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In pitch, and dead within his lair, Except for a transfixing stare From lidless eyes of burnished jet, And a hard spasm now and then Within his viscous centre, when His scabrous feelers intertwined Would stir, vibrate, and then unwind Their ligatures with easy strength To tap the gloom, a cable length; And finding no life that might touch The mortal radius of their clutch, Slowly relax, and shorten up Each tensile tip, each suction cup, And coil again around the head Of the mollusc on its miry bed, Like a litter of pythons settling there To shutter the Gorgonian stare. But soon the squid's antennae caught A murmur that the waters brought No febrile stirring as might spring From a puny barracuda lunging At a tuna's leap, some minor thing, A tarpon or a dolphin plunging But a deep consonant that rides Below the measured beat of tides With that vast, undulating rhythm A sounding sperm whale carries with him. The kraken felt that as the flow Beat on his lair with plangent power, It was the challenge of his foe, The prelude to a fatal hour; Nor was there given him more than time, From that first instinct of alarm, To ground himself in deeper slime, And raise up each enormous arm

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Above him, when, unmeasured, full On the revolving ramparts, broke The hideous rupture of a stroke From the forehead of the bull. And when they interlocked, that night Cetacean and cephalopod No Titan with Olympian god Had ever waged a fiercer fight; Tail and skull and teeth and maw Met sinew, cartilage, and claw, Within those self-engendered tides, Where the Acherontic flood Of sepia, mingling with the blood Of whale, befouled Delgado's sides. And when the cachalot out-wore The squid's tenacious clasp, he tore From frame and socket, shred by shred, Each gristled, writhing tentacle, And with serrated mandible Sawed cleanly through the bulbous head; Then gorged upon the fibrous jelly Until, finding that six tons lay Like Vulcan's anvil in his belly, He left a thousand sharks his prey, And with his flukes, slow-labouring, rose To a calm surface, where he shot A roaring geyser, steaming hot, From the blast-pipe of his nose. One hour he rested, in the gloom Of the after-midnight; his great back Prone with the tide, and, in the loom Of the Afric coast, merged with the black Of the water; till a rose shaft, sent From Madagascar far away, Etched a ripple, eloquent Of a freshening wind and a fair day.

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Flushed with the triumph of the fight, He felt his now unchallenged right To take by demonstrated merit What he by birth-line did inherit The lordship of each bull and dam That in mammalian waters swam, As Maharajah of the seas From Rio to the Celebes. And nobly did the splendid brute Leap to his laurels, execute His lineal functions as he sped Towards the Equator northwards, dead Against the current and the breeze; Over his back the running seas Cascaded, while the morning sun Rising in gold and beryl, spun Over the cachalot's streaming gloss, And from the foam, a fiery floss Of multitudinous fashionings, And dipping downward from the blue, The sea-gulls from Comoro flew, And brushed him with their silver wings; Then at the tropic hour of noon He slackened down; a drowsy spell Was creeping over him, and soon He fell asleep upon the swell.

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III

The cruising ships had never claimed So bold a captain, so far-famed Throughout the fleets a master-whaler New England's pride was Martin Taylor. Twas in this fall of eighty-eight, As skipper of the Albatross, He bore south from the Behring Strait,

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Down by the China Coast, to cross The Line, and with the fishing done To head her for the homeward run Around the Cape of Storms, and bring Her to Nantucket by the Spring. She had three thousand barrels stowed Under the hatches, though she could, Below and on her deck, have stood Four thousand as her bumper load. And so to try his final luck, He entered Sunda Strait and struck Into the Indian Ocean where, According to reports that year, A fleet had had grand fishing spells Between the Cocos and Seychelles. Thither he sailed; but many a day Passed by in its unending way, The weather fair, the weather rough, With watch and sleep, with tack and reef, With swab and holystone, salt beef And its eternal partner, duff; Now driving on with press of sail, Now sweaty calms that drugged the men, Everything but sight of whale, Until one startling midday, when A gesture in the rigging drew The flagging tension of the crew. In the cross-trees at the royal mast, Shank, the third mate, was breathing fast, His eyes stared at the horizon clouds, His heels were kicking at the shrouds, His cheeks were puffed, his throat was dry, He seemed to be bawling at the sky.

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'Hoy, you windjammer, what's the matter? What's this infernal devil's clatter?' 'She blows, sir, there she blows, by thunder, A sperm, a mighty big one, yonder.' 'Where-a-way?' was Taylor's scream. Ten miles, sir, on the looard beam!' 'Hard up and let her go like hell!' With heeling side and heady toss, Smothered in spray, the Albatross Came free in answer to his yell And corked off seven with a rout Of roaring canvas crowding her, Her jibs and royals bellying out, With studsail, staysail, spinnaker. The barque came to; the first mate roared His orders, and the davits swung, The block-sheaves creaked, and the men sprung Into the boats as they were lowered. With oars unshipped, and every sail, Tub and harpoon and lance in trim, The boats payed off before the gale, Taylor leading; after him, Old Wart, Gamaliel, and Shank Three mates in order of their rank. The day was fine; 'twas two o'clock, And in the north, three miles away, Asleep since noon, and like a rock, The towering bulk of the cachalot lay. Two hundred barrels to a quart/ Gamaliel whispered to Old Wart.

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'A bull, by gad, the biggest one I've ever seen,' said Wart, Til bet'ee He'll measure up a hundred ton, And a thousand gallons of spermaceti.' 'Clew up your gab!'

'Let go that mast! There'll be row enough when you get him fast/

'Don't ship the oars!'

'Now, easy, steady; You'll gaily him with your bloody noise.'

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The four harpooners standing ready Within the bows, their blades in poise, Two abaft and two broadside, Arched and struck; the irons cut Their razor edges through the hide And penetrated to the gut. 'Stern all! and let the box-lines slip. Stern! Sheer!' The boats backed up. 'Unship That mast. Bend to and stow that sail, And jam the pole under the thwart.' With head uplifted the sperm whale Made for the starboard boat of Wart, Who managed with a desperate swing To save his skiff the forehead blow, But to be crushed with the backward swing Of the flukes as the giant plunged below; On this dead instant Taylor cleft

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His line; the third mate's iron drew, Which, for the sounding trial, left But one boat with an iron true The one that had Gamaliel in it. The tubs ran out, Gamaliel reckoned Two hundred fathoms to the minute; Before the line had cleared the second, He tied the drugg and quickly passed The splice to Shank who made it fast, And with ten blistering minutes gone, Had but a moment left to toss It to the fifth boat rushing on With Hall fresh from the Albatross, Who when his skiff, capsizing, lay So low he could no longer bail her, Caught up the end for its last relay, And flung it to the hands of Taylor. With dipping bow and creaking thwart, The skipper's whaleboat tore through tunnels Of drifting foam, with listing gunwales, Now to starboard, now to port, The hemp ran through the leaden chock, Making the casing searing hot; The second oarsman snatched and shot The piggin like a shuttlecock, Bailing the swamping torrent out, Or throwing sidelong spurts to dout The flame when with the treble turn The loggerhead began to burn. A thousand fathoms down the lug Of rope, harpoon, of boat and drugg, Began, in half a breathless hour, To get his wind and drain his power; His throbbing valves demanded air, The open sky, the sunlight there;

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The downward plunging ceased, and now, Taylor feeling the tarred hemp strand Slackening that moment at the bow, Began to haul hand over hand, And pass it aft where it was stowed Loose in the stern sheets, while the crew After the sounding respite threw Their bodies on the oars and rowed In the direction of the pull. 'He blows!' The four whaleboats converged On a point to southward where the bull In a white cloud of mist emerged Terror of head and hump and brawn, Silent and sinister and grey, As in a lifting fog at dawn Gibraltar rises from its bay. With lateral crunching of his jaw, And thunderous booming as his tail Collided with a wave, the whale Steamed up immediately he saw The boats, lowered his cranial drum And charged, his slaughterous eye on Shank; The mate - his hour had not yet come Parried the head and caught the flank With a straight iron running keen Into the reaches of his spleen. The other boats rushed in; when Taylor backed, Gamaliel leaped in and lodged A thrust into his ribs, then dodged The wallowing flukes when Hall attacked. As killers bite and swordfish pierce Their foes, a score of lances sank Through blubber to the bone and drank

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His blood with energy more fierce Than theirs; nor could he shake them off With that same large and sovereign scoff, That high redundancy of ease With which he smote his enemies. He somersaulted, leaped, and sounded; When he arose the whaleboats hounded Him still; he tried gigantic breaches, The irons stuck to him like leeches; He made for open sea but found The anchors faithful to their ground, For, every surface run, he towed The boat crews faster than they rowed. Five hectic hours had now passed by, Closing a tropic afternoon, Now twilight with a mackerel sky, And now a full and climbing moon. 'Twas time to end this vanity Hauling a puny batch of men, With boats and cross-boards out to sea, Tethered to his vitals, when The line would neither break nor draw. Where was his pride, too, that his race Should claim one fugitive in a chase? His teeth were sound within his jaw, His thirty feet of forehead still Had all their pristine power to kill. He swung his bulk round to pursue This arrogant and impious crew. He took his own good time, not caring With such persistent foes to crush Them by a self-destroying rush, But blending cunning with his daring, He sought to mesh them in the toil Of a rapid moving spiral coil,

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Baffling the steersmen as they plied Their oars now on the windward side, Now hard-a-lee, forcing them dead Upon the foam line of his head. And when the narrowing orbit shrank In width to twice his spinal length, He put on all his speed and strength And turned diagonally on Shank. The third mate's twenty years of luck Were ended as the cachalot struck The boat amidship, carrying it With open sliding jaws that bit The keel and sawed the gunwales through, Leaving behind him as he ploughed His way along a rising cloud, Fragments of oars and planks and crew. Another charge and the death knell Was rung upon Gamaliel; At the same instant Hall ran foul Of the tail sweep, but not before A well directed iron tore Three feet into the lower bowel. Two foes were now left on the sea The Albatross with shortened sail Was slatting up against the gale; Taylor manoeuvring warily Between the rushes and the rough Wave hazards of the crest and trough, Now closed and sent a whizzing dart Underneath the pectoral fin That pierced the muscle of the heart. The odds had up to this been equal Whale and wind and sea with whaler But, for the sperm, the fighting sequel Grew darker with that thrust of Taylor.

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From all his lesser wounds the blood That ran from him had scarcely spent A conscious tithe of power; the flood That issued from this fiery rent, Broaching the arterial tide, Had left a ragged worm of pain Which crawled like treason to his brain The worm of a Titan's broken pride! Was he - with a toothless Bowhead's fate, Slain by a thing called a second mate To come in tow to the whaler's side? Be lashed like a Helot to the bitts While, from the cutting stage, the spade Of a harpooner cut deep slits Into his head and neck, and flayed Him to the bone; while jesters spat Upon his carcass, jeered and wrangled About his weight, the price his fat Would bring, as with the heavy haul Of the blocks his strips of blubber dangled At every click of the windlass pawl? An acrid torture in his soul Growing with the tragic hurry Of the blood stream through that widening hole Presaged a sperm whale's dying flurry That orgy of convulsive breath, Abhorred thing before the death, In which the maniac threads of life Are gathered from some wild abysm, Stranded for a final strife Then broken in a paroxysm. Darkness and wind began to pour A tidal whirlpool round the spot, Where the clotted nostrils' roar Sounded from the cachalot A deep bay to his human foes.

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He settled down to hide his track, Sighted the keels, then swiftly rose, And with the upheaval of his back, Caught with annihilating rip The boat, then with the swelling throes Of death levied for the attack, Made for the port bow of the ship. All the tonnage, all the speed, All the courage of his breed, The pride and anger of his breath, The battling legions of his blood Met in that unresisted thud, Smote in that double stroke of death. Ten feet above and ten below The water-line his forehead caught her, The hatches opening to the blow His hundred driving tons had wrought her; The capstan and the anchor fled, When bolts and stanchions swept asunder, For what was iron to that head, And oak - in that hydraulic thunder? Then, like a royal retinue, The slow processional of crew, Of inundated hull, of mast, Halliard and shroud and trestle-cheek, Of yard and topsail to the last Dank flutter of the ensign as a wave Closed in upon the skysail peak, Followed the Monarch to his grave. Tatterhead

The old man's vacant stare was out to sea, His back against the bollards on the quay. His face was of that wind-taut grain

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As if his skin had never brooked A calm; as if his eyes had looked On nothing but the whip of salt and rain. Day after day He spent that way, Making no sound But the scratch of a jack-knife on the bung Of a Demerara sugar-keg, And an intermittent thump Against a loosened timber as his leg, Made up of cork and hickory, swung Upon the swivel of his rump. 'They call that fellow - Tatterhead, A harmless, witless fellow/ said Leopold to Theodore, As arm in arm they strolled along the shore. 'A beastly, uneventful life indeed/ Quoth Leopold, whose tender mouth Was sucking at a chocolate meraschino. They say he cannot write or read/ This from the lips of Theodore, Whose head was sleekly combed below A tilted Borsalino. 'Come, let us go; these dreary rains!' So home they went - and with their deadly canes, They murdered dandelions by the score. But eighteen years before, one wild March night, When those young bloods, In the rose glow of candelabra light, And smooth with olive oil and Castile suds, Were drooling on their bibs, This weazened tar, through bonds of ice and hemp, Incorporate with a wheel, Had watched two shuddering jibs

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167 Dip to a plunging keel, In a northern strait - somewhere Within the track of Frobisher.

January 1926

The Sea-Cathedral Vast and immaculate! No pilgrim bands, In ecstasy before the Parian shrines, Knew such a temple built by human hands, With this transcendent rhythm in its lines; Like an epic on the North Atlantic stream It moved, and fairer than a Phidian dream. Rich gifts unknown to kings were duly brought At dawn and sunset and at cloudless noons, Gifts from the sea-gods and the sun who wrought Cascades and rainbows; flung them in festoons Over the spires, with emerald, amethyst, Sapphire and pearl out of their fiery mist.

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And music followed when a litany, Begun with the ring of foam bells and the purl Of linguals as the edges cut the sea, Crashed upon a rising storm with whirl Of floes from far-off spaces where Death rides The darkened belfries of his evening tides. Within the sunlight, vast, immaculate! Beyond all reach of earth in majesty, It passed on southwards to its fate To be drawn down by the inveterate sea Without one chastening fire made to start From altars built around its polar heart.

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December 1926

168 The Great Feud (A Dream of a Pleiocene Armageddon) Like a quarter moon the shoreline curled Upon the neck of the ancient world, Where, as the modern Magians say, In one cool morning of the Earth, Australasia had its birth, And vertebra ted with Malay. Monsoons from Arafura Seas Had played their native energies Full upon the western tip, Until the vast recessional Of scourging wash and tidal rip Had made a stubborn littoral Take on a deep indented shape A hundred leagues, to the eastern Cape, Of broken bays with narrow reaches, Deltas and gulfs bulwarked by steep Eroded headlands, with a sweep Of fifty miles of central beaches, And rich alluvial flats where luscious Grasses, ferns and milk bulrushes Made up the original nursery For fauna of the land and sea. Stretching from the water line By gentle slope and sharp incline, Past many an undulating plain, The land ran southward to a chain Of heavy-wooded hills and rose Beyond them to the Black Sierras, Soaring aloft to where the snows That capped the ranging Guadeleras Were blackened by the brooding dread Outline of a volcano's head -

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Jurania, with her crater jaw, Her slanting forehead ancient-scarred, And breathing through her smoky maw, Lay like a dragon left to guard The Isthmian Scarps against the climb Of life that left the ocean slime, In far adventurous design, On footholds past the timber line. In such a place, at such a time, Long before the birth of man, This great Tellurian feud began. For ages which cannot be told The fish along the Isthmian border Had felt the invasion of their cold Blood by an unexplained disorder. It looked as if the destination, Of all life of the stock marine, Was doomed to be, through paths unseen, The most profound obliteration. Millions of youthful fins were led Far from their safe and watery bed, To sport along the tidal edge, Nosing for grubs and water-lice, For pickerel weed and shoots of rice That grew luxuriant within the sedge, And many feasting unawares Were drawn into relentless snares; Strange rasp-and-saw bills harried them, And swooping talons carried them Into the air, and many more Were stranded high and dry on shore, Where poisonous lizards, asps and adders Bit them or where the solar fire Caught them at noon-tide in the mire,

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Curdled their blood and starched their bladders. And thousands that survived the heat Turned their backs upon their breed, Shed their fins and took on feet, And clambered far inland to feed On windy things like grass and roots, Bark and leaves and bitter sloes, Or, like those horrid jungle brutes With hairy pelts and horny toes, To quaff the warm blood of their foes; While many more that did return, After one aeonian night, Came back contemptuous to spurn Their parents, like the trilobite, With stony back and stonier heart; Rolled up in balls and dwelt apart In sulky isolation; while others The mongrel water scorpion sprung From crabs and spiders - came and stung Their little sisters and their brothers. And thus it was throughout the whole Sea-range of the Australian zone, The fear of racial doom was thrown Heavily upon the piscine soul. A futile anger like a curse Only made confusion worse. Their mad desire to strike back At their destroying coward-foe Turned all their fury of attack Into consuming vertigo. It broke their hearts and crushed their wills, It thinned the juices of their maws, Left them with gnashing of the jaws And deep prolapsis of the gills. And hitherto unsuffered pains,

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A ghastly brood, came in by legions, Rheumatic tremors in the veins, And palsy in the ventral regions. Now, not a single evening passed But an aquatic breathed its last Beneath the terrifying roar Of some dread plantigrade on shore; And so this strange insidious spark Of wild adventure carried sorrow To many a yearning matriarch With the drab dawning of the morrow. But worst of all the horrors which Enmeshed them was the galling sense That never would the recompense Of battle come; that primal itch For vengeance would expend its force, According to an adverse Fate, Running a self-destroying course Down the blind alley of their hate. But by some quirk that Nature flings Into the settled scheme of things That old beldame, she gets so grumpy, No mortal vision may foretell Her antics, when her nerves are jumpy It happened that she broke the spell By a freak shifting of the odds Within the sea-lap of the gods. Vibrant calms unknown before Lay on the Australasian shore, And Silences, a hooded band, Like portents of catastrophe, Tip-toed expectant on the land, And mummed about the open sea. Neptune had resigned the trident, For months Aeolus had not spoken, Nor had the sea-waves heard the strident

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Trumpeter - his conch was broken. From igneous fissures in the ground Blue wisps of smoke with eerie sound Curled on the air to indicate That some elaborate escapade Was on the point of being played By the royal clowns of Fate. Here and there through asphalt holes Was heard a most uncanny racket Charon, before the birth of souls Called for his modern Stygian packet, Was busy at enormous scows, Caulking them with walrus skin, Hammering, sawing to the din Of Cerberus with his gruff bow-wows, Together with the gird and clatter Of wheels and whiffletrees, the croak Of scranny throats, and the fast patter Of feet and flap of wings, that spoke Of straining, jostling ambulances; Of Hecate with a frightful brood Of harpies in a phantom wood, Rehearsing new macabre dances. Now all this strange activity Was radiating everywhere; It rapped the calms upon the sea, It shot through flumes of stagnant air, It tingled in the blood of brutes Of land and water; in the roots Of trees; and even stuff like rocks Felt the strong etheric shocks, Until all natural things that dwelt In the marine Australian belt Had come to feel, in a dumb way, That their protracted evil spell Might, with the birth of any day, Dissolve before a miracle.

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One vital morning when the tide Was out and the Scala flats were dried, The largest-livered, heaviest-brained, Most thoroughbred pedestrian Of all the tribes that had attained The rank of the amphibian, A green-back turtle left the sea. Her blood was changing and a scent, Unknown to her rude ancestry, Had charged her with presentiment Of some unfathomed destiny. She had her eyes upon a spot She long aspired to, but had not For lack of muscle, wind and time, Been able to effect the climb. Today, with fast evolving legs, Urged by the lure of distant land, She struggled for this cone of sand, Proudly there to lay her eggs, And from this vantage point, some day, To take her young and wend her way, Far up into the hills to view What kind of giant there might dwell Stretched asleep against the blue A turtle with a snow-white shell, Or inland whale, for aught she knew, Sending through a spiracle, Intermittent puffs of grey Cloud resembling ocean spray. But when after four dusty hours She reached the top of the sandy cone, A thrill her blood had never known Paralysed her laying powers, And concentrated all her thought Upon the scene the morning brought.

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An amphitheatre that held Valleys and cliffs and waterfalls, Gorges hewn like royal halls, Forests flanked by hills that swelled To mountains, these again to clouds From peaks of ice; and everywhere On ground, in trees and in the air, All forms of living things; dense crowds Of kites and gulls; vultures that hung Within the blue; and mangabees; Pig-tailed baboons that peered and swung From the liana of the trees; Wombats beneath acacias; Tasmanian tigers in the grass; Civets and sloths and bandicoots; High-standing elks in hollowed stumps Of redwood; tapirs in the clumps Of banyan, grubbing at the roots; And under eucalyptus trees, Flocks of emus and kiwis, With herds of skipping kangaroos, Antelopes and brindled gnoos All earth's delegates were sent, Blood relations, tribal foes, Bound by cordial entente, To this prodigious Parliament Lions and water-buffaloes, Clouded leopards, chamois droves, Side by side and cheek by nose, Rested in the myrtle groves; While pumas, rams and grizzly bears Stroked each other in their lairs. And central to this wild tableau, A white giraffe began to scale A scraggy monolith of shale,

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Standing on a high plateau. And when his neck had arched the summit, A female anthropoidal ape Climbed up, and settling on the nape, Surveyed the crowded congress from it. The comeliest of the primate race, No one of all the Southern lands Could match her for arboreal grace, For hairy contour of her hands, For contemplation in her face, Or wisdom in her thyroid glands. To hide her young, to fight or climb, She was the cleverest of her time. She taught the family tribes to make A brier or a bamboo stake, Fashion an eolith and throw It deadly at a distant foe, To charge in serried ranks, or beat A hurried or prepared retreat, Showed them new uses for their paws In battle for the monkey cause. And faintly she had sniffed the raw Material of the moral law; She had observed, one windy night, The skull of an alligator cut Open by a cocoanut Falling from a lofty height An alligator that had torn And eaten up her youngest born. Then to a corner she had crept, And had not eaten, had not slept, But scratched her head and drummed her breast, And Reason entered as she wondered, Brooded in the trees and pondered

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On how the reptile was struck dead. And now on wide and just behalf Of all the land brutes of the world, She took the leadership and curled Around the neck of the giraffe; And all at once confusion ceased, As every hard raptorial beak And slanted eye of bird and beast Were strained upon the central peak And every lobe of every ear Was cocked that none might fail to hear The message when the ape unfurled Her simian marvel to the world. 'All ye that dwell afar or nigh Upon the plains or on the hills, In valley caves or in the sky, Feathers, and bristles, talons, quills, Flesh-eating ones and herbivores That roam inland or ramp the shores; All ye with snouts that turn the furrow For colonies of ants or burrow For savoury roots and fattened worms; And ye that carry on your sides Inpenetrable armour hides, Slow-moving, ponderous pachyderms; All ye that lie in wait and crouch And gnashing leap upon your prey; And those that at the breast or pouch Suckle the young; all ye that lay, And scratch the ant-hills with your claws; And all that brotherhood that climb, Cracking great nuts between the jaws; Give ear and know ye that the time Has come when he that slumbereth Shall pay the penalty of death.

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Turn ye your gaze, a moment, far Beyond the plain over the height Of the palm trees where the white Foam-line breaks upon the bar. There under the blue stretch of sea, Living in darkness out of sight Skulks our ancient enemy, Devouring everything that passes Along the great lagoons to feed On clams and shrimps and rich swamp grasses Growing beside the tidal weed. By right of conquest and of birth We claim all footholds on this Earth: Those flats there steaming in the sun, The coast-line to the salted edge Where the coral foam is spun, That long three-cornered rocky wedge On which the walrus warms his hide, Where the dugong sleeps - which the manatee Claims as his dwelling when the sea Sucks it from us at high tide. All ye that hail from foreign parts Whose warm blood knocking at your hearts Has led you to this southern place, Attend upon my words! and know What great disaster to our race Befell us thirty years ago. You noticed as you cleared the height Of the Aral range that, to the south, Three juts of land came into sight, Extending far out of the mouth Of the Ravenna river; - these Have ever been the nurseries For the monkey tribe and kangaroo, For gentle bears and wallabies, For marmoset and wanderoo,

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And for the crinkly-tailed baboon. On one dread summer day - at no A terror broke upon our eyes; We saw the blazing sun go out, And the level sea begin to rise Under the breath of a typhoon, And break with tidal water-spout, Carrying with the general ruin Of the palms, the aged and the young, The mother bear and little bruin; And wailing mandrill babes that clung To the parental neck were flung Into the watery abyss To satisfy the avarice And lust of every carrion foe And devil-fish that dwelt therein. Today that slaughter at the delta Remains the nightmare of the years; Those death-cries of the apes could melt a Stony crocodile to tears. Since then, their blood-thirst unappeased, They've ventured up our quiet streams; Gannets and herons have been seized, Baboons have died with horrid screams, And elephantine calves for miles All along the water-courses, Together with young water-horses, Have been dragged down by crocodiles. For years reports have been received From distant countries occupied By furs, feathers and hairs allied By blood, how they have been bereaved And plunged in blackest misery By that insane, consuming hate Of ignorant, inarticulate

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Cold-blooded barbarians of the sea. All we observant ones have seen That at high tides in clouded moons The habits of the fish have been To pass into the great lagoons, To lie in wait throughout the course Of night and morning to midday, Then chase our swimming breeds and slay Them with no feeling of remorse; And then with foul distended maw, The cowards that they are withdraw To their unlighted haunts, to shun An open struggle in the sun. Therefore, let it now be known, By tokens that can never err By the marrow in the fox's bone, By the light growth of the ermine's fur, And by the camel's drinking bout, That the season's blasting drought, With lowering of the tides, will last Till three up-tilted moons have passed. Then will the inland shallows be At all their gateways unexposed To the waters of the open sea, When the barrier reefs have closed. So if our hearts are resolute, At the appointed hour we'll match them With our brave hosts in massed pursuit; No quarter shall there be: we'll catch them From the smallest to the largest brute Throw them into consternation, Hem them in the muddy places And on the shoals, leaving no traces Save of their damned annihilation. Before I close - just one word more. Oft have we seen a jealous raid

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Grow into a great crusade; Or end by internecine war, When the blood of kindred drenched The higher mountain snows and quenched The jungle grass and arid moors. Therefore ye thirsty carnivores Be ye adjured that till the hour Of trial ye shall not devour The flesh of either animal Or bird upon the earth; nor shall Ye taste of blood; your daily food Shall be the Earth's fair yield of fruits, Her store of plants and sappy roots, The fresh rind of the sandalwood, And willow bark, berries and beans, Tussac grass and mangosteens, Papaws and guavas and the sweet Milk of the cocoanut, the meat Of durian with celery, The ripe fruit of the mango-tree; Yea - all the natural plenitude Of Earth shall henceforth be your food. Likewise ye herbivores, be ye Adjured against all enmity. Ye shall not trample; shall not gore, With hoof or horn, the carnivore; But as their allies, ye shall spend, In one grand consummating blow Of death against the common foe, Your strength to a triumphant end. Now hie ye to your lairs; sleep not; Gather your hosts; abate no jot Of this day's wrath, and when the year Is big with three up-tilted moons, We'll charge on the aquatics here, And trap them in the great Lagoons/

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She spoke: and every throat and lung Of herbivore and carnivore, In volleying symphonic roar, Rang with persuasion of her tongue. With vengeance firing up the breast, And with the speed of a monsoon blast, The keen dispersing hordes soon passed Beyond the skyline of the West. And the sultriness of peace again Brooded on valley, hill and plain, Shaken only when a cloud Of thick Juranian vapour, thrown In a dark spiral, burst with loud Echoes, like laughter from the cone. Scrambling from her hill of sand, The disillusioned, now unfertile, Amphibious and bilingual turtle Fled the spectre of the land; Crossed the muddy flats and sought her Endangered kindred of the water, Apprised them of their bloody fate; The congress vote; the rage and hate Of the ape; her story of the feud, And the news was borne at ether rate Throughout the ocean's amplitude, And hailed with fierce, exultant mood, With wave of pectorals and high leap Into the air and foamy sweep Of tail and clutch of tentacle; Broken was the hoary spell! The hour for revenge, for daring, Had come for fin and scale and shell! For shark! swordfish! mackerel! Lobster! octopus! and herring! (With the Passage of the Moons)

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THE MUSTER

Black bucks whose distant ancestry Sprang from the (now) Westphalian hills; Wild boars with hair as stiff as quills, Or Brandenburgian pedigree; Wallachian elks, whose antlers spread A full five feet above the head, Trekked around the Caucasus, Sounding with defiant stare Their gutturals blent with blasphemous Umlauts upon the stricken air; And they were joined near Teheran By camels down from Turkestan, And elands from Trans-Caspian snows, Persian gazelles with harts and roes, Arabian antelopes and masses Of quaggas, zebras and wild asses; And on the eastern move, they met Horses following in the tracks Of ibexes and shaggy yaks From South Bokhara and Thibet And countries far-distributed; The thunderous Indian quadruped Rhinoceros and elephant, And every kind of ruminant, And non-cud-chewing animals, Mammal and marsupial; From hill and valley, steppe and prairie, Peccary and dromedary, Bashan bull and Cashmir ram, The male spring-bok, chamois, gnoo, The reid-buck and the kangaroo Heading downwards through Siam. Likewise, with earth-shattering roars, Accompanied by the screams of birds,

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From the wide compass came the herds Of storming, hungry carnivores. On them the patriotic call Fell with the greatest sacrifice. A troop of tigers from Bengal, Full of caraway and rice, (In keeping with the simian pledge) Discovering early that their edge Of appetite was dulled enough By such ill-regulated stuff Upon a base of hops and oats, Attacked (although they did not slay) A flock of Himalayan goats Resting on a wooded height In their mid-journey to Malay; They drained their udders, bleached them white, And leaving them in awful plight, Prostrate and helpless for the fray, Passed on with energy renewed Into the Australasian feud. Through scorching plains and bleak defiles Of Northern India's spacious miles, Spread a vast host of tawny, mad Lions from Allahabad. Oleanders, roots of taro With ginseng and dried kauri cones Had changed the substance of their marrow, And alternated growls with groans. Hyaenas forced-fed on salt-bush With sago palms and tapioca Wailed so loudly that they woke a Pack of wolves from Hindu Kush, Whose tocsin cry antiphonal Was caught by every caracal Sleeping with his stomach full Of rhododendrons near Cabul;

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And this was followed by the blab Of jackals cursed with elderberry All the way from the Punjab As far South-East as Pondicherry. Over the stretch from Turkestan, From Shamo Desert to Hunan, From Shantung down to Singapore, Along the central isthmus, fell The mighty, myrmidonian roar, That ululant and choric yell Of leopards full of okra pods And lentils; cheetahs gagging hard At cascarilla spiced with nard; Polecats charged with cotton wads, And bears and civets overcome With stringent eucalyptus gum. All these in thousands numberless Had, with the triple lunar round, Arrived, in hot blood-thirstiness, Upon the Isthmian battle ground, Where, when the welter of their roars Had ceased along the littoral border, The hordes were disciplined to order, Divided into army corps, Brigades, battalions and platoons; Some were ambushed by the coast In heavy scrub and bush, but most Were stationed near the great lagoons Connected with the hostile beaches, And regimented into shape By the anthropoidal ape Who, by her rousing martial speeches, Kept up to fever heat their zeal For the imperilled commonweal. At last when the appointed week Had come; and when the final night

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Was over with the first faint streak Of orange in the Eastern light Just at the hour when every pad And hoof were tingling with the mad Moment of impending slaughter, A reeking, ghastly, unknown flair Compounded of the earth and water, Of subterranean clay and air, And like no other scent, arose And fell upon each roving nose. Over the top of the nearest alp A cliff-like head began to rise; A lizard's skull with horny scalp, Dragon's teeth and boa's eyes; Covered with scales of greenish blue The lower jaw swung into view, And from the open mouth there came A lolling tongue of scarlet flame; A column of a neck whose reach Topped the high branches of a beech; Prehensile arms and girthy paunch Upheld by massive spine and haunch Are followed by unmeasured thighs; With hock and joint the inches rise, Until the monster in dread sight Of all, to the last claw, collects His stature on the Aral height,

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And 10 - TYRANNOSAUROS REX!

Now let the sceptic disbelieve The truth I am about to state, And urge, with curling lip, I weave A legend that is out of date. Let him disgorge his lie; I claim That by a wanton twist of Fate,

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(To which I am by Hera sworn) A creature of this sounding name, Although three million years too late, Stood on that peak this awful morn. It came to pass, one day, before Mammals appeared upon the Earth, A dinosaurian mother bore Tyrannus in a tragic birth. Chasing a mighty stegosaur Into a bed of pitch, she tried, With huge success, before she died, To lay an egg that chanced to live Throughout its long bituminous night, Enveloped by this soft, air-tight Most excellent preservative; Until just fifty years ago, When the volcano underwent Her seismal periodic throe, The egg came bouncing through a rent. A moa passing by espied The object; sidled up, cock-eyed, And watched it with a mother's pride. Like a beach-stone pumiced by the sea, It glowed with the full sunlight on it. She sniffed the thing excitedly, Walked around it, pecked and scratched The shell, then feathered down upon it. And in due course of time she hatched Her prodigy. At first she fed him On cotton-tails and unweaned lambs, On calves and badgers; then she led him To the higher ridges where she filled His stomach with the coarser hams Of pigs and short-horn mountain rams, Until he took on strength and killed All comers with their sires and dams.

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Now after fifty years, the bird Had, from a cassowary, heard About the Pan-cyclonic rally Of beasts in the Juranian Valley, And how at their great gastric session They swore to stand by the Food Concession. And so the moa felt she'd serve her Race the best, fanning the wild Instinct of her foster child With her strong patriotic fervour. She found this lesson easy for A huge blood-quaffing dinosaur; The next one that she strove to teach To feed on rushes, roots and grass Seemed to this hungry ward, alas, Beyond his intellectual reach. Still, after days of bleats and pants, Of clucking at the balsam cones, Of digging graves for flesh and bones, And building pyramids of plants And after days of petulant scolding, She managed to convey, by holding Within her talons, cocoanuts And bread-fruits rather than the cuts From the sirloin of putrid cattle That fasting from all flesh and blood, And chewing, self-imposed, of cud, Was the condition of the battle. And so the fatal morning found Him bloated, angry and unsound Of wind and reeling down the height For flesh, his object of the fight. His skyward neck took on the form Of a pliant topmast in a storm. His headlong and unsteady gait Had been the more provoked, of late,

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By a yeasty alimentary state. For, on the day before, twitch grass With coarse buck wheat and sassafras Had formed the staple of his diet. A vinery of red grape then lay Before him; he resolved to try it; Which done, his head began to sway, The hot, fermenting liquor rose, And just before the charge was made, Had sluiced up through his neck, and played A geyser through his throat and nose, Until his body seemed to seethe With dragon foam on scale and claw, The scarlet dripping from his teeth, And fire issuing from his jaw. The ape had feared the monster's coming Would cause a panic as the sound Of thunder from the infernal drumming Of Tyrannus' feet upon the ground, Breaking like waves along the coast, Fell upon the affrighted host. And for a moment as he neared The rostral monolith and tossed His head for carnage it appeared As if the national cause was lost. So strong the impact as he hit A line of tigers near the centre It paralysed the simian's wit And for a fearful second rent her Courage as the jungle mass Went floundering in a deep morass. But instant as a thunderclap The prescience of her soul awoke, For by the self-same tiger stroke Tyrannosauros filled the gap, And as the stress upon the line

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Was centrally towards the sea, She caught the panic's energy Of flight in time, and flashed the sign Of battle from her lofty tower, Then launched the seething frenzied power Of tusk and claw. Blood red the Dawn! The die was cast! The fight was on! Now was seen the strategy Hidden in the stern decree Of the wise old anthropoid. The long-continued carnal void, With all its gastric irritation, Had raised their lust to slay and eat Raw flesh to the internal heat Of a universal conflagration. Just in from dry Allahabad, Farinaceous lions had Spied, upon an oozy bank, Five hundred head of walruses, Their hides of rubber steaming rank With odours oleaginous. Such was their fury when they smelled them, It seemed as if the nether air Were raining tails and brindled hair The way those brutes of India felled them; They had them stripped before the sun Arose to bleach each skeleton. Fifteen miles farther down the Coast, An angry and conglomerate host Inflammatory Bengalese, Starved with cherry bark and peas; With salicaceous jaguars, Leguminous leopards full of beans That murmured in their jugulars Swooped, with the speed of peregrines,

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Upon the red substantial meals Of dolphins hot and blubberous, And a large school of porpoises, Manatees and ursine seals, Until the sand-spit where they were Surrendered back unto the sea Not one shred of fat or fur But polished skulls and vertebrae. Down a sharp declivity Where the eastern skyline touched a plain, Wild cats of Burmese demonry Fell like a cloud of typhoon rain. Raisins had so alkalized them That the fur upon their necks had moulted, Soyas and poppies which they bolted Stuck in their throats and agonized them. So swift and vital was their spring When circling round a 'Sulphur Bottom/ They drove him on the rocks and got'im Like turkey buzzards on the wing, Pouncing on a carrion, Until beneath the morning sky His ribs were arching high and dry Like the frame of a stranded galleon. With the first hours of the day It seemed the battle fortunes lay In ample margins with the land. No courage of the sea could stand Against the all-consuming, savage Hunger springing from such a fast, Nor millions numberless outlast That crash of pyramidal ravage. But with the pangs of thirst abated, A temporary slackening of the drive Gave to the fish infuriated

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With loss a moment to revive Their ranks, when soon upon the air New cries of terror and despair Announced destruction for the land. Rounding the Roc peninsula, Sperm whales from Carpentaria Had reached the Dura bank of sand, And bellying round, began to blow Their challenge in contemptuous spout At any brute the earth could show Possessing horn or tusk or snout. Undaunted, a battalion Of bulling elephants from Canton, Directed by a jackass, tore Their ponderous course down to the shore, In answer to the loud defiance Of those humpbacked mammalian giants. Lured by the low ebb of the tide, And a hundred yards of bar, sun-dried, They plunged into the quicksands where, With roar of suction and the blare Of strained uplifted trunks, they died, Or slipping into weedy ground Off the silting edge, were drowned At leisure by the sweeping tails And jaw-tug of victorious whales. Down at the delta of Ravenna, The hardest struggle of the day For three long hours was under way, Wild as the tumult of Gehenna. A thousand tigers of the land Were fighting, under the command Of a Sumatran chimpanzee, Ten thousand tigers of the sea. The thirstier cats that formed the van

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Took the water, swimming far Beyond the shallows of the bar, Heedless of the risk they ran; Others of more tempered daring, Striking the water margin, kept Well within their depth but swept Along the muddy regions, tearing The placid surface into spray, Like a gale's lash upon a bay. For those three hours the waters ran With every hue of the rainbow span Saffron lines and serpentine, Lurid darts of iris green, Mottled browns with dusky stripe, Eyeballs flashing streaks of red, Leaped and zigzagged to the gripe Of lamia and of hammerhead, Locking with inveterate teeth The tigers' bellies underneath. Phantoms blue and ashen pale Followed white ones in the race Where blade of dorsal, scythe of tail Cut and ripped the water's face, Curved and sank while in their place The vitreous glare of stomachs rose With flapping pectorals, as the claws Of tigers tore a bottle-nose Or bullet-head; or as their jaws, Just at the moment they were drowned, With paralysing seizure found Their last authentic tiger mark In the marble throat of a slate-blue shark. And when the fierce dispute was over, And the tides were crimson in the sun, The splash of a ground shark or the dun Lithe shadow of an ocean rover

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Cutting across the backward spins Of settling eddies showed how vast Was the jungle ruin when at last The furs were conquered by the fins. Beyond the edge of the chalk canal, In the deeper part of the Skibo Run The tiger slaughter was outdone By a longer, bloodier carnival. There, neutral hippopotami, Spotted deer, mild-mannered sows, Milk-white mules and buffalo cows Had wandered with their young to lie And bathe beneath a peaceful sky, With antelopes and quagga mares, Soft gazelles and brown she-bears, Frightened by the roars that rent The rafters of the firmament; When suddenly as by design It seemed as if the whole Pacific Had yielded up her most terrific Monsters of the fighting line. Their long blades flashing in the sun, Sword-fish were swimming up the Run, Accompanied by flagitious things Saw-bills with their deadly pikes, Thornbacks with their poisoned spikes, Torpedo rays with scorpion stings; Most feared by everything that lives Above the ocean floor, they broke With full mortality of stroke On neutrals and on fugitives, Hemmed them backwards from the beaches Into the water's deeper reaches, Where with rapiers lightning sped, They took the measure of their sides,

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Till all the antelopes were dead, And all the hippos' leathery hides Transfixed and all the bears were drilled With holes and all the calves were killed. Now late within the afternoon Again the tide of battle changed. Fish from the Seven Seas were ranged Along the stretch of the Blue Lagoon That had beneath the withering spell Of three hot rainless moons been closed. There, lash-rays - the marines of hell Had come with sharks - the shovel-nosed, And sickle-finned; dog-fish, big jacks Gifted with prophetic smell All following in the conquering tracks Of threshers from the Hebrides, Of Greenland killers and those mailed, Tremendous rhinodons that hailed From the typhoons of the Indian seas. Against that swarming, heaving pack Was launched the raving, massed attack Of full-grown argali, and rams From South Afghanistan that mourned The swordfish slaughter of their dams; And fighting boars that would have scorned Brigades of tigers, with koodoos, Flanked by battalions of gnoos, And bull-head rhinos double-horned. Into that reeling, shapeless ruck, Scarce covered by the water, poured This furious and avenging horde Surviving rhinodons that struck For ocean spaces through the ford Were caught fast in the mire, and gored To death by stag and water-buck.

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And as the dubious hours went by, Cormorants, in carrion mood, Ospreys and kestrels thronged the sky, Impatient, as the fiery feud Swung through such vicissitude As never, after or before, Was known within the files of War. Such acts of valour as were done Outshone the white flame of the sun; Such hopeless sacrificial deeds And feats of strength as might belong To men or gods, when weaker breeds Wrecked their bodies on the strong. Reversals with the strangest luck, Unknown to contests in the sea, Took place where bulk and energy Matched themselves with skill and pluck. Mackerel and electric eels Drowned zebras, weighting down their thi Leonine and ursine seals Were killed by lemurs and aye-ayes. To rescue otters with their young From saw-fish and an instant slaughter, A scouting beaver party flung Themselves into the salted water, Were caught, outnumbered and were beat Run through by bayonet-bills, and eaten. But their assailants blown with greed Were seized, after the hottest chase, By hounds of an Eo-Irish race, And terriers of a Gallic breed. And the sun went down upon the sight Of bison worsted by becunas, Of foxes putting sharks to flight And weasels at the throats of tunas.

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Along the shore from tip to tip, This interlocking battle grip Relaxed only as either side Gave ground with flow and ebb of tide; For all were pledged, with teeth and claws, To racial blood and comradeship, Devoted to the national cause And loyal to the boundary strip. In one swift hour when the night Was far advanced, the Saurian, By some half-blinded route, began To scent the issue of the fight. Throughout the day he did not know Which was his ally or his foe; Beyond the blue lagoon he waded Where sluggish alligators hid Behind a sand-spit, and invaded The rocky strongholds of the squid. With his deep claws he rent apart Amphibia along the shore, And wandering farther out, he tore Pelagic mammals to the heart. He followed up a narwhal, wedged Him dry upon the Gumra shoals, Left him with twenty streaming holes From twelve-inch canines double-edged. Then back upon his tracks he wheeled, Floundered through the littoral mud, Entered the battle zone and reeled Through mounting sloughs of flesh and bio Scattering a full hyaena pack That hung all day upon his track Along the freshly swollen moors, Wondering how their nostrils missed The secret of those bloody spoors

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197 Left by the alien Atavist. Fish and land animals alike Were objects for his fangs to strike; Elephants and jungle cats Met the same fate as hares and rats; Beneath his horned, gigantic toes Camels went down and buffaloes; And wild cats were so many fleas That tickled him below the knees. But when the evening wore to night Gorillas under cover hit him With flying stones, and cave bears bit him; A flock of eagles bleared his sight With beak and claw; a downy pack Of monkeys in a scyamore Swung downward by their tails and tore The scaly armour from his back. The bravest lions in the ranks Buried their teeth into his hocks; From hemlock crotches and from rocks, Tigers leaping on his shanks Gouged deeply with insistent claws And dropped with flitches in their jaws. Then from this unremitting stress Came the sure touch of weariness; A pulse of apprehension dim Of what this struggle double-faced Might in the outcome mean to him. Perhaps some inland desert taste During the slaughter of the camels, Taught him his kinship with the lizard, His blood removal from the mammals, And gave him nausea at the gizzard, Perhaps in some sharp way it sprang From the reminiscent tang Of salt sea water on his muzzle,

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The moment that he stooped and took The narwhal's blood as from a brook With one inebriating guzzle. Something in his racial birth, At variance with the things of Earth A tidal call that beat like pain From spinal ganglion to brain Now made him shake his foes aside, And leave the battle's desperate zone, And wander off to climb alone A promontory where the tide Sounded its nocturnal flow A sheer three hundred feet below. He cleared the base, his body fagged, And clambered on from shard to shard, Pausing, jibbing, breathing hard. Under his weight his knee-caps sagged; Bleeding fast from fissures torn By tiger fang and rhino horn, He groped and stumbled up until He reached a level granite sill; Raw fillets hanging from his thighs, He sank a moment faint with pain; Chaos was closing on his eyes, When the voice of the sea-god called again, Far across the water - 'ExSaurian of the Pleiocene, Blind wanderer from the race marine,

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TYRANNOSAUROS REX!'

Starting sharply from his swoon, He stood upright, his figure set Black like a poplar's silhouette Against the orb of an inflamed moon. And once again from a crystal bell, Oceanus wove his spell; Sounding like a three-fold ring,

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Steepled in the crimson surge, It tolled... 'TYRANNOSAUROS ! TYRANNOSAUROS! TYRANNOSAUROS KING!' The lizard staggered to the verge, Looked into the water's face, The rolling cradle of his race, Brooded a moment as he hung Over the crag-holds wearily, And with the final echo, flung His body to the Austral Sea.

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Wilder than the maddest rout, Madder than the wildest roar, A storm of rage unknown before Followed Tyrannus' passing out. The dark unreason of his mind, Read in promiscuous assault Upon the land and ocean kind, Had placed the agreement in default. But through the day, the immediate sight Of a teeming and aggressive sea Enforced the covenantal right Against a mutual enemy; Kept in abeyance blood desires As veteran as Jurassic fires. Now under cover of the night When many of their ranks had died Of virus from the saurian's bite, The leash of discipline was untied, And soon the full abysmal sound Broke out in internecine notes From all the brutes on fighting ground Feeling for each other's throats.

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So piercing was the central cry It carried to the southward high Over the foothills to the crests Of the snowy Gaudeleras, waking The aeries of the eagles; shaking The condors from their craggy nests. Then by a fierce contagion carried East and west to either tip Of the Isthmian sea-board, it was harried Into ten thousand shards; - the rip Of lion's claws on buffalo hides; Of ivory through the lions' sides; The grunt of a bush-hog or the squeal Of a babyroussa with the pounce Of an infuriated ounce; Of leopards crushed beneath the kneel Of battle-wearied elephants; The growls of bears; the dissonance Of fleeing, howling allouattes Pursued by cheetahs; of wild cats Nine-lived and strung in endless knots Upon the backs of Cashmir ewes, Or arguing with ocelots The fallen bodies of kangaroos. And now and then the storm would rise To unimaginable cries, As though a stubborn racial note, Goaded to the bitter-full, Had baulked within the cosmic throat. And yet the scale, for all this woe, Had still a higher note to go. All through the day - in throaty pant Of steam and pulmonary moan, Being full of slag, the stridulant Jurania, like a surly crone,

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Had growled about a deeper pain, Caused by an old Silurian sprain. By dusk, her fetid breath had grown Into a thick revolving cone. And as the minutes passed, a flash An incandescent fork of blue, And now of green would struggle through The smothering pall of smoke and ash, Until with undulating sheet Of multi-coloured flame that beat The blank face of the sky apart Just as the last convulsive stroke Unthrottled the volcano's heart The storm flood of the lava broke. It shot a fifteen thousand feet Straight to the sky, then billowing higher, And outward, made as if to meet Its own maternal stellar fire With tenuous play of finger streaks; But failing in its vaunted leap, Returned with frenzied haste to sweep Across the Guadelera peaks; Inundate the valleys; glut The plains and canyons; rise and shut The higher gorges, rifts and caves Of the mountains; overflow and roll Seaward with tumbling lava waves Over the great Juranian bowl. It blazed the forest pines and passed The northern stretch of cliffs until, Clearing the summit and the last Excoriated ridge and hill, It poured its fury on the dead; Then the inexorable blast, Capping the horrors of the night, Pursued the living remnants, bled

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To the final pulses with the fight, And caught them as they tried to flee To the drowning mercies of the sea. Far to the East - from all this dire Titanic strife of claw and fire, The onlyfighterto escape The female anthropoidal ape! By subtle powers that placed her head Of land belligerents, she, alone, Had often turned to watch with dread The beat of catastrophic power, In cloud and thunder, as the cone Ticked off her last Aeonian hour. She sniffed the warning just in time, Before the extinction throe, to reach The forest heights that flanked the beach. She took the eastern headland climb, And then turned southwards from the sea, Shambling upward wearily, Ever on the chasing fringe Of the lava that, with hideous twist Of myriad anacondas, hissed And spat out fiery tongues to singe Her hair. Gaining the summit where Water breezes cooled the air, She paused a moment to endure The scene survived, her eyes aglow Held first by the mesmeric lure Of globes of vivid indigo That danced and burst as they were thrown From the deep labour of the cone, And then by that which choked her breath And dazed her brain - the molten red Of plain and ridge on which were spread The incredulities of death, Riding on tumultuously

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In a gulf of fire to the sea. Under the shelter of the height, She gathered up her residue Of will to blot out from her view The awful fiction of the night, And take upon herself the strain Of the descent. By swinging, crawling, Running in little spurts and falling, Splay-footed, shoulders crooked with pain, She reached a shallow river-bed Winding through a moor which led Her to a grove of sandalwood. There, at the hollow of a tree, She found her lair, and brokenly She entered in, cuddling her brood To withered paps; and in the hush Of the laggard hours as the flush Of dawn burnt out the coppery tones That smeared the unfamiliar West, The heralds of the day were moans, And croons, and drummings of the breast.

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Cherries Til never speak to Jamie again7 Cried Jennie, 'let alone wed, No, not till blackbirds' wings grow white, And crab-apple trees grow cherries for spite, But I'll marry Percy instead.' But Jamie met her that self-same day, Where crab-apple trees outspread, And poured out his heart like a man insane, And argued until he became profane, That he never meant what he said.

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Now strange as it seems, the truth must be told, So wildly Jamie pled, That cherries came out where the crab-apples grew, And snow-winged blackbirds came down from the blue, And feasted overhead. October 1927 The Lee-Shore Her heart cried out - "Come home, come home/ When the storm beat in at the door, When the window showed a spatter of foam, And her ear rang with the roar Of the reef; and she called again, 'Come home/ To the ship in reach of the shore. 'But not tonight/ flashed the signal light From the Cape that guarded the bay, 'No, not tonight/ rang the foam where the white Hard edge of the breakers lay; 'Keep away from the crash of the storm at its height, Keep away from the land, keep away/ 'Come home/ her heart cried out again, 'For the edge of the reef is white/ But she pressed her face to the window-pane, And read the flash of the signal light; Then her voice called out when her heart was slain, 'Keep away, my love, tonight/ The Iron Door: An Ode Its features half-revealed in passing gleams Which had no origin in earthly light,

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Half-buried in a shifting mass of gloom Which had no kinship with the face of night, It had its station in the cliffs to stand Against the clamour of eternal storm. A giant hand Had wrought its cruciform, And placed deep shadows on its sunken panels, Then in ironic jest, Had carven out the crest Of death upon the lintel. Out of some Plutonian cave It had been brought, and hung Within its granite architrave. I saw no latch or knocker on the door; It seemed the smith designed it to be swung But once, then closed forevermore. The noise as of stubborn waters Came in from a distant tide To the beat of Time with slow, Immeasurable stride. From an uncharted quarter, A wind began to blow, And clouds to rise, And underneath I saw the forms of mortals Come and go, And heard their cries Fragments of speech, bewildered pleas, That rose upon the pauses of the wind, To hush upon the thunder of great seas. And I thought what vain credulities Should lure those human souls before This vast inexorable door.

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A music which the earth has only known In the drab hours of its emptiness, Or in the crisis of a fiery stress Fell on my ear In broken chord and troubled undertone. For in this scale were tragic dreams Awaiting unfulfilled decrees, Some brighter than the purest gleams Of seraphic ecstasies; And some with hopes and fears Which ran their paling way Beyond the boundaries of availing prayer, To dim-illumined reaches where the frore, Dumb faces of despair Gazed at their natural mirror in the door. Then with the intermittent lull Of wind and the dull Break of transitory light, Where rents in the shawl of the darkness Revealed star-bursts and clouds in flight, The cries were winged into language, And forms which were featureless grew Into the shapes of persons I knew Who had tasted of life and had died. Standing, anxious-eyed, So small against the drift of space, Enveloped by the gloom, A boy searched for his father's face, With that unvoiced appeal, Which I remember, when he brought A water-spaniel home one day, Crushed beneath an engine-wheel; And could not, by a rational way, Be fully made to understand That the mending of a lifeless body lay Beyond the surgery of his father's hand.

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A master mariner Stood looking at the dull Outline of a basalt spur, Which in the fall and lift of fog, Took on the shape of a gigantic hull. He was old and travel-stained, And his face grained With rebel questionings Urged with unsurrendered dignity; For he had lost three sons at sea, In a work of rescue known To the high Atlantic records of that year. Then as the crag took on the heaving motion Of the fog, and the roar beat in his ear Of surge afar off, he hallooed The unknown admiral of the unknown ocean: Ahoy! The latitude and longitude? Within these parts do the stars fail? Is the sextant in default? What signals and what codes prevail? And is the taste of the water salt About your reefs? Do you bury your dead In the national folds? Is the blood of your sailors red When songs are sung At the capstan bars? Are davits swung At a call from the bridge when the night is dark, And life like wine is spilled at a word to retrieve The ravage of gales? Do courage and honour receive On the wastes of your realm, their fair name and title? As they do at our sea grey altars - by your leave. The fog closed in upon the spur, The moving hull became a rock Beneath the undulations, and the shock

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Of winds from an unknown compass point cut short The seaman's challenge till that sound again From the hinter-sea broke through, and the swart Impress on his face was stirred By that insurgent flash It once had known when after the report Of his sons' loss on the High Seas, he had heard With a throb of pride, The authentic word From the captain's lips, Of the way the lads had died. Another form appeared, One whom I knew so well - endeared To me by all the natural ties which birth And life and much-enduring love impose. There was no trace Of doubt or consternation on her face, Only a calm reliance that the door Would open and disclose Those who by swifter strides had gone ahead. It was the same expression that she wore, One evening, when with life-work done, She went to bed, In the serene belief that she could borrow Sufficient strength out of the deep Resources of a final sleep, To overtake the others by the morrow. A young man struck against the door Demanding with his sanguine prime, If the eternal steward registered The unrecorded acts of time; Not for himself insisting, but for one A stranger at his side For whom he had staked his life,

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And on the daring odds had died. No one had seen this young man go, Or watched his plunge, To save another whom he did not know. Men only guessed the grimness of the struggle, The body-tug, the valour of the deed, For both were wrapped in the same green winding-sheet, And blood red was the colour of the weed That lay around their feet. Life for a life! The grim equivalent Was vouched for by a sacred precedent; But why the one who should have been redeemed Should also pay the price In the mutual sacrifice, Was what he wished to know, And urged upon the iron, blow by blow. One who had sought for beauty all his days, In form and colour, symphony and phrase, Who had looked on gods made perfect by man's hand, And Nature's glories on the sea and land Now paused and wondered if the Creator's power, Finding itself without a plan, was spent, Leaving no relic at this vacant hour, But a grave-stone and iron monument. One who had sought for truth, but found the world Outside the soul betray the one within, Knew beacon signals but as casual fires, And systems dead but for their power to spin, Laid deeply to his heart his discipline, Looked at the door where all the roadways closed, And took it as the clench of evidence, That the whole cosmic lie was predisposed, Yet faced it with a fine indifference.

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From somewhere near the threshold of the door, A sharp insistent cry, Above all other notes, arose A miserere flung out to the sky, Accompanied by a knocking So importunate, It might have been the great Crescendo from the world of human souls, Gathering strength to assail The unhearing ears of God, or else to hail His drowsy warders at the stellar poles. Then through a rift In a storm-cloud's eddying, A greyness as of drift Of winter snow in a belated spring, Appeared upon a woman's face, Eroded with much perishing. The same dark burden under which the race Reaches old age lay strapped upon her soul: That which collects in silence all the shame, Through hidden passages of time and blood, Then puts the open stigma of the blame Upon a spotless name. Why all the purchase of her pain, And all her love could not atone For that incalculable stain: Why from the tortuous stream Flesh of her flesh, bone of her bone Should issue forth a Cain; Were queries rained upon the iron plates. 'Twas not enough, it seemed, that her one gift To life should be returned To death, but that the Fates Should so conspire To have this one devoted offering burned

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At such an altar, and by such a fire! But what availed A woman's cry against the arrest Of hope when every rubric paled Before the Theban mockery of the crest? At this darkest moment, as I dreamed, The world with its dead weight of burdens seemed To pause before the door, in drifts of sand, And catacombs of rock and burial turf: For every wind that raged upon the land Had fled the nescient hollow of God's hand. And all the music left upon the waters Lay in the grey rotation of the surf, With calls of seamen in great weariness At their unanswered signals of distress; And all the light remaining was bereft Of colour and design in full eclipse; No fragrance in the fields; no flowers left But poppies with their charred autumnal lips.

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Then with a suddenness beyond surprise, When life was sinking in its cosmic trial, And time was running down before my eyes, New lights and shadows leaped upon the dial. I have often heard it said that by some token, As fragile as a shell, Or a wish thrice-spoken, The direst spell, Though old and ringed of iron, might be broken; That a fool's belief in the incredible, Joined to the sounding magic of a name, Makes up the stuff of miracle. From such a source, it well might be, Came this supreme authority.

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It may have been the young man's claim On life; or the old captain calling stormily From sea to sea; Or that root faith within a woman's heart; Perhaps it was the white face of the child; Or that last argument so wild Of wing, of such tumultuous breath, Its strange unreason might be made to prove The case for life before the throne of death, I do not know; But in the dream the door began to move. A light shot through the narrow cleft, And shattered into hurrying gleams that rode Upon the backs of clouds, and through deep hollows, Like courtiers with weird, prophetic code. And as the door swung forward slowly, A sound was heard, now like the beat Of tides under the drive of winds, Now like the swift deck-tread of feet, Steadying to a drum Which marshalled them to quarters, or the hum Of multitudinous voices that would tell Of the move of life invincible.

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Then as the opening widened, And the sound became more clear, I tried With insatiate hunger, to discover The fountain of that light and life inside; And with an exultation which outrode The vaunt of raw untutored strength, I cried: -

Now shall be read The faded symbols of the page which keeps This hoary riddle of the dead.

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But something heavy and as old as clay, Which mires a human soul, Laid hold upon the quest so that it fell, Just baffled of its goal. Beyond the threshold of the door, I could not see; I only knew That those who had been standing, waiting there, Were passing through; And while it was not given me to know Whither their journey led, I had caught the sense Of life with high auroras and the flow Of wide majestic spaces; Of light abundant; and of keen impassioned faces, Transfigured underneath its vivid glow. Then the door moved to its close with a loud, Relentless swing, as backed by ocean power; But neither gird of hinges, nor the feel of air Returning with its drizzled weight of cloud, Could cancel half the meaning of that hour Not though the vision passed away, And I was left alone, aware Of blindness falling with terrestrial day On sight enfeebled by the solar glare. An Awakening We could not think of her as being dead, Although one ripe in age and wisdom proved, By slow, chill words, that where no pulses moved, And when there was no breathing, life had fled; For when our tears ran salter than the sea, And midnight walled us in without a gleam, Our hearts flung back the reason with a dream That cleared the ramparts of mortality.

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Strange power to overrule a judgment so! Her hands were still and folded as for prayer; Her lips were pale, and grey as grey her hair; Her forehead was as chased and cold as snow. But something just beyond our minds' poor reach Had lifted from her face the night's eclipse, It would not have surprised us, had her lips Bid us Good-morning in her old-time speech.

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April 1928

Old Age

So poor again - with all that plunder taken; Your mountain stride, your eagle vision - gone! And the All Hail of your voice in a world forsaken Of song and curving wings and the laughter of dawn. So little is left; I cannot be persuaded It is your hand that shakes; your step that falls; Your will, once statured on the crags, now faded To the round of a wheel chair and four dull walls. And yet today as I watched your pale face yearning, When the sun's warmth poured through the open door, And something molten in your soul was burning Memorial raptures life could not restore,

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I knew, by some high trick of sight and hearing, Your heart was lured beyond the window sills, Adventuring where the valley mists were clearing, And silver horns were blowing on the hills. November-December 1928

215 A Prairie Sunset

What alchemist could in one hour so drain The rainbow of its colours, smelt the ore From the September lodes of heaven, to pour This Orient magic on a Western plain; And build the miracle before our eyes Of castellated heights and colonnades, Carraran palaces, and cavalcades Trooping throughout a city in the skies? A northern cloud became a temple spire, A southern reach showed argosies of fire; And in the centre, with unhurried feet, Came priests and paladins, soon to descend To earth with swinging censers to attend The God of harvests down amidst the wheat.

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And scarcely less resplendent was the passing, When with the night winds rising on the land The hosts were led by a Valkyrian hand To their abodes - accompanied by the massing Of amber clouds touched with armorial red, By thrones dissolving, and by spirals hurled 20 From golden plinths, announcing to the world That Day, for all his blazonry, was dead. And when, like a belated funeral rite, The last pale torch was smothered by the night, The mind's horizon like the sky was stripped Of all illusion but a fable told Of gods that died, of suns and worlds grown cold In some extinct Promethean manuscript. May-June 1929

216 The Convict Holocaust (Columbus, Ohio, 1930) Waiting their turn to be identified, After their fiery contact with the walls, Three hundred pariahs ranged side by side Upon the floors along the cattle stalls! The fires consumed their numbers with their breath, Charred out their names; though many of the dead Gave proof of valour, just before their death, That Caesar's legions might have coveted. But these, still subject to the law's commands, Received the last insignia of the cell: 10 The guards went through them, straightened out their hands, And with the ink-brush got the thumb-prints well. June 1930 Whither?

A million years or so, they say, This world of ours will tire Of all its burdens, and one day Perish through frost or fire. No soul will then remain alive, And all things good therein Faith, love, or valour, will survive As little as its sin. But I know one whose heart possessed A love that won't expire, Should Fate provide no sterner test Than time or frost or fire.

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September-October 1930

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The Lost Cause Although with heart as keen and speed as swift As ancient courier had or argonaut, You followed every quest that light had caught Within its web; yet day with niggard thrift Withdrew its crimsons, causing greys to sift Like ashes through your hands, till what you thought Brave banners in the west were phantoms wrought Merely of space and its amorphous drift. Still let the heart take counsel of the feet, 1O Whose loyal sinews bore it up to greet The night: for though the frugal game denies The goal - one flaming pennant from the sun It won't refuse, after your baffled run, The long cool wash of stars upon your eyes. September-October 1930 Blind It was your boast, before the darkness fell, That you could measure all your love, and chart The return of mine so surely as to tell Both boundary and trespass in my heart. But when the dawn and the meridian Entered their sudden fusion with the night; When roses and anemones began To grow as winter rushes in your sight; I wondered by what navigator's sign, By what vicarious starlight, you could trace Horizons which were never yours nor mine, Until your wistful fingers sought my face.

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December 1930

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Sea-Gulls For one carved instant as they flew The language had no simile Silver, crystal, ivory Were tarnished. Etched upon the horizon blue, The frieze must go unchallenged, for the lift And carriage of the wings would stain the drift Of stars against a tropic indigo Or dull the parable of snow. Now settling one by one Within green hollows or where curled Crests caught the spectrum from the sun, A thousand wings are furled. No clay-born lilies of the world Could blow as free As those wild orchids of the sea.

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December 1930

The Child and the Wren (To Claire) It took three weeks to make them friends The wren in fear the maid molest Those six white eggs within the nest She built up at the gable-ends. What fearful language might be heard (If only English she could speak) On every day of the first week, All from the throat of that small bird! The scolding died away, and then The fear was followed by surprise At such sky-blue within the eyes That travelled from the girl to wren.

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But that third week! I do not know It's neither yours to tell nor mine Some understanding glance or sign Had passed between them to and fro; For never was her face so flushed, Never so brilliant blue her eye At any gift that I could buy, As at the news when in she rushed To tell us that the wren had come, With flutter and hop and gurgling sound, From gable to tree, to shrub, to ground, Right to her hand to get a crumb.

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1930

The Roosevelt and the Antinoe Her high freeboard towering above the pier, She lay beneath the lift of spars and blocks: Her port life month by month and year by year Knew nothing but the humdrum of the docks; The rumble of trucks along the warehouse floors, The blare of sirens, shout of stevedores, The play of tackle under the gruff mood Of winches, clatter of hooks and booms, subdued To the credit balance that must never fail The ledgers of Hoboken Lines - so she, Built for the tides of commerce on the sea, Was under schedule in an hour to sail. In the Commissioner's room it was agreed Between the Master and the mariners, That as the men received per month or run Their wage in dollars and were guaranteed By statutes of the State that they might draw

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220 Their scale of rations - bread and meat and water, Lemon and lime and such prescribed by law, With means of warmth in weather, they, the crew,

Should pledge themselves to conduct, faithful, true,

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And orderly, in honest, sober manner; At all times in their duties diligent; To the Master's lawful word obedient, In even/thing relating to the vessel Safety of passengers, cargo and store, Whether on board, in boats, or on the shore.

And with the reading thus concluded, both The parties to the contract gave their oath Of signature. Items of birthplace, age, Height and description then were written in, Each sailor's time of service with his wageAllotment, and address of Next-of-Kin. So, with their sea-bags on their backs, the crew Went up the gangway to the foc's'le; threw Their dunnage on the bunks; soon to be lined Two hundred of them, on the deck; assigned Stations and duties, as the bos'n drew The likeliest man, his mate the next; and then, Alternately the Watches claimed the men, In that renowned and tacit lottery Full of the hoary savour of the sea. The mooring cables splashing from the bollards, Three stern and bow tugs moved her to the stream, And slowly swung her head round with the ebb-tide; Were cast off; when the liner on her steam Proceeded down the channels of the Hudson, Into the outer harbour, to the sea, And on past Sandy Hook where finally She set her course which led her to the Great Circle Track for Queenstown, Plymouth, Cherbourg

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(Service of passenger and mail), thence straight To Bremen with the body of her freight. Thursday morning rose without a sun, Sleet in the air: the wind was westerly: The river breeze of Wednesday had begun To stiffen to a whole gale on the sea. By noon the stations at the coast were flashing Warnings, making smaller ships delay Their date of sailing. Vessels under canvas, Attempting shorter trips in gulf or bay, Crawled back to harbour double-reefed, while others, Still further to the east, that could not make Return - sails blown to ribbons from the gaskets Were forced to scud under bare poles to take The luck ahead. Long threat lay in the signals. The charts traced not a cyclone's come-and-go The fury soon begun and as soon ended But those broad areas on which storms grow, Northern and Oceanic, where each hour, Feeding on the one before, transmits In turn its own inheritance of power Unto the next until the hammer hits A hemisphere. Along the eastern seaboard, And inland to one-half the continent, Thousands of dials in studio and station Were 'off the air' by an ungrudged consent That the six-hundred-metre wave might keep Upon the sea that night its high command For the great business that was nigh at hand, With deep already calling unto deep.

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Friday evening, with Cape Race reporting Big seas with thickening fog followed by snow, Barometer still falling, very low. Morning of Saturday! the gale now rising To the dimensions of a hurricane, With gusts that boxed the compass of a vane, Sweeping around the headlands to contest The arrogated highway from the West. Evening again, and in its power to smite The snowy cordon with its warning light, The Cape's revolving beacon was as sick As the guttering limit of a candle-wick. And never - it was claimed - had tides so climbed A slope of shoal from such a depth to feed The tumult of the upper waves; so timed Direction with their volume and their speed, To meet both wave and wind that all might lock In foam above so high a line of rock. South of this Cape within these hours, the Roosevelt Was driving East by North, with her decks stripped; Her lower ventilator cowls unshipped, The shafts plugged; battened and wedged the hatches; Bell-mouths full-bore discharging from the bilge-pumps Under the straining hull; thirty degrees Measuring her roll within the heavier seas. The facing of the "midship house was spattered At seventy feet. Captain and quarter-master Saw nothing legible upon the face Of day or night: the sextant in its case, The navigators guessed the ship's position.

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Abaft - the smoke came out, to be driven back In eddies low and fierce against the white Salt crust upon the surface of the stack, Then, split in billows to the left and right, Dispersed before it found a line of flight. The double lines of life-boats lay like rows Of mastodons asleep in polar snows. Ahead - appeared under the steamer's light Truncated day between two walls of night. Sometimes the for'ard derrick-posts were blotted Out; the hooded shapes of winches squatted Upon the deck; and with each long roll, patches Of white laggin' from the steampipes swirled And blended with the foam around the hatches. The sea itself was gone save when it hurled The body of a wave across the bow; Soon even this was lost to the bridge, and now Behind the weather-cloth it seemed the world Was carried with the last gust to the void. Fried stepped inside the Pilot House to get Another reading from the aneroid. An hour ago the adjusting hand was set At twenty-nine - the low foul weather mark, And the indicator for that hour had stood Directly underneath as though it were glued To the card. He came nearer, full of dark Conjecture, tapped the glass, and the hand fell, The barest fraction but perceptible, Entering by slow, inexorable rate, The tragic ranges of the twenty-eight. Later he returned; the oracle Yielded this time a record to appal The heart. Muttering 'twenty-eight (point) three/ He shot a glance to the right where on the wall

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He found, in confirmation, the line drawn To the same level on the mercury. Twas four o'clock on a North Atlantic sea, Three hours before a January dawn. The wind having slipped the gale's leash was soon To match the wing-shod speed of a typhoon: The storm of nineteen twenty-six was on. Somewhere far-off in that unwavering gloom, Cramped in the quarters of a wireless room, A boy was seated, tapping at a key. Water ran along the floor: his knee Was braced against a table to resist The dangerous angle of a starboard list. Upon his right a wireless log-chart lay With many entries for so young a day. He reached and pushed a button and the drone Of a generator started. A switch thrown, He rapped the key, then instantly transferred To the receiving set; listened with keen Thrust of his face; and with no answer heard, Changed over, going through the same routine. But once when on the panel a blue flame, Crackling like tearing linen at the gap, Responded to a more than hectic tap Of the finger, dumb and drowsy symbols came To life. Through aerials screaming like curlews, Magnetic messengers carried the name Of a disabled vessel with the news Of water in the stokehold and a crew's Vigil upon a flooded deck. Legions Unnumbered moving at the rate of light, Pushed out beyond all navigated regions, Exploring every cranny of the night, Reaching out through dusky corridors Above the sea to uninhabited shores,

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225 Or taking undecoded human cries Below the keel to the Atlantic crypts. And millions undulated to the skies, Through snow and vapour and the cloud eclipse, Past day and night and the terrestrial air, To add their wasted sum to a plethora Of speed and power in those void spaces where Light-years go drifting by Andromeda. And yet in all that sterile plenitude A few were harnessed to a human mood.

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The cabin of the Roosevelt radio! Three dots, three dashes, and the dots again (The call sign) British freighter, 'Antinoe.' Don't know position. Sixteen hours ago, Rough latitude - North forty-six and ten, Rough longitude - thirty-nine, five-eight. Been hove-to ever since; the present rate Of drift to East, two knots (approximate). Fried took the message, reading nothing more Than that a ship was sending out a call For help, and that since noon the day before She had not known her bearings. This was all The cryptogram surrendered for a clue. A fresh despatch was brought two minutes later, The Aquitaniacalling -Which of two Should undertake location of the freighter? Their own positions given, 'twas agreed Cunarder farther off by hours, pressed To the muzzle of the storm and moving West The job might therefore be assigned to Fried.

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Orders were given to the wireless chief To bring the direction-finder into play, Capture the signals and report at brief Periods - and the ship was on her way. Taking his station at the binnacle, The head-phones on, he listened while he swung The handwheel slowly to the right until The loop above the Pilot House that hung The wires came broadside to the signal cry. The sounds grew fainter, faded out, came back With further revolution but to die Again with the reversal of the track. Underneath, the hair-line on the face Of the dummy compass card had kept its pace With every move, faithful to every trial, And like a dogma that might take denial From neither sense nor reason, pointed There, At a figure stamped in black upon the dial: For when it moved to either side with the wheel, It came back ever with the aerial square To the source of the signal like a steadying keel Demanding its position. How far? Where, Along this line, now tossing like a chip Upon those crests and hollows, lay the ship, It could not tell - one hundred miles or two It might have been for all the seamen knew. Back in the wireless room the call came in With the staccato of a bulletin; Triads of notes spare and reiterant, A whistle shot with burr and sibilant The international prelude which the sea Beats out in storm from human veins to express The fever pulses of its own distress. Whether it was the sharp economy

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Of pauses in the breaks, or some known trick Of the ear to catch the timbre of a click, A pressure or a crotchet in the tapping, The operator felt someone was rapping A message out with white intensity, In life-death finger action on a key, Within the cabin of the Antinoe. Tarpaulins ripped. Another hatch let go. Bad list. Grain swelling fast. Seams loosening now. All life-boats gone from starboard davits. How Many knots are you making? How far away Do you reckon you are? Ten knots: now eight: Now ten - top speed allowed by sea. You say That we sound nearer to you? Cannot wait Much longer. Twelve. Find it hard to steer. Ice-chest has crushed into the steering gear.

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Coming. Six o'clock. Now seven. The dots Of the freighter answered by the liner's knots, Followed by danger when the sea would turn And test the rivets from the stem to stern With longitudinal blows, hurling cascades Upon the bow, till with a burial wave The engines instantly would stop to save The tail-shaft from the racing of the blades. A longer silence; and a deep suspicion. Destruction of the ship? or loss of power? Blindness was coming with the light of morning, Ten minutes, twenty, now a half-an-hour. Where are you, 'Antinoe'l - The keys kept rapping,

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But the receiving phones were dumb to space, And in the Pilot House there came no signal, The hand lay palsied on the compass face. The operator meantime on the wreck Had left his room and crossed a slushing deck, Reporting to his captain. When he tried Return, a wave upon the weather side Reached and caught the last port life-boat; smashed It from the davits down the incline; crashed The forward wall of the wireless cabin; sheared It clean. Matching death with strategy, The sailors took their chance with each spent sea; The fragments were removed; the way was cleared; The set put in emergency repair And human speech again was on the air. Eleven o'clock. Fried knowing that he neared The ship's position by the growing power Of the signals slowed the Roosevelt down to scour The closer plotted area, fighting squall On top of storm, boring through a pall Of snow, till at the heart of the wave-zone, With Jack reversed, the freighter like a lone Sea-mallard with a broken wing was seen Ahead, lee-rail awash, taking it green At the bow. Do you wish to abandon? Not just yet; Endeavouring to fix steering gear, and get Hatches secured. Water in stokehold. Grain Cargo shifted. Trying to maintain Sufficient steam to heave-to and survive Till weather moderate. Crew twenty-five. Can you spread oil to windward? Please stand-by.

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But hard as the three engineers might try, The leaks outraced the pumps. The daylight grew To dusk, the hatches opened and the crew Signalled for rescue. Fried, a quarter mile To windward, poured his fuel oil on the sea, Giving, that distance, what the Roosevelt lee Afforded, edging in and backing while He waited for a sign of the wind's subsiding, Watching the scud of waves, the darkening sky, The drifting snow and the freighter heavily riding.

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Then suddenly at nine as the squall increased, With a smother of black hail the Roosevelt's light Could not pierce through, the bridge look-out lost sight Of the Antinoe and the wireless contact ceased. Dead Slow! The Roosevelt took a risk as great As if the air shook with the roar of reefs. The wireless and the navigating chiefs Fried summoned to the flying bridge to debate The course. What with the hammer of the sea To windward, and that anvil on the lee, Judgment and will were warped by doubt. Suspend Pursuit? Keep steerage-way and just hold on? For at this hour with sight and hearing gone, All felt within their blood they could depend On nothing but an elemental trust In bulkheads; in the physics of a dark / Equation, where with each remorseless thrust Down to the starboard limits of the arc, The ship should take under unheard commands The port recoil, a pivoted keel, and then, At the crux of the port roll find again The firm up-heave of Atlantean hands. On such a faith, borne in by night and snow, Rested the riddle of the Antinoe.

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Was she beyond that scurrying barricade, To come back on a wave-lift, as a score Of doubtful moments she had done before When gusts had passed? Or had the Roosevelt strayed Beyond the vernier of her calculation, Caught suddenly by a winter vertigo, After reaching the Antinoe's location By a straight miracle of navigation? But why no message? Flooded dynamo? Followed by exhausted batteries? The wireless room demolished by the seas? Or aerials blown off like a wind-swept kite From a wallowing ship beam-to and rudderless? Or had she foundered? This the likelier guess. The ship with unremitting search despite The chances stacked against her, steamed on far Into the night, past midnight and the slow Hours, blindly heading into snow; Not a sextant reading off a star; No radio now with subtle fingering Untied the snarl of the freighter's wayward course. Nothing but log and the dead reckoning, And the Roosevelt's instruments stating the force Of wind, direction and the tidal stress, Nothing but these and the wheel's luck to trail her Unless there might be added to the sum Of them an unexplored residuum The bone-and-marrow judgment of a sailor. But all this time signals were streaming through The ship's antennae: 'Solvang' in collision, Bulkheads crushed, and sinking; the 'Curlew' A-leak, and under jury-rig, 'Carlstad' Searching; 'Carlotta' helping 'Orebro'; The 'Bremen' hastening to the 'Lariston'; Engine trouble, serious, twenty-two

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231 Aboard. No record of the Antinoe.

Each hour the searchlight moving on its swivel, Traced but a wide circumference of yeast, Bounding the clash of forces on the ocean, With endless lorries heading for the east. At times the sea would snow the Roosevelt under, As shearing a wave, her bow came to the luff, Or as she turned with sharp careening angle To avoid a shadow, putting beam to trough. The scent was cold by now. Few words were spoken Between the officer-on-watch and captain; The Antinoe was sunk by every token And every law known to the wind and weather. 'With such a list, no shift or pumps could right her.' 'A dollar flashlight! All she's got to signal.' Tf she's afloat, 'twould take a hawk to sight her.' 'A flash upon the weather quarter?' 'No. Her power gone, that handlight wouldn't show A hundred yards.'

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'A dog's chance for a boat To get across ... assuming she's afloat.' 'What do you reckon her drift?' Tort easy! Hold her! Let her take that one on her starboard shoulder.' Feeling her shifted courses over-run, And yet uncertain whether she should tack Upon a chosen port or starboard track, The baffled liner like a water-dog Would dip her nose to the sea and then up-rear Her head with black hawse nostrils keen to flair A flying quarry covered by a fog. Dawn and noon and now the afternoon. We picked her up - so ran the captain's log One point upon the starboard bow at four

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Rhh And sixty miles from her last known position. Her navigating bridge was swept away; Flooded, steam off, lights out, a closing day The time again awaited Fried's decision. To pour fuel upon the sea to assuage Its fury; make a high-decked vessel ride Steady; maintain sufficient weather gage, Four hundred tons of pressure at the side, To avoid the crisis when a wave should toss Her like a dinghy on the smaller ship, Beam against beam, or stem to rail, to rip The plates like cardboard to a double loss; And yet mindful of this first charge, to crawl Within a narrow margin to the hulk, To take advantage of the liner's bulk, As windbreak for a life-boat, and forestall The second disappearance in a squall Of the Antinoe-, - in fine, to run a race For a crew's life with the storm laps in advance; To outstare Death to his salt countenance, Made up the grim agenda on his face. Fried took a turn upon the weather deck, Saw little of assurance in the sky, Came back to the lee-wing, gauging with his eye The span his boat must cover to the wreck; Made up his mind alone on the degree Of risk; issued a call; in such a sea And cause the order needed no command, Only the heart's assent unto the hand. The men answering the summons with a will, Came aft; were picked for hardihood and skill. Their names as on the shipping register: Robert Miller, the first officer, Commanding; Ernest Heitman, bos'n's mate,

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No relative; Uno Wertanen, Master-at-arms, aged twenty-eight, a Finn, His mother (Helsingfors), the next of kin; Sam Fisher; Franelich, an Austrian; Bauer, a naturalized American; Maurice Jacobowitz of New York State; And a Dane named Alexander Fugelsang Made up the life-boat complement of eight. A dozen orders from the bos'n rang 'Stand by and clear the falls for running; man The cranks; let go the gripes/ Winch ropes began To move, winding through the leading blocks; Slowly the boat was lifted from the chocks. The crew holding suspended lines that ran Along the spring-stay, freeboards from the stern To bow were jacked to gunwales; at a turn Of the quadrant screw both boat and davit swung Outboard. The oars and boat-hooks kept her free. With painters taut at fore and aft, she hung For her sixty feet of journey to the sea. Below, like creatures of a fabled past, From their deep hidings in unlighted caves, The long processions of great-bellied waves Cast forth their monstrous births which with grey Appeared upon the leeward side, ran fast Along the broken crests, then coiled and sprang For the boat impatient of its slow descent Into their own inviolate element. A shout or instant gesture of the hand Was answered by the double roar of winches. The ropes ran through the iron cleats by inches, Straining, checking, running on demand Of the fore-and-after levels. 'Lower away!' A steady longer roar, then a moment clear Of the side. 'Avast! Let go releasing gear!'

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The blocks shot from the slip-links evenly, And number one had settled on the sea. Here was a trial far beyond her training; Her tests had been accorded her in weather, And in blue water where there was no danger Where, governed by the stroke, all pull together, And every rhythmic blade falls to the feather Against the breeze. Now like a colt untried, She bucked control and though she carried well The lop of the shorter waves, she plunged and shied The moment that she reached the top of a swell, And went down sidling to the trough and flung The crew in the water. Under discipline Of many a drill, they struggled back and clung To the running loops and cork-grips, clambered in, And started for the wreck; but with recall From the bridge, they brought her to the wind and tried Over a wave-barrel to reach the side Of the ship when, twenty feet away, a squall Combined with tide-rip caught the boat and threw The men back to the waves. Six of the crew Clutching ladders and lines which might afford A toe or finger hold were drawn aboard. Heitman, crushed between the ship and boat, Slipped from a life-buoy and was seen to float Senseless away, down by the liner's stern, Where he was lost under the wave and churn Of the propeller. Wertanen, who twice And willingly released his own firm grip To take within his teeth a rope eye-splice, Swam fifteen yards to leeward of the ship To help an exhausted mate, and paid his price In drifting past the adventure of return. By help of current and by desperate swim, A wave pitched him against the life-boat stern.

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He clutched the running-line and then the rim Of the gunwale; tried to get his weight athwart, But oil had greased his hands and he fell short. The crew could see him grab and plunge and cling, Using his legs as rudders so to swing Her head around to the wreck and with the sheer Abandon of his youth to try to steer His open, wilful, single-handed craft So close to the side that wind might bear it aft, And round the freighter's stern to where he knew Life-belts and lines were waiting, with the crew Gathered at the lee taffrail. Jockeying the boat Within three fathoms length he tried to grip A belt, but oil had made his fingers slip, And oil was in his eyes and in his throat, And the last thing sighted from the liner's deck, Near to the close of an hour's futile searching, Were tossing oars and a frenzied life-boat lurching From wave to wave, a gunshot from the wreck, And here and there as far as might be scanned Within the spindrift, a tide-revolving speck A belt perhaps or human head or hand. From every quarter came the night confounding The unhorizoned sea with sky and air, And to the crew of the Antinoe - despair. At ten o'clock the Roosevelt bugle sounding From the saloon stairway a call to prayer! With separated phrase and smothered word An immemorial psalm became a blurred Bulwark under erosion by the sea. Beneath the maddening crashes of the wind Crumbled the grammar of the liturgy. God of all comfo

humbly beseeching thee...

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We do acknowledge sinned... Most merciful.. .confess.. .grievously... Who spreadest out the heavens, crownest the years. Grant us we pray thee Who commandest the seas and they do obey thee. Nigh unto all

our distresses and fears. A father to the fatherless. Followed the fragments of great passages: 7 am the Resurrection We commit bodies to the deep... Corruptible Of those who sleep... shall put on immortality. And then brief tributes to the seamen drowned, While Miller and his men were ranged around, Bandaged in head and wrist, with arms in sling, And others who had come, despite the warning, To take their places were envisaging The job that lay before them in the morning. Meanwhile outside, echoing the ritual Now unto Him who is able to do Exceeding abundantly ... a wild antiphonal Of shriek and whistle from the shrouds broke through, Blending with thuds as though some throat had laughed In thunder down the ventilator shaft; And the benediction ended with the crack Of a stanchion on the starboard beam, the beat Of a loose block, with the fast run of feet, Where a flying guy careered about the stack; Then following the omen of a lull, The advent of a wave which like a wall Crashed down in volleys flush against the hull, Lifting its white and shafted spume to fall Across the higher decks; and through it all, As on the dial of the telegraph,

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237 Governed by derelict and hurricane, Rang Stop, Full Speed Astern or Slow or Half, The irregular pulse and cough of the engine strain, The quick smite of the blades against a wave, And always threat, escape, threat, then the brave Lift of the keel, and still that breathless sink, Dividing up the seconds, nearing the brink Of a grey, unplumbed precipice and grave. Within this hour a priest clothed with the whole Habiliment and dignity of office Black cassock, surplice white and purple stole Feeling that from an older faith would come The virtue of a rubric yet unspoken For the transition of a soul, a crumb Of favour from a cupboard not bereft Of all by the night's intercessions, left His room; climbed up the stairs; pushed through a door Storm-wedged, and balancing along the floor Of the deck to where a davit stood, he placed His grip securely on a guy rope there. Lifting up a crucifix, he faced The starboard quarter, looking down the waste Of the waters casting back the flickering light Of the steamer, where two bodies without wrap Of shroud, deprived of their deck funeral rite, Swung to the rune of the sea's stern foster-lap. Ego vos absolvo ab omnibus Peccatis et censuris in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti .Attende Domine et miserere

Hear...O Stella marls.. Mary.

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But no Gennesaret of Galilee Conjured to its level by the sway Of a hand or a word's magic was this sea, Contesting with its iron-alien mood, Its pagan face, its own primordial way, The pale heroic suasion of a rood. And the absolving Father, when the ship Righted her keel between two giant rolls, Recrossed himself, and letting go his hold, Returned to berth, murmuring God rest their souls. And now throughout the middle of the night, The Roosevelt took the hurricane, hove-to. Into her own defence the captain knew Must enter all the sinews of her fight Her searchlight ripping fissures as through dark Parchment where at times the freighter, set In a frame of tossing silver, showed the stark And streaming edges of her silhouette, Battered but yet miraculously afloat, Heaving, subsiding with her lathered flank, Like a bison smitten from the loin to shank, Surrendering to the wolves about her throat. And every hour in the wireless room, The shards of cries as by an incantation, Were joined to an Atlantic orchestration; Epic and drama rising to illume Disaster - now the call and now reply; The Bremen radio - still standing by The 'Laristan.' Six rescued. Will resume At daylight. 'Solvang' lost. All saved but two. 'Sparta' reported floundering. Left no clue. Daylight and wreckage. Bremen calling still The 'Laristan' gone down with rest of crew.

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With every tap of key, the Roosevelt knew How little would the game depend on skill Of hand or resolution of the will, How much would all the morrow's gain and loss Turn on the unknown chances of a toss. At four o'clock the Roosevelt moved to windward, And drew again upon her fuel tanks; Only the whitened edges left the combers, Like a growth of harvest stubble from the banks Of rolling prairies that a fire had gleaned. Still black and dangerous stretches intervened. At six o'clock the flag at the mast-head Was lowered half-high in token of her dead, And the Red Ensign on the freighter went To the same place in mute acknowledgement. Then back to their full height the flags were run, To snap out like the folds of a toreador: With so much on the boards still to be done, 'Twas fitting that they should, in that same breath With which the storm took the salute, restore The colours to their stations, baiting death. At noon the starboard list began to assume The final margin for the Antinoe, The signal flags reporting that below The sea was filling up the engine room.

650

The next attempt was with the Lyle gun. Fried edged his vessel nearer to the wreck, Trying for the safest, shortest run To get a line across the after-deck. But once again an adverse hand conspired Against the chance, checkmated the design, For at the muzzle as the gun was fired, The steel projectile snapped the messenger line. The second did the same, the third, and so

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The fourth; the six succeeding carriers trailed Their lines midway; the last, the eleventh, failed; Only the iron passed the Antinoe.

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The store of rockets next - but what availed Their slender shafts and powder charges scaled Against the weight of vapour, wind and snow? An empty cask was lowered with the hope The wind might carry it to the ship's side. It sank beneath its sagging weight of rope. Another stroke of rescue was devised. A life-boat was trailed off without a crew; It climbed, zigzagged and floundered, plunging through, But pitched against the freighter and capsized.

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Fried tried again, placing his ship to hoard Less than a hundred yards. The next boat moored By a line rove through the high block of the kingpost On the quarter-deck, was towed close to the stern Of the Antinoe, but with the luff of the Roosevelt To the weather side, the rope sagged at the turn, Went underneath and fouled, and number three Started to drift beyond recovery. Another night, the third, confronted Fried, When the last remnant of the sky was blown Out, with the ocean like a pampas stirred To the confusion of a great stampede Riot of lariat and hoof, of spurred Horses, and the Antinoe a thrown Spent rider overtaken by the herd.

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Wednesday morning! and the twenty-five Huddled on the aft deck - still alive. One hundred hours had passed since the men had known The wool-warmth of a bunk, or stood the cold With nourished veins; and sleep had taken hold Of tired bodies salt-drugged to the bone. And in that hundred hours eternity Had ticked its lazy seconds on the sea, Timing the wind and surge and the defeat Of day by night; of night by day; the slow Unreasoned alternation of the sleet With hurrying phantoms of the hail and snow, The same rotation on the deck - the grey Sterility of hope with each life-boat gone, Dusk followed by the night, and every dawn A slattern offering dust instead of day. During the night the fact was plain the gun Would by such lavish firing soon outrun The standard stock of carriers and consume The packing cord; so in the engine room A humming lathe was making up arrears, In cutting blocks of steel; in fashioning Projectiles and their rods; and engineers, Following a passenger's design, Were busy in construction of a spring, A spiral coil to graduate the strain Of the steel rod upon the carrying line At the initial instant of the shots. And knowing how the day ahead would drain Resources, men began to overhaul The cordage, making loops for arms and knots For hand-grips, culling big stuff from the small For nets and heaving-lines and ladders - all Which might be spared out of the essential store, From cargo-slings to the stout rope from the fall

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Of a wrecked life-boat davit. Others toiled For hours, whaler-fashion, over the four Containing tubs, undid the twists, and coiled The messenger line many thousand feet, From vertical core to the end-loop with neat Precision. So when morning came it seemed Defaulted effort now might be redeemed, For though the seventh shot burst free and sped Away beyond the wreck, it carried true, Trailing sufficient line to lay it dead On the poop deck in centre of the crew. A heavier rope made fast was pulled aboard, And when the Roosevelt's boat was safely lowered, Another paying off through fair-leads gave What help it could to the wavering bow control. The boat without a load mounted each wave, Righting herself from every plunge and roll, Covered the stretch of water like a gull. Until within five fathoms of the hull, She turned broadside in an attempt to scale A sea, the bow line chafed against the rail And snapped, the stern line gave, and number four Followed her sisters of the day before. And so the latter half of the fourth day Came with the ocean well astride its prey: The storm in front like a shifty pugilist, Watching for some slight turn of luck to slay The rescuer with an iron-knuckled fist. Twas useless for the Roosevelt to await The issue of the struggle by debate. For nothing in those skies favoured a sign That by manoeuvre could the fight be won By floating cask or breeches-buoy or line, Mere parleying with rockets and a gun.

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The hour had called for argument more rife With the gambler's sacrificial bids for life, The final manner native to the breed Of men forging decision into deed Of getting down again into the sea, And testing rowlocks in an open boat, Of grappling with the storm-king bodily, And placing Northern fingers on his throat. The call again, and number five was ready. The men were chosen and the davits swung; The boat moved outward easily and hung Level and snug to leeward but unsteady In the capricious pockets of the squall. Another order and the falls began To move - eight men inside her; Alfred Wall, Araneda, Diaz, Albertz, Hahn, Upton, Roberts, Miller in command. The gunwale fended off with oar and hand At every lurch, she managed luckily To clear the steamer's side, covering the steep Descent, and then undamaged took the sea. Three oars a side and with a steering sweep, The boat pulled out from the immediate lee Into the eddies where the waters met From stern and bow - where the last ounces put On the oars, even with the wind abaft, could yet Advance them only by the inch and foot. They followed down the beam-path of the searchlight, The Roosevelt all the while manoeuvring, Now drawing in, now clawing off, and now Dead close, beam to the wind, just shadowing The brute drive of the freighter, to allow The boat with heavy lateral drift to steer With wider berth into the wind and clear The danger of the surge around the bow.

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A swamping moment caught her, but each blade Flexed to the curve of snapping, Miller made The turn and came down sharp broadside to gain A point amidships that he might obtain Such shelter as this windbreak could afford. But the wells were under water and the lee Was like the surf of breakers, for the sea, Contemptuous of this man-made sunken mole, Threatened each time to hurl the boat aboard, And reach the funnel with resurgent roll. Escaping this disaster, Miller drew His boat back in the sea, and tried to creep Forward to higher freeboard where the crew Near the First Hatch might have the shortest leap. Backwatering and staving off the hull, And crawling in again with a slight lull Of the wind, or with recession of the surge, He took three men who on the perishing verge Of sleep fell from the rail to the thwarts and slumped To the floor-boards. Out and back once more With slow manoeuvring, and another four Secure. Others of tougher sinew jumped To the stern sheets from the rail. The task was done With sudden moves and checks like a strange play Which starts, is forced to stop, and then begun Afresh on unknown ground but under sway Of old Olympian rules. So one by one The lives were scored and those who missed their aim, And fell into the sea, were grabbed and pulled Over the gunwale; counted with the same Slow chalking up as of advances bulled Out of the fiery scrimmage of a game. Miller tried to close again but failed. With water shipped as fast as it was bailed, Seams leaking, twelve half-dead men barely stowed,

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And with his crew of eight he did not dare To give his boat a more unstable load; So pushed away and with the wind and tide In favour, forced her water-logged to where The Roosevelt, now round to leeward, showed A maze of lines and ladders on her side. The first instalment of the crew too numb To lay their hands on heaving-lines were placed Within the cargo-nets and drawn up plumb; The others taking ropes, with their feet braced Against the hull went up with the sheer lift Of their mates, till all were safe aboard, and now The life-boat number five with damaged bow And broken hoisting hooks was cast adrift. The pitch of the storm, late night and still the snow, Two hundred yards between of yawning space, And thirteen sailors on the Antinoe. Three nights upon the bridge behind the shield Of the canvas dodger, his accustomed place, Fried doubtful, peering with his blizzard face. Now one o'clock, and a slight rift revealed A spatter of light above the running seas The freighter's lantern jabbing out in Morse That the ship's list had reached fifty degrees. The last hour was on with no recourse Except another summons to the crew. Miller commanding for the third time drew From the line-up of forty volunteers Of every rank - deck-hand to passenger His four uninjured veterans and five new Hands: Thomas Sloan, the third officer; Reidel; Wilke; Deck Yeoman Wilson Beers; And Caldwell, messman to the engineers. The sixth life-boat was ready on the lee. The others stood a moment in review;

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Three hundred passengers, two hundred crew; The cut was getting near the artery. The men, lowered without mishap, once more Brought round the boat to the lee bow of the freighter, And ranged her off the First Hatch as before. The risk this time for boat and ship was greater; The growing list could take no steeper verge, And all the boatmanship could not avail At first against the backwash of the surge; For there was peril in the sunken rail, When at uncertain moments the ship tried For balance, lifting up a wounded side To ease a wave that struck amidships, cleaving Her port; and peril in those hours of doubt For strengthless men that watched their comrades leaving, And long the galley fires had been out. Fried shortened up his weather gage to try To give a double shelter to the life-boat: The message later read - Had to rely Upon the final power of my engines, For had a revolution failed - 'twas either 'Roosevelt' or 'Antinoe' with odds on neither. The revolution did not fail, and Miller Secured his men, and though with cracked air-tank, And all the spare oars rent in hull-collision, The boat came down the wind to the lee flank Of the liner where the remnant with their clothes Sodden and shrunk were, like drowsed children, gathered To the cargo hammocks, twelve of them, then Tose, The captain, who had worn his buttons well. His bread had now returned upon the waters, For ten years back, as later stories tell, He had while master of another vessel, Rescued a Philadelphian bark in seas And winds only less full of death than these.

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Now open throttles! Now my lads, YOHO! The twenty-five, by Neptune, every one! Captain to deck-hand, every mother's son Aboard! GOOD-BYE, GOOD-BYE, THE ANTINOE\ The sea had closed on forward deck and bow; Let flag and mast and funnel settle now. Frost-bitten, thinned in blood, gnarled to the bone, But everyone surviving. All were brought Below where ocean miracles are wrought, Where the hearts' furnaces are stoked and blown, Where men are shepherded in the old way Of the sea, where drowned men come to life, they say, Under such calls to breathe as never come To those that roam the uplands of this earth: The hearty comradeship of a foc's'le berth, With treble-folded blankets on their numb Bodies, with balsam thawing out the brain, Hot milk and coffee piping down their dumb Constricted throats and mustard scattering pain When cold half-foundered bellies steam again Under the red authority of rum. The siren! Never did a whistle blow Upon a ship at sea like this before. The notes came from a silver throat aglow With life and triumph. Steady blast to roar Rising to pitch and volume that would crow The daybreak in. A shorter blast, A mimic of halloo, followed by fast Merry little runs in tremolo, And then again with open throat the long Insistent call with pauses, trills and strong Leaping crescendos. Vital, sound and steady, For the first hour in days was heard to start The normal rhythm of the liner's heart;

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Her bearings bathed, her boilers breathed and ready For the ports of England. The fifth morning found her With high gales still and white seas all around her, But clean in every valve and with the main Play of her steam free on every turbine-vane. Another day and the back of the storm was broken. The snow and hail had ceased; the clouds rode high; And though the wind remained, the glass gave token Of fairer weather. Through a rift of sky A level shaft, the first one for the week, Quivered on an edge of cloud, then struck A line of foam making for the grey peak Of a kingpost, then to waterline from truck, Till from the starboard taffrail up the span Of the hull, it reached the lettering where it ran In crimson coronation of her name, As if a god might thus salute the deed, And ratify the venture with the screed Of an aurora milled in solar flame.

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The Lizard Point, and now the Eddystone! Meanwhile a nation which was never spared The discipline of waters, had prepared Her subjects' hearts from foc's'le to throne With this Atlantic record to attest The valour of the eagle from the west, In bringing home her brood of castaways. • For there had come through radiogram and wire As high romance as any since the days When Grecian sails and the triremes of Tyre Hailed Carthaginian ships upon the bays Of the Aegean. So she entered Plymouth, With crusted funnel, twisted rails, scoured clean By salt on every deck, and overdue;

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Yet with the bearing of a Viking Queen Prerogative of life within her hand. She anchored in the roadstead, while the crew Of the wrecked ship were taken to the land. The nation gave its thanks on board; and she, Soon ready for completion of her run, Swung out the Sound, with her day's work well done, And in an hour was on the Channel sea.

1930

To Angelina, an Old Nurse She lingers in our memory even yet, Like an aroma or an anecdote, Chipped from the 'nineties with her silhouette Begemmed with buttons from the shoes to throat; Her paper curls, her parlour pompadour, Her leg-o'-mutton sleeves, the shawl she wore; So trussed with cord and whalebone that she faced The near annihilation of her waist. Stark as a rampike under winter skies, She brooded on us with her deep-set eyes That never slept: mournful and thin was she, Like something borrowed from eternity. She never tucked us in our beds at night, But feared we should not see the next day's light; And when in course of time the morning broke, She could not understand it that we woke. She watched for every sneeze, for every whoop, And even breadcrumbs in our throats was croup. A lengthy spell of laughter was a fit, And she could always put a stop to it. Though healthy and as active as young beavers, She always saw in us a soil for fevers.

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When we were sound asleep within our cots, She'd listen to our breathing, bending down With many a murmur, many an anxious frown, And turn us over on the search for spots, Spots on the back and chest and diaphragm, Spots on the tongue and throat ad nauseam It might have been a sunburn or the glow Left over from a joy-ride in the snow, But measles, chicken-pox or scarlatina Were always present there to Angelina. And when, our stomachs full, we went to bed, Heavy with purloined cake instead of bread, And gave a bilious scream within our sleep, Or called her name - Lord, how her blood would creep! This was delirium - her greatest fear, The last of all the mortal ills that shocked her, She knew that the eternal imps were near, And sent at once for clergyman and doctor. That town of ours had no apothecary, And faith, for us he was not necessary. For Angelina had the cupboards stacked With every known and unknown medicine Hundreds of bottles, till the household smacked Of things malodorous, day out, day in; Powders and pills for every malady, Goose oil and turkey rhubarb, turpentine, And still more oil, pine syrup, senna tea, Sulphur and blackstrap, tonics for the spring, Liquids unnamed - acid and alkaline, And all most pungent and disquieting. She used not only standard remedies By which all mothers classify the seasons: She improvised for all emergencies And filled us up for most fictitious reasons

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Before the meals or after, on retiring, Or any time when chilled or just perspiring; The moment that we felt unduly merry, It was our failing appetite, she said She touched our temples, charted out the head, And reached at once for essence of wild cherry. But then, her first and last line of defence, The utmost limit of her confidence, Was what she kept upon the highest board. 'Twas there her rancid Dead Sea salts were stored. This saturated brine she daily poured With senna down our throats in fixed routine. What mattered it to her that we should go At any time into the world unseen, With spirits unprepared or hearts unclean; It satisfied her conscience quite to know That if we died, we died at least saline. And yet, we know, that failing Angelina, Our infancy and childhood would have been a Most dull and unheroic sort of thing. She gave to life its deepest flavoring, She taught us tastes, improved our deglutition. We loved her with a pale sardonic love The way she kept our thoughts on things above, Etherialized our bodies by attrition, The way she proved, despite our apprehensions, That all she did was with the best intentions. It's twenty-seven years ago today, That sainted Angelina passed away, Answering the summons of an evening bell. Her soul or wraith or whatsoe'er it be, That's left from her corporeality, Spun out upon its voyage. Whither? Well,

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It matters not: but this one thing we know, That most unhappy would the old nurse be, If somehow she were not allowed to go Throughout the nurseries of the nebulae, Stalking at will, administrative, grim, With spoon or cup in hand full to the brim With oil designed for the felicity Of young and fever-spotted cherubim.

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January 1931

The Fugitive He reached the lake when day's last hours were strung To themes that made more deep the forest hush Whisper of leaf; the vesper of a thrush; The whirr of plover wings. A rainbow hung Above a waterfall. To north, age-old Hemlocks were tipped by blue of Tyrian dye. Through spruces jet against the western sky The level sun was pouring tides of gold. Along the shore a cry rose to assail His ear, distant, but loud enough to start Wild echoes from the hammers at his heart A deep recurrent baying at a trail. Of all invading discords, this - to break A sunset-thrush concerto on a lake. Doors Daylight now is unavailing, You will come no more, Call of voice or bell unheeding Through life's open door.

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Only night may work the magic With its wand of sleep, Only when the hour is darkest And the dream is deep. Welcome then the unawakening, Should you come no more But when voice or bell is calling Through another door.

10 May 1931

For Better or Worse That shrug of yours was all I needed, There could be no surer sign; I swear it shall not pass unheeded, You go your way: I go mine. At cross-roads we salute, wherever Chance or dust shall guide the feet, And only then with shoulders - never On path or highway shall we meet. Agreed. The bargain then must hold For good or ill - till Time restores Our bodies to a common mould; I go my way: you go yours. Time-Worn What magic long ago was in your footstep, That changed each night to day, And swung high noon to midnight every hour You went away.

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How long the time - is now beyond my telling, With days become as years, And that last pledge of your returning - seasons In arrears! I only know my heart is beating slowly: Come - and swift your feet! Or else there will be neither noon nor midnight When we meet.

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June 1931

Erosion

It took the sea a thousand years, A thousand years to trace The granite features of this cliff, In crag and scarp and base. It took the sea an hour one night, An hour of storm to place The sculpture of these granite seams Upon a woman's face.

June 1931

At a Sanitarium

Sap of the birch and resin of the pine, Balsam of fir in mountain purity, Carry their aromatics to the sea, Blend with the salt and take the blood like wine. Broad-flanked, deep lunged, wide nostril7d, with his head Flung back and antlered like an oak, a stag Snorts out his challenge to a distant crag, Held by a rival with an equal spread.

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Across the scarps beyond the highest tracks Of the wild goat, beyond the line where rock Resists the advance of timber, soars a flock Of eagles bearing down upon their backs. Great God! To build a world and make it seethe With life and rhythm, with such glorious things As air and mountains, waves and eagles' wings, And stretch me here without the power to breathe.

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June 1931

Water Charcoal and lime in stumps and stones, And dust upon the plains Were not more arid than his bones, More thirsty than his veins. The height of a Sirocco noon Had left him perishing, When at the wood-fringe of the dune He stumbled on a spring. He took no time for breath or sips, But, head down on the bank, He opened his Sahara lips, And like a camel drank. Dreams

Your body slouched before a dying hearth, Your pulse just ticking in its faded case, A greyness as of chill December earth Recording ninety winters on your face;

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When suddenly as if discovering wings, Your spirit soared into a world of dream, And high romance shot through your voyaging, Like laughter rippling from a mountain stream. What if one hour could eighty seasons shed, And bring those youthful murmurs to your lips Just one slight drowsy tilting of your head Restore you to your seas and skies and ships;

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How should with deeper dream the ocean burn In amethyst upon its western foam, And lures unknown to earth arise to turn Those blanched hands on the tiller towards your home! November 1931 The Highway What aeons passed without a count or name, Before the cosmic seneschal, Succeeding with a plan Of weaving stellar patterns from a flame, Announced at his high carnival An orbit - with Aldebaran! And when the drifting years had sighted land, And hills and plains declared their birth Amid volcanic throes, What was the lapse before the marshal's hand Had found a garden on the earth, And led forth June with her first rose?

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And what the gulf between that and the hour, Late in the simian-human day, When Nature kept her tryst With the unfoldment of the star and flower When in her sacrificial way Judaea blossomed with her Christ! But what made our feet miss the road that brought 20 The world to such a golden trove, In our so brief a span? How may we grasp again the hand that wrought Such light, such fragrance, and such love, O star! O rose! O Son of Man! October-November 1931 The Armistice Silence Since Death breathed on those youthful hearts that burned Once in the fierce exchange of wounds, and healed All feuds with his own limitless forgiving; Should Life now wait on Death before it learned A sacrificial secret that concealed A reconciliation from the living? How comes it then, that in a kindred way, The hosts of alien dead should take salute From flags half-lowered, like ours, upon the staffs? And - like our own - upon Remembrance Day, 10 The mothers of our foes should stand so mute Before the letters on their cenotaphs? November 1931 The 6000 For creatures of this modern breed, Reared from the element of flame, Designed to match a storm for speed,

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Ionia would have found a name, Like Mercury or Bucephalus Some picturesque immortal label That lifts a story into fable, Out of the myths of Uranus; Then changed its root to demonize The nature of its strength and size With fictions out of Tartarus. Those giants of Vulcan, leather-skinned, Whose frightful stare monocular Made mad the coursers of the wind, And chased the light of the morning star Away from the Sicilian shore, Would have been terror-blind before This forehead which, had it been known In Greek or Scandinavian lore, Had turned the hierarchs to stone, Had battered down the Martian walls, Reduced to dust Jove's arsenals, Or rammed the battlements of Thor. His body black as Erebus Accorded with the hue of night; His central eye self-luminous Threw out a cone of noon-day light, Which split the gloom and then flashed back The diamond levels of the track. No ancient poet ever saw Just such a monster as could draw The Olympian tonnage of a load Like this along an iron road; Or ever thought that such a birth The issue of an inventor's dream With breath of fire and blood of steam, Could find delivery on this earth. In his vast belly was a pit,

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Which even Homer would admit, Or Dante, searching earth and hell, Possessed no perfect parallel. Evolved from no Plutonian forge, The tender, like a slave, that followed, Conveyed bitumen to his gorge, Which on the instant it was swallowed Ran black through crimson on to white. Above the mass floated a swirl Of crystal shapes, agate and pearl And rose, like imps a-chase, and light As thistledown, while the blast roared With angry temperatures that soared To seven hundred Fahrenheit. Outside, the engine's dorsal plate, Above the furnace door ajar, Revealed the boiler's throbbing rate, By dial fingers animate, Like pulses at the jugular. For every vital inch of steel, A vibrant indicator read Two hundred pounds plus twenty-five, Waiting for the hour to drive Their energy upon the wheel In punches from the piston head. And there another one supplied The measure of the irrigation, Whereby the lubricating tide, Through linear runs and axle curves, Made perfect his articulation. And ramifying copper wire Made up the system of his nerves, In keeping with his lungs of fire.

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Now with his armoured carapace On head and belly, back and breast, The Taurian prepared to face The blurring stretches of the west. To him it was of no concern The evening gale was soon to turn To the full stature of a storm That would within an hour transform The ranges for a thousand miles, Close up all human thoroughfares, Sweep down through canyons and defiles, And drive the cougars to their lairs. A lantern flashed out a command, A bell was ringing as a hand Clutched at a throttle, and the bull, At once obedient to the pull, Began with bellowing throat to lead By slow accelerating speed Six thousand tons of caravan Out to the spaces - there to toss The blizzard from his path across The prairies of Saskatchewan. From Stone to Steel From stone to bronze, from bronze to steel Along the road-dust of the sun, Two revolutions of the wheel From Java to Geneva run. The snarl Neanderthal is worn Close to the smiling Aryan lips, The civil polish of the horn Gleams from our praying finger tips.

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The evolution of desire Has but matured a toxic wine, Drunk long before its heady fire Reddened Euphrates or the Rhine.

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Between the temple and the cave The boundary lies tissue thin: The yearlings still the altars crave As satisfaction for a sin. The road goes up, the road goes down Let Java or Geneva be But whether to the cross or crown, September-October 1932 The path lies through Gethsemane. The Depression Ends If I could take within my hand The rod of Prospero for an hour, With space and speed at my command, And astro-physics in my power, Having no reason for my scheme Beyond the logic of a dream To change a world predestinate From the eternal loom of fate, I'd realize my mad chimera By smashing distaff and the spinner, And usher in the golden era With an apocalyptic dinner. I'd place a table in the skies No earthly mind could visualize: No instruments of earth could bound it 'Twould take the light-years to go round it. And to this feast I would invite Only the faithful, the elect -

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The shabby ones of earth's despite, The victims of her rude neglect, The most unkempt and motley throng Ever described in tale or song. All the good lads I've ever known From the twelve winds of sea and land Should hear my shattering bugle tone And feel its summoning command. No one should come who never knew A famine day of rationed gruel, Nor heard his stomach like a flue Roaring with wind instead of fuel: No self-made men who proudly claim To be the architects of fame; No profiteers whose double chins Are battened on the Corn-Exchange, While continental breadlines range Before the dust of flour bins. These shall not enter, nor shall those Who soured with the sun complain Of all their manufactured woes, Yet never had an honest pain: Not these - the well-groomed and the sleeked, But all the gaunt, the cavern-cheeked, The waifs whose tightened belts declare The thinness of their daily fare; The ill-starred from their natal days, The gaffers and the stowaways, The road-tramps and the alley-bred Who leap to scraps that others fling, With luck less than the Tishbite's, fed On manna from the raven's wing. This dinner, now years overdue, Shall centre in a barbecue. Orion's club - no longer fable -

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Shall fall upon the Taurus head. No less than centaurs shall be led In roaring pairs forth from their stable And harnessed to the Wain to pull The mighty carcass of the bull Across the tundras to the table, Where he shall stretch from head to stern, Roasted and basted to a turn. I'd have the Pleiades prepare Jugged Lepus (to the vulgar hare), Galactic venison just done From the corona of the sun, Hoof jellies from Monoceros, Planked tuna, shad, stewed terrapin, And red-gut salmon captured in The deltas of the Southern Cross. Devilled shrimps, and scalloped clams, Flamingoes, capons, luscious yams And cherries from Hesperides; And every man and every beast, Known to the stars' directories For speed of foot and strength of back, Would be the couriers to this feast Mercury, Atlas, Hercules, Each bearing a capacious pack. I would conscript the Gemini, Persuading Castor to compete With Pollux on a heavy wager, Buckboard against the sled, that he, With Capricornus could not beat His brother mushing Canis Major. And on the journey there I'd hail Aquarius with his nets and pail, And Neptune with his prong to meet us At some point on the shores of Cetus,

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And bid them superintend a cargo Of fresh sea-food upon the Argo Sturgeon and shell-fish that might serve To fill the side-boards with hors d'oeuvres. And worthy of the banquet spread Within this royal court of night, A curving canopy of light Shall roof it myriad-diamonded. For high above the table head Shall sway a candelabrum where, According to the legend, dwelt a Lady seated in a chair With Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, Busy braiding up her hair. Sirius, the dog-star, shall be put Immediately above the foot, And central from the cupola Shall hang the cluster - Auriga, With that deep sapphire-hearted stella, The loveliest of the lamps, Capella. For all old men whose pilgrim feet Were calloused with life's dust and heat, Whose throats were arid with its thirst, I'd smite Jove's taverns till they burst, And punch the spigots of his vats, Till flagons, kegs and barrels all Were drained of their ambrosial As dry as the Sahara flats. For toothless, winded ladies who, Timid and hesitating, fear They might not stand the barbecue (Being so near their obsequies), I'd serve purees fresh from the ear Of Spica with a mild ragout -

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To satisfy the calories Of breast of Cygnus stiffened by The hind left leg of Aries, As a last wind-up before they die. And I would have no wardens there, Searching the platters for a reason To seize Diana and declare That venison is out of season. For all those children hunger-worn From drought or flood and harvest failing, Whether from Nile or Danube hailing, Or Yangtze or the Volga born, I'd communize the total yields Of summer in the Elysian fields, Gather the berries from the shrubs To crown souffles and syllabubs. Dumplings and trifles and eclairs And roly-polies shall be theirs; Search as you may, you will not find One dash of oil, one dish of prunes To spoil the taste of the macaroons, And I would have you bear in mind No dietetic aunt-in-law, With hook-nose and prognathic jaw, Will try her vain reducing fads Upon these wenches and these lads. Now that these grand festivities Might start with holy auspices, I would select with Christian care, To offer up the vesper prayer, A padre of high blood - no white Self-pinched, self-punished anchorite, Who credits up against his dying His boasted hours of mortifying, Who thinks he hears a funeral bell In dinner gongs on principle.

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He shall be left to mourn this night, Walled in his dim religious light: Unto this feast he shall not come To breathe his gloom. No! rather some Sagacious and expansive friar, Who beams good-will, who loves a briar, Who, when he has his fellows with him Around a board, can make a grace Sonorous, full of liquid rhythm, Boom from his lungs' majestic bass; Who, when requested by his host To do the honours to a toast, Calls on the clan to rise and hold Their glasses to the light a minute, Just to observe the mellow gold And the rare glint of autumn in it. Now even at this hour he stands, The benison upon his face, In his white hair and moulded hands, No less than in his spoken grace. "We thank thee for this table spread In such a hall, on such a night, With such unusual stores of bread, O Lord of love! O Lord of light! We magnify thy name in praise At what thy messengers have brought, For not since Galilean days Has such a miracle been wrought. The guests whom thou hast bidden come, The starved, the maimed, the deaf, and dumb, Were misfits in a world of evil, And ridden hard by man and devil. The seven years they have passed through Were leaner than what Israel knew. Dear Lord, forgive my liberty,

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267 In telling what they mayst not know, For it must seem so queer to thee, What happens on our earth below: The sheep graze on a thousand hills, The cattle roam upon the plains, The cotton waits upon the mills, The stores are bursting with their grains, And yet these ragged ones that kneel To take thy grace before their meal Are said to be thy chosen ones, Lord of the planets and the suns! Therefore let thy favours fall In rich abundance on them all. May not one stomach here tonight Turn traitor on its appetite. Take under thy peculiar care The infants and the aged. Bestow Upon all invalids a rare Release of their digestive flow, That they, with health returned, may know A hunger equal to the fare, And for these mercies, Lord, we'll praise Thee to the limit of our days/ He ended. The salubrious feast Began: with inundating mirth It drowned all memories of earth: It quenched the midnight chimes: nor ceased It till the wand of Prospero, Turning its magic on the east, Broke on a master charm, when lo! Answering the summons of her name, Fresh from the surf of Neptune came Aurora to the Portico.

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268 Putting Winter to Bed Old Winter with an angry frown Restationed on his head his crown, And grew more obdurate, As rumours every day had flown From some officials near the throne That he might abdicate. Fixing his rivals with his eyes, He thumped his chest and slapped his thighs, And ground his Arctic heel, Splintering the dais, just to show That he was lord of ice and snow, With sinews of wrought steel.

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His patience had been sorely tried By a recent blow dealt to his pride, When March, the stripling, dared To jeer at him with callow yells, And shake the hoary icicles From off the royal beard. Then at a most indecent time, The lusty youngster nearing prime, Gaining in reach and height, Had called out Winter to his face To meet him in a neutral place, And join in single fight. The gage accepted, Winter drew First blood, then beat him black and blue With Nordic thrust and swing, Till March at last, the wily fox, Clipped him on the equinox, And bashed him round the ring;

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And would have clearly had him down, Captured his domain and crown, When three parts through the bout, Had not the king with trick malign, Cracked him on the nether sign, And March was counted out. So now, with an Alaskan ire, He donned in full his white attire, Lord of the Polar waste, And claimed before those flabby-thewed Contenders of a Southern brood, He could not be displaced.

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And yet before the week was passed, Neuralgic headaches thick and fast Were blinding him with tears; Despite the boast, he needed rest To stop that panting in his breast, That buzzing in his ears. He wandered to a frozen brook Beneath dank willows where he took His usual noon-day nap; He heard dull subterranean calls, Narcotic sounds from crystal falls, The climbing of the sap. He laid his head against a stump, One arm reclined upon a clump Of glaciated boulders; The other held his side - he had Pleuritic pains and very bad Rheumatic hips and shoulders.

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A sorry sight indeed he lay, A god-like being in decay Dead leaves were all around him: His favourite cave of ice was streaming, And many a fallen trunk was steaming, The day that April found him. With one glance at his swollen feet, Her diagnosis was complete, That dropsy had set in: She felt his pulse - 'Lord, what a rate! His heart is in a parlous state, And colic roars within/

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'O shame, that March should thus surprise him, Without a thought to acclimatize him Towards a mellow age; I know another way benign To lead him through an anodyne Into his hermitage/ She spent the morning in the search For twigs of alder and of birch And shoots of pussy willow; She wove these through a maze of fern, Added some moss on her return, And made the downiest pillow. Then with a bath of rain and sleet, She took the chilblains from his feet With tender lubrication: She poulticed out the angry spots, The kinks and cramps and spinal knots, And all discoloration.

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So with her first aid rendered, she Began her ancient sorcery, Quietly to restore His over-burdened mind to sleep, Dreamless and passionless and deep, Out of her wild-wood lore. It took three days to get his throat Clear of that wheezy guttural note, His brain to vaporize; She conjured him at last to rest, Folded his hands across his breast And sealed up both his eyes.

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Then over his lank form she threw The lightest coverlet she knew, Brought from her deepest glades The whites and greys of quiet mood, Pale pinks and yellows all subdued With brown and purple shades; The choicest of her tapestries, Spring beauties and anemones Plucked from the winter grass, Wake-robins too: with these she took Trout-lilies from a woodland brook And cool hepaticas. With one thing more, her task was done Something she found hid from the sun Within a valley low; 'Just what he needs, dawn fresh and white The north wind brought it overnight A counterpane of snow/

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'So now this makes his bed complete/ She doubled it across his feet, And tucked it neatly in; Then taking on a mood austere, Kneeling, she whispered in his ear, A word of discipline. Take heed! Before you enter sleep, Swear by your honour you will keep A vow which I propose: Listen - an oath, which if you break, Twill carry for you in its wake A multitude of woes/

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'For eight months now, without demur, You give your promise not to stir, And not to roar or wail, Or send your north wind with its snow, Or yet the east whose vapours blow Their shuddering sleet and hail/ 'So help you then for evermore If you so much as cough or snore, My seven younger sisters, Who follow after me in turn, Are under strict command to burn Your body up with blisters/ 'Of autumn, too, you must beware, For if you rise to scent the air, Our Indian-summer maid Will plague you past what you endure, Until you think your temperature One hundred Centigrade/

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'But if you keep this honest vow, I pledge their virtue, here and now, To rouse you in December; Then you may come on Christmas Day With furs and bells, reindeer and sleigh But, hand on heart - remember!' And now, to make the pledge come true, She walked around the king and drew Three circles on his breast; Murmured a charm, then bending down, She graciously removed the crown, And left him to his rest.

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A Reverie on a Dog We know the symptoms well: that sudden stitch, We call it, in the side, and the cold rheum That fills the corners of the eyes; the twitch Of nerves, and those hot spasms that consume The strength that would endure the duller pains In creaking joints and knotted sinews. Time Accounts for it, pouring his chilling rime, Instead of blood, through arteries and veins And hardening up the walls. It's just old age, Plying her tendon needles through and through, That knits the tangles in the cartilage. Easy to see why she should come to men Under the stress of threescore years and ten, But why to dogs and least of all to you. Tonight it's hard for me to understand You are the same great fellow that I knew, As free-born to the sea as to the land. There is the same wide forehead; the same wise

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Reflection in your brown and tolerant eyes; The deep curl lustre of your shaggy coat; The massive jet circumference of your throat; Your heave of shoulders, length of back - but these, Reminders of your prime, may not disguise That in the effort of that laboured thump Your tail declared lumbago in the rump; Nor make me disbelieve how ill at ease You feel placing your head upon my knees, For when I spoke your name, your forelegs told As plain as speech itself that you were old. Not years - but fifteen weeks - it seems to be: The span of a canine biography. We had you as a pup, a ball of fur, Without a bone in your anatomy. No leopard's cub was ever livelier. I do not know the kind of lubrication that Was rendered to your gristle from your fat. You tied yourself in skeins and then untied, Or with your teeth into a stick you hung, Like a blood-leech to a swimmer, as we swung You over water from a schooner's side. A whistle acted like a hidden spring, Releasing inward levers, wheels and traps; Your leaps were antics of a crazy thing, Your barks - a series of percussion caps. And you were brought up somewhat like a child: We teased and petted you and leathered you, And sent you to your kennel, tethered you, And put you on short rations for your wild And freakish ways; and often did we turn You with a broomstick out of doors To howl the livelong night that you might learn To have respect for kitchen mats and floors.

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You don't forget the evening when you kept Your vigil waiting till the household slept, Crept up the stairs, entered the attic, stole Into a cupboard, and began to chew The life out of a silver-buckled shoe. You caught it like a muskrat without warning, You tore the clasp and uppers from the sole, And then slept on the carnage till the morning, When Aunt Marie with her keen tongue and keener Strap, sauntered in, and with a master-stroke That caught you flush upon the quarters, woke Your conscience to its first high misdemeanor. But when you grew to adult strength and size, We thought it most absurd to scandalize Your judgment with such capers as debase The minds of other dogs about the place. What greater training nonsense can be known Than this - to whistle for a full-grown dog, Especially if old and adipose, And bid him stand upon his two hind legs, Silent with forepaws drooping as he begs A lump of sugar placed upon his nose, While someone counted up to five or six; Or dress him up in scarlet coat and pants, And make him balance on one leg or dance As if he were a monkey: now, these tricks Might well pertain to Poms or Pekingese And other breeds of sofa pedigrees, But not to you who, scorning a command, The circus gesture of a whip or hand, But just for fun, would never hesitate To make a clear leap at a five-foot gate, Jump from the bow-sprit to the sea or take A two-mile morning swim across a lake; Or - what we thought the greatest sport of all -

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To fight your way out to the last high wall Of breakers, place your fine retrieving grip On anything we flung - a rope or chip; And what a sight as you emerged and laid It at our feet! and how the rainbows played Above the rising showers as you tried To drown us with salt water from your hide! You never fought with smaller dogs: your pride Regarded wrangling as undignified. But once when a half-bred conceited pup, A Dachshund or a poodle broke your nap One afternoon with his infernal yap; When for a solid hour he kept it up, Presuming on your patience - then we saw You lose your temper. Not being worth a bite, Much less the honour of a serious fight, He took a blow from your contemptuous paw Which drove him deep into a snow-drift where You held him without benefit of air, Until, at length released, he scrambled out With what was left to him of wind and limb, And disappeared in one vertiginous rout As if the devil himself were after him. Now in the course of years it came to pass This little strip of shoreline grew to fame, Merely as habitation for your name, When a great kennel of the ribbon class, Whose carriage of the head and vertebrae Announced but one - your own - paternity, Delivered to the world a score of males Those champions that crashed the fairs, and made Competitors from other nations fade Into a group of sorry draggle-tails. So in those less known parts your blood prevails

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Over the mix of anonymity, For no one here may question dogs whose sires First drew from such a regal pedigree To fortify their biologic fires. And other habits that were bred within Required no hand of mine to discipline: Indeed our human sense lagged far behind The deep uncanny wisdom of your kind. Call it a second sight or just plain scent, A calculation or presentiment, You never were, as we have been, storm-blind, Nor felt our herded judgment when with head Bent down we followed hard where no one led, Circling upon our tracks with that arrest Of will when east was north and north was west, And when the winds lied in our throats to tell Us it was evening before the evening fell. The way you hit direction was our wonder: Like a St Bernard you could find your man And dig him out; or with the roads snowed under, Go out into the bush and fetch a span Of horses home. Blindfolded you could tell The folk from one another by their smell, Identify the owner by a sniff At a shoe-lace or a mitt, and when your tail Began to wag, we knew it without fail, That racing down the wind our herring skiff Was making for the cove - before an eye Could spot it from the fleet, or could descry The cut of jib or colour of the sail. How did it happen too that in default Of words you had a language all your own With many a modulation, many a tone?

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How much of tameless fury for assault Was held in the potential of your growl Awakened by a distant timber howl? Your notes ran the full gamut from a roar That fell only below the leonine Down to the soft insistence of a whine That begged admittance at the kitchen door. And, in between, varieties of bark Expressive of annoyance or delight, With those domestic gutturals that mark A mutual recognition and a fight. But this I know, however much I tried To give the tongue canine its shadings, yet The vocal meaning would be poor beside The drama of your silent alphabet. Here was the cipher in epitome Of all our human moods from 'A! to 'Z(ed).' In your cocked ear and gently tilted head Attention had its perfect simile. What disciplined submission as you tried To feign indifference though your dilated Nostrils, sniffing the oven air, belied The patience in your haunches as you waited: And what oblivion when you lay curled Upon the flagstone in the summer shade; What drowsy misconception of a world Where stores are always full and bad debts paid! But tongue and ear and eye and nostril fail To measure the expression of the tail. For every curve and angle known to Science Lay in its lines - the one that stiffly barred A tramp's suspicious entrance to the yard Looked like a level ramrod of defiance: Only one cause could make it deadlier straight We saw it on occasions when you stood,

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Sniffing the wolf within the husky blood, When the grey fellow came too near the gate. And then that most abject configuration, The tail between the legs, which means disgrace To other dogs I know, but in your case The final symbol for complete damnation. That day - now let me recollect - I've long Forgotten the real nature of the deed, Some piece of mischief rather than a wrong Done with intent I'll readily concede. But like a fool I hurled at you a word Hard as a granite fragment for it stirred The self-respect within your own dog soul; It made you slink away without a sound, With lowered flanks and head close to the ground, As though you searched for the last burial hole. And when I saw the way your tail became The figure of your mood, I had no doubt That even Adam when he was cast out Knew not such deep contrition in his shame. But I shall not attempt to picture all The many joyous movements when it curved In gentle oscillation at a call To those tremendous lateral sweeps reserved For high ecstatic moments when the ship Came into harbour from a five-months' trip: For joining in our welcome to the crew Your tail outdid your bark in the halloo, And as it thudded on your sides, the slam Had power enough to flatten out a ram. Hanged be the man who first tried to defame An instrument of speech so eloquent As this - by dubbing it with such a name That from the dawn of monkeys it has meant

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A carry-over fussing at the end: For I am sure that when you greet a friend It is the tail itself that wags the dog, And not a vulgar spinal epilogue. Enough of this - I must reform my ways, And speak of acts which seven years ago Broke in upon the passage of our days, Doings of yours which stirred the village so, When from the wharf we watched you wondering What caused your frantic movements to and fro Behind the five young swimmers, shepherding Their strange and headlong struggle to the beach; The way in which you criss-crossed on your track, Snapping at something that you could not reach, Dived and came up, swam forward and swam back, But ever at the youngsters' plunging feet; Till someone pointed out in full retreat, A fin shaped like a cutlass, and we knew That underneath the furrow was a blue Torpedo shark making its baffled way Back to the deeper waters of the bay. Do you remember too your own wild fear You would not reach the children at their play Through the high palings of the field, the day You managed with that mighty spring to clear The fence, made for the charging Hereford, caught Him by the muzzle with four fangs, held on And worried him until his wind was gone, When with his nostrils clogged with blood, you brought Him to his knees? And many another deed There was of this like scale which would have won A barrow full of stars, had it been done By men, but being natural to your breed The acts have slipped your knowledge and concern; For who upon this troubled earth would earn

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281 Such wages for such service measureless And yet demand so little in return A caribou-bone of marrow for your share At supper; a soft word, or the caress Of a child's arms and the great debt was square. And there were other days of bitterness Whose salt was like the sea, but where no less Your royal kinship with our hearts was shown The failures where the will was strong to save, As on that winter night you took that brave Dive through the ice-crack, but came up alone; No pulse next day beat slower than your own At the enigma of the open grave. So here you are, your head upon my knees; Your joints are stiff, your blood is running cold; How strange it is, in all these fantasies, I had forgotten that you had grown old. Old ... Well! Here is your last great bond with men, This year will seal it fast, or perhaps another; Your fifteen years is our threescore and ten; Give me your paw, old chap - and now, the other. Bereft This face with all its scores and stresses could, Like some remote and ragged palimpsest, Disclose the present but leave unexpressed The darker transcript of its bygone mood. That wind and sea had triumphed in a feud With an exhausted heart is manifest, For unlit years had followed the arrest Of hope behind the stone similitude.

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But wind and sea alone could not create A handiwork so stark and ultimate. What other craft than that of love as high As heaven, as ageless as eternity, Might so collude with time to calcify A grief to the chill mould of Niobe?

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November 1932

The Man and the Machine By right of fires that smelted ore Which he had tended years before, The man whose hands were on the wheel Could trace his kinship through her steel, Between his body warped and bent In every bone and ligament, And this 'eight-cylinder' stream-lined, The finest model yet designed. He felt his lesioned pulses strum Against the rhythm of her hum, And found his nerves and sinews knot With sharper spasm as she climbed The steeper grades, so neatly timed From storage tank to piston shot This creature with the cougar grace, This man with slag upon his face. The Mirage Complete from glowing towers to golden base, Without the lineage of toil it stood: A crystal city fashioned out of space, So calm and holy in its Sabbath mood,

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It might constrain belief that any time The altars would irradiate their fires, And any moment now would start the chime Of matins from the massed Cathedral spires. Then this marmoreal structure of the dawn, Built as a fiat of Apocalypse, Was with the instancy of vision gone; Nor did it die through shadow of eclipse, Through clouds and vulgar effigies of night, But through the darker irony of light.

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November 1932

The Way of Cape Race

Lion-hunger, tiger-leap! The waves are bred no other way; It was their way when the Norsemen came, It was the same in Cabot's day: A thousand years will come again, When a thousand years have passed away Galleon, frigate, liner, plane, The muster of the slain. They have placed the light, fog-horn and bell Along the shore: the wardens keep Their posts - they do not quell The roar; they shorten not the leap. The waves still ring the knell Of ships that pass at night, Of dreadnought and of cockle-shell: They do not heed the light, The fog-horn and the bell Lion-hunger, tiger-leap!

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December 1932

284 Out of Step (1931 A.D.)

When the celestial dance was planned For star and constellation, A mighty baton took command Of perfect orchestration. We praised the Master of the skies For sun and moon and planet The ellipse was lovely to our eyes, So gracefully he ran it. But when the human dancers met, This year - about two billion They fumbled with their minuet, And CRASH went their pavilion!

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1932

A Puzzle Picture Back of the shell the armour plate, Behind the armour plate the shell, Back of a wall a flame of hate, Behind the hate a sentinel. Within a strident word a smart, And held within the smart a blow, And central to the blow a heart Smouldering up against a foe. Puzzle - find the antidote, When the heart can thus distil Out of the rancour of the throat Such poison from a syllable.

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The Parable of Puffsky Puffsky knew not how to live, But only how to sell, And strange it is - this truth to tell That he was never known to give And never known to buy. Crack salesman of his time, He kept financiers wondering why He found such means to multiply His wealth yet never parted with a dime. He sold by night, he sold by day, Sold long, sold short, sold anyway; He'd sell his teeth, he'd sell his eyes; it made No difference to his trade No matter what he sold Bottles, gases, oils or foods The other fellow took the goods, But Puffsky took the gold. And yet alas! One night it came to pass That just the hour that Puffsky died, He still assumed the bargain-role, For, shambling up to God, he tried To dicker with his soul. And the good Lord sized him up and down, And looked him through and through, As he would a parvenu; And then replied with darkening frown, As Puffsky wedged his foot against the door. 'Sirrah - you may think it strange, But on the floor Of this Exchange We neither barter, buy nor sell,

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And neither dime nor rusty sou Have we to offer you': And whereupon the Lord adjusted well A glittering monocle, And said: 'Hence - try thy game in hell/ So without further argument, Thither Puffsky went. Then Satan with a hoarse and bronchial laugh Amazed that such a spirit could exist Appointed a commission, Composed of two professors on his staff, A chemist and a pessimist, To make report upon the apparition; To estimate Its size and weight, Specific gravity, And value in Gehenna currency.

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And from the laboratory retort Came back this joint report 'Both size and weight Are indeterminate. It is a watered soul That hath a swollen diaphragm, Gaseous, but non-inflammable When mixed with coal, Therefore in hell Not worth a current damn/

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A Legacy The will she made contained no room for strife, For twisted words concerning gold or lands, For all the wealth that she had saved from life Was such as lay within her folded hands.

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She would have been less rich with other store, And we the poorer if she had not willed Only her heart, and then gone out the door, Leaving that cupboard on the latch and filled.

1932

A Feline Silhouette They faced each other, taut and still; Arched hickory, neck and spine; Heads down, tails straight, with hair of quill, The fence - the battleline. The slits within their eyes describe The nature of their feud; Each came to represent a tribe Which never was subdued. One minute just before they fought, Before their blood called Time/ One told the other what he thought In words I cannot rhyme. They hit each other in mid-air In one terrific bound, And even yet, as I'm aware, They have not struck the ground. Frost The frost moved up the window-pane Against the sun's advance, In line and pattern weaving there Rich scenes of old romance Armies on the Russian snows, Cockade, sword, and lance.

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It spun a web more magical, Each moment creeping higher, For marble cities crowned the hills With turret, fane and spire, Till when it struck the flaming sash, The Kremlin was on fire.

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1932

A November Landscape

November came today and seized the whole Of the autumnal store of reds, and left But drabs and yellows on a land bereft Of bird and leaf, of body and of soul. Outide my window now rain-winds patrol The earth; last August elms and birches seem Like half-remembered legends in a dream; Melodious myths - the thrush and oriole. Such strange delusions when November weaves The sense of desolation and regret Through clay and stubble, through dead ferns and leaves As here lie sodden on the ground: and yet This was the story told six months ago, When April lured the crocus through the snow. Magic

To order sun and stars to change their course, To gather flowers from the Arctic snows, Command a stream flow upward to its source, Or make a desert blossom as a rose:

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289 These things Aladdin taught us; and we saw How to distil a rapture from a moan, And over-ride the sternest natural law By straight appeal to a more sovereign throne. More than a dream tonight - that miracle. Winter has bridged the autumn back to spring; For suddenly you entered and your spell Had power to start a desert blossoming: But tarry long - the instant you depart, Sand will resume its drift about my heart.

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1932

Horizons You would not come when you were near, And when the lamp was lit, And though you always knew I'd hear Your call and answer it. Now you would speed across the sea, To find the door ajar ... The lamp is out, and as for me, I could not call so far. Jock o' the Links Ah Jock! I'm sure that as a right Good honest friend I ken ye, And damned be he that would indite A scornful word agen' ye: A self-controlled God-fearin' Scot, You fight with all that's evil, But every time you top your shot The odds are with the devil.

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A softer heart in human breast I do not know another, And many a time, in many a test, You've proved yourself a brother. That man, I'll swear, is not alive More temperate in speech, But every time you fan your drive I get beyond your reach. That God is partial to the plaid, Long-suffering, too, I've heard; I hope He was the day I had You stymied on the third; I cannot vouch for rumour, but One thing I trust is clear, That when He saw you miss your putt, He turned His one deaf ear. I'm thankful, too, that when you dub Your spoon, it's not on me You break your new steel-shafted club, But on your Highland knee. And wise I have been to abstain From comments on your stance, With pibrochs crashing through your brain, Culloden through your glance. The Pursuit

One glance at my pursuer, and I fled. Monsters had chased me many times before, But nothing with this tongue and with this roar; For every time I turned my head, It changed its shape, A dragon now, and now a dinosaur,

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Now hound, now hippogriff, With flowing mane and mouth agape. It followed me from cliff to cliff, Through sea-weed on the shore, And out into the tide This hungry, fetid carnivore, Greenish-scaled and fire-eyed, This hound, this centipede, This terror of Satanic breed. It gained on me at every stride, Then struck - I do not know The part of me that took the blow; I thought it was my collar-bone; I woke, and heard a voice... 'You sinner! Next time you eat roast duck for dinner, You sleep alone/

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The Empty Room I know that were my soul tonight Strung to the silence of this room, I'd hear remembered footfalls light As wayward drift of lotus bloom. Nor would it just be make-believe, Were I to find her in this chair, Or catch the rustle of her sleeve, Or note the glint upon her hair. Say, would you blame me if I knelt To put faith to its enterprise? So surely must her touch be felt In liquid coolness on my eyes.

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Now listen! If the veil should part Within this holy ritual, You'll hear a voice call to my heart More lovely than a madrigal.

June 1933

Like Mother, Like Daughter

Helen, Deirdre, Heloise, Laura, Cleopatra, Eve! The knight-at-arms is on his knees, Still at your altars - by your leave. The magic of your smiles and frowns Had made you goddesses by right, Divorced the monarchs from their crowns, And changed world empires overnight. You caught the male for good or ill, And locked him in a golden cage, Or let him out at your sweet will A prince or peasant, lord or page.

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But do not preen your wings and claim That when you passed away, the keys The symbols of your charm and fame Were buried with your effigies. For, wild and lovely are your broods That stole from you the ancient arts; In tender or tempestuous moods, They storm the barrens of our hearts. Amy, Hilda, Wilhelmine, Golden Marie and slim Suzette, Viola, Claire and dark Eileen, Brown-eyed Mary, blue-eyed Bett.

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Daughters are ye of those days When Troy and Rome and Carthage burned: Ye cannot mend your mothers7 ways Or play a trick they hadn't learned. But whether joy or whether woe Lure of lips or scorn of eyes We bless you either way we go, In or out of Paradise.

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December 1933

A Prayer-Medley Lord, how wonderful is the power of man; how great his knowledge! We have triumphed over the earth, the sea, the air and the ether. We have made habitable the poisonous wastes of the world and built cities thereon, changed the courses of rivers and caused deserts to bloom. We have explored the hidden lanes under the sea. We have discovered the chemistry of the soil, and can toughen the hardihood of seeds to prevail over climates. We have extracted gold even from dross-heaps. Our aeroplanes over mountains are as beautiful as eagles that bear the Dawn upon their backs. Our whispers, disdaining the carriage of wires, are heard across continents with the instancy of light and are as immediately answered. Our greetings and warnings are exchanged before the smiles and frowns have left the faces of our statesmen. We have weighed suns and stars, made finite thine unbounded Universe, divided the Invisible and watched the race of solar chariots in an atom. 10 We have invaded the lair of the thunder and placed our jockeys upon tides and cataracts. By taking thought, we have added cubits unto our stature.

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We can tell the signs of the seasons; and as for the winds, we know whence they come and whither they go, for we have pencil-traced the assemblage of storms thousands of miles off. How wonderful is the power of man; how great is his knowledge! .

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Lord, we praise thee for our Statutes, for our Reform Bills, for our Proclamations; for the march of Progress, for our Days of Rest, for the shortening of the Hours of Labour. We no longer harness children to the carts in the black routes under the earth, nor whip them at the cotton mills as we did when their advocates were scarce at thy High Courts of Love. For thou didst soften the hearts of thy legislators when they decreed that no child under ten should work more than twelve hours a day in the damp and the dark. And thou didst further soften their hearts when, in their own time, their own good time, they lifted the lower limits of the years and reduced the sunless hours, until the child, the woman and the slave were made free by the Act of the Nation. . . . . . .

The curse of labour is past. We have thrown the packs from our shoulders, wiped the sweat from our brows, yet multiplied the work which is not of our hands. Times were known when the labourers were heard to sing at their toil, when the spinning-wheel, the reaping-hook and the plough fitted into the measures of the verse, but the songs have died on our lips and the tunes are now sung by the motors and the dynamos. And the music is stern and defiant and absolute, for the machine, in the pride of its precision, answers the hungry discords outside of the doors and windows:

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Keep out of the shops and our mills, With your unpredictable wills, And your clumsy fingers and thumbs; Out of the cloth we make Out of the bread we bake We fling you the rags and crumbs. Keep out - for you will never achieve The pattern perfection of weave In the exquisite strength of our steel. Stay out - for you cannot restrain Fatigue of heart and of brain And the wayward blood you conceal.

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And the song of the machine is answered by the call of the saboteur: Burn, burn, burn, Cotton and coffee and wheat, For the wheels must cease to turn When there's too much food to eat, And the factory doors must be shut On the looms with their market glut.

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And both songs merge in the rugged antiphonal of the individualists: Wait, wait, wait, Till the cycle rings the chime, When Supply begins to abate, And Demand is on the climb; Then brain and iron and brawn, And every man for himself, Will reinstate the Dawn Of Freedom, Power and Pelf.

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Lord, we no longer torture for faith. We no longer arrange the faggots around the knees of the heretic. We no longer crucify. We praise thee that the days, long gone, when, as at Ephesus, the saints seized one another by the throats to vindicate the Godhead, were but nursery days when thy children scrambled up their picture-blocks in the vain attempt to puzzle out the features of thy face. But now having become men, we have put away childish things. We still go as pilgrims on our perennial journeys to the Councils, but how orderly and admirable our conduct! We meet with the crossing of hands and wish one another well. We sit at our common tables, partake of burnt offerings of lambs and bullocks, and toast the royal and presidential healths with the blood of grapes; after which each one tells of his desire for peace and amity with his cousins across the boundaries, favouring the stability and prosperity of the world. Then we go into Committees: We adjourn, but we do not dissolve, for thou has not left thy delegates without hope that at some future date, at Geneva or London or maybe at Washington, we shall meet to confer again, to enter the halls full of wisdom, and to depart void of understanding. Meanwhile we return to our homes, some to report progress from the platform, some to suspend judgment, and others to sit in sackcloth and ashes. It is true we live by faith. For, between the sessions, the chemist continues to brood over the gases, the bacteriologist over the microbes, the mechanic over the lathe, the nationalists over tariffs and trenches, boundaries and corridors, and the war secretaries turn the dials of the vaults upon the last design and the newest formula.

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Lord! Our spirits are kindled by the flash of phrases. We are shaken by the cannonade of mottoes. It is sweet and becoming that one should die for his country.' 60 'Come home with your shield or upon it.' 'Saul hath slain his thousands, but David his tens of thousands.' 'When shall their glory fade.' 'The sword of the Lord and of Gideon.' 'I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.' 'In the multitude of counsellors there is safety.' But our cenotaphs bear no testimony to those who moulder ingloriously upon the mattress. O Kali, Mother of Destruction! Ahriman, of Darkness and Strife! Loki, Spirit of Evil! 70 What is sown of Isis shall be reaped of Hecate, and made the bargain of Mammon, Gatherer of Spoil. O Buddha, of the folded hands and silent lips! Confucius, Sage of the Right Way! Christ, Lord of Love, Lord of Life! May the dream not entirely vanish from our sleep. Our physicians can prescribe for the ills of their own families. They cancure individual diseases,and heal the hurt of the body. But they have found no remedy for the deep malaise in the communal heart of the world. Our Father Who art in heaven.... Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses. December 1933 The Text of the Oath

Upon what Bible will you swear? Before whose altar lift your hand When kettle-drum and trumpet-blare Attest you at the witness stand?

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There was another lad I knew, Blue-eyed and trustful and as mild, A life-enthusiast like you, Who scarcely had outgrown the child. There was a virus in the air That put the toxin in his blood, Bugles were blowing everywhere Breathing romance on sleet and mud.

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He wrote his lesson on a slate, Composed of foreign names to spellThese to defend and those to hate, And at the barracks learned it well. They pinned a medal on his breast Behind the lines one afternoon: He had from a machine-gun nest Annihilated a platoon. And there were further honours paid One evening when his name was read, For after two crossed slabs were laid, The LAST POST sounded overhead. To Any Astronomer Come, reckon up the aeons as you may, And measure out the lag of tide and time, And circumscribe the pace for night and day Within the weave of solar pantomime; Then with a casual shrug dismiss the brief And latest masquerade which started when Blood cells danced red to joy or paled to grief In little ticks called three-score years and ten.

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But chart for me that instant when a pledge Of love was mutualized upon the lips Within a core of flame beyond whose edge All your known planets suffered full eclipse When the hoarse clarions of an atavist Called home your Betelgeuse to formless mist.

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March 1934

The Mystic Where do you bank such fires as can transmute This granite-fact intransigence of life, Such proud irenic faith as can refute The upstart logic of this world of strife Its come-and-go of racial dust, its strum Of windy discords from the seven seas, Its scream of fifes and din of kettle-drum That lead the march towards our futurities? The proof, that slays the reason, has no power 10 To stem your will, corrode your soul - though lime Conspire with earth and water to devour The finest cultures from the lust of slime; Though crumbled Tartar hordes break through their sod To blow their grit into the eyes of God. May 1934 The Seer Dream on while your prophetic sight Is still too keen to probe the day, Before the spectrum of your night Is recomposed to faded grey Before the riot of your vision Is sobered by our prose derision.

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Look as you may - horizon-faced! The distant palms are waving now. But do not touch and do not taste The fruit that clusters from the bough. For on those sands no healing wings Are poised above the water springs. And when the horses thunder on, And dust is on the charioteer, Beware the advent of the Dawn, Lest that the eye betray the ear; Sleep on and let the day eclipse The ghosts of your apocalypse.

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December 1934

Fire

Wiser than thought, more intimate than breath, More ancient than the plated rust of Mars, Beyond the light geometry of stars, Yet closer than our web of life and death This sergeant of the executing squads Calls night from dawn no less than dawn from night; This groom that teams the wolf and hare for flight Is obstetrician at the birth of gods. Around this crimson source of human fears, Where rites and myths have built their scaffoldings, With smoke of hecatombs upon her wings, And chased by shadows of the coming years, Our planet-moth tries blindly to survive Her spinning vertigo as fugitive. But stronger than its terror is the deep Allurement, primary to our blood, which holds Safety and warmth in unimpassioned folds, Night and the candle-quietness of sleep;

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With the day's bugles silent, when the will, That feeds the tumult of our natures, rests Along the broken arteries of its quests. So, let the yellowing world revolve until The old Sun's ultimate expatriate On this exotic hearth leans forth to claim Promethean virtue from a dying flame, His fingers tapered - less to mitigate The chilling accident of his sojourn Than to invoke his ultimate return.

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December 1934

The Prize Cat

Pure blood domestic, guaranteed, Soft-mannered, musical in purr, The ribbon had declared the breed, Gentility was in the fur. Such feline culture in the gads No anger ever arched her back What distance since those velvet pads Departed from the leopard's track! And when I mused how Time had thinned The jungle strains within the cells, How human hands had disciplined Those prowling optic parallels; I saw the generations pass Along the reflex of a spring, A bird had rustled in the grass, The tab had caught it on the wing:

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302 Behind the leap so furtive-wild Was such ignition in the gleam, I thought an Abyssinian child Had cried out in the whitethroat's scream.

February 1935

The Weather Glass There is no refuge from this wind tonight, Though sound the roof and double-latched the door, And though I've trimmed the wick, there is no light, Nor is there warmth although the tamaracks roar; Nor will the battery of those surges keep The hammering pulses silent in my sleep. But one alone might quell this storm tonight, And were he now this moment at the door, His eyes would clear the shadows from this light, His voice put laughter in the billets' roar, 10 And he would clasp me in his arms and keep The wheeling gulls from screaming through my sleep. November 1935 The Titanic H A R L A N D & WOLFF W O R K S , BELFAST, MAY 31, 19!!

The hammers silent and the derricks still, And high-tide in the harbour! Mind and will In open test with time and steel had run The first lap of a schedule and had won. Although a shell of what was yet to be Before another year was over, she, Poised for the launching signal, had surpassed The dreams of builder or of navigator.

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The Primate of the Lines, she had out-classed That rival effort to eliminate her Beyond the North Sea where the air shots played The laggard rhythms of their fusillade Upon the rivets of the Imperator. The wedges in, the shores removed, a girl's Hand at a sign released a ribbon braid; Glass crashed against the plates; a wine cascade, Netting the sunlight in a shower of pearls, Baptized the bow and gave the ship her name; A slight push of the rams as a switch set free The triggers in the slots, and her proud claim On size - to be the first to reach the sea Was vindicated, for whatever fears Stalked with her down the tallow of the slips Were smothered under by the harbour cheers, By flags strung to halyards of the ships.

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MARCH 31, 1912 Completed! Waiting for her trial spin Levers and telegraphs and valves within Her intercostal spaces ready to start The power pulsing through her lungs and heart. An ocean lifeboat in herself - so ran The architectural comment on her plan. No wave could sweep those upper decks - unthinkable! No storm could hurt that hull - the papers said so. The perfect ship at last - the first unsinkable, Proved in advance - had not the folders read so? Such was the steel strength of her double floors Along the whole length of the keel, and such The fine adjustment of the bulkhead doors Geared to the rams, responsive to a touch, That in collision with iceberg or rock Or passing ship she could survive the shock,

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Absorb the double impact, for despite The bows stove in, with forward holds aleak, Her aft compartments buoyant, watertight, Would keep her floating steady for a week. And this belief had reached its climax when, Through wireless waves as yet unstaled by use, The wonder of the ether had begun To fold the heavens up and reinduce That ancient hubris in the dreams of men, Which would have slain the cattle of the sun, And filched the lightnings from the fist of Zeus. What mattered that her boats were but a third Of full provision - caution was absurd: Then let the ocean roll and the winds blow While the risk at Lloyd's remained a record low.

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THE ICEBERG

Calved from a glacier near Godhaven coast, It left the fiord for the sea - a host Of white flotillas gathering in its wake, And joined by fragments from a Behring floe, Had circumnavigated it to make It centre of an archipelago. Its lateral motion on the Davis Strait Was casual and indeterminate, And each advance to southward was as blind As each recession to the north. No smoke Of steamships nor the hoist of mainsails broke The polar wastes - no sounds except the grind Of ice, the cry of curlews and the lore Of winds from mesas of eternal snow; Until caught by the western undertow, It struck the current of the Labrador

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Which swung it to its definite southern stride. Pressure and glacial time had stratified The berg to the consistency of flint, And kept inviolate, through clash of tide And gale, facade and columns with their hint Of inward altars and of steepled bells Ringing the passage of the parallels. But when with months of voyaging it came To where both streams - the Gulf and Polar - met, The sun which left its crystal peaks aflame In the sub-arctic noons, began to fret The arches, flute the spires and deform The features, till the batteries of storm, Playing above the slow-eroding base, Demolished the last temple touch of grace. Another month, and nothing but the brute And palaeolithic outline of a face Fronted the transatlantic shipping route. A sloping spur that tapered to a claw And lying twenty feet below had made It lurch and shamble like a plantigrade; But with an impulse governed by the raw Mechanics of its birth, it drifted where Ambushed, fog-grey, it stumbled on its lair, North forty-one degrees and forty-four, Fifty and fourteen west the longitude, Waiting a world-memorial hour, its rude Corundum form stripped to its Greenland core. S O U T H A M P T O N , W E D N E S D A Y , A P R I L 1O, 1912

An omen struck the thousands on the shore A double accident! And as the ship Swung down the river on her maiden trip, Old sailors of the clipper decades, wise

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To the sea's incantations, muttered fables About careening vessels with their cables Snapped in their harbours under peaceful skies. Was it just suction or fatality Which caused the New York at the dock to turn, Her seven mooring ropes to break at the stern And writhe like anacondas on the quay, While tugs and fenders answered the collision Signals with such trim margin of precision? And was it backwash from the starboard screw Which, tearing at the big Teutonic, drew Her to the limit of her hawser strain, And made the smaller tethered craft behave Like frightened harbour ducks? And no one knew For many days the reason to explain The rise and wash of one inordinate wave, When a sunken barge on the Southampton bed Was dragged through mire eight hundred yards ahead, As the Titanic passed above its grave. But many of those sailors wise and old, Who pondered on this weird mesmeric power, Gathered together, lit their pipes and told Of portents hidden in the natal hour, Told of the launching of some square-rigged ships, When water flowed from the inverted tips Of a waning moon, of sun-hounds, of the shrieks Of whirling shags around the mizzen peaks. And was there not this morning's augury For the big one now heading for the sea? So long after she passed from landsmen's sight, They watched her with their Mother Carey eyes Through Spithead smoke, through mists of Isle of Wight, Through clouds of sea-gulls following with their cries.

no

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Electric elements were glowing down In the long galley passages where scores Of white-capped cooks stood at the oven doors To feed the population of a town. Cauldrons of stock, purees and consommes, Simmered with peppercorns and marjoram. The sea-shore smells from bisque and crab and clam Blended with odours from the fricassees. Refrigerators, hung with a week's toll Of the stockyards, delivered sides of lamb And veal, beef quarters to be roasted whole. Hundreds of capons and halibut. A shoal Of Blue-Points waited to be served on shell. The boards were loaded with pimolas, pails Of lobster coral, jars of Bechamel, To garnish tiers of rows of chilled timbales And aspics. On the shelves were pyramids Of truffles, sprigs of thyme and water-cress, Bay leaf and parsley, savouries to dress Shad roes and sweetbreads broiling on the grids. And then in diamond, square, crescent and star, Hors d'oeuvres were fashioned from the toasted bread, With paste of anchovy and caviar, Paprika sprinkled and pimento spread, All ready, for the hour was seven! Meanwhile, Rivalling the engines with their steady tread, Thousands of feet were taking overhead The fourth lap round the deck to make the mile. Squash racquet, shuffle board and quoits; the cool Tang of the plunge in the gymnasium pool, The rub, the crisp air of the April night, The salt of the breeze made by the liner's rate, Worked with an even keel to stimulate

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Saliva for an ocean appetite; And like storm troops before a citadel, At the first summons of a bugle, soon The army massed the stairs towards the saloon, And though twelve courses on the cards might well Measure themselves against Falstaffian juices, But few were found presenting their excuses, When stewards offered on the lacquered trays The Savoy chasers and the canapes. The dinner gave the sense that all was well: That touch of ballast in the tanks; the feel Of peace from ramparts unassailable, Which, added to her seven decks of steel, Had constituted the Titanic less A ship than a Gibraltar under heel. And night had placed a lazy lusciousness Upon a surfeit of security. Science responded to a button press. The three electric lifts that ran through tiers Of decks, the reading lamps, the brilliancy Of mirrors from the tungsten chandeliers, Had driven out all phantoms which the mind Had loosed from ocean closets, and assigned To the dry earth the custody of fears. The crowds poured through the sumptuous rooms and halls, And tapped the tables of the Regency; Smirked at the caryatids on the walls; Talked Jacobean-wise; canvassed the range Of taste within the Louis dynasty. Grey-templed Caesars of the world's Exchange Swallowed liqueurs and coffee as they sat Under the Georgian carved mahogany, Dictating wireless hieroglyphics that Would on the opening of the Board Rooms rock The pillared dollars of a railroad stock.

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IN THE G Y M N A S I U M

A group had gathered round a mat to watch The pressure of a Russian hammerlock, A Polish scissors and a German crotch, Broken by the toe-hold of Frank Gotch; Or listened while a young Y.M.C.A. Instructor demonstrated the left-hook, And that right upper-cut which Jeffries took From Johnson in the polished Reno way. By midnight in the spacious dancing hall, Hundreds were at the Masqueraders' Ball, The high potential of the liner's pleasures, Where mellow lights from Chinese lanterns glowed Upon the scene, and the Blue Danube flowed In andantino rhythms through the measures. By three the silence that proceeded from The night-caps and the soporific hum Of the engines was far deeper than a town's: The starlight and the low wash of the sea Against the hull bore the serenity Of sleep at rural hearths with eiderdowns. The quiet on the decks was scarcely less Than in the berths: no symptoms of the toil Down in the holds; no evidence of stress From gears drenched in the lubricating oil. She seemed to swim in oil, so smooth the sea. And quiet on the bridge: the great machine Called for laconic speech, close-fitting, clean, And whittled to the ship's economy. Even the judgment stood in little need Of reason, for the Watch had but to read Levels and lights, meter or card or bell To find the pressures, temperatures, or tell

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Magnetic North within a binnacle, Or gauge the hour of docking; for the speed Was fixed abaft where under the Ensign, Like a flashing trolling spoon, the log rotator Transmitted through a governor its fine Gradations on a dial indicator. Morning of Sunday promised cool and clear, Flawless horizon, crystal atmosphere; Not a cat's paw on the ocean, not a guy Rope murmuring: the steamer's columned smoke Climbed like extensions of her funnels high Into the upper zones, then warped and broke Through the resistance of her speed - blue sky, Blue water rifted only by the wedge Of the bow where the double foam line ran Diverging from the beam to join the edge Of the stern wake like a white unfolding fan. Her maiden voyage was being sweetly run, Adding a half-knot here, a quarter there, Gliding from twenty into twenty-one. She seemed so native to her thoroughfare, One turned from contemplation of her size, Her sixty thousand tons of sheer flotation, To wonder at the human enterprise That took a gamble on her navigation Joining the mastiff strength with whippet grace In this head-strained, world-watched Atlantic race: Her less than six days' passage would combine Achievement with the architect's design. 9A.M.

A message from Caronia: advice From ships proceeding west; sighted field ice And growlers; forty-two north; forty-nine

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To fifty-one west longitude. S.S. 'Mesaba' of Atlantic Transport Line Reports encountering solid pack: would guess The stretch five miles in width from west to east, And forty-five to fifty miles at least In length.

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Amerika obliged to slow Down: warns all steamships in vicinity Presence of bergs, especially of three Upon the southern outskirts of the floe. 1.42 P.M.

The Baltic warns Titanic: so Touraine; Reports of numerous icebergs on the Banks, The floe across the southern traffic lane.

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5 P.M.

The CalifornianandBaltic again Present their compliments to Captain. TITANIC

Thanks.

THREE MEN TALKING ON DECK

That spark's been busy all the afternoon Warnings! The Hydrographic charts are strewn With crosses showing bergs and pack-ice all Along the routes, more south than usual For this time of year/ 'She's hitting a clip Instead of letting up while passing through This belt. She's gone beyond the twenty-two.'

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312 'Don't worry - Smith's an old dog, knows his ship, No finer in the mercantile marine Than Smith with thirty years of service, clean Record, honoured,with highest of all commands, Majestic, then Olympic on his hands, Now the Titanic/ "Twas a lucky streak That at Southampton dock he didn't lose her, And the Olympic had a narrow squeak Some months before rammed by the British Cruiser, The Hawke/ 'Straight accident. No one to blame: Twas suction - Board absolved them both. The same With the Teutonic and New York. No need To fear she's trying to out-reach her speed. There isn't a sign of fog. Besides by now The watch is doubled at crow's nest and bow.' 'People are talking of that apparition, When we were leaving Queenstown - that head showing Above the funnel rim, and the fires going! A stoker's face - sounds like a superstition. But he was there within the stack, all right; Climbed up the ladder and grinned. The explanation Was given by an engineer last night A dummy funnel built for ventilation.' That's queer enough, but nothing so absurd As the latest story two old ladies heard At a rubber o'bridge. They nearly died with fright; Wanted to tell the captain - of all things! The others sneered a bit but just the same It did the trick of breaking up the game. A mummy from The Valley of the Kings Was brought from Thebes to London. Excavators Passed out from cholera, black plague or worse. Egyptians understood - an ancient curse

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Was visited on all the violators. One fellow was run over, one was drowned, And one went crazy. When in time it found Its way to the Museum, the last man In charge - a mothy Aberdonian Exploding the whole legend with a laugh, Lost all his humour when the skeleton Appeared within the family photograph, And leered down from the corner just like one Of his uncles/ 'Holy Hades!' The B.M. Authorities themselves were scared and sold It to New York. That's how the tale is told.'

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'The joke is on the Yanks.'

'No, not on them, Nor on The Valley of the Kings. What's rummy About it is - we're carrying the mummy.' 7.30 P.M. AT A TABLE IN THE DINING S A L O O N

Green Turtle!

Potage Romanoff!

'White Star Is out this time to press Cunarders close, Got them on tonnage - fifty thousand gross. Preferred has never paid a dividend. The common's down to five - one hundred par. The double ribbon - size and speed - would send Them soaring.' 'Speed is not in her design, But comfort and security. The Line Had never advertised it - 'twould be mania To smash the record of the Mauretania.'

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Sherry!

The rumour's out/ There's nothing in it/ 'Bet you she docks on Tuesday night/ Til take it/ 'She's hitting twenty-two this very minute/ That's four behind - she hasn't a chance to make it/

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Brook Trout!

Fried Dover Sole! 'Her rate will climb From twenty-two to twenty-six in time. The Company's known never to rush their ships At first or try to rip the bed-bolts off. They run them gently half-a-dozen trips, A few work-outs around the track to let Them find their breathing, take the boiler cough Out of them. She's not racing for a cup/ Claret! 'Steamships like sprinters have to get Their second wind before they open up/ That group of men around the captain's table, Look at them, count the aggregate - the House Of Astor, Guggenheim, and Harris, Straus, That's Frohman, isn't it? Between them able To halve the national debt with a cool billion! Sir Hugh is over there, and Hays and Stead. That woman third from captain's right, it's said Those diamonds round her neck - a quarter million!' Mignon of Beef! Quail!

'I heard Phillips say He had the finest outfit on the sea; The new Marconi valve; the range by day,

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Five hundred miles, by night a thousand. Three Sources of power. If some crash below Should hit the engines, flood the dynamo, He had the batteries: in emergency, He could switch through to the auxiliary On the boat deck.' Woodcock and Burgundy! 'Say waiter, I said RARE, you understand/ Escallope of Veal! Roast Duckling! Snipe! More Rhine! 'Marconi made the sea as safe as land: Remember the Republic - White Star Line Rammed off Nantucket by the Florida, One thousand saved - the Baltic heard the call. Two steamers answered the Slavonia, Disabled off the Azores. They got them all, And when the Minnehaha ran aground Near Bishop's Rock, they never would have found Her - not a chance without the wireless. Same Thing happened to that boat - what was her name? The one that foundered off the Alaska Coast Her signals brought a steamer in the nick Of time. Yes, sir - Marconi turned the trick.'

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The Barcelona salad; no, Beaucaire; That Russian dressing; Avocado pear; They wound her up at the Southampton dock, And then the tugs gave her a push to start Her off -as automatic as a clock.' Moselle!

'For all the hand work there's to do Aboard this liner up on deck, the crew

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Might just as well have stopped ashore. Apart From stokers and engineers, she's run By gadgets from the bridge - a thousand and one Of them with a hundred miles of copper wire. A filament glows at the first sign of fire, A buzzer sounds, a number gives the spot, A deck-hand makes a coupling of the hose. That's all there's to it; not a whistle; not A passenger upon the ship that knows What's happened. The whole thing is done without So much as calling up the fire brigade. They don't even need the pumps - a gas is sprayed, Carbon dioxide - and the blaze is out.' A Cherry Flan!

Champagne!

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Chocolate Par fait!

'How about a poker crowd tonight? Get Jones, an awful grouch - no good to play, But has the coin. Get hold of Larry.' 'Right.' 'You fetch Van Raalte: I'll bring in MacRae. In Cabin D, one hundred seventy-nine. In half-an-hour we start playing.' Tine.' ON DECK

The sky was moonless but the sea flung back With greater brilliance half the zodiac. As clear below as clear above, the Lion Far on the eastern quarter stalked the Bear: Polaris off the starboard beam - and there Upon the port the Dog-star trailed Orion. Capella was so close, a hand might seize

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The sapphire with the silver Pleiades. And further to the south - a finger span, Swam Betelgeuse and red Aldebaran. Right through from east to west the ocean glassed The billions of that snowy caravan Ranging the highway which the Milkmaid passed.

430

9.05 P.M. CALIFORNIANF L A S H I N G

7 say, old man, we're stuck fast in this place, More than an hour, field ice for miles about. TITANIC

Say, 'Californian/ shut up, keep out, You're jamming all my signals with Cape Race. 10 P.M.

A group of boys had gathered round a spot Upon the rail where a dial registered The speed, and waiting each three minutes heard The taffrail log bell tallying off a knot.

440

11.20 P.M. B E H I N D A DECK HOUSE

First act to fifth act in a tragic plan, Stage time, real time - a woman and a man, Entering a play within a play, dismiss The pageant on the ocean with a kiss. Eleven-twenty curtain! Whether true Or false the pantomimic vows they make Will not be known till at the fifth they take Their mutual exit twenty after two.

450

3i8

11.25P - M -

Position half-a-mile from edge of floe, Hove-to for many hours, bored with delay, The Californianfifteen miles away, And fearful of the pack, has now begun To turn her engines over under slow Bell, and the operator, his task done, Unclamps the 'phones and ends his dullest day. The ocean sinuous, half-past eleven; A silence broken only by the seven Bells and the look-out calls, the log-book showing Knots forty-five within two hours - not quite The expected best as yet - but she was going With all her bulkheads open through the night, For not a bridge induction light was glowing. Over the stern zenith and nadir met In the wash of the reciprocating set. The foam in bevelled mirrors multiplied And shattered constellations. In between, The pitch from the main drive of the turbine Emerged like tuna breaches to divide Against the rudder, only to unite With the converging wake from either side. Under the counter, blending with the spill Of stars - the white and blue - the yellow light Of Jupiter hung like a daffodil.

0-179 'Ace full! A long time since I had a pot.'

460

470

319

'Good boy, Van Raalte. That's the juiciest haul Tonight. Calls for a round of roodles, what? Let's whoop her up. Double the limit. All In.' (Jones, heard muttering as usual, Demurs, but over-ruled.) 'Jones sore again.'

480

Van Raalte (dealer): Ten dollars and all in! The sea's like glass Tonight. That fin-keel keeps her steady.' Jones:

(Not looking at his hand)

Larry: Cripps:

Tass.' 'Pass.'

'Open for ten.' (Holding a pair of aces.) 'Say, who won The sweep today?' 'A Minnesota guy With olive-coloured spats and a mauve tie. Five hundred and eighty miles - beat last day's run.'

Mac: 'My ten/ Harry: (Taking a gamble on his four Spades for a flush) Til raise the bet ten more.' Van R.: (Two queens) 'AND ten.' Jones:

(Discovering three kings) 'Raise you to forty' (face expressing doubt).

Larry: (Looking hard at a pair of nines) T'm out.'

490

320

Cripps: (Flirts for a moment with his aces, flings His thirty dollars to the pot.) Mac:

(The same.)

Harry: 'My twenty. Might as well stay with the game/ Van R.: Tm in. Draw! Jones, how bloody long you wait/ Jones: (Withholds an eight) 'One/ (And then draws an eight.) Cripps: Three/ (Gets another pair.)

'How many, Mac?'

Mac: 'Guess I'll take two, no, three/ (Gets a third Jack.) Harry: 'One/ (Draws the ace of spades.) Van R.:

'Dealer takes three/

Cripps (The Opener): (Throws in a dollar chip.) Mac:

(The same.)

Harry: You ten/ VanR.: Jones:

Til see you/

The chips.) 'Another ten/

Cripps:

Mac:

Til raise

(Hesitates, surveys

Til call you/

'See/

500

321

Harry: 'White livers! Here she goes to thirty/ VanR.: 'Just The devil's luck/ (Throws cards down in disgust.) Jones: 'Might as well raise/ (Counts twenty sluggishly, Tosses them to the centre.) 'Staying, Cripps?' Cripps: 'No, and be damned to it/ Mac:

'My ten/ (With groans.)

Harry: (Looks at the pyramid and swears at Jones, Then calls, pitching ten dollars on the chips.)

510

Jones: (Cards down.) 'A full house tops the flush/ (He spreads His arms around the whites and blues and reds.) Mac: 'As the Scotchman once said to the Sphinx, I'd just like to know what he thinks, I'll ask him, he cried, And the Sphinx - he replied, It's the hell of a time between drinks/ Cripps (watch in hand): 'Time? Eleven forty-four, to be precise/ Harry: 'Jones -that will fatten up your pocket-book. My throat's like charcoal. Ring for soda and ice/ Van R.: 'Ice: God! Look - take it through the port-hole - look!'

520

322

11.45 P - M -

A signal from the crow's nest. Three bells pealed: The look-out telephoned - Something ahead, Hard to make out, sir; looks like ... iceberg dead On starboard bow! M U R D O C H H O L D I N G THE B R I D G E - W A T C H

Starboard your helm: ship heeled To port. From bridge to engine-room the clang Of the telegraph. Danger. Stop. A hand sprang To the throttle; the valves closed, and with the churn Of the reverse the sea boiled at the stern. Smith hurried to the bridge and Murdoch closed The bulkheads of the ship as he supposed, But could not know that with those riven floors The electro-magnets failed upon the doors. No shock! No more than if something alive Had brushed her as she passed. The bow had missed. Under the vast momentum of her drive She went a mile. But why that ominous five Degrees (within five minutes) of a list?

530

IN A CABIN 'What was that, steward?' 'Seems like she hit a sea, sir.' 'But there's no sea; calm as a landlocked bay It is; lost a propellor blade?' 'Maybe, sir/ 'She's stopped.' 'Just cautious like, feeling her way, There's ice about. It's dark, no moon tonight, Nothing to fear, I'm sure, sir.'

540

323

For so slight The answer of the helm, it did not break The sleep of hundreds: some who were awake Went up on deck, but soon were satisfied That nothing in the shape of wind or tide Or rock or ice could harm that huge bulk spread On the Atlantic, and went back to bed.

550

CAPTAIN IN WIRELESS ROOM

'We've struck an iceberg - glancing blow: as yet Don't know extent; looks serious; so get Ready to send out general call for aid; I'll tell you when - having inspection made/ REPORT OF SHIP'S CARPENTER AND FOURTH OFFICER

A starboard cut three hundred feet or more From foremast to amidships. Iceberg tore Right at the bilge turn through the double skin: Some boiler rooms and bunkers driven in; The forward five compartments flooded - mail Bags floating. Would the engine power avail To stem the rush? WIRELESS R O O M , FIRST OFFICER PHILLIPS AT KEY

Titanic, C.Q.D. Collision: iceberg: damaged starboard side: Distinct list forward. (Had Smith magnified The danger? Over-anxious certainly.) The second (joking) - 'Try new call, maybe Last chance you'll have to send it.' S.O.S. Then back to older signal of distress.

560

324

On the same instant the Carpathia called, The distance sixty miles - Putting about, And heading for you; double watch installed In engine-room, in stokehold and look-out. Four hours the run, should not the ice retard The speed; but taking chances: coming hard!

570

THE BRIDGE

As leaning on her side to ease a pain, The tilted ship had stopped the captain's breath: The inconceivable had stabbed his brain, This thing unfelt - her visceral wound of death? Another message - this time to report her Filling, taxing the pumps beyond their strain. Had that blow rent her from the bow to quarter? Or would the aft compartments still intact Give buoyancy enough to counteract The open forward holds? The carpenter's Second report had offered little chance, And panic - heart of God - the passengers, The fourteen hundred - seven hundred packed In steerage - seven hundred immigrants! Smith thought of panic clutching at their throats, And feared that Balkan scramble for the boats. No call from bridge, no whistle, no alarm Was sounded. Have the stewards quietly Inform the passengers: no vital harm, Precautions merely for emergency; Collision? Yes, but nature of the blow Must not be told: not even the crew must know: Yet all on deck with lifebelts, and boats ready, The sailors at the falls, and all hands steady.

580

590

325 WIRELESS ROOM

The lilac spark was crackling at the gap, Eight ships within the radius of the call From fifteen to five hundred miles, and all But one answering the operator's tap. Olympic twenty hours away had heard; The Baltic next and the Virginian third; Frankfurt and Burma distant one-half day; Mount Temple nearer, but the ice-field lay Between the two ships like a wall of stone; The Californian deaf to signals though Supreme deliverer an hour ago: The hope was on Carpathia alone.

600

610

ON THE DECKS

So suave the fool-proof sense of life that fear Had like the unforeseen become a mere Illusion - vanquished by the towering height Of funnels pouring smoke through thirty feet Of bore; the solid deck planks and the light From a thousand lamps as on a city street; The feel of numbers; the security Of wealth; the placid surface of the sea, Reflecting on the ship the outwardness Of calm and leisure of the passengers; Deck-hands obedient to their officers; Pearl-throated women in their evening dress And wrapped in sables and minks; the silhouettes Of men in dinner jackets staging an act In which delusion passed, deriding fact Behind the cupped flare of the cigarettes.

620

326

Women and children first! Slowly the men Stepped backward from the rails where number ten, Its cover off, and lifted from the chocks, Moved outward as the Welin davits swung. The new ropes creaking through the unused blocks, The boat was lowered to B deck and hung There while her load of sixty stepped inside, Convinced the order was not justified. Rockets, one, two, God! Smith - what does he mean? The sounding of the bilges could not show This reason for alarm - the sky serene And not a ripple on the water - no Collision. What report came from below? No leak accounts for this - looks like a drill, A bit of exhibition play - but still Stopped in mid-ocean! and those rockets - three! More urgent even than a tapping key And more immediate as a protocol To a disaster. There! An arrow of fire, A fourth sped towards the sky, its bursting spire Topping the foremast like a parasol With fringe of fuchsia - more a parody Upon the tragic summons of the sea Than the real script of unacknowledged fears Known to the bridge and to the engineers. Midnight! The Master of the ship presents To the Master of the Band his compliments, Desiring that the Band should play right through; No intermission. Conductor:

'Bad?'

630

640

650

327

Officer: 'Yes, bad enough, The half not known yet even to the crew; For God's sake, cut the sentimental stuff, The BLUE BELLS and Kentucky lullabies. Murdoch will have a barrel of work to do, Holding the steerage back, once they get wise; They're jumpy now under the rockets' glare; So put the ginger in the fiddles - Zip Her up.'

660

Conductor: 'Sure, number forty-seven.' E-Yip I Addy-I-A, I Ay ... I don't care... NUMBER TEN GOES OVER THE SIDE

Full noon and midnight by a weird design Both met and parted at the median line. Beyond the starboard gunwale was outspread The jet expanse of water islanded By fragments of the berg which struck the blow. And further off towards the horizon lay The loom of the uncharted parent floe, Merging the black with an amorphous grey. On the port gunwale the meridian Shone from the terraced rows of decks that ran From gudgeon to the stem nine hundred feet; And as the boat now tilted by the stern, Or now resumed her levels with the turn Of the controlling ropes at block and cleat, How easy seemed the step and how secure Back to the comfort and the warmth - the lure Of sheltered promenade and sun decks starred By hanging bulbs, amber and rose and blue, The trellis and palms lining an avenue With all the vista of a boulevard: The mirror of the ceilings with festoon

670

680

328

Of pennants, flags and streamers - and now through The leaded windows of the grand saloon, Through parted curtains and the open doors Of vestibules, glint of deserted floors And tables, and under the sorcery Of light excelling their facsimile, The periods returning to relume The panels of the lounge and smoking-room, Holding the mind in its abandonment During those sixty seconds of descent. Lower away! The boat with its four tons Of freight went down with jerks and stops and runs Beyond the glare of the cabins and below The slanting parallels of port-holes, clear Of the exhaust from the condenser flow: But with the uneven falls she canted near The water line; the stern rose; the bow dipped; The crew groped for the link-releasing gear; The lever jammed; a stoker's jack-knife ripped The aft ropes through, which on the instant brought her With rocking keel though safe upon the water.

690

70O

THECARPATHIA

Fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, eighteen -three Full knots beyond her running limit, she Was feeling out her port and starboard points, And testing rivets on her boiler joints. The needle on the gauge beyond the red, The blow-offs feathered at the funnel head. The draught-fans roaring at their loudest, now The quartermaster jams the helm hard-over, As the revolving searchlight beams uncover The columns of an iceberg on the bow, Then compensates this loss by daring gains Made by her passage through the open lanes.

710

329 THE BAND

East side, West side, all around the town, The tots sang 'Ring-a-Rosie' 'London Bridge is falling down/ Boys and girls together....

The cranks turn and the sixth and seventh swing Over and down, the 'tiller' answering 'Aye, Aye, sir' to the shouts of officers 'Row to the cargo ports for passengers/ The water line is reached, but the ports fail To open, and the crews of the boats hail The decks; receiving no response they pull Away from the ship's side, less than half full. The eighth caught in the tackle foul is stuck Half-way. With sixty-five capacity, Yet holding twenty-four, goes number three. The sharp unnatural deflection, struck By the sea-level with the under row Of dipping port-holes at the forward, show How much she's going by the head. Behind The bulkheads, sapping out their steel control, Is the warp of the bunker press inclined By many thousand tons of shifting coal. The smoothest, safest passage to the sea Is made by number one - the next to go Her space is forty - twelve her company: 'Pull like the devil from her - harder - row! The minute that she founders, not a boat Within a mile around that will not follow. What nearly happened at Southampton? So Pull, pull, I tell you - not a chip afloat,

720

730

740

330

God knows how far, her suction will not swallow/ Alexander's rag-time band... It's the best band in the land...

750

Voices From the Deck: There goes the Special with the toffs. You'll make New York tonight rowing like that. You'll take Your death o'cold out there with all the fish And ice around/ 'Make sure your butlers dish You up your toddies now, and bring hot rolls For breakfast/ 'Don't forget the finger bowls/ The engineering staff of thirty-five Are at their stations: those off-duty go Of their free will to join their mates below In the grim fight for steam, more steam, to drive The pressure through the pumps and dynamo. Knee-deep, waist-deep in water they remain, Not one of them seen on the decks again. The under braces of the rudder showing, The wing propeller blades begin to rise, And with them, through the hawse-holes, water flowing The angle could not but assault the eyes. A fifteen minutes, and the fo'c'sle head Was under. And five more, the sea had shut The lower entrance to the stairs that led From C deck to the boat deck - the short cut For the crew. Another five, the upward flow Had covered the wall brackets where the glow Diffusing from the frosted bulbs turned green Uncannily through their translucent screen.

760

770

331 ON THE

CARPATHIA

White Star - Cunarder, forty miles apart, Still eighteen knots! From coal to flame to steam Decision of a captain to redeem Errors of brain by hazards of the heart! Showers of sparks danced through the funnel smoke, The firemen's shovels, rakes and slice-bars broke The clinkers, fed the fires, and ceaselessly The hoppers dumped the ashes on the sea. As yet no panic, but none might foretell The moment when the sight of that oblique Breath-taking lift of the taffrail and the sleek And foamless undulation of the swell Might break in meaning on those diverse races, And give them common language. As the throng Came to the upper decks and moved along The incline, the contagion struck the faces With every lowering of a boat and backed Them towards the stern. And twice between the hush Of fear and utterance the gamut cracked, When with the call for women and the flare Of an exploding rocket, a short rush Was made for the boats - fifteen and two. 'Twas nearly done - the sudden clutch and tear Of canvas, a flurry of fists and curses met By swift decisive action from the crew, Supported by a quartermaster's threat Of three revolver shots fired on the air. But still the fifteenth went with five inside, Who, seeking out the shadows, climbed aboard And, lying prone and still, managed to hide Under the thwarts long after she was lowered.

780

790

800

332

Jingle bells, jingle bells, Jingle all the way, O what fun.... 'Some men in number two, sir!' Back.

810

The boat swung

'Chuck the fellows out/

Grabbed by the feet, The lot were pulled over the gunwale and flung Upon the deck. 'Hard at that forward cleat! 'A hand there for that after fall. Lower Away - port side, the second hatch, and wait/ With six hands of his watch, the bosun's mate, Sent down to open up the gangway door, Was trapped and lost in a flooded alley way, And like the seventh, impatient of delay, The second left with room for twenty more. The fiddley leading from a boiler room Lay like a tortuous exit from a tomb. A stoker climbed it, feeling by the twist From vertical how steep must be the list. He reached the main deck where the cold night airs Enswathed his flesh with steam. Taking the stairs, He heard the babel by the davits, faced The forward, noticed how the waters raced To the break of the fo'c'sle and lapped The foremast root. He climbed again and saw The resolute manner in which Murdoch's rapped Command put a herd instinct under law; No life-preserver on, he stealthily Watched Phillips in his room, bent at the key, And thinking him alone, he sprang to tear

820

830

333 The jacket off. He leaped too soon. Take that!' The second stove him with a wrench. 'Lie there, Till hell begins to singe your lids - you rat!' But set against those scenes where order failed, Was the fine muster at the fourteenth where, Like a zone of calm along a thoroughfare, The discipline of sea-worn laws prevailed. No women answering the repeated calls, The men filled up the vacant seats: the falls Were slipping through the sailors' hands, When a steerage group of women, having fought Their way over five flights of stairs, were brought Bewildered to the rails. Without commands Barked from the lips of officers; without A protest registered in voice or face, The boat was drawn up and the men stepped out Back to the crowded stations with that free Barter of life for life done with the grace And air of a Castilian courtesy.

840

850

I've just got here through Paris, From the sunny Southern shore, I to Monte Carlo went.... I S I D O R A N D I D A STRAUS

At the sixteenth - a woman wrapped her coat Around her maid and placed her in the boat; Was ordered in but seen to hesitate At the gunwale, and more conscious of her pride Than of her danger swiftly took her fate With open hands, and without show of tears Returned unmurmuring to her husband's side; 'We've been together now for forty years, Whither you go, I go.'

860

334 A boy of ten, Ranking himself within the class of men, Though given a seat, made up his mind to waive The privilege of his youth and size, and piled The inches on his stature as he gave Place to a Magyar woman and her child.

And men who had in the world's run of trade, Or in pursuit of the professions, made Their reputation, looked upon the scene Merely as drama in a life's routine: Millet was studying eyes as he would draw them Upon a canvas; Butt, as though he saw them In the ranks; Astor, social, debonair, Waved 'Good-bye' to his bride - 'See you tomorrow/ And tapped a cigarette on a silver case; Men came to Guggenheim as he stood there In evening suit, coming this time to borrow Nothing but courage from his calm, cool face. And others unobserved, of unknown name And race, just stood behind, pressing no claim Upon priority but rendering proof Of their oblation, quiet and aloof Within the maelstrom towards the rails. And some Wavered a moment with the panic urge, But rallied to attention on the verge Of flight as if the rattle of a drum From quarters faint but unmistakable Had put the stiffening in the blood to check The impulse of the feet, leaving the will No choice between the lifeboats and the deck. The four collapsibles, their lashings ripped, Half-dragged, half-lifted by the hooks, were slipped Over the side. The first two luckily

870

880

890

335

Had but the forward distance to the sea. Its canvas edges crumpled up, the third Began to fill with water and transferred Its cargo to the twelfth, while number four, Abaft and higher, nose-dived and swamped its score. The wireless cabin - Phillips in his place, Guessing the knots of the Cunarder's race. Water was swirling up the slanted floor Around the chair and sucking at his feet. Carpathian call - the last one heard complete Expect to reach position half-past four. The operators turned - Smith at the door With drawn incredulous face. 'Men you have done Your duty. I release you. Everyone Now for himself/ They stayed ten minutes yet, The power growing fainter with each blue Crackle of flame. Another stammering jet Virginian heard 'a tattering C.Q.' Again a try for contact but the code's Last jest had died between the electrodes. Even yet the spell was on the ship: although The last lifeboat had vanished, there was no Besieging of the heavens with a crescendo Of fears passing through terror into riot But on all lips the strange narcotic quiet Of an unruffled ocean's innuendo. In spite of her deformity of line, Emergent like a crag out of the sea, She had the semblance of stability, Moment by moment furnishing no sign, So far as visible, of that decline Made up of inches crawling into feet. Then, with the electric circuit still complete, The miracle of day displacing night

900

910

920

930

336

Had worked its fascination to beguile Direction of the hours and cheat the sight. Inside the recreation rooms the gold From Arab lamps shone on the burnished tile. What hindered the return to shelter while The ship clothed in that irony of light Offered her berths and cabins as a fold? And, was there not the Californian? Many had seen her smoke just over there, But two hours past - it seemed a harbour span So big, so close, she could be hailed, they said; She must have heard the signals, seen the flare Of those white stars and changed at once her course. There under the Titanic's foremast head, A lamp from the look-out cage was flashing Morse. No ship afloat, unless deaf, blind and dumb To those three sets of signals but would come. And when the whiz of a rocket bade men turn Their faces to each other in concern At shattering facts upon the deck, they found Their hearts take reassurance with the sound Of the violins from the gymnasium, where The bandsmen in their blithe insouciance Discharged the sudden tension of the air With the fox-trot's sublime irrelevance. The fo'c'sle had gone under the creep Of the water. Though without a wind, a lop Was forming on the wells now fathoms deep. The seventy feet - the boat deck's normal drop Was down to ten. Rising, falling, and waiting, Rising again, the swell that edged and curled Around the second bridge, over the top Of the air-shafts, backed, resurged and whirled Into the stokehold through the fiddley grating.

940

950

960

337

Under the final strain the two wire guys Of the forward funnel tugged and broke at the eyes: With buckled plates the stack leaned, fell and smashed The starboard wing of the flying bridge, went through The lower, then tilting at the davits crashed Over, driving a wave aboard that drew Back to the sea some fifty sailors and The captain with the last of the bridge command. Out on the water was the same display Of fear and self-control as on the deck Challenge and hesitation and delay, The quick return, the will to save, the race Of snapping oars to put the realm of space Between the half-filled lifeboats and the wreck. The swimmers whom the waters did not take With their instant death-chill struck out for the wake Of the nearer boats, gained on them, hailed The steersmen and were saved: the weaker failed And fagged and sank. A man clutched at the rim Of a gunwale, and a woman's jewelled fist Struck at his face: two others seized his wrist, As he released his hold, and gathering him Over the side, they staunched the cut from the ring. And there were many deeds envisaging Volitions where self-preservation fought Its red primordial struggle with the 'ought/ In those high moments when the gambler tossed Upon the chance and uncomplaining lost. Aboard the ship, whatever hope of dawn Gleamed from the Carpathia's riding lights was gone, For every knot was matched by each degree Of list. The stern was lifted bodily When the bow had sunk three hundred feet, and set Against the horizon stars in silhouette

970

980

990

1OOO

338

Were the blade curves of the screws, hump of the rudder. The downward pull and after buoyancy Held her a minute poised but for a shudder That caught her frame as with the upward stroke Of the sea a boiler or a bulkhead broke. Climbing the ladders, gripping shroud and stay, Storm-rail, ringbolt or fairlead, every place That might befriend the clutch of hand or brace Of foot, the fourteen hundred made their way To the heights of the aft decks, crowding the inches Around the docking bridge and cargo winches. And now that last salt tonic which had kept The valour of the heart alive - the bows Of the immortal seven that had swept The strings to outplay, outdie their orders, ceased. Five minutes more, the angle had increased From eighty on to ninety when the rows Of deck and port-hole lights went out, flashed back A brilliant second and again went black. Another bulkhead crashed, then following The passage of the engines as they tore From their foundations, taking everything Clean through the bows from 'midships with a roar Which drowned all cries upon the deck and shook The watchers in the boats, the liner took Her thousand fathoms journey to her grave. And out there in the starlight, with no trace Upon it of its deed but the last wave From the Titanic fretting at its base, Silent, composed, ringed by its icy broods, The grey shape with the palaeolithic face Was still the master of the longitudes.

1010

1020

1030 *935

Textual Variants and Emendations

This list is a record of all substantive variants between the poem chosen as copy-text (designated with an asterisk) and all other authoritative printed versions; it also makes reference to all emendations made by the editors and may, at times, offer interesting variants from manuscript sources. Not accepted as authoritative versions are poems included in minor anthologies, unless they occur nowhere else or are first versions; and not included in this list are the accidentals - the typographical errors and minor punctuation changes (of which there are very few). If titles are missing from this list, the reader is to understand that no variants exist (ie, no major errors have occurred in previous printings or revisions been made by the author after the first printing), and no emendations have been made to the copy-text. A detailed bibliographical description and textual transmission of all poems can be found in the descriptive bibliography included in Part 2 of this work. ABBREVIATIONS

AV CB CF CJRT CM CP CPC

CPM

Acta Victoriana Canadian Bookman Canadian Forum Canadian Journal of Religious Thought Canadian Magazine Collected Poems (1944 & 1958) Canadian Poetry for Children, ed. J.W. Garvin Canadian Poetry Magazine

DR FG HTF LM MM NF NH NW NM

Dalhousie Review Fable of the Goats Here the Tides Flow, ed. D.G. Pitt London Mercury Many Moods New Frontier New Harvesting New World Northern Medley

340 Textual Variants and Emendations NO NP NR NV

QQ

RR SL

New Outlook New Provinces Northern Review Newfoundland Verse Queen's Quarterly Review of Reviews Still Life and Other Verse

SW TC TSP VS VV

Star Weekly The Twentieth Century Ten Selected Poems, ed. EJ. Pratt Verses of the Sea, intro. Charles G.D. Roberts Voices of Victory

The Secret of the Sea AV (1914), The Rebel (1917), NV* (1923), HTF (1962) Original title: The Sea/ AV and The Rebel 3 Come, breathe] Low breathe, AV; Low-breathe, The Rebel 5 It's midnight] Tis midnight, AV and The Rebel 5 ... and from me has sleep] ... and all is so still, The Rebel 6-8 Come, sweeten my spirit with calm, And into my pulses distil The answering dews of thy balm, The Rebel 9-12 Between the second and third stanzas of the copy-text the following stanza appeared only in the AV version: I come now to know of thy will, O sweeten my spirit with calm. And into my pulses distil An answer cooled in thy balm. 10 only] naught but, AV and The Rebel 12 As an] Like an, The Rebel 12 sobbed from] Sobbed out from, AV and The Rebel 16 Bedewed with the waste of thy tears] Bedewed by the offering of tears, AV and The Rebel 18 grey mantle] green mantle, AV and The Rebel 26 grief] loss, AV and The Rebel 27 Of this storm-beaten life] Of this life, from its strife, AV and The Rebel Evening AV (1915), NV* (1923) Original title: 'By the Sea', AV i beat] this is the reading of both printed versions and the manuscript, even though the sense seems to demand 'heat.'

341 Textual Variants and Emendations

The Seed Must Die AV (1917), NV* (1923) Subtitle: 'To the British Dead/ AV 7 flowed] coursed, AV 14 that] which, AV The Great Mother AV (1917), NV* (1923), VS (1930) i Where] O where, AV 14 colours] colour, VS 17-18 Instead of these lines the AV version read: How rugged the pathway that leads to the fold, Where Death shepherds his erring ones in from Life's cold! 18 and the seal] and seal, VS 24 home-rivers flow] home-rivers all flow, AV Omitted from the NV and VS versions was this stanza (which was stanza four in the AV version): Their feuds all-forgotten, their hates all-forgiven, Removed from the roar of the fire and the flood, Do they lie neath the fields whereon they have striven, Sealed in eternal atonement of blood; O God! if life springs from birth and its pains, Canst thou not wrest from Death's losses, its gains? Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland in Verse Privately printed 1917* and HTF (1962) 23 Both printed versions read 'Summer-trade winds'; the mss read 'Summer trade winds' which may seem more correct, except that Pratt may have wanted the emphasis on 'Summer-trade.' 54 women's hearts] women hearts: an obvious typographical error in all printed versions 142 briny] brimy,i9i7. Compositorial error; the mss read 'briny/ 211 coursed] course, 1917 and HTF. This emendation seems to improve both grammar and sense, and accords with the mss. readings. 278 warmed] warned, 1917 and HTF. The ms reading 'warmed' has been accepted in our text. 468 fearsome] In ms B (Pratt Library) 'fearsome' is crossed out and 'fearful' inserted;this seems a better reading but since 'fearsome' does not obscure the sense it has been accepted.

342 Textual Variants and Emendations

480 seemed] seem, 1917. Mss support 'seemed' 528 fight] close, 1917 and HTF. This is also the reading of the mss, but in the NV (1923) reprinting of the 'Conclusion' the word 'fight' was substituted. 558 his] this, 1917. Mss support 'his' NOTE: The only part of 'Rachel' to have been reprinted before 1962 was The Conclusion of "Rachel": In Memory of R.S. Le D.' in Newfoundland Verse (1923). It begins at line 414 and contains a number of authorial revisions, cited below: 420-7 Broke the thick silence. Soon (a globe of fire Behind a bank of smoke that thickened fast Against a dull circumference of grey) The moon arose, and tongueless vapours stole Heavily athwart the sea. Within her home ... 436-8 There she remained until the smaller hours Had passed; then took her lamp and went to bed And yet more from the habit of the night 446-9 Anon ... mane, omitted 452-6 Another night, and still the blast increased Its power, tearing, lifting cottage roofs, But nowhere did it make completer ruin Than in the heart of Rachel. By the light... 477-8 Omitted 498-9 Omitted 505 And now each night she got up from her bed, 517-23 There flashed now through her mind, as every time She looked upon his face, a night long past, When croup had racked his frame - when she had fought Death with a woman's courage as she watched The cradle's tiny heavings, till the dawn 546 'A tale she brought' becomes 'She brought a tale' 572-81 Throughout the days and weeks following the storm She often left her home to wander off, Searching as if some object of her love

343 Textual Variants and Emendations

Had strayed upon the moor or on the beach. At times she stood awhile and looked, with eyes That somehow had forgotten how to weep, Far out to sea. At times she made her way Along the shore to where two beetling crags Rose from their slippery base, as if they'd break The waves with a last crash. There in the cleft 593-602 Another morn and sleep. With a white hand The day was ushered in. The seams of pain And arid loss which each awakening light Had freely veined, now reappeared no more. The fall's loud blast that whirled the senile leaves Above the trees, she did not hear; nor sound Of breaking seas, nor swirl of surge or foam. Dawn The Rebel (1918), NV (1923), VS* (1930) Alternate titles: The Angler,' The Rebel;'?', NV 3 of the morn] of morning, The Rebel The Dear Illusion AV (1918), The Rebel (1919), DR* (1925) 12 - or so it seems] - e'en so it seems, AV and The Rebel Overheard by a Stream The Rebel (1919), NV (1923), VS (1930), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Original title: 'A Dialogue by a Stream,' The Rebel 20 damn] big, NV, VS, CP (44 and 58). 'Damn' seems more Prattian. Signals The Rebel (1920), NV* (1923), VS (1930) Alternate titles: 'On the Shore,' The Rebel, 'Later,' NV. Carlo CF (1920), NV (1923), VS (1930), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) 102 The devil take his legislation] I scorned his small adjudication, CF

344 Textual Variants and Emendations

In Absentia CF (1921), NV (1923), VS (1930), CP (1944), CP* (1958) 15-16 That old professor's by-gone face Looked like a shrivelled asterisk, CF. These lines were crossed out in the typescript version and the new lines written in the margin by Pratt. The Pine Tree CF (1921), NV* (1923) 21 Dropped with a crash of branches] Dropped like a felon, CF Sea Variations CB (1922), NV* (1923) 127 high-unctioned] supreme hour, CB The Ground Swell AV (1923), NV (1923), VS (1930), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) 8 a] my, AV

The Decision AV (1923), CJRT (1924), LM (1928), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Other subtitles: '(To Langford Rowell),' AV, CJRT; '(To L.R.),' LM The Morning Plunge NV* (1923), VS (1930) This poem is an obvious reworking of a small section (lines 160-6) of 'Rachel' (1917). Here, for comparison, are the original lines: He sprang from boom or bowsprit, diving full Into the azure bay with agile curve, As some lithe salmon leaping from a pool Hangs, instant poised, then arches for the plunge, Cutting with dexterous fin a speedy path Down tb his haunts, and leaves a lustrous trail Of garnet sunbeams chasing amethysts.

345 Textual Variants and Emendations Loss of the Steamship Florizel NV* (1923), HTF (1962) This poem is a revised version of stanzas three and four of 'Invocation/ See p 26. The Drowning NV (1923), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) There is a second poem with this same title in The Fable of the Goats (1937), p 45, which in CP (1958) has been retitled The Illusion/ The Epigrapher NV (1923), CP (1944), CP* (1958) In all printed versions 'I/Envoi' is misplaced between the two final stanzas; we have restored it to its proper place in accordance with the ms version. Ode to December, 1917 NV (1923) 157 dread] dead, NV; an obvious error; ms supports 'dread/ Newfoundland NV (1923), VS (1930), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) 20 In all versions preceding CP (1944), line 20 was followed by: 'And swept by the wings of dream/ The line was omitted on Pratt's request in a letter (August 1944) to Winnifred Eayrs, a Macmillan editor. On the Shore NV (1923), VS (1930), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Not to be confused with 'On the Shore/ The Rebel (1917). See 'Signals/ above. Fragment from a Story NV(i923) This is an extract from Pratt's hitherto unpublished drama, Clay. See Appendix B. 246-81 The section entitled 'A Later Spring' had already appeared as 'Anticipations' in CF, i, #9 (June 1921) 271. We have therefore chosen to alter the transmission chronology in this one instance by placing the poem in its larger context.

346 Textual Variants and Emendations One Hour of Life CB (1924), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Alternate title: The Alternative/ CB 5-12 Extensive revisions were made in the MM version, the CP44 and CP58; thus the final stanzas of the CB version are quoted in their entirety: Nor shall its sleeping heart, grown cold After a pulse of life, unfold That grim refusal on the face Of her who with a last embrace Could only cheat the earth to save The plunder for another grave For as the island mothers know, There are two ways a lad may go. The waters bide their time today, Death does not need a grave of clay But with her arms about him, she Forgot the patience of the sea. To an Enemy CJRT (1925), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) 4 stain] blood, CJRT 13 An Orient form] The Nazarene, CJRT 14 And quenched their hate in his forgiving eyes] And drank the starswept wonder of His eyes, CJRT The Witches' Brew 1925, 1926 [distinct editions], CP (1944), CP* (1958) 154 To filets mignons from Shanghai] To braided rat-tails from Shanghai, 1925, 1926. It is interesting to note that in a rough draft of the poem (E.J. Pratt Collection, Victoria University Library) the line reads: To ingrown toe-nails from Shanghai/ 259-81 In the rough-draft ms Pratt had included another section in the 'Inventory of Hades': Politicians, orators, Pugilists, ambassadors

347 Textual Variants and Emendations

Architects and scientists Lawyers and evangelists Some with brains and some without Made up a ragged ghastly rout With teachers of Theology Whose dogmas like their gowns thread-bare And musty with Eternity Gave off an odour like hot air. In a broadside (n.d.) prepared for the Toronto Arts and Letters Club, Pratt offered a slightly different rendition of the 'Inventory of Hades' meant to invoke specific members of the Club: A Club Inventory of Hades A member of the Arts and Letters Club, fifty years hence, pays a visit to Hades to see his fellow-members domiciled in that region. They come crowding up to greet him - and here they are. Composers and apothecaries, Poets, plumbers, antiquaries, 1. Bankers with their secretaries Home and foreign missionaries And writers of obituaries. 2. Mystics in perpetual trance, Painters with their disputants, Philosophers in baggy pants, Ministers to whom the chance Had never come in life to dance, Save when the dreadful circumstance Of death removed their maiden aunts. 3. Doctors, auctioneers and bakers Dentists, diplomats and fakirs Architects and undertakers.

348 Textual Variants and Emendations 4. Baritones and Pacifists, Tenors and evangelists, Publishers and atheists, Puritans and classicists Scrapping with the modernists. 5. Journalists who slanted news, Actors who forgot their cues, And those who never paid their dues. 6. Landscapers clad in dungarees, Chronic luncheon absentees, Scholars, saints and PH.D.'S. 7. Rich men, poor men, sages, sots, Lawyers tying shades in knots, Pagans, Christians and what-nots, Musicians good and bad in spots, Ruralists and Wyandots. 8. And others not easily classified. 281-2 Between these two lines, in a holograph manuscript of The Witches' Brew in the Queen's University Archives, there is an extra section, omitted from all printed versions: For some time past the inhabitants of the underworld had fallen on evil times. Strong, insurrectionary vibrations from the earth had penetrated the great vault, producing an atmosphere of unrest and insubordination. Sabotage and incendiarism became so rife that Oliver Cromwell, finding it desirable to appoint himself Dictator, had proclaimed a 'Bone-Dry' Prohibition. His fire-marshals were instructed to seize all incoming Shades and to confiscate and explode all liquors found in their possession. Water pumped up from the Styx now became the national drink, after that highly polluted stream had been charged, by Cromwell's Minister of Public Health, to the point of saturation, with chloride of lime. This with other repressive measures had indeed resulted in a net reduction of sabotage and kindred disorders, but had greatly increased ennui and promoted recurrent

349 Textual Variants and Emendations

waves of blasphemy amongst certain temperamental types of Shades. It was claimed that many rich and versatile natures were on the point of breaking up under the enforced standardisation of tastes. Moodiness and apathy with the general loss of spiritual horizon settled heavily down. Not that there was a condition of complete prostration. A few of the more reminiscent Shades were still weakly interested in their former earthly tasks and ideals. Burns and Heine continued to write screeds upon the ebony tables and chairs of the great Common Rooms. Gibbon, day after day, was observed to pass to and fro between the ghosts of his acacias. A small band of Peripatetics hung on to the shadow of Aristotle. John Bunyan spent his time in scribbling caricatures of some of the more frivolous folk; Michael Angelo, in drawing charcoal silhouettes of the Devil upon asbestos. Guy Fawkes was generally attempting to light some dusty heaps of graphite taking it to be gunpowder. The members of the Board of Directors that organized the South Sea Company would sit, from dawn until dark, around a table, and blow through corn-cob pipes an unending series of bubbles from a lather of soft soap. Roger and Francis Bacon were trying to find out the specific gravity of fire. Priestley, Boyle and Lussac occasionally set all the Shades sneezing by making new combinations of gases. Absorbed at a desk littered with logarithmic tables, charts, graphs and a ticker sat Adam Smith, Turgot, Karl Marx and Galileo who were endeavoring - after the collapse of the Hades Exchange - to work out a formula in terms of light-year units which might compute the number of American dollars it would take to come up to the value of a Russian rouble. These rather fatuous imitations of earlier activities on the part of a few served only to deepen the gloom of the masses. The only protest against the enervating decrees of the Protectorate was the composition of an anonymous dirge called The Lament of the Wets, and sung every evening in the Rotunda of Hades by the national quartette. The following is a free translation of the original Hindustani. The Quartette Nimrod Trombone Nimrod Trombone Nimrod Trombone Nimrod Trombone

350 Textual Variants and Emendations The Orchestra Friar Tuck Piccolo Nimrod Trombone Nimrod Trombone Nimrod Trombone Come weep with us; the holy fire That once had warmed our veins is dead; Drowned in a vast aquatic bed. Only the canker of desire Survives unsatiated; Nor shall the wisdom of this age Concoct another beverage, By any art, that might inspire A taste once chlorinated. Only the blood of fish shall flow Through arteries that once did burn With high-ball, cocktail and sauterne; No more their ardours shall we know Within our watery cloister; The respiration of the clam Is all that's left us now bydam, For never shall the erotic glow Reanimate any oyster. No more - a voice now cries - no more, Dear heart, that with thy rolling pin. Welcomest the wanderer in, Will dawn show on a stranger's floor Thy hermit tarrying, And vowing on his flagging knees To mend his domesticities, Nor shalt thou greet him at the door With thy sweet carolling. Farewell the honours of the toast, The mellowed gallantries that grew Out of a reminiscent brew; Farewell the tavern and the host,

351 Textual Variants and Emendations Farewell the jag that shot us. For us alone - O spite accurst The spasms of eternal thirst; Even now, a dry Bacchantian ghost Faints at the epiglottis. This spirit of passive resistance continued for some time until the height of the Feast when with the second unchallengable sniff from the far-off cauldron an attack was made on the Gates under the joint command of Julius Caesar and Oliver Goldsmith. The Gates resisted the onset until the arrival of cavalry led by Don Quixote on Rosinante and Hannibal with an elephant, when they crashed with a mighty roar, and the Shades poured through. 3i9ff The Midnight Revels as Observed by the Shades' is considerably shorter in the printed versions than it is in the holograph manuscript in the Queen's University Archives. This is how it appeared in that manuscript: Charles i

This new, wet world appears to me An awful, democratic wreck Or is this what a man must see, When he is looking through his neck?

Louis xvi

There must be some malignant force Here in control of Nature's course; While on the earth I never saw So little reverence for law.

Gulliver

I saw a sardine just now glut His hunger on a halibut.

Pepys

What maddening impulse makes that shark, Which ought by its own nature choose a Mate of its own kind, to spark With that gelatinous Medusa?

Samson

I saw a flounder chase and truss A giant of an octopus.

352 Textual Variants and Emendations

Samuel Butler

How could a thing like rye or hops stir The turgid corpus of a lobster? And thus induce an inflammation Within the shell of a crustacean?

Jonah

I saw a small phlegmatic mullet Holding a dog-fish by the gullet.

Jonathan Edwards

Mark you those squid and caplin? They Have always been the codfish prey, And yet within this very hour I watched them turn upon and slay With ease at least one hundred cod. Now how could this perverted power Rest in the sovereignty of God?

Balfour of Burley

What if a caplin kill a cod, A pilchard or a mackerel Overtake and maul a shark Would that affect the ways of God? Render his nature still more dark? His judgments more inscrutable?

Adam

If I may be allowed to quote What Moses and John Milton wrote, Then the behaviour of a squid Sprang from what I and Eva did. O Moses! Milton! that this night Should follow from an apple bite!

Saint Patrick

Such crimes as from the sea arise Beat out the days of old Gomorrah; Had I not seen it with my eyes, I would not have believed, begorra!

General Booth

I have the gravest doubts that grace Could operate on such a race.

Goethe

That things like fish could get so shot Has nearly wrecked my faith in Gott.

353 Textual Variants and Emendations Matthew Arnold

Am I awake? or did I dream His golden tongue had turned to lead? Or is it that this heavy steam Has dulled that once Olympian head? I never knew such slangy Worter Debase the hallowed lips of Goethe. May Jove save me from going mad On this Helotic night, by Gad!

Byron

Now what the Devil can be hid In whiskey straight, or punch or sherbet, To give the doldrums to that squid, Or plant the horrors in that turbot? I never dreamed a calamary Could get so dead stiff on Canary. (Here a group of Shades led by Falstaff succeed in persuading Bardolph to visit Maryan, the head witch, on the chance of securing some of the liquor either in bottles or on draught.) Falstaff

I prithee, boy - a stoup of sack.

Marlowe

It's gin for me - my throat is black.

Keats

A beaker of Chianti - quick!

Omar Khayham

Any drink that holds a kick.

Martin Luther

Now everything that's labelled 'near' Refuse point-blank. Keep on the watch For Munich or for Frankfort beer.

Cyrano de Bergerac

For me a cask of Burgundy.

Robert Bruce

If you return without the Scotch Then, by this battle-axe, you die. (exit Bardolph)

354 Textual Variants and Emendations Now when beneath the riotous drinking, The witches found the liquor sinking So low their ladles couldn't reach it, The blacksmith with a blazing larynx Organized a sword-fish phalanx, And charged the cauldron plate to breach it... Back from its copper flanks they fell, The smith had done his work too well. A Greek

For such a race of myrmidons Our heroes and our Marathons.

Fabius Maximus

It's but the fury of despair.

A French General

Magnifique! mais ce n'est pas la guerre.

Napoleon

By some wild demonic means My astral promise was undone.

Nelson

By spirits like to such marines Trafalgar and the Nile were won.

Carlyle

Full ten feet thick that plate was wrought, And yet those swordh'sh tried to ram it; Unthinking fools! I never thought The sea so full of numskulls, dammit!

At this juncture a commotion occurs in a remote corner of the hall. Bardolph had returned and was observed surreptiously passing around to some of his friends a large flagon of a hitherto untried brew, and picked up a few yards from the cauldron. A conversation ensued heightened by a display of excitement and anger in which Milton (who at first refused to drink but afterwards decided to do so in order to vindicate his conception of liberty) called Oliver Cromwell a 'bally Roundhead' for his Puritanic interference. Cromwell appealed to Satan for damages, and the Devil ordered Cromwell, Herrick, Moliere and the Vicar of Wakefield to remove Milton through a secret aqueduct in the wall. On the way each member of the carrying squad, finding a bottle in Milton's hip pocket, proceed to taste. In the

355 Textual Variants and Emendations distance the other Shades locate their departed brethren by the rather bibulous rendering of far-off snatches of song. Milton (To be sung to the tune of Old Hundred, if possible) From me no further vapourings Of nectar in the Eden springs, Nor Michael's sword nor Satan's wings, Nor other archangel things Shall be the burden of my strings. From now henceforth one thing I do, One song I chant, one goal pursue, Tis of the witches and their brew, Of Bardolph and his whiskey too, To these alone my praise is due. Carlyle

The blown wind-bag!

Arnold

The Philistine; A Gaza slave he might have been, He got so skiffy on that brew.

Horace

He's pickled bad.

Burns

He's roarin' fu'. Herrick (singing) Julia! As long as I'm alive Thy faithful spouse I'll be. The Vicar For harps and crowns I shall not strive, This is the life for me. Cromwell The one who planned this snappy brew Should be the Lord of Hell; Moliere Gel! Ce monde est plein de fous, Vive la bagatelle!

356 Textual Variants and Emendations Wordsworth

Milton who sang of morning stars, Loaded! and borne out by four pickups; Joining with them in maudlin bars, With ribald jests and vulgar hiccups.

Adam

If he would blame me when he's dry, For all that I have seen tonight, What kind of language would he try To fasten on me, when he's tight.

(Order having been restored, Satan addresses the witches) Now by my hoof, this recipe Is worth a million souls to me; But lo! what mortal creature there Grins, haunched upon the parapet, Whose fierce, indomitable stare I long have dreamed of, but not met? Maryan

Most sovereign and most sulphurous Lord! We, with the help of Cretans made This circumambient palisade Of this great height and strength, to ward Off such invaders as might mar Our feast, and then as sentinel Chief vigilante out of hell We stationed HIM from Zanzibar.

Satan

Why does it claw the air and spit?

Maryan

Satan! Thou only knowest it.

Satan

Has it partaken of the brew?

Maryan

Not yet, Your Majesty, not yet, Not while he's on the parapet.

Satan

What means that deep and dark tattoo Upon his brow and near his nose?

357 Textual Variants and Emendations Maryan

We cannot read what is writ here, Without a wise interpreter.

Satan

Virgil! Decipher.

Virgil

Satan

Flectere si nequeo Acheronta movebo.

Superos

Good! From such audacious seed Sprang Heaven's finest, fallen breed. Maryan! Ardath! Lulu! Try out upon this cat the brew.

48iff The section immediately following this one, entitled 'Further Observations of the Immortals' in the holograph at Queen's University Archives, contains the following additional speeches: Homer [between The Blacksmith and Sir Isaac Newton] As fierce as a euroclydon, His like is not in Acheron. Captain Ahab [between Blake and Bottom] I swear now by my ivory leg, By my Fedallan and Queequeg, That in a fight with Moby Dick, This cat would make the whale look sick. Buffon [this and the remainder coming after Calvin] II n'y a que le premier pas Qui coute. Newman Wilberforce

Fas est.

Nee scire omnia

You must admit I win; No kinship have we with this brute, No point of contact with his sin, The cleavage here is absolute.

358 Textual Variants and Emendations Huxley

I'm not sure one could not trace A likeness on his Lordship's face.

Augustine

Nemo turpissimus fuit Repente.

Duns Scotus

Sequitur deteriora.

Videt meliora;

Cicero

Hie felis - nascitur, non fit.

Kant

Monster! Whence thy original? What dire passions in thee dwell? What nature in thy bosom lives, So dead to all imperatives?

So intense has become the speculation and so personal that Hamlet, seeing no solution, goes over and throws himself into the cauldron. Excited Voices

Faux pas! Felo de se! Mandamus!

Methuselah

Vita brevis!

Falstaff

Ergo bibamus!

Falstaff follows Hamlet to the cauldron but soon returns, remarking that he too would have committed suicide if he had been able to stand the steam. For some time now the cat has disappeared from the vision of all except Satan who is observed by the Shades to be often rubbing his hands, chuckling and muttering to himself in a language unknown except to a small bevy of Assyriologists who decide, upon the resemblance of some of the Devil's syllables to certain hypothetical roots that the Prince of Darkness is using an antediluvian tongue. Presently, however, the whole company is startled by a gesture from Ardath.

359 Textual Variants and Emendations 468 things] thing, 1925, 1926. An obvious compositorial error The Cachalot CF (1925), Titans (1926), VS (1930), CP (1944), TSP (1947), CP* (1958) 77-8 In the CF version these lines read: A punt would founder; while a 'fliver' Or a dog-cart might be made to pass His bile-duct to the duodenum 79 Without a peristaltic quiver] omitted from CF 183 six] ten, CF 371 crunching] crunchings, CF 380 The other boats] The boats, CP58; seems to be a compositorial error 410 one fugitive] own one fugitive, CF 423 oars] bows, CF 432 amidship] amidships, CF 443 Three] Five, CF 464 The worm of a Titan's broken pride] Of a vanquished Titan's broken pride, CF Tatterhead AV (1926), QQ (1927), Acadie (1930), MM* (1932), HTF (1962) 23 or] nor, AV, QQ 27 dreary] blasted, AV, QQ, Acadie 33 smooth] sleek, AV, QQ, Acadie The Sea-Cathedral AV (1926), CF (1927), VS (1930), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) 17 far-off] distant, AV, CF 18 his] the, AV, CF, MM 21 southwards] southward, AV, CF The Great Feud Titans (1926), CP (1944), NR (1952), CP* (1958) 79 Came] Come, CP44, NR 103 in by] by in, NR 116 that primal] that the primal, NR; the latter seems to make better sense, but the copy-text has not been emended. 515 animals] animal, Titans

360 Textual Variants and Emendations 984 throats] throat, Titans 1154-5 The following lines, omitted from all other versions, are to be found between these two lines in Titans: Had baulked within the cosmic throat. And now and then the storm would lull To admit the sharp reverberant crack From the last strain on a camel's back, Or break in the horn of an eland bull; Or now, within a deadlier pause, The ricochet of a jackal's laugh, Or the rap of the hoof from a giraffe Staving in a panther's jaws. And then the rage would sweep again Throughout the battle curve of pain; A scuffling run with gride and clash As of a thousand scimitars Wild boars attacking jaguars; The click of teeth with heavy splash In the mangrove swamp of the Blue Lagoon, And alligators' necks were wrung By gorillas in the reeds who flung Them at the red disk of the moon, In vengeance for a slain baboon; And this was followed by the scud Of Barbary apes and orang outangs Scarified by lions' fangs, Till all was swallowed in the thud Of many antlered herds, aurochs, Zebus, and hartlebeests, spring-boks, Marsh buffaloes and elks and yaks, Taking with concerted brunt, Of savage hoof and lowered front, The charge of congregated packs Of wolves whose shadow-doubled forms Swept down as if they had been hurled, By the vexed hands of winter storms, From all the tundras of the world ... And yet the scale, for all this woe, Had still a higher note to go.

361 Textual Variants and Emendations 1157-64 In the Titans version these lines were as follows: All through the day - in throaty rasp, And sulphurreted bronchial gasp, In intermittent cough with pant Of steam and pulmonary groan Being full of slag, the stridulant Jurania, like a surly crone Retching with abdominal strain, Began to spit and tell how sore She felt down to the inmost core With pressure of Silurian pain. By dusk, her fetid breath had grown Into a thick revolving cone Which swelled and burst into a wrack Of vapour which, re-forming later Into a cloud with heart of black, Filtered down and slowly spread Heavily over the yawning crater With faint periphery of red. 1172-6 In the Titans version these lines were expanded as follows: Just as the last convulsive stroke Unthrottled all the tidal drains That branched from the volcano's heart, The storm flood of the lava broke. Through all her slag-corroded veins And thousands of arterial cracks, Through vertical and lateral rips And gullies in the visceral tracks, Through open gullet and through lips Scored with unhealing fissures came This deluge of Tartarean flame. The Lee-Shore CF (1927), VS (1930), Onward (1932), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (i95»)/ HTF (1962) Alternate titles: 'A Lee Shore,' CF; 'A Lee-Shore/ MM, Onward The Iron Door; An Ode 1927 [distinct edition], CP (1944), CP* (1958)

362 Textual Variants and Emendations 227 When life was sinking in its cosmic trial] When life was winged at its Icarian trial, 1927 Old Age CJRT (1928), CM (1931), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (1958) 8 To the round of a wheel chair and four dull walls] To a wheeled chair and the round of four dull walls, CJRT; To the round of a wheeled chair and four dull walls, CM, MM

The Convict Holocaust (Columbus, Ohio, 1930) CF (1930), MM (1932), NP (1936), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Alternate title: The Fair-Grounds Columbus, Ohio/ CF Whither? CJRT (1930), Onward (1932), MM* (1932) 7 will] shall, CJRT The Lost Cause CJRT (1930), QQ (1932), MM* (1932) 7 Brave] Were, CJRT; Proud, QQ Sea-Gulls AV (1930), MM (1932), LM (1932), RR (1933), NP (1936), NH (1938), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) 7 a] the, AV The Child and the Wren CPC (1930), Onward (1932), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (1958) 4 gable-ends] gable-end, C?44 The Roosevelt and the Antinoe 1930 [distinct edition], CP (1944), CP* (1958) 679 six] five, 1930 To Angelina, an Old Nurse CF(i93i), MM (1932), CP (1944), TSP (1947), NM (1954), CP* (1958) 22 always] ever, CF 79 pale sardonic] fleshless, CF Time Worn CF (1931), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962)

363 Textual Variants and Emendations i footstep] footsteps, CF 9 I only] I can only, CF The 6000 CNR Magazine (1931), MM (1932), CP (1944), TSP (1947), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) Original title: 'No. 6000' 64 And there] And here, CNR Mag 67 this line omitted from CNR Mag 68 Made] Kept, CNR Mag 90 Six] Two, CNR Mag From Stone to Steel C/RT (1932), MM (1932) NP (1936), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Alternate title: 'From Java to Geneva/ C/RT, NP The Depression Ends CF(i932), MM (1932), CP (1944), CP* (1958) 29 stomach] belly, CF & MM The following lines, between 32 and 33, were omitted from the CP44 and CP58 versions: No major-generals iron-shod Who stalk through life as on parade, Wearing their badges and gold braid, And throwing out their chests to God; 49 Tishbite's, fed] Tishbite fed, CF; Tishbite, fed, MM The Man and the Machine NO (1932), MM (1932), NP (1936), CP (1944), CP* (1958) 15 cougar] panther, NO The Mirage TC (1932), FG (1937), CP* (1958) 7 And any moment now would start the chime] And any signal would command the chime, TC 13 and] or, TC Like Mother, Like Daughter SN (1933), FG (1937), CP (1944), CP* (1958)

364 Textual Variants and Emendations 21-4

Olga, Gretchen, Wilhelmine, Golden Sal and slim Suzette, Fiery Peg and dark Kathleen, Brown-eyed Mary, blue-eyed Bett, SN A Prayer-Medley

CF (1933), FG* (1937)

This last line in the CF version was omitted from FG: For we do not forgive those who trespass against us. The Text of the Oath AV (1933), NP (1936), NF (1936), FG* (1937) Alternate title: Text of the Oath/ NP and NF 15 those to hate] these to hate, NP, NF 21-4 Omitted from NP, NF The Mystic QQ (1934), FG (1937), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Alternate title: 'Credo Quia Non Intellego/ QQ The Seer Vo*(i934), CF (1936), FG* (1937) Alternate title: The Twentieth Century Prophet/ CF Fire

Vox (1934), FG (1937), CP (1944), CP* (1958) 23 The old Sun's ultimate expatriate] Old Demogorgon's last expatriate, Vox, FG The Prize Cat QQ (1935), CPM (1936), NP (1936), FG (1937) NH (1938), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Alternate title: The Prize Winner/ QQ, NP 10 strains] strain, QQ The Weather Glass CF (1935), FG (1937), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) 10 billets'] billows', CF

Annotations Sandra Djwa, Robert Gibbs, David Savage

The notes, which are intended to provide a general guide for the student of Pratt's poetry, include explanations of archaic words, some proper names, nautical terms, and Newfoundland dialect words as well as brief references to biblical, literary, mythological, and historical allusions. ABBREVIATIONS

E/P: EV EJP: MY E/P: TY NV OHLP TSP UTQ

E.J. Pratt: The Evolutionary Vision, by Sandra Djwa E.J. Pratt: The Master Years 1927-1964, by David G. Pitt E.J. Pratt: The Truant Years 1882-1964, by David G. Pitt Newfoundland Verse E.J. Pratt: On His Life and Poetry, ed. Susan Gingell Ten Selected Poems, ed. E.J. Pratt University of Toronto Quarterly

A Poem on the May Examinations

12 'slaughter of the Innocents': See Matthew 2:16. 27 'Laws of Motion': Isaac Newton's three laws of motion 30-68 'an element of White': There is no white in the spectrum. Pratt introduces a series of errors relating to Alexander, Plato, Phidias, and Xenophon to illustrate the mistakes students make in examinations. 69-73 Compare these lines with Byron's 'Thoughts Suggested by a College Examination.' 86 'Beghadkhephaths': from Hebrew grammar, acronym for consonants whose sound is modified by the presence of a daghesh 86 'Dagheshes': points or dots placed within Hebrew letters to denote that they are doubled or aspirated

366 Annotations 87 'Athnak': in Hebrew, an accent indicating a rest, used to regulate recitation of sacred texts 92 Te Nun verbs': a class of contracted verbs in Hebrew The Wind of the West 15 'that wild child of Nereus': Amphitrite, one of the Nereides, daughter of the Greek sea god, Nereus 18 'temple of Neptune's High Priest': Amphitrite became the wife of Neptune, or Poseidon, who controlled the waves by his trident and his chariot. The Secret of the Sea 22 'amaranth': (Gk: 'unfading') flower of the genus Amaranthus and poetic symbol of immortality. Several species have an unfading red pigmentation in stems and leaves. Unseen Allies 3 'Sydney': Sir Philip Sydney (or Sidney), poet of the English Renaissance and courtier of Elizabeth i 7 'Grenville, Hawke': Sir Richard Grenville was a sixteenth-century naval hero; Lord Edward Hawke was an eighteenth-century English admiral. The Seed Must Die 2 'wastrel waters of the Marne and Yser': the waters ran riot with the blood of World War i casualties. There were two crucial battles in 1914 and 1918 near the Marne River, in France. The Yser (the old spelling of Ijzer), northwest of Ypres, Belgium, also was an area of heavy fighting. 4 'Ceres': Roman name of the Earth Mother, goddess of agriculture 9 'impurpurate': to make purple The Greater Sacrifice 11 'Joffre's kiss': General Joseph Jacques Joffre was commander-in-chief of the French forces during the first two years of World War i. His 'kiss' refers to the custom of French commanders, when presenting a medal, of kissing the recipient on both cheeks. 12 'Nivelle's soul-shaking words': General Robert Georges Nivelle commanded the French armies from 1916 to 1917. His 'soul-shaking words' were delivered on 23 June 1916, at Verdun, France, during

367 Annotations the great battle there, when he wrote 'Us ne passeront pas' (They shall not pass), referring to the opposing German troops. 16 'tunnels of Verdun': Verdun, a key French fortress in World War i, was heavily tunnelled. 17 'limed scoriae': 'Scoriae' is refuse made from cellular material, in this case human bodies covered with quicklime to speed decomposition. One million men were killed at Verdun during World War i. For Valour 36 'thrice-reefed canvas': sail (or sails) with three reefs taken in to reduce the sail's surface as much as possible. The reefs are strips across a sail that can be taken in or rolled up to reduce the sail's surface. 39 'stanchions': upright posts 40 'bulwarks': the ship's sides above the deck 42 'barque' (or 'bark'): specifically, a three-masted vessel; poetically, any ship or boat 45 'reck': pay heed to The Sea-Shell 32 'threnodies': songs of lamentation, especially at death Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland in Verse 2 'the giant bay': possibly Fortune Harbour, Newfoundland 39 'Banks': the Grand Banks, submarine plateau off SE Newfoundland, one of the most important fishing grounds in the world 92 'flake': a fish flake, which is a wooden drying rack for fish 160 'boom': a long spar, with one end attached to the mast, stretching the foot of a sail 160 'bowsprit': a spar swung out from a ship's stem, the stem being an upright continuation of a ship's keel at its bow 183 'belay': to coil round a cleat, which is a projecting piece of wood or iron bolted to a deck or dock 183 'sheet': rope or chain at the lower end of a sail to regulate it 184 'gibe' ('jib' or 'gybe'): to bring a sail from one side to the other of a boat 188 'wing-a-wing': wing-and-wing, nautical term for sails extended on either side by booms 207 'abaft': to the rear of, behind 207 'beam': the side of a vessel, or the direction at right angles to the keel with reference to the wind or sea

368 Annotations 208 'taffraiT: rail round the stern of a vessel, or the upper part of the stern 232 'moil': toil or turmoil 252-70 See The Ice-Floes.' 256 'Outpanning': the noun 'pan' denotes a pile of seal pelts on the ice, marked with a flag during sealing. 'To pan' means to pile the pelts in this fashion. To outpan is to pile more seal pelts than another group of sealers. 288 'linguals': sounds formed by the tongue 393 'cloke': cloak 421 'sun-hound': sun-dog or parhelion, a mock sun or bright spot near the sun, usually portending stormy weather 461 'weltering': rolling 461 'Cape Race': For a fuller description of this treacherous spot, see Pratt's poem 'The Way of Cape Race.' 476 'petrel': a small black and white seabird with long wings 512 'guerdon': reward 548 'naiad': a water nymph The Largess of 1917 39 'Life - sandalled on the waters': an allusion to Christ. See Matthew 14:2511. Invocation Refers to the wreck of the ss Florizel, 24 February 1918. See 'Loss of the Steamship Florizel/ October, 1918 30 'Gethsemane': the scene of Christ's betrayal. See Matthew 26:36 and Mark 14:32^. Amerongen Amerongen is the town in Holland to which Emperor William in of Germany (the Kaiser) fled on 9 November 1918 and from which he announced his abdication. 10 'myrmidons': a mythical race of man said to have sprung from ants. In the Trojan War, the myrmidons fought with Achilles In Memoriam 7 'Courcelette': town in France taken by the British led by a FrenchCanadian battalion, 15 September 1916 8 Tasschendaele': town in Belgium captured by Canadians, 6 November 1917

369 Annotations 22 'triangulate': divide into triangles for surveying purposes to determine distance, with the connotation (see stanza i) of triangulating to determine a target Blow! Winds/ and Roar! The source of the title is unknown. Cf. King Lear, 3.2.1.: 'Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks!' Signals See OHLP 61: 'dealing with a tragic incident towards the close of the First World War.' (See Textual Variants. The commentary on this poem under its early title, 'On the Shore,' does not fit the poem later given this title in NV.) Carlo The Evening Telegram, St John's, Newfoundland, has accounts of the rescue of passengers from the ss Ethie by a Newfoundland dog in its issues of 8 January 1920 and 12 March 1920. See OHLP 55-6. This story, widely circulated at the time, was later proven to be fictitious. See also Byron's 'Inscription on the Monument of a Newfoundland Dog.' 36 'Butler': Joseph Butler (1692-1752), Anglican divine, Bishop of Durham, author of The Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course of Nature (1736) 36 'Knox': John Knox (1505-72), Protestant reformer and founder of Presbyterianism 46 'Gadsooks!': an oath, probably a variant of 'God's hooks' 64 The Good Book says are classified': See Matthew 25:32. 80 'a baby in a basket': the child of Mrs J.C. Batten. This incident is discussed in The Evening Telegram, 8 January 1920. 86 'Holy Keys': the keys of heaven. See Matthew 16:19. 98 "'A cunningly devised fable"': See 2 Peter 1:16. In Absentia For a discussion of this poem, see OHLP 56. 19 'ill-starred May and blank September': the end and beginning of the academic year Sea Variations 27 'cressets': metal cups or baskets, often mounted on a pole or suspended from above, containing flammable material burned as a light or beacon

370 Annotations 40 'Prince of all the Revels': In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries revels were times of merrymaking and entertainment as, for example, the Twelfth Night Revels on the night of 5 January. 43 'motley': In medieval times, the jester, or fool, wore motley, a particoloured costume. 87 'besom': a broom, particularly one made of twigs or brush The Ice-Floes See OHLP 56-9. i 'Foretop': the top of the foremast, or the lower forward mast i 'Barrel': a wooden barrel affixed to a mast from which a lookout can spot seals 3 'master-watch': the man in charge of one set group of the crew aboard a sealing vessel hunting seals at sea 4 'The Eagle': ss Eagle was a well-known whaling and sealing ship during Pratt's boyhood but it was not involved in such a tragedy. However, in 1898, forty-eight men from the ship Greenland were lost in similar circumstances to those the poem describes, and in 1914, fifty men were lost from the Newfoundland. 7 'slob and growler': 'slob' is a mass of densely packed ice fragments. 'Growler' is a piece of floating ice, particularly one hazardous to navigation. 10 'white harps': Harp seals are the best-known type of seal in Canada; their young are white in colour. 17-18 Susan Gingell observes that these lines echo the metre, rhyme, and diction of the opening lines of Byron's The Destruction of Sennacherib' (Essays on Canadian Writing, 31, Summer 1985, 93-105). 48 'iron bill': the top of the gaff, now banned, which is a stout stick with an iron hook used for killing seals, hauling pelts, and for survival when sealers fell through the ice 56 'watch's flag': flag set up by a watchman to show where he wants pelts placed 60 'mizzen peak': top of the mizzenmast The Ground Swell See OHLP 56-59. The History of John Jones See OHLP 60. See also 'Newfoundland Types/ OHLP 16.

371 Annotations A Student's Prayer at an Examination 7-8 Thy Word / That honours the intention': See Hebrews 4:12. The Shark See OHLP 60. See also the illustration and description of a shark in Charles G.D. Roberts' The Prowlers' in The Haunters of the Silences (Boston: Page 1907) 96-8. The Decision 'L.R.': Langford Rowell, a student athlete at Victoria College, E/P.TY 260 The Toll of the Bells On 28 March 1898, the ss Greenland reached St John's with twenty-five corpses. Forty-eight men had been lost on the ice. For Pratt's account of this poem, see OHLP 60-1: '...a great church service held here in St John's when the Greenland came in with her survivors.' 13 'A tale of life's fore-shortened days': an allusion of the burial service, as in the words 'Man that is born of woman hath but a short time to live.' 14 The tidal triumph of Corinthians': See i Corinthians i5:2off. 19 Vaunt': a proud or boastful utterance 28 'Iliad of Death': See Homer's Iliad. Magnolia Blossoms 10 'irenic': peaceful The Fog See OHLP 61. 3-4 'rifling Polaris / And the Seven Stars': The fog has robbed the light from Polaris, the 'North Star' used by mariners for navigation, and from the Pleiades, a cluster of stars often called 'the Seven Sisters.' 10 'ash-blades': blades of their oars, which were made of ash

The Morning Plunge 4-8 A reworking of a passage from Rachel 161-6 Loss of the Steamship Florizel On Saturday, 23 February 1918, the Florizel sailed from St John's, bound

372 Annotations for Halifax and New York. On Sunday, shortly after 5 A.M., she went aground on Horn Head Reef, Cappahayden, twelve miles north of Cape Race. For Pratt's account, see OHLP 92:'... the captain steered west too soon and his ship piled up on the rocks. A few of my old class-mates were drowned in that disaster/ For an earlier version of the poem, see OHLP, Appendix c, 158-9. See also Cassie Brown's A Winter's Tale: The Wreck of the Florizel (Toronto: Doubleday 1976). Overheard in a Cove 24 'quintal': a measure of weight; in Newfoundland a hundredweight, which is 112 pounds 42 'Galileo and Copernicus': Galileo (1564-1642) was an Italian astronomer and physicist who supported the principles of Copernicus (1473-1543), a Prussian astronomer who said that the earth and planets revolve around the sun. 91 'Aesculapius': the Greek god of medicine no 'Jack spavin': 'Jack' here means common or ordinary (as in 'jack tar' for an ordinary seaman). Spavin is a disease of a horse's hock, the joint in its hind leg below the knee. 141 'swilin": (Newfoundland dialect) sealing 144 'Jamaica': Jamaica rum 147 'staragons': (Newfoundland dialect) gnarled or twisted evergreen stumps 169 'clamant': insistent, urgent 184 'sand': slang for courage or grit 191 'juniper': probably Newfoundland juniper, a misnomer for larch, a subgroup of the pine family bearing cones and needles 193 'black-strap': a thick and dry molasses 196 'jumper': a canvas outer jacket worn by sailors 201 'quid': a lump of tobacco 206 'scuppers': holes in the ship's side to carry away water from the deck 218 'the primrose by the river's brink': See William Wordsworth, 'Peter Bell,' Part i, i, 249. 220 'eating and drinking ... The world being too much with you': See Wordsworth, The World Is Too Much With Us Late and Soon/ 222 'A presence that disturbs': See Wordsworth, Tintern Abbey/ 11. 94-5-

373 Annotations 226 'brooks that babble on for ever': See Alfred Lord Tennyson, The Brook/ 227 'Sermons there are in stones': see Shakespeare, As You Like It, 2.1.16-17. 255-6 'the thousand natural shocks / That flesh is heir to': See Shakespeare, Hamlet, 3.1.62-3. 320-1 'skulls so old that not a bit / Of chop was left upon the jowls': See Hamlet 5.1.211-12. 328 Tower of Babel': See Genesis 11:4-19. The Passing of Jerry Moore 41 'shoal of caplin': a school of caplin (or capelin), small, salmon-like fish resembling smelts 49 'caulking punts': stopping up, with oakum and melted pitch, the seams of a punt, a term used in the Maritimes and Newfoundland for a sturdy rowboat 178 'Ararat': Mount Ararat. See Genesis 8:4. The Bird of Paradise 34 'osprey': name given by milliners to the large feather of an egret, commonly used during the early twenties as a headdress or on a hat The Epigrapher Title: in this context, one who studies inscriptions on statues, buildings, and coins 6 To justify the ways divine': See Milton's Paradise Lost, Book i, line 26. 8 'Gezir' (or Gezer): a natural fortress in Palestine, on the road between Jerusalem and Jaffa 9 'Lagash, Ur and Eridu': ancient cities in Mesopotamia 13 'Aaron's rod': See Numbers 17:8. 14 'Rameses': the name of many ancient Egyptian pharaohs, or kings. The embalmed body of Rameses n was discovered in 1881. 21 'Behistun Rock': a i,7oo-foot high rock inscribed in Old Persian, Susian, and Assyrian. In 1835, Sir Henry Rawlinson scaled the rock and copied the writings; it was his subsequent translation that led to deciphering cuneiform. 32 'Hammurabi': King of Babylon about 2100 B.C. His code of laws, dis-

374 Annotations covered on a column at Susa, is considered one of the greatest ancient legal codes. 43 'Eternal Salt': The Dead Sea, with no outlet to the sea, contains a high proportion of salt. Ode to December, 1917 74 'sea-mews': sea-gulls 88-91 For a later treatment of this theme, see 'Come Away, Death/ 115 'Apocalypse': See Revelation i:iff. Newfoundland See Lawren Harris's painting, Newfoundland Coast (1920). 26 'gulch-line': the boundary line of a flow of water A Coast 17 'basalt': dark green or brown volcanic rock, typical of rock in Newfoundland cliffs 20 'ground-swell': heavy sea caused by a distant or past storm or an undersea disturbance, characterized by a deep moaning sound 26 'waterspout': formation of water and cloud caused when a whirling cloud descends in a funnel shape towards the sea and draws up a similar volume of whirling water, the two forming a pillar of mixed sea and cloud Morning 3 'flying-jib': light sail set before the jib, the jib being a triangular stay-sail 3 'spanker': fore-and-aft sail set on the aft side of the mizzenmast 6 'moleskin': fabric of twilled cotton used for fishermen's work clothes A Dirge 4 'bare': archaic form of the past tense of 'to bear,' commonly used in the Bible 10 'Sickled': cut down with a sickle Come Not the Seasons Here See Pratt's comment, OHLP161: 'a picture of a countryside devastated by war7 and Frank Watf s response in a 'Letters in Canada' review of OHLP, UTQ (Aug. 1984) that Pratt's comment might be designed to hide that the poem is, perhaps, 'about a more personal graveside grief (452).

375 Annotations 19 'a leaf in the sere': dried, withered, or blasted. See Macbeth 5.2.22-3. Before a Bulletin Board Beaumont-Hamel, was the site of the opening contest of the Battle of the Somme. On i July 1916, the Newfoundland regiment was virtually wiped out. Pratt's younger brother, Arthur, was missing but was later discovered wounded. See Pitt, E/P.TY 159. 2 'k or m'\ killed or missing 4 'hydras': In Greek myths, the Hydra was a many-headed serpent, a monster of the underworld in some accounts, a swamp dweller in others. The nine-headed Hydra that Hercules battles with grows two new heads for every one the hero strikes off. 7 'dawn from midnight': See Exodus 10:22-3. 7 'from fire the gold': See Numbers 31:21-3. 8 'did a rose once blossom from a rod': See Numbers 17:5-8. Before an Altar Subtitle 'After Gueudecourt': Gueudecourt was a French village recaptured from the Germans in September 1916. 8 'Shrovetide': period of three days preceding Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent 9 'rubric': in this context, direction for the conduct of a service of public worship In a Beloved Home 'W.H.G.': W. Hubert Greaves, an American-born professor of public speaking at Victoria College, was a close friend of Pratt's in the 19205. See companion poem 'To Cornie' in the 'Unpublished Poems.' 14 'Even Hamlet came and brooded on the fire': The group read and discussed Shakespeare's Hamlet. Fragment from a Story These verses, written in response to World War i and to unprecedented ocean storms during 1916-17, were excerpted from an unpublished verse play entitled 'Clay,' Ci9i8-i9. The full text of it is reproduced in an appendix to this volume. For suggestions regarding derivation of the title, also see Pitt, E/P:TY 90. Thaddeus': character in Pratt's unpublished verse play, 'Clay,' a foil to the central figure

376 Annotations 'Julian': protagonist in 'Clay/ an embittered ironist. The name suggests Julian the Apostate, Roman Emporor of the fourth century A.D., who tried to restore paganism as the state religion. See also Shelley's Julian and Maddolo: A Conversation. 126 'hecatombs': great public sacrifices, originally sacrifices of 100 oxen to the Greek gods 152 'A ship': perhaps the Titanic. See The Titanic, 86off. 190 'embassage': the sending of ambassadors 232 'rivets on the bolted doors of God': early conception of a mechanical door, bolted against man and thus dramatically closing off his hopes of eternity. A similar image reappears in the 1927 poem The Iron Door: An Ode. 305 'thews': sinews or muscles 401 'a knocking in this clay': 'Clay' is used in the biblical sense as an analogue for human flesh. See Isaiah 46:9, 64:8 and Job 10:9. Comrades 7 'marl': type of soil, mostly clay and carbonate of lime, used as a fertilizer The Lie 5 'shrift': confession

The Drag-Irons Title: 'Drag-irons' are metal hooks used to search the bottom of waters. 8 'grapnel hook': device consisting of a hook, or hooks, for dragging Tokens 8 'fan-light': fan-shaped window over a door The Ritual 20 'shags': cormorants, which are large seabirds To an Enemy 13 'Orient': radiant or rising The Witches'Brew A poem written for Pratt's fifth wedding anniversary. For his account of the writing, publication, and reception of the poem, see OHLP 40. See also Byron's The Vision of Judgment as a prototype for Pratt's

377 Annotations parody and compare the mode of epic burlesque with Samuel Butler's Hudibras. 8 'Saturnalian': of unrestrained revelry, after the ancient Roman festival of Saturn, the god of agriculture 20 'double pectorals': pair of fins situated behind the head of a sea creature 24 'Vulcan's union with [Neptune's] daughter': In some myths, Venus, goddess of love, was the daughter of Neptune. She was the wife of Vulcan, the Roman god of fire and of metal working. 29 'sub-aquaceous': variant spelling of 'subaqueous,' meaning 'under water' 42 'Magellan': Strait of Magellan, between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans near the southern tip of South America 61 'Bacchanals': rites and celebrations of the followers of Bacchus, Greco-Roman god of the vine; in contemporary usage, a drunken revel 66 '"To serve their god while here below"': A parody of the doxology: 'Praise God from whom all blessings flow - / Praise Him all creatures here below.' There is also an analogue for Pratt's transposition of below to hell in Byron's The Vision of Judgment, where Satan states 'I've Kings enough below, God knows!' 69 'the ivy god': Bacchus, who wore a band of ivy around his head 71 'Christiania': alternative name for Oslo, capital of Norway 84-5 'O'Brien's, Burke's, and Johnny Begg's, I Munich, Bock, and Seagram's Rye': Sandra Djwa speculates in EJP:EV (pp 48-9) that the collocation of 'Johnny' and 'Burke' evokes the most popular Newfoundland balladeer of the twenties, Johnny Burke. His account of an alcoholic 'spree,' in 'The Kelligrew's Soiree' may have also filtered into The Witches' Brew. 113 'Laodiceans': those who are lukewarm or indifferent. See Revelations 3:14-16. 118 'Spitzbergen': group of islands in the Arctic Ocean 129 'Auk': northern seabird 131 'Ungava': territory north of Quebec 142 'Patagonian': of Patagonia, the southern part of Argentina 178 'Nantucket': once a famous whaling port on Nantucket Island, off the Massachusetts coast 178 'Baccalieu': small island at the entrance to Conception Bay, Newfoundland

378 Annotations 203 'Zanzibar': island off the east coast of Africa 232 'Salamander': mythical reptile able to live in fire, or a tailed amphibian that leaves the water for the land 238 'ecliptic': apparent path of the sun followed annually 241 'beldams' (or deldames): shrewish hags, here referring to the three witches 271 'phylacteries': small leather cases containing Hebrew texts worn by Jews during prayer. See Deuteronomy 6:8 and 11:18. 272 'Sadducees': members of an ancient Jewish sect who opposed the Pharisees, another sect who strictly observed tradition and written law 278 'Shades': departed spirits in Hades. Like Byron in The Vision of Judgment, Pratt calls forth a procession of spirts to comment on the action. 281 'Wyandots': a pun on Wyandot, brand-name of a tractor, and Wyandots (usual spelling 'Wyandottes'), a breed of chicken 323 'oral': perhaps a play on the Freudian concept of perfect oral adjustment 343 'Byron': In the four lines beginning with 1. 350 Pratt parodies, with slight variation, the rhyme structure of Byron's 'Written After Swimming from Sestos to Abydos.' 347 'calamary': another kind of cuttlefish 348 'Canary': short for Canary wine, a dry white wine from the Canary Islands off the northwest coast of Africa After 349 'Wolsey': Cardinal Wolsey, sixteenth-century English cardinal 349 'dram': drink of spirits 350 'Richmond': Henry Fitzroy, natural son of Henry vm, named first Duke of Richmond in 1525 350 'Buckingham': Edward Stafford, third Duke of Buckingham, executed in 1521 for high treason after a quarrel with Wolsey 352 'Royal Henry': Henry vin 354 'benefice': a position in the Church 357 'hake': fish related to the cod 361 'Campeggio': Lorenzo Campeggio (1474-1539), Italian humanist and cardinal who went to England in 1528 to inquire about Henry vm's marriage to Catherine of Aragon 361 'Hat': cardinal's hat 361 'Clement': probably Pope Clement vn (1342-94). Clement vin (15361605) would have been only three years old at Campeggio's death

379 Annotations 365 Tepys': Samuel Pepys, seventeenth-century English diarist. A philanderer, he was familiar with the 'maddening impulse' of 1. 372. 368 'Medusa': In Greek legend, Medusa was one of the three gorgons, women whose heads were covered with snakes instead of hair. Anyone who looked at them was turned to stone. 369 'Paracelsus': famous sixteenth-century Swiss physician, the subject of Robert Browning's 1835 dramatic poem 'Paracelsus' 370 'Divinest Luna': Roman goddess of the moon. 'Luna' is also used to mean the moon itself. After 373 'Gulliver, 'the hero of Jonathan Swift's 1726 satire, Gulliver's Travels 375 'Samuel Butler': (1612-80), author of Hudibras, whose mode of epic burlesque Pratt is adapting 381 'Saint Patrick': patron saint of Ireland 382 'Gomorrah': an ancient city, destroyed with Sodom for wickedness. See Genesis i8:2off. 384 'begorra': Irish euphemism for 'by God' 394 'Marathons': site of a Greek victory over the Persians in 490 B.C. 395 'Fabius Maximus': great Roman general of the third century B.C. 396 'A French General': Pierre Jean Francois Bosquet, French army officer at the Battle of Balaklava, 1854, during the Crimean War between Britain, France, and Turkey on one side and Russia on the other. 396 'Magnifique! mats ce n'est pas la guerre.' ('Magnificent! But that is not war.') Bosquet made this comment on the charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaklava, when greatly outnumbered British soldiers charged Russian troops. 400 'Trafalgar and the Nile': Two of Nelson's great naval victories were Trafalgar, 1805, and the Nile, 1798. 401 'Carlyle': Thomas Carlyle, nineteenth-century British writer and thinker 431 'jag-on': slang for as much liquor as one can hold 474 'cetacean': order of sea mammals including whales, porpoises, and dolphins 475 'Grampus': dolphin-like cetacean 476 'Humpback, Rorqual, Black and White': four kinds of whale 477 'walrus, lion, hood': three kinds of seal 482 The Blacksmith': See 1. 19 above. 484 'Sir Isaac Newton': seventeenth-century English physicist and philosopher who formulated the laws of motion and gravitation

380 Annotations 488 'Blake': William Blake, eighteenth-century English poet, author of The Tyger' 492 'Bottom': rustic in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream 494 'Owen Glendower': rebellious fourteenth-century Welshman who led the last serious attempt to free Wales from English rule, a character in Shakespeare's Henry iv, Part n, 3.1.53, who says 'I can call spirits from the vasty deep.' 496 'Benjamin Franklin': eighteenth-century American statesman and scientist 497 /my fa*6''- Experimenting with a kite in a thunderstorm, Franklin proved that lightning and electricity are identical. 499 'caudal': of a tail 500 'Aesop': sixth-century B.C. Greek writer of fables 502 'ignis fatuus' (foolish fire): will-o'-the-wisp, meaning a phosphorescent light seen on marshy ground 504 'Euclid': fourth-century B.C. mathematician of Alexandria. He wrote Elements of Geometry, hence the mention of 'circle' in 1. 511 below. 510 'Johnny Walker': personification of Johnny Walker Scotch Whisky, and thus one of the 'discerning spirits' of 1. 522 518 'Calvin': John Calvin, sixteenth-century French theologian and founder of Calvinism, author of The Institutes of the Christian Religion, 1536 567 'Acheron': Greek for 'the River of Sorrows/ referring to a river in Hades, or to Hades itself 578 'masonry': construction, with a secondary playful reference to the secret rites of the Masonic Order The Cachalot For Pratt's accounts of the poem's genesis and composition, see OHLP 35-6, 61-7. For additional literary sources, see Herman Melville's Moby Dick, Frank T. Bullen's The Cruise of the 'Cachalot/ Round the World After Sperm Whales (London: Smith, Elder 1901), and Sir Charles G.D. Roberts' The Haunters of the Silences (Boston: Page 1907). Title: The Cachalot': sperm whale 4 'Leif: Leif Ericsson, Norse discoverer of America ciooo A.D. 6 'Marco Polo': thirteenth-century Venetian traveller in China 6 'Cathay': archaic word for China 10 'da Gama': Vasco da Gama, fifteenth-century Portuguese navigator 12 'Cortez' (usual spelling 'Cortes'): Hernando Cortes, fifteenth-century Spanish soldier and colonizer

381 Annotations 12 'Cavendish': Thomas Cavendish, sixteenth-century English navigator 16 'Van Tromp': presumably Maarten Tromp (1598-1653) or Cornellis Tromp (1629-91), father and son, Dutch admirals during wars against France, Spain, and England. Both were renowned for feats of seamanship. 18 'Redoubtable': English spelling for 'Redoutable,' a French ship at the battle of Trafalgar 24 'Baffin Bay': in the far north, between Baffin Island and Greenland 28 Taurian': bull-like 32 'Saghalien': old spelling of Sakhalin, an island off the east coast of Siberia in the Sea of Japan 44 'Tonga': South Pacific Island. 44 'Hudson Strait': south of Baffin Island 47 'hammerhead': kind of shark whose head is shaped like a doubleheaded hammer 49 'shovelnose': kind of shark with a shovel-like snout 65 'subsidences': refers to square shape of the jaw, gradually slanting away from the vertical to an unimpressive underjaw 75-9 'his pancreas': For Pratt's anecdote about Dr Frederick Banting's response to this image, see OHLP 174, nil. 83 'ambergris': wax-like secretion from a whale used in making perfume 85 'spermaceti': fatty substance obtained from oil in sperm whale's head and used in making ointments 104-223 For an account of a battle between a whale and kraken, see F.T. Bullen, 'Which Treats of the Kraken,' in The Cruise of the 'Cachalot' (London: Smith, Elder 1912) reprinted in OHLP 64-5. 104 'Cape Delgado': cape in Mozambique, in the Indian Ocean 141 'mollusc': term used to describe a giant squid by Charles G.D. Roberts in The Haunters of the Silences; also soft-bodied and usually hard-shelled creatures such as snails and oysters 143 'Gorgonian': of a Gorgon, a mythical snake-haired woman. The sight of a Gorgon can turn people to stone. 167 'cephalopod': mollusc with a tentacled head 205 'Celebes': island in Indonesia 218 'Comoro': short for 'Archipel des Comores,' a group of islands in the Indian Ocean off Mozambique 232 The Line': the equator 234 'Cape of Storms': Cape Horn 241 'Sunda Strait': between the islands of Sumatra and Java in Indonesia

382 Annotations 245 'Cocos and Seychelles': Cocos Island and the Seychelles group of islands, both in the Indian Ocean 251 'duff: pudding of flour and other ingredients boiled in a cloth bag 258 'cross-trees': two horizontal timbers bolted to the head of a lower mast to support the mast above 258 'royal mast': mast above the topmast, the topmast being the mast next above the lower mast 269 'looard': slang for 'larboard,' the old term for the left-hand side of a ship looking forward 269 'beam': direction at right angles to the keel, in this case on the left side 280 'block-sheaves': a block pulley is one housed in a case, and the sheaves are its grooved wheels which the rope runs on. 298 'Clew up your gab!': To 'clew up' is to draw the lower ends of a sail to the upper yard or the mast for furling. Thus in Newfoundland dialect 'Clew up your gab!' means 'Keep Quiet!' 301 'gaily': put to flight by frightening. See Pratt's note in TSP (passim the entire poem). 308 'box-lines': The lines attached to the harpoons are stored in boxes to prevent tangling. 309 'Sheer!': change course 309 'Unship': take down 311 'jam the pole under the thwart': store the mast under the thwart, the bench an oarsman sits on 326 'the drugg': wooden drag attached to the end of a harpoon rope 338 'gunwales': upper edges of a ship's sides 343 'piggin': small bailing bucket 345 'to dout': to dowse or extinguish as in 'do out' 347 'loggerhead': post built into a boat for fastening to it a turn of rope 402 'mackerel sky': sky dotted with small white clouds 406 'cross-boards': thwarts 408 'draw': The harpoon is said to draw when its hold on the blubber of the whale is unable to stand the strain (Pratt's note, TSP). 424 'hard-a-lee': turned hard to the lee side, meaning the side away from the wind 465 'Bowhead': whale allied to the Greenland type, inhabiting Arctic and Antarctic waters (Pratt's note, TSP) 468 'Helot': serf in ancient Sparta

383 Annotations 468 'the bitts': posts on ship's deck for securing cables 477 'pawl': catch on a windlass to prevent it from running back 517 'shroud': set of ropes supporting a mast 517 'trestle-cheek': The trestle is a framework on a lower mast which supports the topmast. The cheeks are the sidepieces of this framework. 520 'skysail peak': top of the skysail, a light sail above the royal sail in a square-rigged ship, the royal sail being above the topgallant sail and mast Tatterhead 2 'bollards': posts set in a wharf for securing mooring ropes 22 'chocolate meraschino' (usual spelling 'maraschino'): cherry that has been preserved in maraschino, a liqueur, and then dipped in chocolate 26 'Borsalino': brand of fine hats manufactured in Alessandro, Italy 33 'Castile suds': reference to Castile soap, made from olive oil and soda 40 'Frobisher': Sir Martin Frobisher, sixteenth-century English navigator who searched for the Northwest Passage and discovered Frobisher Bay The Sea-Cathedral For Pratt's comments on this poem, see OHLP 67-8. 2 'Parian': of the Greek island of Paros, source of much marble used in ancient sculpture The Great Feud For Pratt's accounts of the poem's composition and meaning, see OHLP 68-73. See also Charles G.D. Roberts, In the Morning of Time (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart 1922) and F.A. Lucas, Animals of the Past: An Account of Some of the Creatures of the Ancient World (New York: American Museum of Natural History 1922). 'Pleiocene': geological epoch in which modern plants and animals developed, a period of active volcanoes and mountain building 1-2 'Like a quarter moon ... world': See Roy Campbell's poem, The Flaming Terrapin (London: Jonathan Cape 1924) 48. 3 'Magians': wise men. The best-known magi were the three who visited the infant Jesus 7 'Arafura Seas': section of the Pacific Ocean between Australia and New Guinea. 'The scene is laid in Australasia on the littoral border

384 Annotations of an isthmus joining Australia and Malay, a geological fact about a million years ago' (OHLP 68). 30 'Guadeleras': This is one of the place names used that has no connection with Australasia, scene of the poem. Others are 'Scala/ suggesting that the 'Scala flats' were the ladder between sea and land, 'Aral/ 'Ravenna,' 'Roc/ 'Dura/ 'Skibo Run/ 'Blue Lagoon/ and 'Gumra.' It appears that as Pratt considered none of the modern Australian place names appropriate, he invented names or borrowed them from a distant land (as in the case of 'Ravenna'), perhaps to suggest that in the later forming and separating of continents, places once close together moved far apart. 33 'Jurania': The Jura range in France gave its name to the Jurassic period, a geological epoch earlier than the Pleiocene, in which giant reptiles had flourished. 43 Tellurian': of the earth 73 'sloes': small, plumlike fruit of the blackthorn shrub 78 'aeonian': of an aeon; an indefinitely long period of time 80 'trilobite': extinct group of creatures with jointed legs which included hard-backed sea creatures and spiderlike land creatures 101 'prolapsis' (usual spelling 'prolapsus'): slipping down or falling out of place of a body organ 134 'mummed': went silently 136 'Aeolus': god of the winds 138 Trumpeter': in mythology, Triton, a son of Neptune 147 'Charon': mythic Greek ferryman of dead souls. Charon plied his trade on the Styx, the river surrounding Hades. 148 'Stygian packet': 'stygian/ of the river Styx or of Hades; 'packet/ a boat, in this case Charon's ferry, which travels regularly on a fixed route 152 'Cerberus': three-headed dog guarding Hades 154 'whiffletrees': A whiffletree is a crossbar to which the traces of a horse's harness are fastened in pulling a cart or plow. 155 'scranny': weak or reedy in sound 158 'Hecate': Greek goddess of the dead associated with witchcraft 159 'harpies': in Greek mythology, rapacious monsters, each with a woman's head and body but a bird's wings and claws 201 'spiracle': breathing-hole in animals, such as the blow-hole of whales 224 'bandicoots': type of very large rat 231 'gnoos' (usual spelling 'gnus'): type of antelope

385Annotations

260 'eolith': rude stone implement considered man's first tool 297 'ramp': move on the hind legs 349 'wanderoo': kind of monkey 376 'water-horses': hippopotamuses 436 'mangosteens': edible fruit of the East Indian mangosteen tree 439 'durian': the pungent fruit of the durian tree of Southeast Asia 506 'quaggas': South African mammals related to zebras 519 'Bashan': region of ancient Palestine 519 'Cashmir' (usual spelling 'Kashmir'): former princely state, north of India, now divided into Jammu and Kashmir 521 'reid-buck' (usual spelling 'reedbuck' or 'reitbok'): South African antelope that frequents reedy places 553 'salt-bush' (usual spelling 'saltbush'): any one of various Australian plants of the goosefoot family, plants with large coarse leaves shaped like a goose's foot 556 'Hindu Kush': mountains in Afghanistan and Pakistan 560 'Cabul' (usual spelling 'Kabul'): province of Afghanistan 573 'nard': aromatic Himalayan plant whose extract was made into an ointment in ancient times 624 'Tyrannosauros Rex' (usual spelling 'Tyrannosaurus'): huge carnivorous dinosaur that walked upright on its hind legs 631 'Hera': goddess of marriage and fertility, wife of Zeus. Her Roman name is Juno. 639 'stegosaur': giant reptile found in fossil form in upper Jurassic rocks 650 'moa': extinct, flightless New Zealand bird that resembled an ostrich 668 'cassowary': large, flightless Australian bird, like an ostrich but somewhat smaller 669 Tan-cyclonic': moving in all circles, all-embracing 705 'sassafras': tree whose aromatic bark is used medicinally 773 'peregrines': peregrine falcons 777 'ursine': covered with dense bristles 791 '"Sulphur Bottom"': largest species of whale 838 'Gehenna': gorge southwest of Jerusalem, in which was Topheth, the scene of sacrifices to Moloch, god of the Ammonites, to whom children were made to 'pass through the fire' and burn to death. To prevent further human sacrifices, Josiah polluted Topheth. See 2 Kings 23:10 and Milton, Paradise Lost, Book i, 403-5. 860 'lamia': one of a group of mythical monsters which had the head and breast of a woman and the body of a serpent

386Annotations

870 'bottle-nose': bottle-nosed dolphin 871 'bullet-head': generic term not applicable to a specific species of whales 904 'Saw-bills': sawfish, or fish with saw-like teeth 905 Thornbacks': European flat-bodied fish that have a double row of spines in their tails 906 Torpedo rays': electric rays, flat-bodied fish that can stun their prey with electric shocks 925 'lash-rays': sting-rays, with a strong barbed spine attached to the upper side of the tail 927 'jacks': male salmon 932 'rhinodons': giant sharks of the Indian Ocean 936 'argali': Asiatic wild sheep 940 'koodoos': large African antelope 970 'aye-ayes': nocturnal mammals, related to monkeys and about the size of cats, found in Madagascar 979 'hounds of an Eo-Irish race': primeval Irish wolfhounds, dogs trained to hunt wolves 982 'becunas': ferocious Mediterranean fish 994 'Saurian': of the Sauria, a group of reptiles such as lizards, crocodiles, and dinosaurs 1006 'Pelagic': of the seas 1042 'flitches': portions of meat 1090 'Oceanus': in Greek mythology, the god of the salt river that the ancients thought flowed round the earth. Oceanus was one of the six male Titans, pre-Olympian immortals of great size and strength. 1103 'Austral': presumably an abbreviated version of 'Australasian.' The word may have been copied from 'Austral' in 'Austral Islands,' a volcanic group of islands in the South Pacific. 1139 'babyroussa' (usual spelling 'babiroussa'): eastern Asiatic wild hog 1144 'allouattes' (usual spelling 'alouattas'): The alouatta is a South American monkey, often called a howler monkey because its call is claimed to be the loudest sound any animal can make. 1162 'Silurian': of rocks beloning to the Silurian period, a geological era between 440 million and 400 million years ago. Cherries For Pratt's comments on this poem, see OHLP 73.

387 Annotations The Lee-Shore

For Pratt's comments on this poem, see OHLP 73-4. The Iron Door: An Ode The occasion of this poem was the death of Pratt's mother, Fanny (Knight) Pratt, on 20 December 1926. For Pratt's account of the poem's genesis and meaning, see OHLP 74-5. 13 'Plutonian': of Pluto, Roman god of the dead and of the lower regions. 'Plutonian' is also used to describe volcanic rock. 15 'architrave': lowest part of an entablature, the portion of a classic architectural structure that rests horizontally on the columns 47 'frore': frozen 96 'capstan bars': A capstan is a revolving barrel used for winding cable or hoisting heavy sails. A hand-operated capstan had horizontal bars around it; seamen walked round pushing these bars. 96 'davits': pair of cranes for lowering or lifting a ship's boat 116 'Another form': Pratt's mother 145 'winding-sheet': sheet in which a corpse is wrapped for burial 148 'Life for a life': See Deuteronomy 19:21 and John 10:10. 159-60 'Creator's power... spent': This suggests late nineteenth-century thought, in particular the concept that God, the great clockmaker, has withdrawn from his artifact, creation. 165-6 'beacon signals ... systems dead': See Book i passim of Thomas Hardy's The Return of the Native. Djwa, in EJP:EV 52 identifies this section of the poem with Hardy's evolutionary pessimism. 169 'clench' (or 'clinch'): conclusive settlement 175 'miserere': cry for mercy. See Psalm 51:1. 189 'dark burden': sins of the fathers or original sin. See Exodus 34:07 and Deuteronomy 5:09. This concept is fused with Darwinism, which held that certain traits are transmitted to one's offspring. 200 'Cain': See Genesis 4:8. 209-10 'A woman's cry against the arrest / Of hope': See Romans 8:24. 211 Theban mockery of the crest': The meaning of this phrase is debatable. When Oedipus abdicated as King of Thebes, his two sons, Eteocles and Polynices, agreed to reign in alternate years. But Eteocles, the elder brother, refused to give up the kingship after his year. In the resulting civil war the two brothers killed each other. Thus the death's head might be seen as the crest of Thebes. A somewhat different explanation is offered by F.W. Watt, who suggests

388 Annotations

that the phrase is an allusion to the sphinx and the encounter with Oedipus on the road to Thebes. Failure to answer the riddle of the sphinx meant a penalty of death (UTQ, 54.127-47, Winter 1984-5). 227 'cosmic trial': When the poem was first published in 1927, this phrase read Tcarian trial/ thus suggesting human rashness. Icarus, attempting to fly, attached wings to his body with wax. When he ventured too near the sun the wax melted and he plummeted to his death. However, when Pratt changed the phrase from 'Icarian trial' to 'cosmic trial' in 1958, the focus of the argument was changed from human hubris to an indictment of the cosmos. Specifically, the phrase suggests the 'cosmic process' of T.H. Huxley's famous Romanes Lecture of 1893, 'Evolution and Ethics.' In this essay Huxley speculates about the 'unfathomable injustice of the nature of things' and points out that if man were able to bring the cosmos before a tribunal of ethics, 'the cosmos might well seem to stand condemned/ Pratt, who deals with some aspects of this argument in The Iron Door, again raises the concept of the 'trial' in the later poem, The Truant/ 243 'root faith within a woman's heart': See Corinthians 13 passim on faith, hope, and charity. 272 'something heavy and as old as clay': Clay is used in the biblical sense of the limitations of human flesh and, by implication, understanding. See notes to 'A Fragment from a Story.' 280 'it was not given me to know': Vincent Sharman, in 'Illusion and an Atonement: E.J. Pratt and Christianity/ Canadian Literature 19 (Winter 1964) 21-32, argues that the narrator's position is essentially agnostic. However, with reference to i Corinthians 13:12, this section of the poem may be seen as an expression of orthodox Christianity. A Prairie Sunset 7 'Carraran': of Carrara, an Italian marble 12 'paladins': heroic knights 28 'Promethean': Prometheus was a Titan in Greek mythology who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to man. The Convict Holocaust On 22 April 1930, a fire in the State Penitentiary at the Fair-Grounds in Columbus, Ohio, left 355 dead.

389

Annotations

The Lost Cause 2 'argonaut': in Greek legend, one who sailed with Jason in the ship Argo to search for the Golden Fleece Blind Pratt's mother was virtually blind before her death. Sea-Gulls For Pratt's comment on this poem, see OHLP 75. The Child and the Wren 'Claire': Mildred Claire Pratt, Pratt's daughter. For his account of the poem's origin, see OHLP 75. The Roosevelt and the Antinoe For Pratt's detailed accounts of the poem's genesis and composition and of the events themselves, see OHLP 76-86. 2 'She': ss President Roosevelt 13-27 the contract: 'I went through the contracts between the sailors and the master signed before sailing/ OHLP 77-8 35 'foc's'le': short for 'forecastle/ which in a merchant ship is the forward part, under the deck, where the sailors live 36 'dunnage': baggage or personal effects 47 'Hudson': Hudson River, flowing into the Atlantic at New York 49 'Sandy Hook': point of land off New Jersey, south of New York Harbor 50-1 'Great Circle Track': favoured route for ships crossing the North Atlantic 51 'Queenstown' (now called 'Cobh'): port in southern Ireland 56 'Wednesday': 20 January 1926 64 'gaskets': small cords for securing a furled sail to a yard 78 'the six-hundred-metre wave': band reserved for ships' radio signals 102 'cowls': ventilators, cowl-shaped at the top 104 'Bell-mouths': bell-shaped drain endings 104 'full bore': as quickly as possible 107 'midship house': construction, amidships, sheltering the helmsman 124 'laggin'': strips of cloth or felt with which a boiler or steam pipes were insulated 131 'Fried': Captain George Fried. For Pratt's account of another rescue

390 Annotations

effected by Fried and his crew on the America on 29 January 1929, see OHLP177. 132 'aneroid': aneroid barometer, an instrument that measures atmospheric pressure 188 'Andromeda': constellation in the northern sky 215 'binnacle': box holding the compass 279 'his captain': Harry Tose. For Pratt's account of a rescue effected by Captain Tose ten years before, see OHLP 85. 343 'vernier': small auxiliary scale for obtaining fractional parts of the subdivisions of a fixed scale 360 'log': permanent record of all events and the rate of progress on a ship's voyage 360 'dead reckoning': estimating a ship's position by compass and recorded distance when direct observations are not possible 368-71 'Solvang, Curlew, Carlstad, Carlotta, Orebro': other ships suffering damage or attempting to assist others during the storm. See OHLP 83. 380 'came to the luff: came nearer to the wind 390 'weather quarter': direction from which the wind is blowing (aft on the port or starboard side) 394 Tort easy!': 'Steer gently to the port side' 401 'hawse nostrils': Pratt is comparing the hawse-holes in the ship's bow to a dog's nostrils. The hawse-holes are cut in the bow to allow anchor chains to pass through. 401 'flair': smell 413 'weather gage': being to the windward. 430 'lee-wing': extreme side of the ship on the lee side, meaning the side away from the wind 442 'Master-at-arms': on a ship, the equivalent of a policeman 450 'falls': ropes in hoisting tackle 451 'cranks': cranks used to raise and lower the lifeboat 451 'gripes': lashings securing the lifeboat in place 452 'blocks': part of the pulley system 453 'chocks': wedges supporting a boat on deck 455 'spring-stay': horizontal stay connecting the lower topmasts of a vessel 457 'quadrant screw': device for swinging the davits out 90°, from being parallel to the deck to being at right angles to it so that the boat is hanging over the water

391 Annotations

459 'painters': A painter is a rope normally attached to a boat's bow. In this case the lifeboat has two painters, one at the bow and one at the stern. 476 'slip-links': release mechanism on the falls 490 'running loops': loops in a rope along each side of the lifeboat 490 'cork-grips': oval-shaped pieces of cork, each with a hole in the middle to allow it to be strung on a running loop 505 'eye-splice': loop at the end of a rope, made by turning up the end of the rope and weaving its strands with those of the main part of the rope 572 'guy': rope or chain holding something in place 604 'rune': in this context, a mystic song 604 'foster-lap': Because they have not yet received a funeral rite, the two drowned seamen are considered to be in the foster-lap of the sea rather than in the lap of God. 612 'Gennesaret of Galilee': See Matthew 14:32-4. 617 'suasion of a rood': persuasion, especially moral persuasion, of a cross, 'rood' being the archaic name for 'cross' 623 'hove-to': brought to a standstill 658 'Red Ensign': flag used by British merchant ships 661 'the folds of a toreador': folds of a Spanish bullfighter's vermilion cloth called the muleta 670 'Lyle gun': gun for shooting a rope from one vessel to another 677 'messenger line': rope attached to a cable, so that the crew of the Antinoe could fasten the rope to the capstan and haul in the cable 694 'kingpost': vertical post between a roof truss above and a tie beam below. A tie beam is a horizontal timber connecting the lower ends of two main rafters. 696 'luff: luff of the Roosevelt is where it is pointing nearest to the wind. The Antinoe, at right angles to the Roosevelt, had its stern to the weather side, so the rope drifted underneath the Antinoe. 774 'breeches-buoy': apparatus like a pair of canvas shorts, used to carry a person by rope from one ship to another 805 'clawing off: moving against the wind and, in this case, away from the Antinoe 816 'wells': spaces enclosed by bulwarks and higher decks 824 'First Hatch': first aperture in the deck 864 'dodger': shield behind which to dodge the weather 878 'messman': one who looks after a group's meals

392 Annotations

934 'mustard': A mustard plaster, which is a mustard paste spread on a cloth, has a warming effect when placed on the chest. 962 'truck': wooden disc at the top of a mast, with holes in it for halyards (ropes) 969 'Lizard Point': On the south coast of Cornwall, this is the most southerly point of Great Britain. It has a dangerous reef. 969 'Eddystone': Eddy stone Lighthouse, in the English Channel nine miles from the coast of Cornwall, is 14 miles from the entrance to Plymouth harbour. 978 'triremes': ancient Phoenician warship with three banks of oars 985 'roadstead': a stretch of water near the shore where ships can ride at anchor To Angelina, an Old Nurse For Pratt's accounts of the nurse, 'based on a type I knew in a small village in Newfoundland many years ago,' see OHLP 86-7. 9 'rampike': bleached skeleton of a dead tree 49 'senna': laxative made from the leaves of various plants Erosion For Pratt's account of the poem's genesis, see OHLP 87-8. Water 5 'Sirocco': hot, oppressive wind The Highway 2 'seneschal': officer in charge of a household 6 'Aldebaran': one of the brightest stars The 6000 For Pratt's account of his own experience of riding from Toronto to Belleville 'in the cab of a fast locomotive of the 6000 series/ see OHLP 88. 4 'Ionia': in ancient times, part of the west coast of Asia Minor colonized by settlers from Athens 5 'Mercury': Jupiter's messenger 5 'Bucephalus': favourite warhorse of Alexander the Great. By taming Bucephalus, Alexander fulfilled an oracle that whoever did so would be king of Macedon, an ancient country on the Balkan Peninsula.

393Annotations

8 'Uranus': first god of the sky and father of the Titans and the Cyclops 11 'Tartarus': infernal regions of classical Roman mythology 12 'giants of Vulcan': Vulcan, god of fire and the working of metals, was assisted in his workshop by the Cyclops, a group of giants each with only one eye, in the centre of the forehead. 16 'Sicilian shore': Vulcan's forge was on Etna, a volcanic mountain on the coast of Sicily. 21 'Martian': of Mars, Greco-Roman god of war 24 'Erebus': In Hesiod's account of creation, a personified darkness, child of Chaos, spouse of Night. Erebus and Night are the parents of Light and Day. 42 'Plutonian': Pluto was the Roman god of the infernal regions. From Stone to Steel 4 'Java': home of the Java ape man, one of the earliest known species of man 4 'Geneva': Geneva, Switzerland, was home of the League of Nations and is also associated with John Calvin and Protestantism. As such, the city can typify Western Christian civilization. It is likely that the poem reflects both the Geneva Convention of 1929, which stipulated conditions governing treatment of prisoners of war, and the Geneva Disarmament Conference of 1932. 6 'Aryan': descendant of the prehistoric people who spoke IndoEuropean. In Nazi doctrine an Aryan was a gentile of IndoEuropean stock. 7 'horn': substance of which both animal horns and human fingernails are composed 15 'yearlings': animals a year old. It was an ancient custom to offer on the gods' altars the first fruits of the crop and first offspring of the flocks. The Depression Ends For Pratt's account of the poem's genesis, see OHLP 88-9. 2 The rod of Prosper': See Shakespeare's The Tempest, 1.2.471-3. 10 'distaff and the spinner': A distaff is a cleft stick on which wool is wound for spinning by hand. 49 Tishbite's': A Tishbite was an inhabitant of Tishbe. Here it refers to Elijah (see i Kings 17). 50 The hungry children of Israel received 'manna' to eat; see Exodus i6:i4ff.

394 Annotations 53 'Orion's club': In Greek mythology, Orion was a famous hunter who, after death, was made a constellation. 54 Taurus': the bull, a constellation 55 'centaurs': mythical creatures, with the upper body of a man and the rump and legs of a horse; a constellation 57 'Wain': waggon; also, a constellation 62 'Pleiades': In Greek mythology the Pleiades were the seven daughters of Atlas, who were transformed into a cluster of stars in the constellation Taurus. 63 'Jugged Lepus': hare stewed in a jug. Lepus is a constellation. 66 'Monoceros': (L.) 'unicorn,' a constellation in the Milky Way 69 'Southern Cross': the southern constellation Crux, in which the four chief stars are arranged in the shape of a cross 72 'Hesperides': the three daughters of Hesperus. Hesperus is the evening star, the second planet from the sun, and is also known as Venus. 77 'Atlas': mythical giant condemned by Zeus to hold up the heavens on his shoulders 79 'Gemini': (L.) 'twins,' a constellation containing the bright stars Castor and Pollux 83 'Capricornus': (L.) 'goat,' a constellation commonly named Capricorn 84 'Canis Major': (L.) 'the greater dog.' Usually called 'the Great Dog,' it is a southern constellation containing the brightest star, Sirius, commonly called the 'Dog Star.' 87 'Neptune with his prong': Neptune, Greco-Roman god of the sea, is represented as carrying a trident, a three-pronged spear. 88 'Cetus': (L.) 'whale,' a constellation 90 'Argo': southern constellation. The Argo (from the Greek, 'argos,' or 'swift') was the galley in which Jason searched for the Golden Fleece. 106 'Auriga': (L.) 'charioteer/ a constellation 108 'Capella': one of the three brightest stars in the northern hemisphere. 122 'Spica': (L.) 'ear of grain,' a bright star in the constellation Virgo 124 'Cygnus': (L.) 'swan,' a northern constellation 125 'Aries': (L.) 'a ram/ a constellation 129 'Diana': goddess of the moon and of hunting 136 'Elysian': In Greek mythology the dwelling place of the blessed was Elysium, hence 'Elysian fields/

395 Annotations

138 'syllabub': dessert made by mixing milk or cream with wine, cider, or other acid, and adding sugar and flavouring 140 'roly-polies': pudding comprising a sheet of paste, covered with jam or preserves, formed into a roll and then boiled or steamed. 146 'prognathic': According to Pratt's account, OHLP 88-9, he was challenged by Pelham Edgar to write a poem using that word, which means 'projecting jaws.' 154 'anchorite': one who leads a life of religious seclusion 185 'not since Galilean days': See Luke 14:16-24. 192 'leaner than what Israel knew': See Genesis 4i:25ff. regarding the seven years of famine. 226 'Aurora': dawn; Roman goddess of the dawn 226 'Portico': colonnade or covered walkway, especially in classical architecture and usually at the entrance of a building Putting Winter to Bed

For Pratt's brief, comment on the poem, see OHLP 90. 29 'equinox': time at which the sun crosses the equator and day and night are equal. The vernal equinox is about 21 March and the autumnal equinox about 22 September. A Reverie on a Dog For Pratt's account of this poem, 'a biography, actual and imaginative of the finest specimen I knew from the time of his puppyhood into extreme old age,' see OHLP 90-2. 79 'Poms': short for Pomeranians 95-110 For the origin of this incident, see OHLP 181 n4. 120 'draggle-tails': in this context, straggling or dirty dogs Bereft

2 'palimpsest': parchment on which the original writing has been erased to make room for a second piece of writing 14 'Niobe': Queen of Thebes and mother of six sons and six daughters, Niobe boasted of her fertility, deriding Leto, mother of Apollo and Artemis, for having only two children. Angry at the insult to their mother, Apollo and Artemis killed all Niobe's children. The griefstricken Niobe was changed into a stone, from which tears ran like water. See also Hamlet 1.2.149.

396 Annotations

The Way of Cape Race For Pratt's comments on this poem, see OHLP 92. 4 'Cabot': John Cabot, fifteenth-century explorer. On 24 June 1497, he sighted the coast of Newfoundland, Labrador, or Cape Breton Island. 15 'dreadnought': type of twentieth-century battleship, bigger and more powerful than any previous battleship. The first one built was named Dreadnought. 15 'cockle-shell': small, frail boat A Legacy This poem is believed to be tribute to Pratt's mother. A Feline Silhouette For a fanciful account of this poem's genesis, see OHLP 92-4. Frost 6 'Cockade': ribbon or rosette worn on the hat as a badge of office or party Jock o' the Links 31 'pibrochs': musical pieces, usually martial, performed on the bagpipes 32 'Culloden': battlefield in Scotland where, on 16 April 1746, Scotland's Prince Charles Edward Stewart was defeated by England's Duke of Cumberland The Pursuit 7 'hippogriff: mythical creature with the head and wings of an eagle and the body and hindquarters of a horse Like Mother, Like Daughter For Pratt's explanation of this poem, see OHLP 94. i 'Helen': in Greek legend, the beautiful daughter of Zeus who eloped with Paris to Troy, thus precipitating the siege and destruction of that city i 'Deirdre': beautiful heroine of Irish legend, the subject of Yeats's play, Deirdre, and of J.M. Synge's Deirdre of the Sorrows i 'Heloise': celebrated eleventh-century beauty who married Pierre

397 Annotations Abelard, a theologian and lecturer. When they were forced to separate, Heloise entered a nunnery and Abelard became a monk. 2 'Laura': Laura de Sade, fourteenth-century beauty. The Italian poet Petrarch first saw her in church, and in the tradition of medieval courtly love she inspired his Canzoniere. 23 'Viola': Pratt's wife 23 'Claire': Pratt's daughter A Prayer-Medley 12 'added cubits unto our stature': increased our height. See Matthew 6:27. 54 'Ephesus': See Acts ig^ff. 60 'It is sweet and becoming that one should die for his country': translated from the Latin of the Roman poet Horace in Odes 3.2.13: 'Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori.' See also Wilfred Owen's 'Dulce et Decorum Est.' 61 'Come home with your shield or upon it': The first-century A.D. Greek biographer Plutarch, in his Moralia, states that a Spartan woman, seeing her warrior off to war, would say of his shield 'Cum hoc aut in hoc redi' ('With this or upon this return'). 62 'Saul hath slain his thousands, but David his tens of thousands': See i Samuel 18:7. 63 'When shall their glory fade': See Tennyson in 1. 50, 'The Charge of the Light Brigade': 'When can their glory fade?' 64 'The sword of the Lord and of Gideon': See Judges 7:18. 65 'I have not seen the righteous forsaken': See Psalms 37:25. 66 Tn the multitude of counsellors there is safety': See Proverbs 24:6. 68 'Kali': Hindu goddess and wife of Siva, the god of destruction and reproduction 69 'Ahriman': head of the evil spirits opposing mankind, in the Persian religion founded by Zoroaster in the first millennium B.C. 70 'Loki': in Scandinavian mythology, the god of strife, mischief, and fraud 71 Tsis': principal goddess of ancient Egypt 71 'Hecate': originally an ancient chthonian goddess. Zeus gives her great power on earth, sea, and in heaven, but Hecate is most commonly associated with the uncanny or ghostly elements of night, with sorcery and black magic. 71 'Mammon': god of this world. 'Mammon' is Syrian for 'riches.' See Matthew 6:24.

398

Annotations

To Any Astronomer 14 'Betelgeuse': giant star of the first magnitude The Prize Cat See OHLP 94-5. 5 'gads': in this context, claws. Derived from gadlings, spurs on armour gauntlets 19 'an Abyssinian child': Although Mussolini's primary attack on Ethiopia did not take place until five months after this poem was published, there was an earlier widely reported skirmish between Italy and Ethiopia on 5 December 1934 at Walwal, where the spears of the Ethiopian tribesmen were ranged against the guns and tanks of an Italian force. However, David Pitt, in £./. Pratt: The Master Years 1927-1964 suggests that the poem was submitted to Queen's Quarterly in October 1934. It is unclear whether Pratt inserted a reference to Abyssinia after the first draft of the poem or whether, as Pitt argues, the incident provided the poet with an opportunity to make a retrospective statement about human savagery. 20 'whitethroat': white-throated sparrow The Titanic For Pratt's accounts of the poem and of the disaster itself, see OHLP 95-107. See also Thomas Hardy's 'The Convergence of the Twain (Lines on the Loss of the "Titanic")/ In Pratt's copy of the Collected Poems of Thomas Hardy (London: Macmillan 1920), his marginal notes on this poem read: 'The C. of the T. is another instance of H.'s ironic vision where fate takes two things of great beauty and power, one the work of man's hand - The Titanic, the other a work of nature, the Iceberg, and shapes and directs them over years for a great tragedy at sea. The irony is seen in the fact that they appear alien to each other, far and dissociate, but the Spinner of the Years brought the [lines of man?] together... As it took more than two years to build the Titanic and perhaps just as long to bring the Iceberg down from a Greenland glacier to the transatlantic shipping lanes the coincidence is all the more terrible when a matter of one minute or a matter of some few yards would have prevented the catastrophe.' See also Melville's Moby Dick. The case for Pratt's occasional use of Melville's diction when describing scenes of fate and superstition and for

399 Annotations

Pratt's use of Lawrence Beesley's The Loss of the Titanic: Its Story and Its Lessons (London: Allen 1929) as a source for many of the structural details of the poem is made in Djwa's EJP:EV i52n and 77-83. 13 'the Imperatof: rival ship being built by Hamburg-American line. See OHLPioi. 19 'rams': pistons to push a ship to start it sliding down a launching ramp 51 'slain the cattle of the sun': Although warned not to harm the cattle of the sun god, Helius, on the island of Trinacria, Odysseus' crew killed and ate some of the cattle while their master was away. For this act of hubris all of the crew but Odysseus perished in a fierce storm sent by Zeus. 52 'filched the lightnings from the fist of Zeus': reference to Prometheus which echoes Byron's 'Don Juan/ Canto the First, Stanza 127:7-8, '... the unforgiven / Fire which Prometheus filched for us from Heaven.' Prometheus, who gave fire to mankind, was punished by Zeus for his hubris by having his liver plucked out anew each day. He was seen by the Romantic poets as a prototype of man's saviour, notably in Shelley's Prometheus Unbound. 56 'Lloyd's': London insurance underwriting corporation that deals mainly with marine insurance 57 'Godhaven': on Disko Island, off the west coast of Greenland. See A.Y. Jackson's painting Iceberg, at Godhaven (1930). See also Lewis Legrand Noble, After Icebergs with a Painter: A Summer Voyage to Labrador and Around Newfoundland(New York: Appleton 1861). 60 'Behring': Behring (or Bering) Sea, between Siberia and Alaska 63 'Davis Strait': between Baffin Island and Greenland 100 'Corundum': aluminum oxide, noted for its flint-like hardness 135 'Mother Carey eyes': Mother Carey's chickens are petrels that follow departing ships out to sea. In sailors' lore they embody the souls of dead seamen and, as such, are birds of ill omen. 136 'Spithead': roadstead in the English Channel, between the Isle of Wight and Portsmouth 176 'Falstaffian': of Sir John Falstaff, the most famous of all Shakespeare's comic characters, who had a huge appetite for food and drink. See King Henry iv, Part n, 2.2. 179 'Savoy chasers': biscuit covered in sugar served at the end of a meal 191 'tungsten chandeliers': The filaments in the electric lights of the chandeliers were made of tungsten.

400 Annotations 196 'Regency': of the type of furniture made during the Regency in Britain (1811-20) when George, Prince of Wales, was regent. In 11 198-202, 'Jacobean/ 'Louis/ and 'Georgian' refer to the furniture of those periods. 197 'caryatids': female figures carved in stone and used as supporting columns for buildings 209 'Frank Gotch': catch-as-catch-can professional wrestling champion, 1905-13 212 'Jeffries': Jim Jeffries, world heavyweight boxing champion, 18991905 213 'Johnson': Jack Johnson, first American black to win the world heavyweight boxing championship, which he held 1908-15 241 'log rotator': cylinder of metal with a propeller at one end. It was dragged behind the ship by a string and recorded the distance travelled. 253 'Diverging from the beam': The bow parting the water caused a line of foam along each beam, or side, of the ship. 254 'stern wake': This was caused by the Titanic's three propellers - one on each side of the stern, driven by reciprocating engines, meaning engines with pistons, and one in the centre driven by a steam turbine. 272 'solid pack': refers to pack ice, which is an area of ice pieces driven together 291 'Smith': Captain Edward J. Smith 320 The Valley of the Kings': on the west side of the Nile south of Thebes, where archaeologists found the tombs of ancient Egyptian kings 333 The B.M.': British Museum, London 348 'Mauretania': Cunard liner, then holder of the transatlantic speed record 365 'Astor, Guggenheim, and Harris, Straus': financier John Jacob Astor, mining magnate Benjamin Guggenheim, Broadway producer Henry B. Harris, and Isidor Straus, owner of Macy's Department Store in New York 366 'Frohman': celebrated American theatrical manager. The passenger who thought he saw him was in error, as Frohman was not on the Titanic. 368 'Hays': Charles M. Hays, president of the Grand Trunk Railway 368 'Stead': William T. Stead, British spiritualist and editor

401 Annotations 371 'Phillips': Jack G. Phillips, first wireless operator 389 'Bishop's Rock': site of Bishop lighthouse in the Stilly Islands off the Cornish coast of southern England 395 'Beaucaire': red wine from the area around the city of Beaucaire in France 400 'Moselle': dry white wine from the Moselle valley in France 414 'Carbon dioxide': inert gas that smothers fire 417 'Jones': A first-class passenger named Jones was on the Titanic, but Pratt may have intended the name to be more generic than actual as no passenger named 'Van Raalte' or 'MacRae' (1. 418) was aboard. 434 'the highway which the Milkmaid passed': Milky Way 442 'taffrail log': The log rotator activated a counter on the taffrail, and a bell sounded after every knot or nautical mile of distance travelled. 450 'twenty after two': The Titanic sank at 2:20 A.M., 15 April 1912. 463 'bulkheads': Press releases concerning the Titanic before her maiden voyage boasted that these were watertight doors dividing the lower parts of the ship into sections. 464 'bridge induction light': A panel on the bridge had a light for every section, the light glowing to indicate trouble in any section. 466 'the reciprocating set': set of two propellers driven by reciprocating steam engines 469 The pitch from the main drive of the turbine': refers to the water pushed out by the turbine-driven central propeller. The rudder divided the water, which then merged with the wake from the two side propellers. 470 'tuna breaches': Pratt compares the water driven out by the central propeller to tuna breaching, or leaping, out of the water. 475-522 'The game of course is imaginary, made up, indeed, but on a strong basis of probability ...' OHLP 106. Beesley in The Loss of the Titanic, an eyewitness account, does record that a card game was in progress at the time of the collision. See also the reddleman's card game in Hardy's The Return of the Native. 478 'roodles': type of poker game played after a big pot has been won. In roodles, the pot is doubled and it takes a pair of jacks or better to open the bidding. 483 'fin-keel': stabilizers below the waterline on each side to resist any rolling motion of the ship 512 'A full house tops the flush': full house is three of a kind and a pair,

402 Annotations meaning three cards of one denomination and two cards of another denomination 526 'Starboard your helm': Turn to starboard. 526 'ship heeled': The ship heeled, meaning leaned over, to port, away from the direction of the turn, because of the pressure on it the turn exerted. 599 The lilac spark was crackling at the gap': The gap is an area between two electrodes. When the wireless operator used the key a spark flashed across the gap. 600-10 'Eight ships within the radius of the call': for a more detailed account of the responses and movements of these ships, see OHLP 103-5. 629 'chocks': wedge-shaped blocks the lifeboat sat on 659 'Murdoch': First Officer William M. Murdoch 665-6 'Full noon and midnight... median line': On the starboard side of the lifeboat the jet-black water gave the illusion of midnight, while on the port the still-lighted decks of the Titanic reflected in the water gave the illusion of midday. The median is the centre line of the ship's hull. 675 'gudgeon': stern of a ship or, more specifically, the socket in which the rudder works 700 'the exhaust from the condenser flow': On the Titanic, sea water was used to cool the fresh water steam in the condenser and return it as water for reuse. This heated the seawater, which was then sent back to sea through the exhaust. 711 The needle on the gauge': indicating steam pressure 712 The blow-offs': excess steam discharged through the funnel 726 'cargo ports': openings in the side of the ship for loading or unloading cargo 737 'g°mg bytne head': sinking at the bow 739 'warp of the bunker press': The shifting coal in the bunker pressed the steel bulkheads out of shape. 765 'under braces': bottom supports of the rudder 767 'hawse-holes': holes for anchor chains or mooring lines 782 'slice-bars': used for breaking up the clinkers, or lumps of burned coal 814 'cleat': a piece of iron, fastened to the deck or elsewhere, that has two arms around which a rope can be fastened 815 'fall': tackle for lowering a boat 822 'fiddley': iron framework around where stokers work

403 Annotations 830 'the break of the fo'c'sle': where the main structure of the fo'c'sle rises from the deck 831 'foremast root': where the foremast is rooted in the deck 877 'Millet': Francis Davis Millet (1846-1912), u.s. painter and writer 878 'Butt': Major Archibald Butt (1865-1912), u.s. army officer, military aide to Presidents T. Roosevelt and Taft 892 'The rattle of a drum': This suggests Wilhelm Wundt's theory of stimulus-response (see Introduction). 897 'collapsibles': collapsible rafts, which folded flat because they had canvas sides 917 'C.Q/: the first two letters of 'CQD/ then the international distress call 971 'flying bridge': part of the bridge extending over the side of the ship 1007 'shroud and stay': wires or ropes supporting a mast or funnel 1008 'ringbolt': eyebolt that a line can be attached to 1008 'fairlead': block or pulley 1012 'docking bridge': aft bridge used when docking 1027 'Her thousand fathoms journey to her grave': Experts disagree on how many lives were lost. There were 2,207 aboard (1,316 passengers and 891 crew) of whom approximately 700 were rescued.

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Index of First Lines

A huge six-footer 70 A million years or so, they say 216 A thousand years now had his breed 150 Above the tottering ramparts of the day 104 Ah Jock! I'm sure that as a right 289 Although with heart as keen and speed as swift 217 Answer my riddle, will you? Nay 90 Back of the shell the armour plate 284 Blow! winds, and roar 47 Break we the bread once more no By right of fires that smelted ore 282 Charcoal and lime in stumps and stones 255 Clean-limbed and arrowy he shot his way 71 Come home! the year has left you old 109 Come, reckon up the aeons as you may 298 Comes not the springtime here 108 Compassion of heaven no Complete from glowing towers to golden base 282 Dawn 39 Dawn from the Foretop! Dawn from the Barrel 58 Daylight now is unavailing 252 Dead leaves were thick upon the hills and plains 44 'Dead on the field of Honour/ Came the words 10 Death played a merry hand that night 128

406 Index of First Lines Did Jerry get through the gates of gold 84 Dream on while your prophetic sight 299 Dusk - with a grey and silent sea 40 Erect and motionless he stood 52 Existence in this little town I find 73 Fields far and near 112 For creatures of this modern breed 257 For one carved instant as they flew 218 From stone to bronze, from bronze to steel 260 God! How should letters change their colours so 109 Great Tides! You fill the reaches up 103 He paused a moment by the sea 53 He reached the lake when day's last hours were strung 252 He seemed to know the harbour 66 He who had learned for thirty years to ride 128 Helen, Deirdre, Heloise 292 Her heart cried out - "Come home, come home' 204 Her high freeboard towering above the pier 219 Here is the pool, and there the waterfall 46 Here the tides flow 99 His head was like his lore - antique 91 How sweet the stream of life which calmly flows 10 I could not paint, nor could I draw 65 I know that were my soul tonight 291 I saw how he would come each night and wait 53 I see no use in not confessing 49 I would not know him had I not 102 If I could take within my hand 261 Til never speak to Jamie again' 203 Infinite Sea! encompassing all lands 40 It stole in on us like a foot-pad 70 It took the sea a thousand years 254 It took three weeks to make them friends 218 It was your boast, before the darkness fell 217

407 Index of First Lines Its features half-revealed in passing gleams 204 Like a quarter moon the shoreline curled 168 Lion-hunger, tiger-leap 283 Lord, how wonderful is the power of man 293 No blow, no threat, no movement of the hand 45 November came today and seized the whole 288 Now let the earth take 106 Old, old is the sea today 54 Old Winter with an angry frown 268 One glance at my pursuer, and I fled 290 Our eyes were open but we did not see 37 Perched on a dead volcanic pile 131 Piercing the rugged coastline for a depth 20 Puffsky knew not how to live 285 Pure blood domestic, guaranteed 301 Sap of the birch and resin of the pine 254 Scaling where a hundred crags 101 She lingers in our memory even yet 249 She took her name beneath according skies 129 Since Death breathed on those youthful hearts that burned 257 So calm the air; the sunset's dying beat 9 So poor again - with all that plunder taken 214 Some passionate hour before my own deep stripe 130 Strange throbbings in my heart tonight 12 Tell me thy secret, O Sea 8 That shrug of yours was all I needed 253 The Dead! Upon a purple-bordered scroll 45 The frost moved up the window-pane 287 The hammers silent and the derricks still 302 The old man's vacant stare was out to sea 165 The rust of hours 72 The sea was as grey as a wild goose wing 128 The Spring has come and gone; the Summer's hand 43

408 Index of First Lines The sun never shone 63 The will she made contained no room for strife 286 The year was just about to close, the Arts' Exams were on 3 The year's processionals mocked her as they streamed 69 There is no refuge from this wind tonight 302 They faced each other, taut and still 287 This face with all its scores and stresses could 281 This little face will never know 127 Thou knowest, Lord, my term is brief 65 Thou silver shell that liest near 18 Thou Wind of the West, beloved of the Ocean 7 Three times we heard it calling with a low 63 To order sun and stars to change their course 288 To sail life's inland lakes with flowing ease 14 Tread softly here. Beneath this rough-hewn cross 41 Two words - when he was asked to tell 127 Upon what Bible will you swear 297 Vast and immaculate! No pilgrim bands 167 Waiting their turn to be identified 216 Was ever night so wild as this 93 Was that a cry you say you heard 48 Watchful our statued dead! With calm divine 9 We could not think of her as being dead 213 We gave them at the harbour every token 68 We know the symptoms well: that sudden stitch 273 We rose and tracked the coast-line where it led 126 What aeons passed without a count or name 256 What alchemist could in one hour so drain 215 What changed thy face from that of yesterday 72 What is that colour on the sea 103 What magic long ago was in your footstep 253 When the celestial dance was planned 284 Where do you bank such fires as can transmute 299 Where meet the streams from the earth's many fountains 17 Wiser than thought, more intimate than breath 300 Without, the heavy vapours in an endless train 111

409 Index of First Lines Ye meadows, groves, your birth renew 11 You left the field and no one heard 67 You - that could not stand the dust 125 You would not come when you were near 289 Your body slouched before a dying hearth 255

Index of Titles in Parts i and2

After-Calm, The 1.103 Amerongen 1.44 Anomaly, The 2.36 Armistice Silence, The 1.257 At a Sanitarium 1.254 Autopsy on a Sadist 2.133 Awakening, An 1.213 Baritone, The 2.5 Before a Bulletin Board 1.109 Before an Altar 1.110 Behind the Log 2.149 Bereft 1.281 Big Fellow, The 1.70 Bird of Paradise, The 1.90 Blind 1.217 Blind from Singapore 2.191 'Blow! Winds, and Roar!' 1.47 Brawler in Who's Who, The 2.138 Breadliner's Prayer, A 2.359 Brebeufand His Brethren 2.46 But Mary Kept All These Things, and Pondered Them in Her Heart 2.302 But One Way 2.361 Cachalot, The 1.150

Call, A 2.192 Carlo 1.49 Cherries 1.203 Child and the Wren, The 1.218 Clay 2.305 Coast, A 1.101 Come Away, Death 2.111 Come Not the Seasons Here 1.108 Comrades 1.125 Convict Holocaust, The 1.216 Cycles 2.195 Dawn 1.39 Dead on the Field of Honour 1.10 Dear Illusion, The 1.40 Decision, The 1.67 Deed, The 2.196 Depression Ends, The 1.261 Der Fuehrer's Pot-Pourri 2.134 Dirge, A 1.106 Displaced 2.190 Doors 1.252 Drag-Irons, The 1.128 Dreams 1.255 Drowning, The 1.72 Dunkirk 2.46 Dunkirk 2.113

4ii Index of Titles in Parts i and 2 Dying Eagle, The 2.38 Empty Room, The 1.291 Epigrapher, The 1.91 Erosion 1.254 Evening 1.9 Fable of the Goats, The 2.12 Father Time 2.132 Feline Silhouette, A 1.287 Fire 1.300 Fire-Worship 2.45 'First-Born of England' 2.363 Fisher Boy, The 2.367 Flood-Tide, The 1.53 Fog, The 1.70 For Better or Worse 1.253 For Valour 1.14 Fragment from a Story 1.112 From Stone to Steel 1.260 Frost 1.287 Frost Over-Night, The 1.126 Fugitive, The 1.252 Good Earth, The 2.193 Great Feud, The 1.168 Great Mother, The 1.17 Great Tides 1.103 Greater Sacrifice, The 1.12 Ground Swell, The 1.63 Head of the Firm, The 2.304 Heydrich 2.124 Hidden Scar, The 1.45 Highway, The 1.256 His Last Voyage 2.370 History of John Jones, The 1.63 Horizons 1.289

Ice-Floes, The 1.58 Illusion, The 2.29 Impatient Earth, The 2.29 In a Beloved Home 1.111 In Absentia 1.52 Inexpressible, The 2.368 In Lantern Light 1.65 In Memoriam 1.45 Invaded Field, The 2.110 Invocation 1.40 Iron Door, The: An Ode 1.204 January the First 2.294 Jock o' the Links 1.289 Largess of 1917, The 1.37 Last Survivor, The i. 128 Last Watch, The 2.189 Lee-Shore, The 1.204 Legacy, A 1.286 Lie, The 1.127 Like Mother, Like Daughter 1.292 Lines on the Occasion of Her Majesty's Visit to Canada, 1959 2.297 Loss of the Steamship Florizel 1.72 Lost Cause, The 1.217 Magic 1.288 Magic in Everything 2.197 Magnolia Blossoms 1.69 Man and the Machine, The 1.282 Manger Under the Star, The 2.295 Mirage, The 1.282 Missing: Believed Dead: Returned 2.138 Moonlight 2.366 Morning 1.102

412 Index of Titles in Parts i and 2 Morning Plunge, The 1.71 Mother and Child 2.295 Mystic, The 1.299 Myth and Fact 2.193 Nativity, The 2.296 New [Organon] (1937), The 2.28 Newfoundland 1.99 Newfoundland Calling 2.186 Newfoundland Seamen 2.188 Niemoeller 2.134 November Landscape, A 1.288 October, 1918 1.43 Ode to December, 1917 1.93 Old Age 1.214 Old Harry 2.37 Old Organon (1225 A.D.), The 2.28 On the Shore 1.109 One Hour of Life 1.127 Osprey, The 2.370 Out of Step 1.284 Overheard by a Stream 1.46 Overheard in a Cove 1.73 Parable of Puff sky, The 1.285 Passing of Jerry Moore, The 1.84 Pine Tree, The 1.53 Poem on the May Examinations, A 1.3 Prairie Sunset, A 1.215 Prayer-Medley, A 1.293 Prize Cat, The 1.301 Puck Reports Back 2.6 Pursuit, The 1.290 Putting Winter to Bed 1.268 Puzzle Picture, A 1.284

Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland in Verse 1.20 Radio in the Ivory Tower, The 2.41 Reverie on a Dog, A 1.273 Ritual, The 1.129 Roosevelt and the Antinoe, The 1.219 Sacrifice of Youth, The 1.10 St John's, Newfoundland: Steep Are Thy Cliffs 2.370 Scenes from Afar 1.104 Sea-Cathedral, The 1.167 Sea-Gulls 1.218 Sea-Shell, The 1.18 Sea Variations 1.54 Secret of the Sea, The 1.8 Seed Must Die, The 1.11 Seen on the Road 2.4 Seer, The 1.299 Shark, The 1.66 Signals 1.48 Silences 2.3 6000, The 1.257 Snowfall on a Battlefield 1.110 Stag, The 2.36 Still Life 2.136 Stoics, The 2.131 Strip of Sea Coast, A 2.360 Student's Prayer at an Examination, A 1.65 Submarine, The 2.30 Summit Meetings 2.186 Tatterhead 1.165 Text of the Oath, The 1.297 Thanksgiving 2.294 That Night There Came to Bethlehem 2.293 They Are Returning 2.140

413 Index of Titles in Parts i and 2 Time-Worn 1.253 Titanic, The 1.302

To an Enemy 1.130 To Angelina, an Old Nurse 1.249 To Any Astronomer 1.298 (ToCornie) 2.368 To D.H. Lawrence 2.302 ToG.B.S. 2.300 To Pelham Edgar 2.359 [Today and Yesterday] 2.361 Tokens 1.128 Toll of the Bells, The 1.68 [Toucan, The] 2.368 Towards the Last Spike 2.201

Truant, The 2.125

Under the Lens 2.27 Unromantic Moon, The 2.250 Unseen Allies 1.9 Water 1.255 Way of Cape Race, The 1.283 Weather Glass, The 1.302 Whither? 1.216 Wind of the West, The 1.7 Witches' Brew, The 1.131

Wooden Cross, The 1.41 Yeas and the Nays, The 2.369

E.J. PRATT: COMPLETE POEMS PART 2

THE COLLECTED WORKS OF EJ. PRATT GENERAL EDITORS: SANDRA DJWA and R . G . M O Y L E S

The aim of this edition is to present a critical annotated text of the collected works of E.J. Pratt - complete poetry; selected prose and correspondence - fully collated and with a textual apparatus that traces the transmission of the text and lists variant readings.

EDITORIAL COMMITTEE

Robert Gibbs, Susan Gingell, Lila Laakso, David G. Pitt ADVISORY BOARD

Claude Bissell, Robert Brandeis, Peter Buitenhuis, Northrop Frye, Douglas Lochhead, Jay Macpherson, Claire Pratt, Malcolm Ross

EJ. PRATT

Complete Poems Part 2

Edited by Sandra Djwa and R.G. Moyles

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS Toronto Buffalo London

University of Toronto Press 1989 Toronto Buffalo London Printed in Canada ISBN 0-8020-5775-6

Printed on acid-free paper

Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Pratt, EJ. (Edwin John), 1882-1964 Complete poems (The Collected works of EJ. Pratt) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-8020-5775-6 (SET) I. Djwa, Sandra, 1939. II. Moyles, R.G. (Robert Gordon), 1939. III. Title. IV. Series: Pratt, EJ. (Edwin John), 1882-1964. The collected works of E J. Pratt. ps853i.R3Ai71989 c8ii'-52 PR9199.2.P73A17 1989

€88-093068-3

This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. Publication has also been assisted by the Canada Council and the Ontario Arts Council under their block grant programs.

Contents

The Truant 125 The Stoics 131 Father Time 132 Silences 3 Autopsy on a Sadist 133 Seen on the Road 4 Niemoeller 134 The Baritone 5 Der Fuehrer's Pot-Pourri 134 Puck Reports Back 6 Still Life 136 The Fable of the Goats 12 Missing: Believed Dead: Under the Lens 27 The Old Organon (1225 A.D.) 28 Returned 138 The New [Organon] (1937 A.D.) 28 The Brawler in Who's Who 138 They Are Returning 140 The Illusion 29 Behind the Log 149 The Impatient Earth 29 Summit Meetings 186 The Submarine 30 Newfoundland Calling 186 The Anomaly 36 Newfoundland Seamen 188 The Stag 36 The Last Watch 189 Old Harry 37 The Dying Eagle 38 Displaced 190 The Radio in the Ivory Tower 41 Blind from Singapore 191 Fire-Worship 45 A Call 192 Dunkirk 46 The Good Earth 193 Myth and Fact 193 Brtbeufand His Brethren 46 The Invaded Field no Cycles 195 Come Away, Death in The Deed 196 Dunkirk 113 Magic in Everything 197 Heydrich 124 Towards the Last Spike 201 PREFACE VII

vi Contents The Unromantic Moon 250

APPENDIX B: UNPUBLISHED DRAMA

TEXTUAL VARIANTS AND EMENDATIONS 253 ANNOTATIONS 263

APPENDIX C: UNPUBLISHED POETRY

APPENDIX A: MISCELLANEOUS POEMS

That Night There Came to Bethlehem 293 January the First 294 Thanksgiving 294 Mother and Child 295 The Manger Under the Star 295 The Nativity 296 Lines on the Occasion of Her Majesty's Visit to Canada, 1959 297 To G.B.S. 300 The Doctor in the Boat 300 To D.H. Lawrence 302 But Mary Kept All These Things, and Pondered Them in Her Heart 302 The Head of the Firm 304

Clay 305

To Pelham Edgar 359 A Breadliner's Prayer 359 A Strip of Sea Coast 360 But One Way 361 [Today and Yesterday] 361 'First Born of England' 363 Moonlight 366 The Fisher Boy 367 [The Toucan] 368 (To Cornie) 368 The Inexpressible 368 The Yeas and the Nays 369 His Last Voyage 370 The Osprey 370 St John's, Newfoundland: Steep Are Thy Cliffs 370 DESCRIPTIVE BIBLIOGRAPHY 373 INDEX OF FIRST LINES 498 INDEX OF TITLES IN PARTS 1 AND 2 50!

Preface

This is Part 2 of an edition of £./. Pratt: Complete Poems. Part i contains the Introduction/ poems arranged chronologically up to The Titanic (1935), a list of variants and emendations and a set of annotations for those poems. Part 2 contains the remainder of Pratt's poetry - from 'Silences' (1936) to The Unromantic Moon' (1953) - a list of variants and emendations, a set of annotations for those poems, three appendices containing unpublished poetry and drama, and a descriptive bibliography that provides a textual history of every Pratt poem.

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E.J. PRATT: COMPLETE POEMS PART 2

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Silences There is no silence upon the earth or under the earth like the silence under the sea; No cries announcing birth, No sounds declaring death. There is silence when the milt is laid on the spawn in the weeds and fungus of the rock-clefts; And silence in the growth and struggle for life. The bonitoes pounce upon the mackerel, And are themselves caught by the barracudas, The sharks kill the barracudas And the great molluscs rend the sharks, And all noiselessly 10 Though swift be the action and final the conflict, The drama is silent. There is no fury upon the earth like the fury under the sea. For growl and cough and snarl are the tokens of spendthrifts who know not the ultimate economy of rage. Moreover, the pace of the blood is too fast. But under the waves the blood is sluggard and has the same temperature as that of the sea. There is something pre-reptilian about a silent kill. Two men may end their hostilities just with their battle-cries, The devil take you/ says one. Til see you in hell first/ says the other. 20 And these introductory salutes followed by a hail of gutturals and sibilants are often the beginning of friendship, for who would not prefer to be lustily damned than to be half-heartedly blessed? No one need fear oaths that are properly enunciated, for they belong to the inheritance of just men made perfect, and, for all we know, of such may be the Kingdom of Heaven. But let silent hate be put away for it feeds upon the heart of the hater.

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Today I watched two pairs of eyes. One pair was black and the other grey. And while the owners thereof, for the space of five seconds, walked past each other, the grey snapped at the black and the black riddled the grey. One looked to say - The cat/ And the other- The cur/ But no words were spoken; Not so much as a hiss or a murmur came through the perfect enamel of the teeth; not so much as a gesture of enmity. If the right upper lip curled over the canine, it went unnoticed. The lashes veiled the eyes not for an instant in the passing. 30 And as between the two in respect to candour of intention or eternity of wish, there was no choice, for the stare was mutual and absolute. A word would have dulled the exquisite edge of the feeling. An oath would have flawed the crystallization of the hate. For only such culture could grow in a climate of silence Away back before emergence of fur or feather, back to the unvocal sea and down deep where the darkness spills its wash on the threshold of light, where the lids never close upon the eyes, where the inhabitants slay in silence and are as silently slain. March 1936

Seen on the Road The pundit lectured that the world was young As ever, frisking like a spring-time colt Around the sun, his mother. The class hung Upon his words. I listened like a dolt, And muttered that I saw the wastrel drawn Along the road with many a pitch and bump By spavined mules - this very day at dawn! And heading for an ammunition dump.

5 The savant claimed I heckled him, but - Hell! I saw the fellow in a tumbril there, Tattered and planet-eyed and far from well, With winter roosting in his Alpine hair.

May 1936

The Baritone

He ascended the rostrum after the fashion of the Caesars: His arm, a baton raised oblique, Answering the salute of the thunder, Imposed a silence on the Square. For three hours A wind-theme swept his laryngeal reeds, Pounded on the diaphragm of a microphone, Entered, veered, ran round a coil, Emerged, to storm the passes of the ether, Until, impinging on a hundred million ear-drums, It grew into the fugue of Europe.

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Nickel, copper and steel rang their quotations to the skies, And down through the diatonic scale The mark hallooed the franc, The franc bayed the lira, With the three in full flight from the pound. And while the diapasons were pulled On the Marseillaise, The Giovanezza, And the Deutschlandlied,

A perfect stretto was performed As the Dead March boomed its way Through God Save the King And the Star Spangled Banner.

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6 Then the codetta of the clerics (Chanting a ritual over the crosses of gold tossed into the crucibles to back the billion credit) Was answered by The clang of the North Sea against the bows of the destroyers, The ripple of surf on the periscopes, The grunt of the Mediterranean shouldering Gibraltar, 30 And the hum of the bombing squadrons in formation under Orion. And the final section issued from the dials, WHEN Opposed by contrapuntal blasts From the Federated Polyphonic Leagues Of Gynecologists, Morticians, And the Linen Manufacturers The great Baritone, Soaring through the notes of the hymeneal register, 40 Called the brides and the grooms to the altar, To be sent forth by the Recessional Bells To replenish the earth, And in due season to produce Magnificent crops of grass on the battlefields. December 1936 Puck Reports Back OBERON

Much have I longed for thy return, my sprite: This greenwood, once the stage of elfin pranks And welkin-splitting laughter, has become A desert in thy absence. Now these stories Burrow beneath my ribs and chase away The bile, for they reveal a madder world Than what Lysander knew and Hermia. Poor Bottom in his downiest moments saw

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No visions such as these that thou relatest That fire should burn in water; mortals fly Throughout the empyrean on the backs Of birds; and whales with whirling fins should leave Their native element and take the air Across the land and sea with greater speed Than falcons; and that lovers could exchange Their vows in whispers at the self-same instant, Though separate a thousand ocean leagues These tales would tax my own too credulous ears, As though I heard accounts of wrathful capons Tracking Hyrcanian tigers to their lairs. Hast thou another fable in thy scrip? PUCK My Prince of Shadows, these reports I've brought Are more than fantasies that might disturb The reason through the love-juice of a herb. I saw the strangest duel ever fought Sir Guy, Knight of the Garter, famous knight, Has challenged valiant Boris, famous count, To settle a reckoning in single fight. Boris not only questioned the amount, The nature and occasion of the debt, But forwarded a diplomatic note To the knightly challenger that, when they met, He would be pleased to take him by the throat, With many a courtly phrase which might imply His general opinion of Sir Guy. So, to collect, a journey was begun, Which, for the distance under broiling sun And pelting rain, had the same pith of sense As if a man might barter pounds for pence. At last when they appeared in mutual sight Upon two neighbouring hills where a ravine That ended in a quagmire lay between,

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The count began to bellow at the knight With fearful imprecations while Sir Guy Called Boris a bat, a polecat and a kite, A worm, an adder and a wart-hog - Why They should attack each other with such words I know not, but when finished with the birds And all the noxious animals, they hurled The missiles of the vegetable world. And while they cursed they put more armour on Their steeds, beyond all war caparison, And on themselves already over-weight: For every oath they added some new plate To some new part of their anatomy, And when they had their beavers down, no hint Of mortal man escaped captivity Save through the eye-slits where the sovereign glint Of reason peered blasted with ecstasy. OBERON This is the visitation of the moon! But, prithee, how with such accoutrement Climbed they up to the saddles of their coursers? PUCK A dozen robust yeomen by main force Managed to get Sir Guy upon his horse. As many knights accomplished the same feat Placing against the withers of the mount A ladder, they pushed up the angry count And got him fastened well astride his seat. Nor was this all: To see through their disguise And find the men, I had to rub my eyes. As though the armour were not yet complete, The henchmen brought another piece of mail Shaped like a conduit or a metal hose And screwed it to each gladiator's nose.

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Far-off it might have been a dragon's tail, But on a closer view it had the look Of an elephant's trunk, when it recurved On the cuirass - What was the purpose served? The devil knows; so crazed it was I shook With laughing paroxysms, then with fright, For suddenly the day became as night, The curses took on corporal form - so rank The poisonous emanations were, they swept Across the gap and up the hills and stank Like an Irish fen. The squires, they broke and wept; The knights, they choked; while I ran off for cover To an acorn cup and drew a rose-leaf over.

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OBERON Whither did all this lead, my gentle Puck? Did they sit howling on those hills forever? PUCK I went to sleep within my nest of oak To rinse the portent through a dream, then woke, Uncuddled, and stole forth to banks I knew, Where violets, musk-rose and wild thyme grew: I filched them from their beds and sent them out (With a million glow-worms lighting up the air) To pour their distillation through the rout Of wind and stench. Anon, I looked and there Unmoved, the same infuriated pair Sir Guy, rigid, barking his challenge still, And Boris booming, bellowing from the hill. OBERON This story would outwit all tricks of mirth Known to the gullible within my realm. Such folly falling on a broken mirror Could scarce distort its own insane grimaces. How were they loosened from their pedestals?

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PUCK

My lord! I scouted round the clover fields And drove out from their lazy honey yields A furious colony of humble-bees. I fanned them up both hills and bade them squeeze Through rivet cracks and joints, and stick like leeches To the bare lard within the warriors' breeches. I then fled to a pine tree top and heard A pandemonium of oaths and screeches, And by the buckle creakings and the gird Of the loin plates upon their rusty hinges, I knew how well my squads clapped on the twinges. But this, my master, could not get them parted From their incorporate posts, and so I tried A prank that I devised one Hallowtide Which never failed to get two fighters started. Changing myself into a gamecock, I With bristling hackles, and my comb blood-red, Settled upon the helmet of Sir Guy, Until the proud arch of my neck and head Assumed the tautness of a Parthian bow. With such inflammatory mien, I crew Six notes contemptuous at Boris who Stiffened and took the insult like a blow. In half a second, like a meteorite, I landed on the county's helm and shrilled The fiery syllables back at the knight. Thou shouldst have heard my clarion as I drilled Helmet and skull to pierce the globed brain. Each lusty crow held triumph and disdain: I nearly tore my wattles when I blew it, For my restored ears still feel the pain. Zounds, sir, the way the count and knight went to it!

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11 OBERON

The impact of those mighty opposites, Spurred to their wrath by such a vent of scorn, Must have, like an Olympian avalanche, Brought terror to the battlements of Jove. PUCK Nay, nay, your Majesty - 'twas no such fun. Never indeed was there a tilt begun With heraldry like this, that ended so. The rivals did not strike a single blow. When once they started off, they could not stop. They did not seem to ride so much as drop To the solid earth, then rise, bound through the air, Which angry at their overweening pride Bounced them from knoll to knoll, made them collide With their own saddles, till the exhausted pair Pitched from their stallions which, poor jades, were wrecked By the very iron bands meant to protect The fetlocks - took one final somersault Into the miry bottom of the vault. I watched them wallowing like drunken grooms, Pursuing a blind orbit in the mud, Only the gesture of their fighting blood Waving defiance from the bankrupt plumes. Count Boris' nozzle sent a farewell blast, Claiming a fatuous triumph, while a high Blue feather from the proud knob of Sir Guy, Striving to keep erect, gave up the last Frail effort of heroic pantomime, To fall like a snapped water-flag and lie Prone in the sea-green bubbles on the slime.

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OBERON

Enough, my romping elf! I pray, enough! In these reports there's matter to regale Titania through many a sulky moon. Had Nestor heard them, he'd have cracked his sides. The sport that night in the Athenian grove, Compared with this, was but episcopal. There's not a planet left that keeps its course; The distaff cracks; the dizzy earth is run By three inebriated witches - Stay!

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PUCK Another tale of men I could recite Of winged-clipped human eagles living in holes Under the ground in envy of the moles... But I shall leave that for a winter night. OBERON I know not what thou hast in mind to say, But hold! It is not well those jests should come In troops - They have a boding sentry face And smell too strongly of mortality.

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October 1937

The Fable of the Goats One half a continental span, The Aralasian mountains lay Like a Valkyrian caravan At rest along the Aryan Way. And central to the barrier, Rising in mottled columns, were The limestone ramparts of the heights The Carolonian Dolomites. Over those scaffolds nothing passed But navigators of the sky: Those crags were taken only by

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The sun and moon and the wind's blast, By clouds and by the eagles' wings Out on their furthest venturings. So rooted in geography The natural frontier, it could be A theme for neither god nor beast To argue that one side was east And that the other side was west. Yet with this knowledge manifest, We must record a truth as strange As any fact or myth that can Inflict mortality on man. The middle section of this range For endless centuries had been Earth's most dramatic mise en scene For lawless indeterminate fights. Both avalanche and cataract With Time compounding had attacked The lowest of the Dolomites With spring's recurrent cannonade; Had deepened crater and crevasse, Torn down the gorges and had laid The canyon of St Barnabas. Along this canyon's northern edge, One hundred feet in length, a ledge Of schist, known as the Capra Pass, Projected from the mountain wall. This slippery stretch might well appall The tread of cloven-footed things In their most cautious pedallings, But as a ground on which to stage The fortunes of a battle rage, That ledge of Capra might reveal A tale which, for perversity, Could tame the Kyber Route or steal

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The title from Thermopylae. The country which those peaks divide Was noted for its rich terrains, Its sweeping uplands and its wide Deltas and undulating plains. Millions of horned ruminants Roebucks and elks and argalis Upon this vast inheritance Had founded aristocracies, Which ruled the commons till, between Their slaughterous feuds internecine And foreign raids, they lost their lead To a lusty more endurant breed A new totalitarian horn Known as the genus Capricorn. The Aralasian country west, Described as Carob, was possessed By a remarkable race of goats With lyrate horns and shaggy coats. Unyielding individualists At first by nature they had learned The folly of obstructionists Within their tribal ranks and turned To federal virtues for the wise Conduct of corporate enterprise. And of this wide domain the head Was Cyrus. It was he who led The bucks against the bulls in that Perfidious effort to profane The purity of the racial strain: was he, the high-born aristocrat Who rounded up intransigents, Drove out all civil disputants, And bent the proletariat Under a regimen of drill To his authoritarian will.

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And on the east there was a spot As fertile as the Carob land, Where goats likewise had won command The ancient dynasty of Gott. Straight-horned those tribes, of wiry coat, They had outmatched their canine foes, Then turned upon the yaks and smote The harts and put to shame the does. Inebriated by success, With numbers vastly multiplied, They built a citadel of pride About a national consciousness, Outran their borders to possess The lush exotic harvest yields Of hitherto unvanquished fields, Until they had from that wild shore Of the Fallopian corridor Down to the grey Ovidian Sea Established their hegemony. Now when the veterans returned Flushed with their foreign victories, The hearts of all the generals burned With personal antipathies. All scrambled for the seats of power, Some wanted this, some wanted that, And some they knew not what - whereat Uprose the leader of the hour, A buck who by right of descent, As by his natural temperament, Had never recognized retreat. A scion of a Caliphate, He knew the strategy to beat The factions by a stroke of state And quell diversity of bleat, For of all lands, the realm of Goti Indubitably was polyglot.

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His stroke of state, his coup d'etat Was nature's oldest formula. It was the leader's bright idea To send them forth to find their grub On fetid moors and desert scrub Where tuber roots of Ipomoea Purga - the standard panacea For disaffections of the mind Became their diet, which, combined With seeds of Croton Tiglium, Restored their equilibrium. The mightiest hybrid of his race Was this ballista of the herd; The orient framework of his face Had been through generations blurred By a gigantic Ural trek For unlike Cyrus, Prince of Carob, The Gottite leader's stream was stirred By elements from Turk and Arab: Tincture of Tartar, touch of Czech Lay in the great Abimelech. So with the martial banners furled At all the frontiers in debate, It seemed as if the caprine world Might manage to domesticate The gains imperial and release Their bucking energies for peace Under a wise duumvirate Two cousins far removed but Joined From the same root, the god-like Pan, Abimelech and Cyrus joined In a world reconstruction plan! But goats like men have never found Much standing room on neutral ground,

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Once let a point of honour rise And death stalks in on compromise. Those Gottites and the Carobites Stood pat upon their natural rights, And here we must at once admit Three rocks on which a League might split. It seemed that Nature had designed, When first she fixed a Gottite mind, Or pitched the Carob brain, and bent The bony bulwarks round about, Into a three-inch armament, That compromise should never find An alley either in or out. For when in any age was born A freak without a cloven hoof, Or with palmated frontal roof That blossomed points along the horn Some civilized concessive goat Who carried democratic stripes Upon his softly textured coat The uniformitarian types, Who strove to dominate the breed, Exiled him from the herds. Indeed, One had appeared like this to show Progressive softening of the brain By urging tolerance towards the foe At the finish of a great campaign. Now, inasmuch as he was not Pure Carob or acknowledged Gott, By some form of a large jerboa Derived from stray spermatozoa, They tore his carcass joint from joint And sheared him to the fourteenth point. That goats were laid down for dissent Was clearly, whether right or wrong,

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An architectural intent. Those picket horns were three feet long What was their purpose but reproof? And what the skull's, if not for shock? As axiomatic as the hoof For stance upon the mountain rock! Moreover, Nature - quirky dame Had planted in their disposition A sacred but a smoky flame Of uncontrollable ambition. Nomads from zoologic time, The race grew conscious that they must Give to an aimless wanderlust The sublimation of a climb. Valleys and plains were nurseries Which full-grown goats might leave behind For the wild gully routes that wind Up to the mountain crags and screes Places of habitation where Ancestral bands of satyrs shook Lascivious lightnings from their hair. They marvelled with exalted look At things that voyaged through the air; They worshipped clouds and glorified The golden eagles as they took The solar orbit in their stride. Joined with this instinct of ambition There was a problem called nutrition, A knotty, vexed consideration Not yet resolved by sublimation. Of all the animals that faced The question of a food supply, The goat had the most catholic taste That crops could ever satisfy.

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It could be proved by any test He had no rival at a feast; He craved the foliage of the west To vary pastures of the east, New barks and fresher rinds: the sight Of grasses inaccessible Was whetstone to the appetite. The more he had, the more he wanted; A taste unrecognized, a smell Still unappropriated, haunted The rumen like a ghostly spell. The eastern tribes had often stared Up at the peaks and wondered what Those vapours were their nostrils flared, What herbs and blossoms there might be Was it goatleaf or bergamot, Red clover or sweet cicely? And likewise when the east wind blew Over the Carolonian summit, The herds from western uplands drew Intoxicating essence from it. Was that bay laurel, was it thyme That floated from the mountain span? Their eyes were fastened on the climb, Their noses quivered with the sniff, Yes, by the beard of the first Khan, There was no error in that whiff, They knew it, every buck and dam, Twas lavender and marjoram. On one crisp morning when the heights Were diamond brilliant with their snows, When dawn had flushed with a deep rose The panels of the Dolomites, And atmospheric odours tart Made tonic impact on the heart,

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A common inspiration struck Concurrently each monarch buck: It was the Ledge, the unconquered Ledge, The sanguinary Copra Pass, That sent its challenge from the edge Of the canyon of Saint Barnabas. Abimelech and Cyrus led Their troops up the opposing sides, Past fell and scaur and watershed, Over the small and great Divides. The marching bleat from every corps Combined into their battle roar, Excelsior! Excelsior! Such stout morale, such fine elan Was never seen since time began. By noon both tribes became aware Through subtle changes in the air Caused by the sharp reverberant sound Of hoofs upon untimbered ground, And by the Carob-Gottite smell, A mixture indescribable, That they might any moment close With their hereditary foes. They reached the hollow where the green Ledge like a boa lay between The twin peaks of the Dolomites. Massed by prophetic signals, kites And buzzards in a storm of wings Swept up and down the great ravine, Impatient for their scavengings. Upon that very ledge were fought Thousands of battles that had wrought The drama of a racial glory, With nothing in the strife more certain Than that each act of the long story

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Should close upon a carrion curtain. And yet - was there a goat dismayed In all that spiral cavalcade? No - not a buck, nor could there be From stock designed for battery And built like Carthaginian rams, Although that thousand feet of drop Sheer from the Carolonian top Put curds within the milcher dams. With pawing hoofs and sweating flanks, Each chieftain as the duellist Of his own herd stepped from the ranks To try the quarrel on the schist. Abimelech himself had seen His sires - grands and great-grands - fall, Locked with the lyrates, down the wall, Plumb to the crypts in the ravine, Dropping like frenzied bacchanals, Hitting their corrugated globes So bloodily, the frontal lobes Came out through their occipitals. But so intense the patriot fire, And so magnificent the roll, The youth had felt the same desire Kindle the torches of his soul. And had not Cyrus felt as well The potent ritual of the spell, The phobias of his spirit burn In the white heat of discipline, As he had watched his kith and kin In their inexorable turn Perish? How splendidly they fell! And how the witenagemot Would hallow this immortal spot! And had he not gone back to tell The nursing dams who would convey

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To generations then unborn The story? How they would portray That plunge! And had not Cyrus sworn Upon the blood script of the laws, That on some sacrificial day He would go forth his father's way, Crusading downward to be torn By canyon jags and vulture claws, Maintaining to the end The Cause, The exaltation of The Horn? And now the fatal hour had struck. Abimelech, that eastern buck With all the pride of a Mogul, His anger rising in a storm Of snorts, superbly true to form, Moved to the centre, lowered his skull The famous Gottite cranium To meet the Carobite Defender, The noble Cyrus who had come To die but never to surrender. Come all ye hair-dividers, wise To ways of nature and of art, Who know how to anatomize The fine vagaries of the heart, Come bring your lore and make it plain This riddle in the Carob brain. In that weird passage from the dark Matrix that shaped the Carobite And stratified his skull for fight, Up to this present hour, the spark Had never failed the dynamite. Ye cannot say that Cyrus knew Just what he was about to do. For nowhere in his long descent Was there a trace of one rehearsal Which might account for this reversal

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Of military precedent. Folly it is to speculate Upon the food that Cyrus ate, That inland buds of evergreen With valley shoots could mitigate A million years of feudal hate From Irish Moss and carrageen; Or that the Adriatic weed By working on the thyroid freed The activators in his blood; That something in the morning cud Gentled his lymph towards his foes A steadying digitalis flip To the heart when he paused to nip The foxglove. Tell us he that knows. Or failing every shibboleth Of blood or ductless glands or such, Did reason enter in to touch The senses with the thought of death, And flash across goat-leaden eyes Glimpse of futilitarian skies? The vultures with their ten-foot spread, Their hairless necks and crimson lids, Were at their business half-a-mile Below among the ancient dead Or roosting on the pyramids. And some were mounting the defile To flank the Pass of Capra where They lounged like lizards on the air; And one black wing had come so near The Rock, its tip had brushed the coat Of the Carob leader as it passed: And had that brush, so leisured, cast The only one acknowledged fear Within the history of the goat? Or was it fear? Did Cyrus know

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That neither courage, strength nor will Behind the battle urge to kill Was proof against a flying foe? That every time when honour wronged Secured revenge upon the peaks, Inevitably the spoils belonged To the swiftest wings and sharpest beaksThe harpies and the cormorants Who, compensating for their theft Of blood and flesh and fat, had left The glory to the ruminants? But do not reason why the mind Should save the soul or seek to find Within the evolutionary dream An optimistic phagocyte, That cleaning up the corporate stream, Had scrubbed a conscience into light, The conscience of a Carobite An Aryan working overtime Beating the Tartar to the climb! Ye cannot know what Cyrus felt; Ye only know that Cyrus knelt. Kneltl Hocks and knees! The body lay Prone - lengthwise - on the Capra Pass, As if beside his dam - the way He went to sleep in summer grass. Now let pathologists explain What happened to the other brain. After a close look at the head, A momentary sniff at hoof And beard which gave Abimelech proof That Cyrus was by no means dead, A flash of understanding thrown Like a dagger of apocalypse, Had pierced the Gottite cranial bone

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And crashed his spiritual eclipse. Was it a glint of chivalry Nurtured under the eastern climes, A throw-back to the Gobi times, When someone in his ancestry Had set a fashion for the race, Made it a stigma of disgrace To foul a fallen enemy? Let him declare it who can tell Whether in Palestinian lands Some new conciliatory cell Had been evolved while roving bands Converged upon the desert sands To share the water from a well. The chieftain saw the road was thrown Wide open: it was his alone To take possession in his stride 'Twas his alone, this flush of pride In a great conquest which would place Him as the hero of his race. But all the arrogance and scorn On which his tribal soul was bred, Spurn of the hoof, flaunt of the horn That was Abimelech's, had fled, And in its place a strangely warm Infusion - a considerate care That would not harm a single hair. He sniffed once more the prostrate form Of Cyrus. Then as if he feared He might do violence to the head Or bring pollution to the beard, He stepped so lightly over, cleared Knees, hoofs and rump with that sure tread Which never yet had made him miss His foothold on a precipice.

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Clean over? Yes, beyond his foe! None could deny the deed was done, The Carolonian summit won, The Capra Pass without a blow! Cyrus looked up and in his eyes Was an incredulous surprise. He could not find his enemy. He shook himself and blinked awhile, Then straightened up and gingerly He made the perilous defile. Reaching the safety of the bend, He stopped and, curious, craned his neck, Only to see Abimelech Watching him at the other end. The eyes of those two hierarchs Were four interrogation marks. No record in the family tree Illumined this epiphany. Five minutes motionless and mute They stood with that hypnotic stare That only puzzled goats could wear; And then in reverent salute As though their eyes had shed their scales, And each had recognized a brother Bidding Good Morning to the other, They waved their beards and stubby tails, And turning took their downward trails, Accompanied by their retinue, Alive to the redemptive clue Cyrus to where the wild thyme grew, And where he could at his sweet beck Tread acres of the cistus-tree And lavender; Abimelech To bergamot and barberry, And where he could, up to his neck, Crop billowing leagues of cicely.

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Under the Lens Along the arterial highways, Through the cross-roads and trails of the veins They are ever on the move Incarnate strife, Reflecting in victory, deadlock and defeat, The outer campaigns of the world, But without tactics, without strategy. Creatures of primal force, With saurian impact And virus of the hamadryads, The microbes war with the leucocytes.

10

Physicians watch the conflict Advance, respite, recession and advance They shake their heads and murmur, 'Body versus organism/ 'A question of endurance/ Try out transfusion/ Tour in fresh troops/ With flush and pallor alternating, Pulses racing, slowing, flickering, The body sinks, Like a derelict with a mutinous crew, Steamless and rudderless, Taking its final drubbing from the sea.

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Once it was flood and drought, lightning and storm and earthquake, Those hoary executors of the will of God, That planned the monuments for human faith. Now, rather, it is these silent and invisible ministers, Teasing the ear of Providence And levelling out the hollows of His hands, That pose the queries for His moral government. 1937

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The Old Organon (1225 A.D.)

When Genghis and his captains Built their pyramids of skulls Outside Bokhara and Herat, And sacked Otrar and Samarcand, There was no sophistry between the subject and the verb; For what the Khan said, he meant. Behind the dust were the hoofs of his cavalry, Behind the smoke was his fire. And when Mohammed and Jehal-ud-Din, In their flight from the Indus to the Caspian, Appealed to Allah for protection, Even the Great God of Islam Could find no escape for the faithful, When he knew the flight was regimented To the paces of a Mongol syllogism.

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1937

The New (1937 A.D.)

Now when the delegates met around the tables And lifted up their voices, The subjects were the civilizing tasks, The fulfilment of historic missions, The redemption of the national honour, And the emancipation of the slaves. But flaws were hidden in the predicates, And in the pips of the adverbials, And the rhetorical adjectives Assumed the protective colouring Of the great cats against the jungle grass -

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THEREFORE,

In all the wealth of their possessive pronouns, Not a syllable was spared For the oil reported in the foreign shales.

1937

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The Illusion All patterns of the day were merged in one Clouds, wings and faces, dunes and harbour bars In a swift blur of vision as the sun Went down at noon upon a drift of spars. In such a lightless hour the sea had cleft A heart, fumbling its way as through a strait, Then passed, bequeathing to the common weft No record but its arid distillate. Though when night comes with sleep there still remains Enough of daylight and of surf to trace The artisan outside the storm-swept panes, Refashioning the pallor of his face To softer lines which thread my nescient mood With the illusion of beatitude.

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1937

The Impatient Earth

Back to the earth would we come In the fullness of years, As we return home at dusk When our eyes are dim with day And our feet tired with stubble. We would come with slow step Along the cool loam of lanes, Home to your heart With the mellow toll of bells in the west. But not as today would we come To the trumpet's unnatural summons, With our loins girt for a longer race And our faces set for a different goal, With our feet strung to the measures of life, To a riot of bells in the east.

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This is the season for blood-root and bud-break, For freshets and resinous airs, For the mating migrations Of swallows and whitethroats, For the scaling of crags, For the plangent call of the surf Where ospreys are building their nests.

20

Then why should we come out of season To take the long lease of your heart, When the swift irresponsible trespass Of our feet above ground Is cut short by the halt of the sentry? There are months still to go for the autumn, And months for the poppies to bloom, Though hate and greed have grown to their harvest, 30 Though tolerance, forgiveness and love are forgotten Like scars on the body of Christ Too soon in the morning for youth To take the deep draught of your opiate! November 1938 The Submarine The young lieutenant in command Of the famous submarine, the K148, had scanned The sea circumference all day: A thousand times or so his hand Revolved the prism in the hope That the image of the ship expected, But overdue, might be reflected Through the lenses of his periscope. 'Twas getting late, and not a mark Had troubled the monotony Of every slow expanding arc

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Of the horizon. Suddenly His grip froze to the handle! What Was that amorphous yellow spot To the north-east? Was it the lift Of a wave, a curl of foam, a drift Of cloud? Too slow for foam, too fast For cloud. A minute more. At last The drift was taking shape; his stroke Of luck had fallen - it was SMOKE!

20

An hour of light in the western sky, And thirty seconds for descent; The quarry ten miles off. Stand by! The valves were opened - flood and vent And the water like a rumble of thunder Entered the tanks. Two generators Sparked her fins and drove her under Down the ocean escalators. No forebear of the whale or shark, No saurian of the Pleiocene, Piercing the sub-aquatic dark Could rival this new submarine. The evolution of the sea Had brought forth many specimens Conceived in horror - denizens Whose vast inside economy Not only reproduced their broods, But having shot them from their wombs, Devoured them in their family feuds And passed them through their catacombs. But was there one in all their race Combined such terror with such grace, As this disturber of the glooms, This rapid sinuous oval form Which knew unerringly the way

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To sound and circumvent a storm Or steal a march upon her prey? No product she of Nature's dower, No casual selection wrought her Or gave her such mechanic power To breathe above or under water. In her thoracic cavities One hundred tons of batteries Were ready, on the dive, to start The musculation of the heart. And where outside a Ming museum Could any antiquarian find An assemblage such as here was shrined Within the vault of her peritoneum? Electric switches, indicators, Diving alarm-horns, oscillators, Rudder controls, and tubes and dials, Yellow, white, magenta vials, Pipes to force out battery gases, Pressure gauges, polished brasses, Surrounded human figures caught At their positions, silent, taut, Like statues in the tungsten light, While just outside the cell was night And a distant engine's monotone Tapping at a telephone. And now two hundred feet below She held her bearings towards her foe, While silence and the darkness flowed Along an unnavigated road. In half an hour she stopped and blew The water ballast with her air, Rose stealthily to surface where Upon the mirror in full view, Cutting an Atlantic swarth

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The trail of smoke turned out to be A fat mammalian of the sea, Set on a course north-east by north, And heavy with maternity. Within her framework iron-walled A thousand bodies were installed, A snug and pre-lacteal brood Drawing from her warmth and food, Awaiting in two days or three A European delivery. Blood of tiger, blood of shark, What a prey to stalk and strike From an ambush in the dark Thicket of the sea! Now like The tiger-shark viviparous Who with her young grown mutinous Before the birth-hour with the smell Of blood inside the mother, will expel Them from her body to begin At once the steerage of the fin, The seizure of the jaw, the click Of serried teeth fashioned so well Pre-natally to turn the trick Upon a shoal of mackerel So like the shark, the submarine Ejected from her magazine The first one of her foetal young. It ran along the trolley, swung Into a flooded tube and there Under a jet of compressed air It found the sea. A trip-latch in The tube a second later sprung A trigger, and the turbine power Acting on the driving fin Paced it at fifty miles per hour.

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So huge and luscious was this feast, The 148 released Three others to offset the chance Of some erratic circumstance Of aim or speed or tide or weather. And during this time nothing was seen Except to an eye in the submarine Of that bevy of sharks on the sea together, So accurately spaced one after the other, And driven by thirst derived from the mother. Each seemed on the glass a tenuous feather Of gold such as a curlew in flight Would make with its nether wing skimming the swell; Not a hint of a swerve to the left or right, The gyros were holding the balance so well. The rich-ripe mammal was swimming straight On the course of her chart with unconcerned leisure, Her steady keel and uniform rate Combining so perfectly with the deep black Of the hull - silhouette against the backDrop of the sunset to etch and measure The target - when three of those shafts of foam At the end of their amber stretch struck home. The first one barely missed - to plough A harmless path across her bow: The next tore like a scimitar Through flesh to rip the jugular; Boilers and bulkheads broke apart When the third torpedo struck the heart; And with what logic did the fourth Cancel the course north-east by north, Hitting abaft the beam to rut The exploding nitrates through her gut.

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The young commander's time was short To log the items for report. Upon the mirror he descried Three cavernous wounds in the mammal's side Three crumbled dykes through which the tide Of a gluttonous Atlantic poured; A heavy starboard list with banks Of smoke fluted with steam which soared From a scramble of pipes within her flanks; Twin funnel-nostrils belching red, A tilting stern, a plunging head, The foundering angle in position, And the sea's reach for a thousand souls In the last throe of the parturition.

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Now with her hyper-sensitive feel Of her master's hands on the controls A pull of a switch, a turn of a wheel, The submarine, like the deep-sea shark, Went under cover, away from the light And limn of the sunset, from the sight Of the stars, to a native lair as dark 170 As a kraken's grave. She took her course South-west by south - for what was the source Of that hum to the port picked up by the oscillator? A rhythm too rapid, too hectic for freighter Or liner! This was her foe, not her prey: Faster and louder, and heading her way! Beyond the depth where the tanks could flood'er, She drove her nose down with the diving rudder, Far from the storm of shells or thrust Of the ram, away from the gear-wrenching zone 180 Of the depth-bomb, away from the scent and lust Of a killer whose might was as great as her own. December 1938

36

The Anomaly The plan on which this life is built Is somewhat like a patchwork quilt, As crazy as may be Two colours stand out in the scheme: To one we give the name of dream, To one reality. For when in sleep man leaves behind His polished economic mind, A pauper though he be, He turns a Sultan overnight, Takes all the wealth of life at sight, And holds a realm in fee. But when within his waking state, As one of the electorate, Though hungry as can be, He gathers in his harvest store, Fills up the pantry, locks the door, Then throws away the key.

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1938

The Stag Branched head lifted and poised, Ears cupped, vibrating, Nostrils flaring, Body shafted to the muscle-strings He leaped to the bay of hounds And took the runway to the lake. Trailing a drift of vapour, From flanks and lungs In the crisp November morning, He measured up his stamina

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Against those footling mongrels, And tossed them off his easy margins Of speed and wind. Water - through the birches! And the challenge of the swim! Both barrels - at thirty yards! Through eyes, sockets, and skull to the brains, Crash of knees, Spate of nostrils, Antlers ploughing through underbrush. 'Dead as a stump!' 'What a spread!' Thirty-five points. No, thirty-six, thirty-seven; For the oak panels Over the west door of the Imperial'; 'Ought to fetch fifty dollars, God - what sport!'

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1938

Old Harry

Along the coast the sailors tell The superstition of its fame Of how the sea had faceted The Rock into a human head And given it the devil's name. And much there was that would compel A wife or mother of a seaman To find a root in the belief The rock that jutted from the reef Was built to incarnate a demon.

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But there's a story that might well Receive a share of crediting, And make the title fit the look Of vacancy the boulder took Under the ocean's battering. Within that perforated shell Of basalt worn by wave and keel The demon ruler of the foam One night upon returning home Was changed into an imbecile,

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Ordered to stay within his cell, Clutch at the spectres of the air, Listen to shrieks of drowning men, And stare at phantom ribs and then Listen again and clutch and stare. So like a sea-crazed sentinel, Weary of sailors and their ships, Old Harry stands with salt weed spread In matted locks around his head, And foam forever on his lips.

February 1939

The Dying Eagle A light had gone out from his vanquished eyes; His head was cupped within the hunch of his shoulders; His feathers were dull and bedraggled; the tips Of his wings sprawled down to the edge of his tail. He was old, yet it was not his age Which made him roost on the crags Like a rain-drenched raven On the branch of an oak in November.

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Nor was it the night, for there was an hour To go before sunset. An iron had entered His soul which bereft him of pride and of realm, Had struck him today; for up to noon That crag had been his throne. Space was his empire, bounded only By forest and sky and the flowing horizons. He had outfought, outlived all his rivals, And the eagles that now were poised over glaciers Or charting the coastal outlines of clouds Were his by descent: they had been tumbled Out of their rocky nests by his mate, In the first trial of their fledgling spins. Only this morning the eyes of the monarch Were held in arrest by a silver flash Shining between two peaks of the ranges A sight which galvanized his back, Bristled the feathers on his neck, And shot little runnels of dust where his talons Dug recesses in the granite. Partridge? Heron? Falcon? Eagle? Game or foe? He would reconnoitre. Catapulting from the ledge, He flew at first with rapid beat, Level, direct; then with his grasp Of spiral strategy in fight, He climbed the orbit With swift and easy undulations, And reached position where he might Survey the bird - for bird it was; But such a bird as never flew Between the heavens and the earth Since pterodactyls, long before The birth of condors, learned to kill And drag their carrion up the Andes.

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The eagle stared at the invader, Marked the strange bat-like shadow moving In leagues over the roofs of the world, Across the passes and moraines, Darkening the vitriol blue of the mountain lakes. Was it a flying dragon? Head, Body and wings, a tail fan-spread And taut like his own before the strike; And there in front two whirling eyes That took unshuttered The full blaze of the meridian. The eagle never yet had known A rival that he would not grapple, But something in this fellow's length Of back, his plated glistening shoulders, Had given him pause. And did that thunder Somewhere in his throat not argue Lightning in his claws? And then The speed - was it not double his own? But what disturbed him most, angered And disgraced him was the unconcern With which this supercilious bird Cut through the aquiline dominion, Snubbing the ancient suzerain With extra-territorial insolence, And disappeared. So evening found him on the crags again, This time with sloven shoulders And nerveless claws. Dusk had outridden the sunset by an hour To haunt his unhorizoned eyes. And soon his flock flushed with the chase Would be returning, threading their glorious curves Up through the crimson archipelagoes Only to find him there -

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Deaf to the mighty symphony of wings, And brooding Over the lost empire of the peaks.

Winter 1939

The Radio in the Ivory Tower (1937-Sept. 1939) This is the castle of peace, And this its quietest hour; There isn't a cry from the gathering dusk, There isn't a stir in the mist; The fog has scarfed the moon and stars, The curtains are drawn on the tides; There isn't a wave at the curve of the shore; A granite-grey silence covers the land, And the gulls are asleep on a soundless swell. Nor is there a sign that under this Rock, At the heart of the earth, the volcanoes Await the word of the Lord of Misrule To renew their ancient carnival; Nor is there a sign above the Rock That the earth responds to the whip of the sun, Directing its pace and its orbit. This is the cloister of the world, Reduced to a cell in the fortress of peace In the midst of anonymous, infinite darkness.

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A slight turn of a dial, And night and space and the silence Thronged and tongued with life As the hosts might swarm through a lens From a blood drop Or a spot of dust in the heavens. Out of the void they came

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To storm the base of the tower, To hammer the walls of the cell And tap at the mullioned panes. Polaris, the scout of Orion, Was frigidly, jealously Watching a speck on the frontier. Adjusting a monocle, He focused a stare which had often congealed The blood of explorers, And frozen their hands to the sextants Till their bodies starched on the parallels. He flashed to his chief That a pair of Muscovite eagles Had taken his stare without blinking, Had rifled the pole right under his nose, And, southward advancing, had brushed with their wings One-half the floor of the world. Nor would it be long, he predicted, Before complaints would come from the stars, All the way from zenith to nadir, That their eyes had been blinded by grit, The moment those birds had swept All the dust from the planet Tellurian With one whiff of their insolent tails. A civilized group from the west, Lithe, sleek and genteel And ambassadorial, Silked from their speech to the rim of their cuffs, Were joined by a rout from the east: Battered, uncouth and down at the heel, Reeking with smoke from Nanking, Weathering typhoons off Shanghai and Burma, They filled the night with their clamour, And spattered the shirts of the Cabinet Ministers With sludge from the bed of the Yangtze.

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From the south, south-east and south-west Came the ghosts of the master of rapture, Invoked by their master executants. Through larynx and fingers and lips, From catgut and silver and brass, They were harassed by spirits still in the flesh Who strove through auditions With tap-dance and croon, with yodel and bleat, To grind out an art cacophonic. And choirs arrayed in white robes Who had heard of blood that redeemed, Of fires that refined And of glory that sanctified dying, Were massed in their anthem formation To peal forth their late Hallelujahs To a sovereign of love, law and order. Tenore robusto and coloratura, Deep-chested contralto and basso profundo Entered to sing of their balcony lovers, Of jealousies, hates and neurotic farewells, Of picadors, passionate gypsies, Of damsels anaemic waiting at windows For exiles that never returned. The moon waxed and waned, And came again to the full, Till the sea arose to the equinox. But only ferrets of sound Came out of the fog To worm themselves through the cracks in the cobbles. The waters leaped at the splayed bastions The might of the waters Against the weight of the concrete, Against the strength of the steel But only the dull reverberation of their paws Disturbed the insulation of the tower;

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Only the faintest echoes seeped through the copper roof As the gulls screamed around the weather-vane. (September 1939) The dial swung to the 69, And with the sprint of light On the last lap of the kilocycles Blew in the great syllabic storm of the age. Slow in the deep bass started the overture, Heavy with guttural chords And growling consonants that raked the cuspids With timed explosions. A crash of the dental mutes Was followed by the pour of the open vowels Along a huge Teutonic corridor. And when the serried sibilants struck High G, A child ran from the room of the tower, An Alsatian bristled his neck, A Dachshund slunk under a chair; And the period ended with a frenzy Of thirty thousand voices orchestrated To reduce the Gotterdammerung To a trundle lullaby. O master mason! What was wrong with the mortar That, built to withstand the siege of the sea, Should crumble beneath the roar from a throat? Another turn, and the static combined With the music of march and the roll of drums, To prelude the close of a civilized aeon. With a new salute and macabre step, Chaos came in at the call of the horns. No longer did news pause to rest on the journey, Relayed through the stations in story and comment, To be combed and groomed by the censors In the leisured light of the studios:

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45 But straight from the rape of the liners, From the listed decks of the cruisers, From trenches and plants and fields, Came the grind from the lurch of the life-boats, The sputter of salt from the throats, The caterpillar crunch of the tanks, The cries that out-blared the burst of the shells, And the wheeze from the lungs that followed the sirens In the smother of black-outs that covered the world. Then Time shedding his mask, His lazy hour-glass, his rusty scythe, And all his tattered mortalities Curved over bowed decrepit shoulders Assumed the stature of a young Apollyon. He rose to be the Paragon of Power. A set of golden keys Closing all doors of life, Fitting the wards of death, Hung from a girdle at his waist; And as he led his mad aerial legions Around the turret, What thunders tarried in his fists! What voltage in the dark tips of his wings! Fire-Worship Many a morning had I watched this bay Rifle the jewels which the Dawn outrolled, And then deliver to the god of Day The plunder for a smock of woven gold. But never had this picture struck my eyes At any bargain counters of the east Such sacrificial use of merchandise, The vision of a bandit turning priest -

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Until this morning when the ocean learned To hold a Mass before the highest name In pagan hierarchies, and returned Its transubstantial gems to flame.

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February 1940

Dunkirk So long as light shall shine upon a world Which has a human sage for the lyre, A pennant at the masthead left unfurled, A name, a title to be writ in fire; So long as there is drama on the earth And the wild pulses leap to the grand themes That dignify our voyaging from birth To death along the highway of our dreams; This name shall be the symbol for the soul, A new Promethean triumph in defeat, And find its place in the historic scroll That lists the immortal stand, the great retreat, Attending causes ultimately won Thermopylae, Corunna or Verdun. Brebeuf and His Brethren i

The winds of God were blowing over France, Kindling the hearths and altars, changing vows Of rote into an alphabet of flame. The air was charged with song beyond the range Of larks, with wings beyond the stretch of eagles. Skylines unknown to maps broke from the mists And there was laughter on the seas. With sound Of bugles from the Roman catacombs,

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July 1940

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The saints came back in their incarnate forms. Across the Alps St Francis of Assisi In his brown tunic girt with hempen cord, Revisited the plague-infected towns. The monks were summoned from their monasteries, Nuns from their convents; apostolic hands Had touched the priests; foundlings and galley slaves Became the charges of Vincent de Paul; Francis de Sales put his heroic stamp Upon his order of the Visitation. Out of Numidia by way of Rome, The architect of palaces, unbuilt Of hand, again was busy with his plans, Reshaping for the world his City of God. Out of the Netherlands was heard the call Of Kempis through the Imitatio To leave the dusty marts and city streets And stray along the shores of Galilee. The flame had spread across the Pyrenees The visions of Theresa burning through The adorations of the Carmelites; The very clouds at night to John of the Cross Being cruciform - chancel, transept and aisle Blazing with light and holy oracle. Xavier had risen from his knees to drive His dreams full-sail under an ocean compass. Loyola, soldier-priest, staggering with wounds At Pampeluna, guided by a voice, Had travelled to the Montserrata Abbey To leave his sword and dagger on an altar That he might lead the Company of Jesus. The story of the frontier like a saga Sang through the cells and cloisters of the nation, Made silver flutes out of the parish spires, Troubled the ashes of the canonized

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In the cathedral crypts, soared through the nave To stir the foliations on the columns, Roll through the belfries, and give deeper tongue To the Magnificat in Notre Dame. It brought to earth the prophets and apostles Out of their static shrines in the stained glass. It caught the ear of Christ, reveined his hands And feet, bidding his marble saints to leave Their pedestals for chartless seas and coasts And the vast blunders of the forest glooms. So, in the footsteps of their patrons came A group of men asking the hardest tasks At the new outposts of the Huron bounds Held in the stern hand of the Jesuit Order. And in Bayeux a neophyte while rapt In contemplation saw a bleeding form Falling beneath the instrument of death, Rising under the quickening of the thongs, Stumbling along the Via Dolorosa. No play upon the fancy was this scene, But the Real Presence to the naked sense. The fingers of Brebeuf were at his breast, Closing and tightening on a crucifix, While voices spoke aloud unto his ear

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And to his heart - per ignem et per aquam.

Forests and streams and trails thronged through his mind, The painted faces of the Iroquois, Nomadic bands and smoking bivouacs Along the shores of western inland seas, With forts and palisades and fiery stakes. The stories of Champlain, Brule, Viel, Sagard and Le Caron had reached his town The stories of those northern boundaries Where in the winter the white pines could brush The Pleiades, and at the equinoxes

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Under the gold and green of the auroras Wild geese drove wedges through the zodiac. The vows were deep he laid upon his soul. 'I shall be broken first before I break them/ He knew by heart the manual that had stirred The world - the clarion calling through the notes Of the Ignatian preludes. On the prayers, The meditations, points and colloquies, Was built the soldier and the martyr programme. This is the end of man - Deum laudet, To seek and find the will of God, to act Upon it for the ordering of life, And for the soul's beatitude. This is To do, this not to do. To weigh the sin; The interior understanding to be followed By the amendment of the deed through grace; The abnegation of the evil thought And act; the trampling of the body under; The daily practice of the counter virtues. In time of desolation to be firm And constant in the soul's determination, Desire and sense obedient to the reason.' The oath Brebeuf was taking had its root Firm in his generations of descent. The family name was known to chivalry In the Crusades; at Hastings; through the blood Of the English Howards; called out on the rungs Of the siege ladders; at the castle breaches; Proclaimed by heralds at the lists, and heard In Council Halls: - the coat-of-arms a bull In black with horns of gold on a silver shield. So on that toughened pedigree of fibre Were strung the pledges. From the novice stage To the vow-day he passed on to the priesthood, And on the anniversary of his birth He celebrated his first mass at Rouen.

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April 26, 1625 And the first clauses of the Jesuit pledge Were honoured when, embarking at Dieppe, Brebeuf, Masse and Charles Lalemant Travelled three thousand miles of the Atlantic, And reached the citadel in seven weeks. A month in preparation at Notre Dame Des Anges, Brebeuf in company with Daillon Moved to Three Rivers to begin the journey. Taking both warning and advice from traders, They packed into their stores of altar-ware And vestments, strings of colored beads with knives, Kettles and awls, domestic gifts to win The Hurons' favour or appease their wrath. There was a touch of omen in the warning, For scarcely had they started when the fate Of the Franciscan mission was disclosed News of Viel, delivered to Brebeuf Drowned by the natives in the final league Of his return at Sault-au-Recollet! Back to Quebec by Lalemant's command; A year's delay of which Brebeuf made use By hardening his body and his will, Learning the rudiments of the Huron tongue, Mastering the wood-lore, joining in the hunt For food, observing habits of speech, the ways Of thought, the moods and the long silences. Wintering with the Algonquins, he soon knew The life that was before him in the cabins The troubled night, branches of fir covering The floor of snow; the martyrdom of smoke That hourly drove his nostrils to the ground To breathe, or offered him the choice of death Outside by frost, inside by suffocation; The forced companionship of dogs that ate

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From the same platters, slept upon his legs Or neck; the nausea from sagamite, Unsalted, gritty, and that bloated feeling, The February stomach touch when acorns, Turk's cap, bog-onion bulbs dug from the snow And bulrush roots flavoured with eel skin made The menu for his breakfast-dinner-supper. Added to this, the instigated taunts Common as daily salutations; threats Of murderous intent that just escaped The deed - the prologue to Huronia!

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July 1626 Midsummer and the try again - Brebeuf, Daillon, de Noue just arrived from France; Quebec up to Three Rivers; the routine Repeated; bargaining with the Indians, Axes and beads against the maize and passage; The natives' protest when they saw Brebeuf, High as a totem-pole. What if he placed His foot upon the gunwale, suddenly Shifted an ounce of those two hundred pounds Off centre at the rapids! They had visions Of bodies and bales gyrating round the rocks, Plunging like stumps and logs over the falls. The Hurons shook their heads: the bidding grew; Kettles and porcelain necklaces and knives, Till with the last awl thrown upon the heap, The ratifying grunt came from the chief. Two Indians holding the canoe, Brebeuf, Barefooted, cassock pulled up to his knees, Planted one foot dead in the middle, then The other, then slowly and ticklishly Adjusted to the physics of his range And width, he grasped both sides of the canoe, Lowered himself and softly murmuring An Ave, sat, immobile as a statue.

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So the flotilla started - the same route Champlain and Le Caron eleven years Before had taken to avoid the swarm Of hostile Iroquois on the St Lawrence. Eight hundred miles - along the Ottawa Through the steep gorges where the river narrowed, Through calmer waters where the river widened, Skirting the island of the Allumettes, Thence to the Mattawa through the lakes that led To the blue waters of the Nipissing, And then southward a hundred tortuous miles Down the French River to the Huron shore. The record of that trip was for Brebeuf A memory several times to be re-lived; Of rocks and cataracts and portages, Of feet cut by*the river stones, of mud And stench, of boulders, logs and tangled growths, Of summer heat that made him long for night, And when he struck his bed of rock - mosquitoes That made him doubt if dawn would ever break. 'Twas thirty days to the Georgian Bay, then south One hundred miles threading the labyrinth Of islands till he reached the western shore That flanked the Bay of Penetanguishene. Soon joined by both his fellow priests he followed The course of a small stream and reached Toanche, Where for three years he was to make his home And turn the first sod of the Jesuit mission. 'Twas ploughing only - for eight years would pass Before even the blades appeared. The priests Knew well how barren was the task should signs, Gestures and inarticulate sounds provide The basis of the converse. And the speech Was hard. De Noue set himself to school, Unfalteringly as to his Breviary,

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Through the long evenings of the fall and winter. But as light never trickled through a sentence, Either the Hurons' or his own, he left With the spring's expedition to Quebec, Where intermittently for twenty years He was to labour with the colonists, Travelling between the outposts, and to die Snow-blind, caught in the circles of his tracks Between Three Rivers and Fort Richelieu. Daillon migrated to the south and west To the country of the Neutrals. There he spent The winter, fruitless. Jealousies of trade Awoke resentment, fostered calumnies, Until the priest under a constant threat That often issued in assault, returned Against his own persuasion to Quebec. Brebeuf was now alone. He bent his mind To the great end. The efficacious rites Were hinged as much on mental apprehensions As on the disposition of the heart. For that the first equipment was the speech. He listened to the sounds and gave them letters, Arranged their sequences, caught the inflections, Extracted nouns from objects, verbs from actions And regimented rebel moods and tenses. He saw the way the chiefs harangued the clans, The torrent of compounded words, the art Concealed within the pause, the look, the gesture. Lacking all labials, the open mouth Performed a double service with the vowels Directed like a battery at the hearers. With what forebodings did he watch the spell Cast on the sick by the Arendiwans: The sorcery of the Huron rhetoric

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Extorting bribes for cures, for guarantees Against the failure of the crop or hunt! The time would come when steel would clash on steel, And many a battle would be won or lost With weapons from the armoury of words. Three years of that apprenticeship had won The praise of his Superior and no less Evoked the admiration of Champlain. That soldier, statesman, navigator, friend, Who had combined the brain of Richelieu With the red blood of Cartier and Magellan, Was at this time reduced to his last keg Of powder at the citadel. Blockade, The piracy of Kirke on the Atlantic, The English occupation of Quebec, And famine, closed this chapter of the mission.

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Four years at home could not abate his zeal. Brebeuf, absorbed within his meditations, Made ready to complete his early vows. Each year in France but served to clarify His vision. At Rouen he gauged the height Of the Cathedral's central tower in terms Of pines and oaks around the Indian lodges. He went to Paris. There as worshipper, His eyes were scaling transepts, but his mind, Straying from window patterns where the sun Shed rose ellipses on the marble floor, Rested on glassless walls of cedar bark. To Rennes - the Jesuits' intellectual home, Where, in the Summa of Aquinas, faith Laid hold on God's existence when the last

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Link of the Reason slipped, and where Loyola Enforced the high authoritarian scheme Of God's vicegerent on the priestly fold. Between the two nostalgic fires Brebeuf Was swung - between two homes; in one was peace Within the holy court, the ecstasy Of unmolested prayer before the Virgin, The daily and vicarious offering On which no hand might dare lay sacrilege: But in the other would be broken altars And broken bodies of both Host and priest. Then of which home, the son? From which the exile? With his own blood Brebeuf wrote his last vow 'Lord Jesus! You redeemed me with your blood; By your most precious death; and this is why I make this pledge to serve you all my life In the Society of Jesus - never To serve another than Thyself. Hereby I sign this promise in my blood, ready To sacrifice it all as willingly As now I give this drop/ - Jean de Brebeuf. Nor did the clamour of the Thirty Years, The battle-cries at La Rochelle and Fribourg, Blow out the flame. Less strident than the names Of Richelieu and Mazarin, Conde, Turenne, but just as mighty, were the calls Of the new apostolate. A century Before had Xavier from the Indies summoned The world to other colours. Now appeals Were ringing through the history of New France. Le Jeune, following the example of Biard And Charles Lalemant, was capturing souls By thousands with the fire of the Relations: Noble and peasant, layman, priest and nun Gave of their wealth and power and personal life.

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Among his new recruits were Chastellain, Pijart, Le Mercier, and Isaac Jogues, The Lalemants - Jerome and Gabriel Jerome who was to supervise and write, With Ragueneau, the drama of the Mission; Who told of the survivors reaching France When the great act was closed that 'all of them Still hold their resolution to return To the combat at the first sound of the trumpets/ The other, Gabriel, who would share the crown With Jean Brebeuf, pitting the frailest body Against the hungers of the wilderness, The fevers of the lodges and the fires That slowly wreathed themselves around a stake. Then Gamier, comrade of Jogues. The winds Had fanned to a white heat the hearth and placed Three brothers under vows - the Carmelite, The Capuchin, and his, the Jesuit. The gentlest of his stock, he had resolved To seek and to accept a post that would Transmit his nurture through a discipline That multiplied the living martyrdoms Before the casual incident of death. To many a vow did Chabanel subject His timid nature as the evidence Of trial came through the Huronian records. He needed every safeguard of the soul To fortify the will, for every day Would find him fighting, mastering his revolt Against the native life and practices. Of all the priests he could the least endure The sudden transformation from the Chair Of College Rhetoric to the heat and drag Of portages, from the monastic calm

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To the noise and smoke and vermin of the lodges, And the insufferable sights and stinks When, at the High Feast of the Dead, the bodies Lying for months or years upon the scaffolds Were taken down, stripped of their flesh, caressed, Strung up along the cabin poles and then Cast in a pit for common burial. The day would come when in the wilderness, The weary hand protesting, he would write This final pledge - 'I, Noel Chabanel, Do vow, in presence of the Sacrament Of Thy most precious blood and body, here To stay forever with the Huron Mission, According to commands of my Superiors. Therefore I do beseech Thee to receive me As Thy perpetual servant and to make Me worthy of so sublime a ministry/ And the same spirit breathed on Chaumonot, Making his restless and undisciplined soul At first seek channels of renunciation In abstinence, ill health and beggary. His months of pilgrimages to the shrines At Rome and to the Lady of Loretto, The static hours upon his knees had sapped His strength, turning an introspective mind Upon the weary circuit of its thoughts, Until one day a letter from Brebeuf Would come to burn the torpors of his heart And galvanize a raw novitiate. in

1633 New France restored! Champlain, Masse, Brebeuf Were in Quebec, hopes riding high as ever.

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Davost and Daniel soon arrived to join The expedition west. Midsummer trade, The busiest the Colony had known, Was over: forty-three canoes to meet The hazards of return; the basic sense Of safety, now Champlain was on the scene; The joy of the Toanche Indians As they beheld Brebeuf and heard him speak In their own tongue, was happy augury But as before upon the eve of starting The path was blocked, so now the unforeseen Stepped in. A trade and tribal feud long-blown Between the Hurons and the Allumettes Came to a head when the Algonquin chief Forbade the passage of the priests between His island and the shore. The Hurons knew The roughness of this channel, and complied. In such delays which might have been construed By lesser wills as exits of escape, As providential doors on a light latch, The Fathers entered deeper preparation. They worked incessantly among the tribes In the environs of Quebec, took hold Of Huron words and beat them into order. Davost and Daniel gathered from the store Of speech, manners, and customs that Brebeuf Had garnered, all the subtleties to make The bargain for the journey. The next year Seven canoes instead of forty! Fear Of Iroquois following a recent raid And massacre; growing distrust of priests; The sense of risk in having men aboard Unskilled in fire-arms, helpless at the paddles And on the portages - all these combined To sharpen the terms until the treasury Was dry of presents and of promises.

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1634 The ardours of his trip eight years before Fresh in his mind, Brebeuf now set his face To graver peril, for the native mood Was hostile. On the second week the corn Was low, a handful each a day. Sickness Had struck the Huron, slowing down the blades, And turning murmurs to menaces Against the Blackrobes and their French companions. The first blow hit Davost. Robbed of his books, Papers and altar linens, he was left At the Island of the Allumettes; Martin Was put ashore at Nipissing; Baron And Daniel were deserted, made to take Their chances with canoes along the route; Yet all in turn, tattered, wasted, with feet Bleeding - broken though not in will - rejoined Their great companion after he had reached The forest shores of the Fresh Water Sea, And guided by the sight of smoke had entered The village of Ihonatiria.

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A year's success flattered the priestly hope That on this central field seed would be sown On which the yield would be the Huron nation Baptized and dedicated to the Faith; And that a richer harvest would be gleaned Of duskier grain from the same seed on more Forbidding ground when the arch-foes themselves Would be re-born under the sacred rites. For there was promise in the auspices. Ihonatiria received Brebeuf With joy. Three years he had been there, a friend Whose visit to the tribes could not have sprung From inspiration rooted in private gain.

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He had not come to stack the arquebuses Against the mountains of the beaver pelts. He had not come to kill. Between the two - Barter and battle - what was left to explain A stranger in their midst? The name Echon Had solved the riddle. So with native help The Fathers built their mission house - the frame Of young elm-poles set solidly in earth; Their supple tops bent, lashed and braced to form The arched roof overlaid with cedar-bark. 'No Louvre or palace is this cabin/ wrote Brebeuf, 'no stories, cellar, garret, windows, No chimney - only at the top a hole To let the smoke escape. Inside, three rooms With doors of wood alone set it apart From the single long-house of the Indians. The first is used for storage; in the second Our kitchen, bedroom and refectory; Our bedstead is the earth; rushes and boughs For mattresses and pillows; in the third, Which is our chapel, we have placed the altar, The images and vessels of the Mass/ It was the middle room that drew the natives, Day after day, to share the sagamite And raisins, and to see the marvels brought From France - marvels on which the Fathers built A basis of persuasion, recognizing The potency of awe for natures nurtured On charms and spells, invoking kindly spirits And exorcising demons. So the natives Beheld a mass of iron chips like bees Swarm to a lodestone: was it gum that held Them fast? They watched the handmill grind the corn; Gaped at a lens eleven faceted

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That multiplied a bead as many times And at a phial where a captive flea Looked like a beetle. But the miracle Of all, the clock! It showed the hours; it struck Or stopped upon command. Le Capitaine Du Jour which moved its hands before its face, Called up the dawn, saluted noon, rang out The sunset, summoned with the count of twelve The Fathers to a meal, or sent at four The noisy pack of Indians to their cabins. 'What did it say?' 'Yo eiouahaoua Time to put on the cauldron/ 'And what now?' 'Time to go home at once and close the door/ It was alive: an oki dwelt inside, Peering out through that black hub on the dial.

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As great a mystery was writing - how A Frenchman fifteen miles away could know The meaning of black signs the runner brought. Sometimes the marks were made on peel of bark, Sometimes on paper - in itself a wonder! From what strange tree was it the inside rind? What charm was in the ink that transferred thought Across such space without a spoken word? This growing confirmation of belief Was speeded by events wherein good fortune Waited upon the priestly word and act. August 27, 1635 A moon eclipse was due - Brebeuf had known it Had told the Indians of the moment when The shadow would be thrown across the face. Nor was there wastage in the prayers as night, Uncurtained by a single cloud, produced An orb most perfect. No one knew the lair

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Or nest from which the shadow came; no one The home to which it travelled when it passed. Only the vague uncertainties were left Was it the dread invasion from the south? Such portent was the signal for the braves To mass themselves outside the towns and shoot Their multitudes of arrows at the sky And fling their curses at the Iroquois. Like a crow's wing it hovered, broodily Brushing the face - five hours from rim to rim While midnight darkness stood upon the land. This was prediction baffling all their magic. Again, when weeks of drought had parched the land And burned the corn, when dancing sorcerers Brought out their tortoise shells, climbed on the roofs, Clanging their invocation to the Bird Of Thunder to return, day after day, Without avail, the priests formed their processions, Put on their surplices above their robes, And the Bird of Thunder came with heavy rain, Released by the nine masses at Saint Joseph. Nor were the village warriors slow to see The value of the Frenchmen's strategy In war. Returning from the eastern towns, They told how soldiers had rebuilt the forts, And strengthened them with corner bastions Where through the embrasures enfilading fire Might flank the Iroquois bridging the ditches, And scaling ramparts. Here was argument That pierced the thickest prejudice of brain And heart, allaying panic ever present, When with the first news of the hated foe From scouts and hunters, women with their young Fled to the dubious refuge of the forest

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From terror blacker than a pestilence. On such a soil tilled by those skilful hands Those passion flowers and lilies of the East, The Aves and the Paternosters bloomed. The Credos and the Thou-shalt-nots were turned By Daniel into simple Huron rhymes And taught to children, and when points of faith Were driven hard against resistant rock, The Fathers found the softer crevices Through deeds which readily the Indian mind Could grasp - where hands were never put to blows Nor the swift tongues used for recrimination. Acceptance of the common lot was part Of the original vows. But that the priests Who were to come should not misread the text, Brebeuf prepared a sermon on the theme Of Patience: - 'Fathers, Brothers, under call Of God! Take care that you foresee the perils, Labours and hardships of this Holy Mission. You must sincerely love the savages As brothers ransomed by the blood of Christ. All things must be endured. To win their hearts You must perform the smallest services. Provide a tinder-box or burning mirror To light their fires. Fetch wood and water for them; And when embarking never let them wait For you; tuck up your habits, keep them dry To avoid water and sand in their canoes. Carry Your load on portages. Always appear Cheerful - their memories are good for faults. Constrain yourselves to eat their sagamite The way that they prepare it, tasteless, dirty/

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And by the priests upon the ground all dots And commas were observed. They suffered smoke That billowed from the back-draughts at the roof, Smothered the cabin, seared the eyes; the fire That broiled the face, while frost congealed the spine; The food from unwashed platters where refusal Was an offence; the rasp of speech maintained All day by men who never learned to talk In quiet tones; the drums of the Diviners Blasting the night - all this without complaint! And more - whatever sleep was possible To snatch from the occasional lull of cries Was broken by uncovenanted fleas That fastened on the priestly flesh like hornets. Carving the curves of favour on the lips, Tailoring the man into the Jesuit coat, Wrapping the smiles round inward maledictions, And sublimating hoary Gallic oaths Into the Benedicite when dogs And squaws and reeking children violated The hours of rest, were penances unnamed Within the iron code of good Ignatius. Was there a limit of obedience Outside the jurisdiction of this Saint? How often did the hand go up to lower The flag? How often by some ringing order Was it arrested at the halliard touch? How often did Brebeuf seal up his ears When blows and insults woke ancestral fifes Within his brain, blood-cells, and viscera, Is not explicit in the written story. But never could the Indians infer Self-gain or anything but simple courage Inspired by a zeal beyond reproof, As when the smallpox spreading like a flame

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Destroying hundreds, scarifying thousands, The Fathers took their chances of contagion, Their broad hats warped by rain, their moccasins Worn to the kibes, that they might reach the huts, Share with the sick their dwindled stock of food A sup of partridge broth or raisin juice, Inscribe the sacred sign of the cross, and place A touch of moisture from the Holy Water Upon the forehead of a dying child. Before the year was gone the priests were shown The way the Hurons could prepare for death A captive foe. The warriors had surprised A band of Iroquois and had reserved The one survivor for a fiery pageant. No cunning of an ancient Roman triumph, Nor torment of a Medici confession Surpassed the subtle savagery of art Which made the dressing for the sacrifice A ritual of mockery for the victim. What visions of the past came to Brebeuf, And what forebodings of the days to come, As he beheld this weird compound of life In jest and intent taking place before His eyes -the crude unconscious variants Of reed and sceptre, robe and cross, brier And crown! Might not one day baptismal drops Be turned against him in a rain of death? Whatever the appeals made by the priests, They could not break the immemorial usage Or vary one detail. The prisoner Was made to sing his death-song, was embraced, Hailed with ironic greetings, forced to state His willingness to die. 'See how your hands Are crushed. You cannot thus desire to live.

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Then be of good courage - you shall die.

True! What shall be the manner of my death? By fire.

When shall it be?

At sunset.

Tonight.

What hour?

All is well/

Eleven fires Were lit along the whole length of the cabin. His body smeared with pitch and bound with belts Of bark, the Iroquois was forced to run The fires, stopped at each end by the young braves, And swiftly driven back, and when he swooned, They carried him outside to the night air, Laid him on fresh damp moss, poured cooling water Into his mouth, and to his burns applied The soothing balsams. With resuscitation They lavished on him all the courtesies Of speech and gesture, gave him food and drink, Compassionately spoke of his wounds and pain. The ordeal every hour was resumed And halted, but, with each recurrence, blows Were added to the burns and gibes gave place To yells until the sacrificial dawn, Lighting the scaffold, dimming the red glow Of the hatchet collar, closed the festival. Brebeuf had seen the worst. He knew that when A winter pack of wolves brought down a stag There was no waste of time between the leap And the business click upon the jugular, Such was the forthright honesty in death

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Among the brutes. They had not learned the sport Of dallying around the nerves to halt A quick despatch. A human art was torture, Where reason crept into the veins, mixed tar With blood and brewed its own intoxicant. Brebeuf had pleaded for the captive's life, But as the night wore on, would not his heart, Colliding with his mind, have wished for death? The plea refused, he gave the Iroquois The only consolation in his power. He went back to his cabin, heavy in heart. To stem that viscous melanotic current Demanded labour, time, and sacrifice. Those passions were not altered over-night. Two plans were in his mind - the one concerned The seminary started in Quebec. The children could be sent there to be trained In Christian precepts, weaned from superstition And from the savage spectacle of death. He saw the way the women and their broods Danced round the scaffold in their exaltation. How much of this was habit and how much Example? Curiously Brebeuf revolved The facets of the Indian character. A fighting courage equal to the French It could be lifted to crusading heights By a battle speech. Endurance was a code Among the braves, and impassivity. Their women wailing at the Feast of Death, The men sat silent, heads bowed to the knees. 'Never in nine years with but one exception/ Wrote Ragueneau, 'did I see an Indian weep For grief.' Only the fires evoked the cries, And these like scalps were triumphs for the captors. But then their charity and gentleness To one another and to strangers gave

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A balance to the picture. Fugitives From villages destroyed found instant welcome To the last communal share of food and land. Brebeuf's stay at Toanche gave him proof Of how the Huron nature could respond To kindness. But last night upon that scaffold! Could that be scoured from the heart? Why not Try out the nurture plan upon the children And send the boys east, shepherded by Daniel? The other need was urgent - labourers! The villages were numerous and were spread Through such a vast expanse of wilderness And shore. Only a bell with a bronze throat Must summon missionaries to these fields. With the last cry of the captive in his ears, Brebeuf strode from his cabin to the woods To be alone. He found his tabernacle Within a grove, picked up a stone flat-faced, And going to a cedar-crotch, he jammed It in, and on this table wrote his letter. 'Herein I show you what you have to suffer. I shall say nothing of the voyage - that You know already. If you have the courage To try it, that is only the beginning, For when after a month of river travel You reach our village, we can offer you The shelter of a cabin lowlier Than any hovel you have seen in France. As tired as you may be, only a mat Laid on the ground will be your bed. Your food May be for weeks a gruel of crushed corn That has the look and smell of mortar paste. This country is the breeding place of vermin. Sandflies, mosquitoes haunt the summer months. In France you may have been a theologian, A scholar, master, preacher, but out here

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You must attend a savage school; for months Will pass before you learn even to lisp The language. Here barbarians shall be Your Aristotle and Saint Thomas. Mute Before those teachers you shall take your lessons. What of the winter? Half the year is winter. Inside your cabins will be smoke so thick You may not read your Breviary for days. Around your fireplace at mealtime arrive The uninvited guests with whom you share Your stint of food. And in the fall and winter, You tramp unbeaten trails to reach the missions, Carrying your luggage on your back. Your life Hangs by a thread. Of all calamities You are the cause - the scarcity of game, A fire, famine or an epidemic. There are no natural reasons for a drought And for the earth's sterility. You are The reasons, and at any time a savage May burn your cabin down or split your head. I tell you of the enemies that live Among our Huron friends. I have not told You of the Iroquois our constant foes. Only a week ago in open fight They killed twelve of our men at Contarea, A day's march from the village where we live. Treacherous and stealthy in their ambuscades, They terrorize the country, for the Hurons Are very slothful in defence, never On guard and always seeking flight for safety. 'Wherein the gain, you ask, of this acceptance? There is no gain but this - that what you suffer Shall be of God: your loneliness in travel Will be relieved by angels overhead; Your silence will be sweet for you will learn How to commune with God; rapids and rocks

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Are easier than the steeps of Calvary. There is a consolation in your hunger And in abandonment upon the road, For once there was a greater loneliness And deeper hunger. As regards the soul There are no dangers here, with means of grace At every turn, for if we go outside Our cabin, is not heaven over us? No buildings block the clouds. We say our prayers Freely before a noble oratory. Here is the place to practise faith and hope And charity where human art has brought No comforts, where we strive to bring to God A race so unlike men that we must live Daily expecting murder at their hands, Did we not open up the skies or close Them at command, giving them sun or rain. So if despite these trials you are ready To share our labours, come; for you will find A consolation in the cross that far outweighs Its burdens. Though in many an hour your soul Will echo - "Why hast Thou forsaken me," Yet evening will descend upon you when, Your heart too full of holy exultation, You call like Xavier - "Enough, O Lord!"' This letter was to loom in history, For like a bulletin it would be read In France, and men whose bones were bound for dust Would find that on those jagged characters Their names would rise from their oblivion To flame on an eternal Calendar. Already to the field two young recruits Had come - Pijart, Le Mercier; on their way Were Chastellain with Gamier and Jogues Followed by Ragueneau and Du Peron.

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On many a night in lonely intervals, The priest would wander to the pines and build His oratory where celestial visions Sustained his soul. As unto Paul and John Of Patmos and the martyr multitude The signs were given - voices from the clouds, Forms that illumined darkness, stabbed despair, Turned dungeons into temples and a brand Of shame into the ultimate boast of time So to Brebeuf had Christ appeared and Mary. One night at prayer he heard a voice command 'Rise, Read!' Opening the Imitatio Christi, His eyes 'without design' fell on the chapter, Concerning the royal way of the Holy Cross, Which placed upon his spirit 'a great peace/ And then, day having come, he wrote his vow 'My God, my Saviour, I take from thy hand The cup of thy sufferings. I invoke thy name; I vow never to fail thee in the grace Of martyrdom, if by thy mercy, Thou Dost offer it to me. I bind myself, And when I have received the stroke of death, I will accept it from thy gracious hand With all pleasure and with joy in my heart; To thee my blood, my body and my life/

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The labourers were soon put to their tasks The speech, the founding of new posts, the sick: Ihonatiria, a phantom town, Through plague and flight abandoned as a base, The Fathers chose the site - Teanaostaye, To be the second mission of St Joseph. But the prime hope was on Ossossane, A central town of fiftv cabins built

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On the east shore of Nottawasaga Bay. The native council had approved the plans. The presence of the priests with their lay help Would be defence against the Iroquois. Under the supervision of Pijart The place was fortified, ramparts were strengthened, And towers of heavy posts set at the angles. And in the following year the artisans And labourers from Quebec with Du Peron, Using broad-axe and whipsaw built a church, The first one in the whole Huronian venture To be of wood. Close to their lodge, the priests Dug up the soil and harrowed it to plant A mere handful of wheat from which they raised A half a bushel for the altar bread. From the wild grapes they made a cask of wine For the Holy Sacrifice. But of all work The hardest was instruction. It was easy To strike the Huron sense with sound and colour The ringing of a bell; the litanies And chants; the surplices worn on the cassocks; The burnished ornaments around the altar; The pageant of the ceremonial. But to drive home the ethics taxed the brain To the limit of its ingenuity. Brebeuf had felt the need to vivify His three main themes of God and Paradise And Hell. The Indian mind had let the cold Abstractions fall: the allegories failed To quicken up the logic. Gamier Proposed the colours for the homilies. The closest student of the Huron mind, He had observed the fears and prejudices Haunting the shadows of their racial past; Had seen the flaws in Brebeuf's points; had heard The Indian comments on the moral law

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And on the Christian scheme of Paradise. Would Iroquois be there? Yes, if baptized. Would there be hunting of the deer and beaver? No. Then starvation. War? And feasts? Tobacco? No. Gamier saw disgust upon their faces, And sent appeals to France for pictures - one Only of souls in bliss: of times damnees Many and various - the horned Satan, His mastiff jaws champing the head of Judas; The plummet fall of the unbaptized pursued By demons with their fiery forks; the lick Of flames upon a naked Saracen; Dragons with scarlet tongues and writhing serpents In ambush by the charcoal avenues Just ready at the Judgment word to wreak Vengeance upon the unregenerate. The negative unapprehended forms Of Heaven lost in the dim canvas oils Gave way to glows from brazier pitch that lit The visual affirmatives of Hell. Despite the sorcerers who laid the blame Upon the French for all their ills - the plague, The drought, the Iroquois - the Fathers counted Baptisms by the hundreds, infants, children And aged at the point of death. Adults In health were more intractable, but here The spade had entered soil in the conversion Of a Huron in full bloom and high in power And counsel, Tsiouendaentaha Whose Christian name - to aid the tongue - was Peter. Being the first, he was the Rock on which The priests would build their Church. He was baptized With all the pomp transferable from France Across four thousand miles combined with what A sky and lake could offer, and a forest

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Strung to .the aubade of the orioles. The wooden chapel was their Rheims Cathedral. In stole and surplice Lalemant intoned 'If therefore thou wilt enter into life, Keep the commandments. Thou shalt love the Lord Thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, With all thy might, and thy neighbour as thyself/ With salt and water and the holy chrism, And through the signs made on his breast and forehead The Huron was exorcised, sanctified, And made the temple of the Living God. The holy rite was followed by the Mass Before the motliest auditory known In the annals of worship. Oblates from Quebec, Blackrobes, mechanics, soldiers, labourers, With almost half the village packed inside, Or jammed with craning necks outside the door. The warriors lean, lithe, and elemental, 'As naked as your hand7 but for a skin Thrown loosely on their shoulders, with their hair Erect, boar-brushed, matted, glued with the oil Of sunflower larded thickly with bear's grease; Papooses yowling on their mothers' backs, The squatting hags, suspicion in their eyes, Their nebulous minds relating in some way The smoke and aromatics of the censer, The candles, crucifix and Latin murmurs With vapours, sounds and colours of the Judgment. v (The Founding of Fort Sainte Marie)

1639 The migrant habits of the Indians With their desertion of the villages

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Through pressure of attack or want of food Called for a central site where undisturbed The priests with their attendants might pursue Their culture, gather strength from their devotions, Map out the territory, plot the routes, Collate their weekly notes and write their letters. The roll was growing - priests and colonists, Lay brothers offering services for life. For on the ground or on their way to place Themselves at the command of Lalemant, Superior, were Claude Pijart, Poncet, Le Moyne, Charles Raymbault, Rene Menard And Joseph Chaumonot: as oblates came Le Coq, Christophe Reynaut, Charles Boivin, Couture and Jean Guerin. And so to house Them all the Residence - Fort Sainte Marie! Strategic as a base for trade or war The site received the approval of Quebec, Was ratified by Richelieu who saw Commerce and exploration pushing west, Fulfilling the long vision of Champlain 'Greater New France beyond those inland seas/ The fort was built, two hundred feet by ninety, Upon the right bank of the River Wye: Its north and eastern sides of masonry, Its south and west of double palisades, And skirted by a moat, ran parallel To stream and lake. Square bastions at the corners, Watch-towers with magazines and sleeping posts, Commanded forest edges and canoes That furtively came up the Matchedash, And on each bastion was placed a cross. Inside, the Fathers built their dwelling house, No longer the bark cabin with the smoke Ill-trained to work its exit through the roof, But plank and timber - at each end a chimney Of lime and granite field-stone. Rude it was

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76 But clean, capacious, full of twilight calm. Across the south canal fed by the river, Ringed by another palisade were buildings Offering retreat to Indian fugitives Whenever war and famine scourged the land.

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The plans were supervised by Lalemant, Assigning zones of work to every priest. He made a census of the Huron nation; Some thirty villages - twelve thousand persons. Nor was this all: the horizon opened out On larger fields. To south and west were spread The unknown tribes - the Petuns and the Neutrals. VI

(The mission to the Petuns and Neutrals) 1640-1641 In late November Jogues and Gamier Set out on snow-obliterated trails Towards the Blue Hills south of the Nottawasaga, A thirty mile journey through a forest Without a guide. They carried on their backs A blanket with the burden of the altar. All day confronting swamps with fallen logs, Tangles of tamarack and jumper, They made detours to avoid the deep ravines And swollen creeks. Retreating and advancing, Ever in hope their tread was towards the south, Until, 'surprised by night in a fir grove/ They took an hour with flint and steel to nurse A fire from twigs, birch rind and needles of pine; And flinging down some branches on the snow, They offered thanks to God, lay down and slept.

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Morning - the packs reshouldered and the tramp Resumed, the stumble over mouldering trunks Of pine and oak, the hopeless search for trails, Till after dusk with cassocks torn and 'nothing To eat all day save each a morsel of bread/ They saw the smoke of the first Indian village. And now began a labour which for faith And triumph of the spirit over failure Was unsurpassed in records of the mission. Famine and pest had struck the Neutral tribes, And fleeing squaws and children had invaded The Petun villages for bread and refuge, Inflicting on the cabins further pest And further famine. When the priests arrived, They found that their black cassocks had become The symbols of the scourge. Children exclaimed 'Disease and famine are outside.' The women Called to their young and fled to forest shelters, Or hid them in the shadows of the cabins. The men broke through a never-broken custom, Denying the strangers right to food and rest. Observing the two priests at prayer, the chief Called out in council voice - 'What are these demons Who take such unknown postures, what are they But spells to make us die - to finish those Disease had failed to kill inside our cabins?' Driven from town to town with all doors barred, Pursued by storms of threats and flying hatchets, The priests sought refuge through the forest darkness Back to the palisades of Sainte Marie. As bleak an outlook faced Brebeuf when he And Chaumonot took their November tramp Five forest days - to the north shores of Erie, Where the most savage of the tribes - the Neutrals -

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7» Packed their twelve thousand into forty towns. Evil report had reached the settlements By faster routes, for when upon the eve Of the new mission Chaumonot had stated The purpose of the journey, Huron chiefs, Convinced by their own sorcerers that Brebeuf Had laid the epidemic on the land, Resolved to make the Neutral leaders agents Of their revenge: for it was on Brebeuf, The chieftain of the robes, that hate was centred. They had the reason why the drums had failed The hunt, why moose and deer had left the forest, And why the Manitou who sends the sun And rain upon the corn, lures to the trap The beaver, trains the arrow on the goose, Had not responded to the chants and cries. The magic of the 'breathings' had not cured The sick and dying. Was it not the prayers To the new God which cast malignant spells? The rosary against the amulet? The Blackrobes with that water-rite performed Upon their children - with that new sign Of wood or iron held up before the eyes Of the stricken? Did the Indian not behold Death following hard upon the offered Host? Was not Echon Brebeuf the evil one? Still, all attempts to kill him were forestalled, For awe and fear had mitigated fury: His massive stature, courage never questioned, His steady glance, the firmness of his voice, And that strange nimbus of authority, In some dim way related to their gods, Had kept the bowstrings of the Hurons taut At the arrow feathers, and the javelin poised And hesitant. But now cunning might do What fear forbade. A brace of Huron runners

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Were sped to the Neutral country with rich bribes To put the priests to death. And so Brebeuf And his companion entered the first town With famine in their cheeks only to find Worse than the Petun greetings - corn refused, Whispers of death and screams of panic, flight From incarnated plague, and while the chiefs In closest council on the Huron terms Voted for life or death, the younger men Outside drew nearer to the priests, cursed them, Spat at them while convulsive hands were clutching At hatchet helves, waiting impatiently The issue of that strident rhetoric Shaking the cabin bark. The council ended, The feeling strong for death but ruled by fears, For if those foreign spirits had the power To spread the blight upon the land, what could Their further vengeance not exact? Besides, What lay behind those regimental colours And those new drums reported from Quebec? The older men had qualified the sentence The priests at once must leave the Neutral land, All cabins to be barred against admission, No food, no shelter, and return immediate. Defying threats, the Fathers spent four months, Four winter months, besieging half the towns In their pursuit of souls, for days their food Boiled lichens, ground-nuts, star-grass bulbs and roots Of the wild columbine. Met at the doors By screams and blows, they would betake themselves To the evergreens for shelter over-night. And often, when the body strength was sapped By the day's toil and there were streaks of blood Inside the moccasins, when the last lodge Rejected them as lepers and the welts Hung on their shoulders, then the Fathers sought

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The balm .that never failed. Under the stars, Along an incandescent avenue The visions trembled, tender, placid, pure, More beautiful than the doorway of Rheims And sweeter than the Galilean fields. For what was hunger and the burn of wounds In those assuaging healing moments when The clearing mists revealed the face of Mary And the lips of Jesus breathing benedictions? At dawn they came back to the huts to get The same rebuff of speech and club. A brave Repulsed them at the palisade with axe Uplifted - "I have had enough/ he said, 'Of the dark flesh of my enemies. I mean To kill and eat the white flesh of the priests.' So close to death starvation and assault Had led them and so meagre of result Were all their ministrations that they thought This was the finish of the enterprise. The winter ended in futility. And on their journey home the Fathers took A final blow when March leagued with the natives Unleashed a northern storm, piled up the snow-drifts, Broke on the ice the shoulder of Brebeuf, And stumbled them for weeks before she sent Them limping through the postern of the fort. Upon his bed that night Brebeuf related A vision he had seen - a moving cross, Its upright beam arising from the south The country of the Iroquois: the shape Advanced along the sky until its arms Cast shadows on the Huron territory, 'And huge enough to crucify us all.'

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(The Story of Jogues) Bad days had fallen on Huronia. A blight of harvest, followed by a winter In which unusual snowfall had thinned out The hunting and reduced the settlements To destitution, struck its hardest blow At Sainte Marie. The last recourse in need, The fort had been a common granary And now the bins were empty. Altar-ware, Vessels, linens, pictures lost or damaged; Vestments were ragged, writing paper spent. The Eucharist requiring bread and wine, Quebec eight hundred miles away, a war Freshly renewed - the Iroquois (Dutch-armed And seething with the memories of Champlain) Arrayed against the French and Huron allies.

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The priests assessed the perils of the journey, And the lot fell on Jogues to lead it. He, Next to Brebeuf, had borne the heaviest brunt The Petun mission, then the following year, The Ojibway where, after a hundred leagues, Canoe and trail, accompanied by Raymbault, He reached the shores of Lake Superior, And planted a great cross, facing it west/ The soundest of them all in legs, he gathered A band of Huron traders and set out, His task made double by the care of Raymbault Whose health had broken mortally. He reached Quebec with every day of the five weeks

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A miracle of escape. A few days there, With churches, hospitals, the Indian school At Sillery, pageant and ritual, Making their due impression on the minds Of the Huron guides, Jogues with his band of forty Packed the canoes and started back. Mohawks, Enraged that on the east-bound trip the party Had slipped their hands, awaited them, ambushed Within the grass and reeds along the shore. (The account of Jogues' capture and enslavement by the Mohawks as taken from his letter to his Provincial, Jean Filleau, dated August 5, 1643.) 'Unskilled in speech, in knowledge and not knowing The precious hour of my visitation, I beg you, if this letter chance to come Unto your hands that in your charity You aid me with your Holy Sacrifices And with the earnest prayers of the whole Province, As being among a people barbarous In birth and manners, for I know that when You will have heard this story you will see The obligation under which I am To God and my deep need of spiritual help. Our business finished at Quebec, the feast Of St Ignatius celebrated, we Embarked for the Hurons. On the second day Our men discovered on the shore fresh tracks Thought by Eustache, experienced in war, To be the footprints of our enemies. A mile beyond we met them, twelve canoes And seventy men. Abandoning the boats, Most of the Hurons fled to the thick wood, Leaving but twelve to put up the best front We could, but seeing further Iroquois

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Paddling so swiftly from the other shore, We ceased from our defence and fled to cover Of tree and bulrush. Watching from my shelter The capture of Goupil and Indian converts, I could not find it in my mind to leave them; But as I was their comrade on the journey, And should be made their comrade in their perils, I gave myself as prisoner to the guard. Likewise Eustache, always devoted, valiant, Returned, exclaiming "I praise God that He Has granted me my prayer - that I should live And die with you." And then Guillaume Couture Who, young and fleet, having outstripped his foe, But finding flight intolerable came back Of his free will, saying "I cannot leave My father in the hands of enemies." On him the Iroquois let loose their first Assault for in the skirmish he had slain A chief. They stripped him naked; with their teeth They macerated his finger tips, tore off The nails and pierced his right hand with a spear, Couture taking the pain without a cry. Then turning on Goupil and me they beat Us to the ground under a flurry of fists And knotted clubs, dragging us up half-dead To agonize us with the finger torture. And this was just the foretaste of our trials: Dividing up as spoils of war our food, Our clothes and books and vessels for the church, They led or drove us on our six weeks' journey, Our wounds festering under the summer sun. At night we were the objects of their sport They mocked us by the plucking of our hair From head and beard. And on the eighth day meeting A band of warriors from the tribe on march To attack the Richelieu fort, they celebrated

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By disembarking all the captives, making Us run the line beneath a rain of clubs. And following that they placed us on the scaffolds, Dancing around us hurling jests and insults. Each one of us attempted to sustain The other in his courage by no cry Or sign of our infirmities. Eustache, His thumbs wrenched off, withstood unconquerably The probing of a stick which like a skewer Beginning with the freshness of a wound On the left hand was pushed up to the elbow. And yet next day they put us on the route Again - three days on foot and without food. Through village after village we were led In triumph with our backs shedding the skin Under the sun - by day upon the scaffolds, By night brought to the cabins where, cord-bound, We lay on the bare earth while fiery coals Were thrown upon our bodies. A long time Indeed and cruelly have the wicked wrought Upon my back with sticks and iron rods. But though at times when left alone I wept, Yet I thanked Him who always giveth strength To the weary (I will glory in the things Concerning my infirmity, being made A spectacle to God and to the angels, A sport and a contempt to the barbarians) That I was thus permitted to console And animate the French and Huron converts, Placing before their minds the thought of Him Who bore against Himself the contradiction Of sinners. Weak through hanging by my wrists Between two poles, my feet not touching ground, I managed through His help to reach the stage, And with the dew from leaves of Turkish corn Two of the prisoners I baptized. I called

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To them that in their torment they should fix Their eyes on me as I bestowed the sign Of the last absolution. With the spirit Of Christ, Eustache then in the fire entreated His Huron friends to let no thought of vengeance Arising from this anguish at the stake Injure the French hope for an Iroquois peace. Onnonhoaraton, a youthful captive, They killed - the one who seeing me prepared For torture interposed, offering himself A sacrifice for me who had in bonds Begotten him for Christ. Couture was seized And dragged off as a slave. Rene Goupil, While placing on a child's forehead the sign Of the Cross was murdered by a sorcerer, And then, a rope tied to his neck, was dragged Through the whole village and flung in the River/

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(The later account) A family of the Wolf Clan having lost A son in battle, Jogues as substitute Was taken in, half-son, half-slave, his work The drudgery of the village, bearing water, Lighting the fires, and clad in tatters made To join the winter hunt, bear heavy packs On scarred and naked shoulders in the trade Between the villages. His readiness To execute his tasks, unmurmuring, His courage when he plunged into a river To save a woman and a child who stumbled Crossing a bridge made by a fallen tree, Had softened for a time his master's harshness. It gained him scattered hours of leisure when He set his mind to work upon the language To make concrete the articles of Faith.

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At intervals he stole into the woods To pray and meditate and carve the Name Upon the bark. Out of the Mohawk spoils At the first battle he had found and hid Two books - The Following of Christ and one Of Paul's Epistles, and with these when 'weary Even of life and pressed beyond all measure Above his strength' he followed the 'running waters' To quench his thirst. But often would the hate Of the Mohawk foes flame out anew when Jogues Was on his knees muttering the magic words, And when a hunting party empty-handed Returned or some reverse was met in battle, Here was the victim ready at their door. Believing that a band of warriors Had been destroyed, they seized the priest and set His day of death, but at the eleventh hour, With the arrival of a group of captives, The larger festival of torture gave Him momentary reprieve. Yet when he saw The holocaust and rushed into the flames To save a child, a heavy weight laid hold Upon his spirit lasting many days 'My life wasted with grief, my years with sighs; Oh wherefore was I born that I should see The ruin of my people! Woe is me! But by His favour I shall overcome Until my change is made and He appear.' This story of enslavement had been brought To Montmagny, the Governor of Quebec, And to the outpost of the Dutch, Fort Orange. Quebec was far away and, short of men, Could never cope with the massed Iroquois; Besides, Jogues' letter begged the Governor That no measures 'to save a single life'

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Should hurt the cause of France. To the Provincial He wrote - 'Who in my absence would console The captives? Who absolve the penitent? Encourage them in torments? Who baptize The dying? On this cross to which our Lord Has nailed me with Himself am I resolved To live and die/ And when the commandant Of the Dutch fort sent notice that a ship At anchor in the Hudson would provide Asylum, Jogues delayed that he might seek Counsel of God and satisfy his conscience, Lest some intruding self-preserving thought Conflict with duty. Death was certain soon. He knew it - for that mounting tide of hate Could not be checked: it had engulfed his friends; Twould take him next. How close to suicide Would be refusal? Not as if escape Meant dereliction: no, his early vows Were still inviolate - he would return. He pledged himself to God there on his knees Before two bark-strips fashioned as a cross Under the forest trees - his oratory. And so, one night, the Indians asleep, Jogues left the house, fumbling his darkened way, Half-walk, half-crawl, a lacerated leg Making the journey of one-half a mile The toil of half a night. By dawn he found The shore, and, single-handed, pushed a boat, Stranded by ebb-tide, down the slope of sand To the river's edge and rowed out to the ship, Where he was lifted up the side by sailors Who, fearful of the risk of harbouring A fugitive, carried him to the hatch And hid him with the cargo in the hold.

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The outcry in the morning could be heard Aboard the ship as Indians combed the cabins, Threatened the guards and scoured the neighbouring woods, And then with strong suspicion of the vessel Demanded of the officers their captive. 1400 After two days Jogues with his own consent Was taken to the fort and hid again Behind the barrels of a store. For weeks He saw and heard the Mohawks as they passed, Examining cordage, prying into casks, At times touching his clothes, but missing him As he lay crouched in darkness motionless. With evidence that he was in the fort, The Dutch abetting the escape, the chiefs Approached the commandant - The prisoner 1410 Is ours. He is not of your race or speech. The Dutch are friends: the Frenchmen are our foes. Deliver up this priest into our hands/ The cries were countered by the officer 'He is like us in blood if not in tongue. The Frenchman here is under our protection. He is our guest. We treat him as you treat The strangers in your cabins, for you feed And shelter them. That is also our law, The custom of our nation/ Argument 1420 Of no avail, a ransom price was offered, Refused, but running up the bargain scale, It caught the Mohawks at three hundred livres, And Jogues at last was safely on the Hudson. The tale of Jogues' first mission to the Hurons Ends on a sequel briefly sung but keyed To the tune of the story, for the stretch Home was across a wilderness, his bed

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A coil of rope on a ship's open deck Swept by December surge. The voyage closed At Falmouth where, robbed by a pirate gang, He wandered destitute until picked up By a French crew who offered him a tramp fare. He landed on the shore of Brittany On Christmas Eve, and by New Year he reached The Jesuit establishment at Rennes. The trumpets blew once more, and Jogues returned With the spring expedition to Quebec. Honoured by Montmagny, he took the post Of peace ambassador to hostile tribes, And then the orders came from Lalemant That he should open up again the cause Among the Mohawks at Ossernenon. Jogues knew that he was travelling to his death, And though each hour of that former mission Burned at his finger stumps, the wayward flesh Obeyed the summons. Lalemant as well Had known the peril - had he not re-named Ossernenon, the Mission of the Martyrs? So Jogues, accompanied by his friend Lalande Departed for the village - his last letter To his Superior read: 1 will return Cost it a thousand lives. I know full well That I shall not survive, but He who helped Me by His grace before will never fail me Now when I go to do His holy will/ And to the final consonant the vow Was kept, for two days after they had struck The town, their heads were on the palisades, And their dragged bodies flung into the Mohawk.

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(Bressani)

1646 The western missions waiting Jogues' return Were held together by a scarlet thread. The forays of the Iroquois had sent The fugitive survivors to the fort. Three years had passed - and where was Jogues? The scant Supplies of sagamite could never feed The inflow from the stricken villages. The sparse reports had filtered to Quebec, And the command was given to Bressani To lead the rescue band to Sainte Marie. Leaving Three Rivers in the spring when ice Was on the current, he was caught like Jogues, With his six Hurons and a French oblate, A boy of twelve; transferred to Iroquois' Canoes and carried up the Richelieu; Disbarked and driven through the forest trails To Lake Champlain; across it; and from there Around the rocks and marshes to the Hudson. And every time a camp was built and fires Were laid the torment was renewed; in all The towns the squaws and children were regaled With evening festivals upon the scaffolds. Bressani wrote one day when vigilance Relaxed and his split hand was partly healed 'I do not know if your Paternity Will recognize this writing for the letter Is soiled. Only one finger of the hand Is left unburned. The blood has stained the paper. My writing table is the earth; the ink Gunpowder mixed with water.' And again -

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This time to his Superior - "I could Not have believed it to be possible That a man's body was so hard to kill/ The earlier fate of Jogues was his - enslaved, But ransomed at Fort Orange by the Dutch; Restored to partial health; sent to Rochelle In the Autumn, but in April back again And under orders for the Huron mission, Where he arrived this time unscathed to take A loyal welcome from his priestly comrades. Bressani's presence stimulated faith Within the souls of priests and neophytes. The stories burned like fuel of the faggots Jogues7 capture and his rock stability, And the no less triumphant stand Eustache Had made showing the world that native metal Could take the test as nobly as the French. And Ragueneau's letter to his General stated 'Bressani ill-equipped to speak the Huron Has speech more eloquent to capture souls: It is his scars, his mutilated hands. "Only show us/' the neophytes exclaim, "The wounds, for they teach better than our tongues Your faith, for you have come again to face The dangers. Only thus we know that you Believe the truth and would have us believe it".'

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In those three years since Jogues' departure doubts Though unexpressed had visited the mission. For death had come to several in the fold Raymbault, Goupil, Eustache, and worse than death To Jogues, and winter nights were bleaker, darker Without the company of Brebeuf. Lion

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Of limb and heart, he had entrenched the faith, Was like a triple palisade himself. But as his broken shoulder had not healed, And ordered to Quebec by Lalemant, He took the leave that seven years of work Deserved. The city hailed him with delight. For more than any other did he seem The very incarnation of the age Champlain the symbol of exploring France, Tracking the rivers to their lairs, Brebeuf The token of a nobler chivalry. He went the rounds of the stations, saw the gains The East had made in converts - Sillery For Indians and Notre Dame des Anges For the French colonists; convents and schools Flourished. Why should the West not have the same Yield for the sowing? It was labourers They needed with supplies and adequate Defence. St Lawrence and the Ottawa Infested by the Iroquois were traps Of death. Three bands of Hurons had been caught That summer. Montmagny had warned the priest Against the risk of unprotected journeys. So when the reinforcements came from France, Brebeuf set out under a guard of soldiers Taking with him two young recruits - Garreau And Chabanel - arriving at the fort In the late fall. The soldiers wintered there And supervised defensive strategy. Replaced the forlorn feelings with fresh hopes, And for two years the mission enterprise Renewed its lease of life. Rumours of treaties Between the French and Mohawks stirred belief That peace was in the air, that other tribes Inside the Iroquois Confederacy Might enter - with the Hurons sharing terms.

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This was the pipe-dream - was it credible? The ranks of missionaries were filling up: At Sainte Marie, Brebeuf and Ragueneau, Le Mercier, Chastellain and Chabanel; St Joseph - Gamier and Rene Menard; St Michel - Chaumonot and Du Peron; The others - Claude Pijart, Le Moyne, Garreau And Daniel. What validity the dream Possessed was given by the seasonal Uninterrupted visits of the priests To their loved home, both fort and residence. Here they discussed their plans, and added up In smiling rivalry their tolls of converts: They loitered at the shelves, fondled the books, Running their.fingers down the mellowed pages As if they were the faces of their friends. They stood for hours before the saints or knelt Before the Virgin and the crucifix In mute transfiguration. These were hours That put the bandages upon their hurts, Making their spirits proof against all ills That had assailed or could assail the flesh, Turned winter into spring and made return To their far mission posts an exaltation. The bell each morning called the neophytes To Mass, again at evening, and the tones Lured back the memories across the seas. And often in the summer hours of twilight When Norman chimes were ringing, would the priests Forsake the fort and wander to the shore To sing the Gloria while hermit thrushes Rivalled the rapture of the nightingales.

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The native register was rich in name And number. Earlier years had shown results Mainly among the young and sick and aged, Where little proof was given of the root Of faith, but now the Fathers told of deeds That flowered from the stems. Had not Eustache Bequeathed his record like a Testament? The sturdiest warriors and chiefs had vied Among themselves within the martyr ranks: Stories of captives led to sacrifice, Accepting scaffold fires under the rites, Enduring to the end, had taken grip Of towns and clans. St Joseph had its record For Gamier reported that Totiri, A native of high rank, while visiting St Ignace when a torture was in progress, Had emulated Jogues by plunging through The flaming torches that he might apply The Holy Water to an Iroquois. Garreau and Pijart added lists of names From the Algonquins and the Nipissings, And others told of Pentecostal meetings In cabins by the Manitoulin shores. Not only was the faith sustained by hopes Nourished within the bosom of their home And by the wish-engendered talk of peace, But there outside the fort was evidence Of tenure for the future. Acres rich In soil extended to the forest fringe. Each year they felled the trees and burned the stumps, Pushing the frontier back, clearing the land, Spading, hoeing. The stomach's noisy protest At sagamite and wild rice found a rest With bread from wheat, fresh cabbages and pease, And squashes which when roasted had the taste

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Of Norman apples. Strawberries in July, October beechnuts, pepper roots for spice, And at the bottom of a spring that flowed Into a pond shaded by silver birches And ringed by marigolds was water-cress In chilled abundance. So, was this the West? The Wilderness? That flight of tanagers; Those linguals from the bobolinks; those beeches, Roses and water-lilies; at the pools Those bottle-gentians! For a time the fields Could hypnotize the mind to scenes of France. Within five years the change was wrought. The cocks Were crowing in the yards, and in the pasture Were sheep and cows and pigs that had been brought As sucklings that immense eight hundred miles In sacks - canoed, and portaged on the shoulders. The traders, like the soldiers, too, had heard Of a great ocean larger than the Huron. Was it the western gateway to Cathay? The Passage? Master-theme of song and ballad; The myth at last resolved into the fact! Along that route, it was believed, French craft Freighted with jewels, spices, tapestries, Would sail to swell the coffers of the Bourbons. Such was the dream though only buffalo roamed The West and autumn slept upon the prairies. This dream was at its brightest now, Quebec Was building up a western citadel In Sainte Marie. With sixty Frenchmen there, The eastern capital itself had known Years less auspicious. Might the fort not be The bastion to one-half the continent, New France expanding till the longitudes Staggered the daring of the navigators? The priests were breathless with another space

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Beyond the measure of the astrolabe A different empire built upon the pulses, Where even the sun and moon and stars revolved Around a Life and a redemptive Death. They pushed their missions to the north and west Further into Algonquin territories, Among the Ottawas at Manitoulin, And towards the Ojibways at Sault Sainte Marie. New village groups were organized in stations St Magdalen, St Jean, and St Matthias. Had Chabanel, ecstatic with success, Not named one fort the Village of Believers? Brebeuf was writing to his General 'Peace, union and tranquility are here Between the members of our Order. We need More workers for the apostolic field, Which more than ever whitens for the harvest/ And to this call came Gabriel Lalemant, Bonin, Daran, Greslon, besides a score Of labourers and soldiers. In one year Twelve hundred converts, churches over-crowded, With Mass conducted in the open-air!

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And so the seasons passed. When the wild ducks Forsook the Huron marshes for the south, It was the signal for the priests to pack Their blankets. Not until the juncos came, And flickers tapped the crevices of bark, And the blood-root was pushing through the leaf-mo Would they reset their faces towards their home. x

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Under the pounding drums. The treaty signed Between the Iroquois and Montmagny Was broken by the murder of Lalande And Jogues. The news had drifted to the fort The prelude only to the heavier blows And deeper treachery. The Iroquois, Infesting lake and stream, forest and shore, Were trapping soldiers, traders, Huron guides: The whole confederacy was on the march. Both waterways were blocked, the quicker route St Lawrence, and the arduous Ottawa. They caught the Hurons at their camps, surprised Canoe-fleets from the reeds and river bends And robbed them, killed them on the portages. So widespread were their forays, they encountered Bands of Algonquins on the hunt, slew them, Dispersed them from their villages and sent Survivors to the northern wilderness. So keen their lust for slaughter, they enticed The Huron chieftains under pledge of truce And closed negotiations with their scalps. As the months passed the pressure of attack Moved grimly towards the west, making complete The isolation of Huronia. No commerce with Quebec - no traveller For a whole year came to the Residence. But constant was the stream of fugitives From smaller undefended villages, Fleeing west and ever west. The larger towns, The deluge breaking down their walls, drove on The surplus to their neighbours which, in turn, Urged on the panic herd to Sainte Marie. This mother of the missions felt the strain As one by one the buffers were destroyed, And the flocks came nearer for their pasturage.

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There could be only one conclusion when The priests saw the migration of the missions That of St Jean four times abandoning Its stations and four times establishing New centres with a more improved defence; That of St Ignace where a double raid That slaughtered hundreds, lifted bodily Both town and mission, driving to their last Refuge the ragged remnants. Yet Ragueneau Was writing - 'We are here as yet intact But all determined to shed blood and life If need be. In this Residence still reigns The peace and love of Heaven. Here the sick Will find a hospital, the travellers A place of rest, the fugitives, asylum. During the year more than three thousand persons Have sought and found shelter under our roof. We have dispensed the Bread of Life to all And we have fed their bodies, though our fare Is down to one food only, crushed corn boiled And seasoned with the powder of smoked fish/ Despite the perils, Sainte Marie was sending Her missionaries afield, revisiting The older sites, establishing the new, With that same measure of success and failure Which tested courage or confirmed a faith. Garreau, sick and expecting death, was brought By Pijart and a French assistant back From the Algonquin wastes, for thirteen days Borne by a canoe and by his comrades' shoulders. Recovering even after the last rites Had been administered, he faced the task Again. Fresh visits to the Petun tribes Had little yield but cold and starving days, Unsheltered nights, the same fare at the doors, Savoured by Jogues and Garnier seven years

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Before. And everywhere the labourers worked Under a double threat - the Iroquois, And the Huron curse inspired by sorcerers Who saw black magic in the Jesuit robes And linked disaster with their ritual. Between the hammer and the anvil now Huronia was laid and the first priest To take the blow was Daniel. Fourteen years This priest had laboured at the Huron mission. Following a week of rest at Sainte Marie He had returned to his last post, St Joseph, Where he had built his church and for the year Just gone had added to his charge the hundreds Swarming from villages stormed by the foe. And now in that inexorable order, Station by station, town by town, it was St Joseph's turn. Aware that the main force Of Huron warriors had left the town, The Iroquois had breached the palisade And, overwhelming the defenders, sacked And burned the cabins. Mass had just been offered, When the war yells were heard and Daniel came Outside. Seeing the panic, fully knowing Extinction faced the town with this invasion, And that ten precious minutes of delay Might give his flock the refuge of the woods, He faced the vanguard of the Iroquois, And walked with firm selective dignity As in the manner of a parley. Fear And wonder checked the Indians at the sight Of a single dark-robed, unarmed challenger Against arrows, muskets, spears and tomahawks. That momentary pause had saved the lives Of hundreds as they fled into the forest, But not the life of Daniel. Though afraid At first to cross a charmed circumference

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To take a struggle hand-to-hand, they drove Their arrows through him, then in frenzied rush Mastering their awe, they hurled themselves upon The body, stripped it of its clothes and flung it Into the burning church. By noon nothing Remained but ashes of the town, the fort, The cabins and their seven hundred dead.

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July 1648 Ragueneau was distraught. He was shepherd-priest. Daniel was first to die under his care, And nigh a score of missionaries were lost In unprotected towns. Besides, he knew He could not, if he would, resist that mob That clamoured at the stockades, day by day. His moral supervision was bound up With charity that fed and warmed and healed. And through the winter following Daniel's death Six thousand Indians sought shelter there. The season's crops to the last grain were garnered And shared. Through the kind Providence of God, We managed, as it were, to draw both oil And honey from the very stones around us. The obedience, patience of our missionaries Excel reward - all with one heart and soul Infused with the high spirit of our Order; The servants, boys, and soldiers day and night Working beyond their strength! Here is the service Of joy, that we will take whatever God Ordains for us whether it be life or death.' The challenge was accepted, for the spring Opened upon the hardest tragic blows The iron in the human soul could stand.

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St Louis and St Ignace still remained The flying buttresses of Sainte Marie. From them the Residence received reports Daily of movements of the Iroquois. Much labour had been spent on their defence. Ramparts of pine fifteen feet high enclosed St Louis. On three sides a steep ravine Topped by the stakes made nigh impregnable St Ignace; then the palisaded fourth, Subject alone to a surprise assault, Could rally the main body of defenders. The Iroquois, alert as eagles, knew The weakness of the Hurons, the effect On the morale of unexpected raids Committing towns to fire and pushing back The eastern ramparts. Piece by piece, the rim Was being cracked and fissures driven down The bowl: and stroke by stroke the strategy Pointed to Sainte Marie. Were once the fort Now garrisoned by forty Frenchmen taken, No power predicted from Quebec could save The Huron nation from its doom. St Ignace Lay in the path but during the eight months After St Joseph's fall the enemy Had leisurely prepared their plans. Their scouts Reported that one-half of the town's strength Was lost by flight and that an apathy, In spite of all the priests could do to stem it, Had seized the invaded tribes. They knew that whe The warriors were hunting in the forest This weaker palisade was scalable. And the day came in March when the whole fate That overtook St Joseph in July Swept on St Ignace - sudden and complete. The Mohawks and the Senecas uniting, A thousand strong, the town bereft of fighters,

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Four hundred old and young inside the stakes, The assault was made two hours before the dawn. But half-aroused from sleep, many were killed Within their cabins. Of the four hundred three Alone managed to reach the woods to scream The alarm to the drowsed village of St Louis. At nine o'clock that morning - such the speed Of the pursuit - a guard upon the hill Behind the Residence was watching whiffs Of smoke to the south, but a league away. Bush fires? Not with this season's depth of snow. The Huron bivouacs? The settlements Too close for that. Camps of the Iroquois? Not while cunning and stealth controlled their tactics. The smoke was in the town. The morning air, Clearing, could leave no doubt of that, and just As little that the darkening pall could spring Out of the vent-holes from the cabin roofs. Ragueneau rushed to the hill at the guard's call; Summoned Bressani; sheets and tongues of flame Leaping some fifty feet above the smoke Meant to their eyes the capture and the torch St Louis with Brebeuf and Lalemant! Less than two hours it took the Iroquois To capture, sack and garrison St Ignace, And start then for St Louis. The alarm Sounded, five hundred of the natives fled To the mother fort only to be pursued And massacred in the snow. The eighty braves That manned the stockades perished at the breaches; And what was seen by Ragueneau and the guard Was smoke from the massed fire of cabin bark. Brebeuf and Lalemant were not numbered In the five hundred of the fugitives.

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They had remained, infusing nerve and will In the defenders, rushing through the cabins Baptizing and absolving those who were Too old, too young, too sick to join the flight. And when, resistance crushed, the Iroquois Took all they had not slain back to St Ignace, The vanguard of the prisoners were the priests. March 16, 1649 Three miles from town to town over the snow, Naked, laden with pillage from the lodges, The captives filed like wounded beasts of burden, Three hours on the march, and those that fell Or slowed their steps were killed. Three days before Brebeuf had celebrated his last mass. And he had known it was to be the last. There was prophetic meaning as he took The cord and tied the alb around his waist, Attached the maniple to his left arm And drew the seamless purple chasuble With the large cross over his head and shoulders, Draping his body: every vestment held An immediate holy symbol as he whispered 'Upon my head the helmet of Salvation. So purify my heart and make me white; With this cincture of purity gird me, 0 Lord. May I deserve this maniple Of sorrow and of penance. Unto me Restore the stole of immortality. My yoke is sweet, my burden light. Grant that 1 may so bear it as to merit Thy grace.'

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Entering, he knelt before as rude an altar As ever was reared within a sanctuary, But hallowed as that chancel where the notes Of Palestrina's score had often pealed The Assumpta est Maria through St Peter's. For, covered in the centre of the table, Recessed and sealed, a hollowed stone contained A relic of a charred or broken body Which perhaps a thousand years ago or more Was offered as a sacrifice to Him Whose crucifix stood there between the candles. And on the morrow would this prayer be answered: 'Eternal Father, I unite myself With the affections and the purposes Of Our Lady of Sorrows on Calvary. And now I offer Thee the sacrifice Which Thy Beloved Son made of Himself Upon the Cross and now renews on this, His holy altar... Graciously receive My life for His life as he gave His life For mine... This is my body. In like manner... Take ye and drink - the chalice of my blood.' XII

No doubt in the mind of Brebeuf that this was the last Journey - three miles over the snow. He knew That the margins as thin as they were by which he escaped From death through the eighteen years of his mission toil Did not belong to this chapter: not by his pen Would this be told. He knew his place in the line, For the blaze of the trail that was cut on the bark by Jogues Shone still. He had heard the story as told by writ

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And word of survivors - of how a captive slave 1960 Of the hunters, the skin of his thighs cracked with the frost, He would steal from the tents to the birches, make a rough cross From two branches, set it in snow and on the peel Inscribe his vows and dedicate to the Name In litanies of love' what fragments were left From the wrack of his flesh; of his escape from the tribes; Of his journey to France where he knocked at the door of the College Of Rennes, was gathered in as a mendicant friar, Nameless, unknown, till he gave for proof to the priest His scarred credentials of faith, the nail-less hands 1970 And withered arms - the signs of the Mohawk fury. Nor yet was the story finished - he had come again Back to his mission to get the second death. And the comrades of Jogues - Goupil, Eustache and Couture, Had been stripped and made to run the double files And take the blows - one hundred clubs to each line And this as the prelude to torture, leisured, minute, Where thorns on the quick, scallop shells to the joints of the thumbs, Provided the sport for children and squaws till the end. And adding salt to the blood of Brebeuf was the thought 1980 Of Daniel - was it months or a week ago? So far, so near, it seemed in time, so close In leagues - just over there to the south it was He faced the arrows and died in front of his church. But winding into the greater artery Of thought that bore upon the coming passion Were little tributaries of wayward wish And reminiscence. Paris with its vespers Was folded in the mind of Lalemant, And the soft Gothic lights and traceries Were shading down the ridges of his vows. But two years past at Bourges he had walked the cloisters,

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Companioned by St Augustine and Francis, And wrapped in quiet holy mists. Brebeuf, His mind a moment throwing back the curtain Of eighteen years, could see the orchard lands, The ddreries, the peasants at the Fairs, The undulating miles of wheat and barley, Gardens and pastures rolling like a sea From Lisieux to Le Havre. Just now the surf Was pounding on the limestone Norman beaches And on the reefs of Calvados. Had dawn This very day not flung her surplices Around the headlands and with golden fire Consumed the silken argosies that made For Rouen from the estuary of the Seine? A moment only for that veil to lift A moment only for those bells to die That rang their matins at Conde-sur-Vire. By noon St Ignace! The arrival there The signal for the battle-cries of triumph, The gauntlet of the clubs. The stakes were set And the ordeal of Jogues was re-enacted Upon the priests - even with wilder fury, For here at last was trapped their greatest victim, Echon. The Iroquois had waited long For this event. Their hatred for the Hurons Fused with their hatred for the French and priests Was to be vented on this sacrifice, And to that camp had come apostate Hurons, United with their foes in common hate To settle up their reckoning with Echon. Now three o'clock, and capping the height of the passion, Confusing the sacraments under the pines of the forest, Under the incense of balsam, under the smoke Of the pitch, was offered the rite of the font. On the head,

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The breast, the loins and the legs, the boiling water! While the mocking paraphrase of the symbols was hurled At their faces like shards of flint from the arrow heads 'We baptize thee with water... That thou mayest be led To Heaven... To that end we do annoint thee. We treat thee as a friend: we are the cause Of thy happiness; we are thy priests; the more Thou sufferest, the more thy God will reward thee, So give us thanks for our kind offices/

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The fury of taunt was followed by fury of blow. Why did not the flesh of Brebeuf cringe to the scourge, Respond to the heat, for rarely the Iroquois found A victim that would not cry out in such pain - yet here 2040 The fire was on the wrong fuel. Whenever he spoke, It was to rally the soul of his friend whose turn Was to come through the night while the eyes were uplifted in prayer, Imploring the Lady of Sorrows, the mother of Christ, As pain brimmed over the cup and the will was called To stand the test of the coals. And sometimes the speech Of Brebeuf struck out, thundering reproof to his foes, Half-rebuke, half-defiance, giving them roar for roar. Was it because the chancel became the arena, Brebeuf a lion at bay, not a lamb on the altar, As if the might of a Roman were joined to the cause 2050 Of Judaea? Speech they could stop for they girdled his lips, But never a moan could they get. Where was the source Of his strength, the home of his courage that topped the best Of their braves and even out-fabled the lore of their legends? In the bunch of his shoulders which often had carried a load Extorting the envy of guides at an Ottawa portage? The heat of the hatchets was finding a path to that source.

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In the thews of his thighs which had mastered the trails of the Neutrals? They would gash and beribbon those muscles. Was it the blood? They would draw it fresh from its fountain. Was it the heart? 2060 They dug for it, fought for the scraps in the way of the wolves. But not in these was the valour or stamina lodged; Nor in the symbol of Richelieu's robes or the seals Of Mazarin's charters, nor in the stir of the lilies Upon the Imperial folds; nor yet in the words Loyola wrote on a table of lava-stone In the cave of Manresa - not in these the source But in the sound of invisible trumpets blowing Around two slabs of board, right-angled, hammered By Roman nails and hung on a Jewish hill. 2070 The wheel had come full circle with the visions In France of Brebeuf poured through the mould of St Ignace. Lalemant died in the morning at nine, in the flame Of the pitch belts. Flushed with the sight of the bodies, the foes Gathered their clans and moved back to the north and west To join in the fight against the tribes of the Petuns. There was nothing now that could stem the Iroquois blast. However undaunted the souls of the priests who were left, However fierce the sporadic counter attacks Of the Hurons striking in roving bands from the ambush, 2080 Or smashing out at their foes in garrison raids, The villages fell before a blizzard of axes And arrows and spears, and then were put to the torch. The days were dark at the fort and heavier grew The burdens on Ragueneau's shoulders. Decision was his. No word from the east could arrive in time to shape The step he must take. To and fro - from altar to hill, From hill to altar, he walked and prayed and watched. As governing priest of the Mission he felt the pride Of his Order whipping his pulse, for was not St Ignace

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The highest test of the Faith? And all that torture And death could do to the body was done. The Will And the Cause in their triumph survived. Loyola's mountains, Sublime at their summits, were scaled to the uttermost peak. Ragueneau, the Shepherd, now looked on a battered fold. In a whirlwind of fire St Jean, like St Joseph, crashed Under the Iroquois impact. Firm at his post, Gamier suffered the fate of Daniel. And now Chabanel, last in the roll of the martyrs, entrapped On his knees in the woods met death at apostate hands. 2100 The drama was drawing close to its end. It fell To Ragueneau's lot to perform a final rite To offer the fort in sacrificial fire! He applied the torch himself. 'Inside an hour,' He wrote, 'we saw the fruit of ten years' labour Ascend in smoke - then looked our last at the fields, Put altar-vessels and food on a raft of logs, And made our way to the island of St Joseph.' But even from there was the old tale retold Of hunger and the search for roots and acorns; Of cold and persecution unto death By the Iroquois; of Jesuit will and courage As the shepherd-priest with Chaumonot led back The remnant of a nation to Quebec.

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THE MARTYRS' SHRINE Three hundred years have passed, and the winds of God Which blew over France are blowing once more through the pines That bulwark the shores of the great Fresh Water Sea. Over the wastes abandoned by human tread, Where only the bittern's cry was heard at dusk; Over the lakes where the wild ducks built their nests, 2120 The skies that had banked their fires are shining again With the stars that guided the feet of Jogues and Brebeuf.

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The years as they turned have ripened the martyrs' seed, And the ashes of St Ignace are glowing afresh. The trails, having frayed the threads of the cassocks, sank Under the mould of the centuries, under fern And brier and fungus - there in due time to blossom Into the highways that lead to the crest of the hill Which havened both shepherd and flock in the days of their trial. For out of the torch of Ragueneau's ruins the candles 2130 Are burning today in the chancel of Sainte Marie. The Mission sites have returned to the fold of the Order. Near to the ground where the cross broke under the hatchet, And went with it into the soil to come back at the turn Of the spade with the carbon and calcium char of the bodies, The shrines and altars are built anew; the Aves And prayers ascend, and the Holy Bread is broken. 1940 The Invaded Field They brought their youth up on the lore Of the Phoenix and the pyre, Of birth from death and gold from fire And the myth of the Aryan spore. They measured life in metric tons, Assessed both man and beast, And with their patriot sweat they greased The breechblocks of their guns. They took their parables from mud How pure the crocus grows! See how the fragrance of a rose May spring from buried blood!

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So, on the promise of this yield The youth swung down the road, Goose-stepping to their songs, and sowed Their bodies on the field. Now if a brier should here be born In some ironic hour, Let life infect both leaf and flower But death preserve the thorn.

April 1941

Come Away, Death Willy-nilly, he comes or goes, with the clown's logic, Comic in epitaph, tragic in epithalamium, And unseduced by any mused rhyme. However blow the winds over the pollen, Whatever the course of the garden variables, He remains the constant, Ever flowering from the poppy seeds. There was a time he came in formal dress, Announced by Silence tapping at the panels In deep apology. A touch of chivalry in his approach, He offered sacramental wine, And with acanthus leaf And petals of the hyacinth He took the fever from the temples And closed the eyelids, Then led the way to his cool longitudes In the dignity of the candles.

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His mediaeval grace is gone Gone with the flame of the capitals And the leisured turn of the thumb Leafing the manuscripts, Gone with the marbles And the Venetian mosaics, With the bend of the knee Before the rose-strewn feet of the Virgin. The paternosters of his priests, Committing clay to clay, Have rattled in their throats Under the gride of his traction tread. One night we heard his footfall - one September night In the outskirts of a village near the sea. There was a moment when the storm Delayed its fist, when the surf fell Like velvet on the rocks - a moment only; The strangest lull we ever knew! A sudden truce among the oaks Released their fratricidal arms; The poplars straightened to attention As the winds stopped to listen To the sound of the motor drone And then the drone was still. We heard the tick-tock on the shelf, And the leak of valves in our hearts. A calm condensed and lidded As at the core of a cyclone ended breathing. This was the monologue of Silence Grave and unequivocal. What followed was a bolt Outside the range and target of the thunder, And human speech curved back upon itself Through Druid runways and the Piltdown scarps,

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Beyond the stammers of the Java caves, To find its origins in hieroglyphs On mouths and eyes and cheeks Etched by a foreign stylus never used On the outmoded page of the Apocalypse.

April 1941

Dunkirk The English May was slipping into June With heralds that the spring had never known. Black cavalry were astride the air; The Downs awoke to find their faces slashed; There was blood on the hawthorn, And song had died in the nightingales' throats. Appeasement is in its grave: it sleeps well. The mace had spiked the parchment seals And pulverized the hedging ifs andwherefores, The wheezy adverbs, the gutted modifiers. Churchill and Bevin have the floor, Whipping snarling nouns and action-verbs Out of their lairs in the lexicon, Bull-necked adversatives that bit and clawed, An age before gentility was cubbed. A call came in from the Channel Like the wash of surf on sand, Borne in by the winds against the chalk escarpments, Into the harbours, up the rivers, along the estuaries, And but one word in the call. Three hundred thousand on the beaches, Their spirit-level vision training West! A vast patience in their eyes, They had fought pig-iron, manganese, tungsten, cobalt;

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And their struggle with hunger, thirst, And the drug of sleep, Had multiplied the famine in their cheeks For England, By forty miles divided from her brood. Seven millions on the roads in France, Set to a pattern of chaos Fashioned through years for this hour. Inside the brain of the planner No tolerance befogged the reason The reason with its clear-swept halls, Its brilliant corridors, Where no recesses with their healing dusk Offered asylum for a fugitive. The straightedge ruled out errors, The tremors in the sensory nerves, Pity and the wayward impulses, The liberal imbecilities. The reason reckoned that the allied guns Would not be turned upon the roads To clear the path for the retreat. It reasoned well.

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Millenniums it had taken to make their stock. Piltdown hung on the frentals of their fathers. They had lain as sacrifices Upon the mortuary slabs of Stonehenge. Their souls had come to birth out of their racial n The sea was their school; the storm, their friend. Foot by foot and hand to hand They had met the legions On the beaches and in the surf. Great names had been delivered unto them;

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Caractacus, Taking his toll of the invaders In his retreat to the fens and hills; Boadicea, The storming of Londinium and Verulamium, And the annihilation of the Roman ninth', Alban, Alfred, Athelney, Edington! And in the march of their survival They had fought the poll-tax and burned The manor rolls under Ball and Tyler. They had led the riots against the Enclosures. They had sung ballads to the rhythms of the gibbets. The welts had been around their necks and ankles. They had swept the Main with Hawkins and Drake. Morgan-mouthed vocabularians, Lovers of the beef of language, They had carved with curse and cutlass Castilian grandees in the Caribbean. They had signed up with Frobisher, Had stifled cries in the cockpits of Trafalgar. They had emptied their veins into the Marne. Freedom to them was like the diver's lust for air. Children of oaths and madrigals, They had shambled out of caves To write the clauses of the Charters, To paint the Channel mists, To stand hushed before the Canterbury tapers.

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THE RACE ON THE CHANNEL

The Royal Yacht squadrons of the Thames and Cowes, Those slim and rakish models of the wave-line theory, Flying the ensign with their Club devices Grand-daughters of Genesta and the Galatea Whose racing spinnakers Outsilvered and outflew the sea-gulls off the Isle of Wight. Cutters, the pride of Folkestone and Sheerness

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With their press balloon-jibs, Their billows of flax and hemp Smothering their single masts And straight-running bowsprits. Excursion paddlers Last of the family known as the fleet of the butterflies, Purveyors of moonlight sonatas and Sunday siestas. The h'reboats from the London Fire Brigade. Luggers with four-sided sails bent to the yards And slung obliquely to the masts, Smelling of the wharves of Deal. Smacks that built the Grimsby name. Yawls with their handy mizzen-sails The Jacks-of-all-trades on the English coast. Barges spritsail-rigged with jigger booms. Bluff-bowed billyboys and Norfolk wherries, Skiffs that stank of herring roes and Yarmouth. Dutch scoots and square-stemmed bawleys rank With kelp, fish-scales and the slime of eels. And with them all, the merchantmen, Three-funnel liners turbine-driven, Cabin cruisers, with whaleboats, rafts and dories Tied to the grimy tails of barges drawn by tugs. A Collingwood came from Newcastle-on-Tyne, Trelawney and Grenville of the Cornish Line, And Raleigh and Gilbert from the Devon Seas With a Somerset Blake. They met at the quays McCluskey, Gallagher, Joe Millard, Three riveters red from Dumbarton Yard, And Peebles of Paisley, a notary clerk, Two joiners from Belfast, Mahaffy and Burke, Blackstone and Coke of Lincoln's Inn, A butcher from Smithfield, Toby Quinn,

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117 Jonathan Wells, a Sheffield bricklayer, Tim Thomas of Swansea, a borough surveyor, Jack Wesley, a stoker, by way of South Shields, And Snodgrass and Tuttle from Giles-in-the-Fields, Young Bill of Old Bill with Hancock and Reid, Two sons of a bishop from Berwick-on-Tweed, A landscape gardener of Tunbridge, Kent, Povey, a draper from Stoke-on-Trent, Arthur Cholmondeley Bennington-Grubbe With Benbow of the Boodles Club, A Ralph Abercrombie, a Fetherstonehaugh With Smith, and Ibbs, and Jones, and Buggs They met on the liners, yachts and tugs: The Princess Maud, the Massy Shaw, The Crested Eagle, the Nicholas Drew, The Gurgling Jean and the Saucy Sue. Two prefects from Harrow - Dudley and Fraser Fresh in their grey flannel trousers and blazer, Helping two tanners, Muggins and Day, To rig up a sail at a mizzen stay, Were hailed by a Cambridge stroke - 'Ahoy! Will you let me go on your billyboy?' A curate from Cardiff, the Reverend Evans, Inspired with zeal by a speech of Bevin's, Called on a Rochester verger named Burchall, Likewise inflamed by a speech from Churchill Together they went to a Greenwich jetty And boarded a lighter - the Bouncing Betty. Meadows, the valet, tapped at the door Of Colonel Ramsbottom, late of Lahore: 'Twas dawn, and the Colonel was sick with a head; The Dean and his lordship, the Bishop, are here, And your sloop, sir, is ready down at the pier,

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And may I go with you?' Meadows said 'No/ roared the Colonel, as he creaked out of bed, Blasting out damns with a spot of saliva, Yet the four of them boarded the Lady Godiva.

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A captain with a Cape Horn face, Being down on his luck without a ship, Had spent ten years in his own disgrace As skipper of a river ferry Tonight he was taking his finest trip As master of a Norfolk wherry. The Junior partner, Davie Scott, Of MacTavish, MacEachren, MacGregor, and Scott, Conspired with Murdoch, MacNutt and MacPhail To go to Gravesend that evening and sail For the Beach in Mr MacTavish's yacht.

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HEARD ON THE COLLIERS

'I've been in a bit of a muss, mesen, With my game left leg,' said Eddie Glen, 'And every night my faintin' spells, Contracted in the Dardanelles.' 'My floatin' kidney keeps me 'ome, My shoulder too 'as never 'ealed.' Quoth Rufus Stirk of 'Uddersfield, Cracked with shrapnel at Bapaume. 'Ow, wot's a kidney, look at me, A bleedin' boulder in my lung/ Said 'Umphrey Tggins of Bermondsey; 'A 'Igh Explosive 'ad me strung On the top of a ruddy poplar tree For thirty hours at Armenteers, 'Aven't spit straight nigh twenty years/

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'Now, my old woman/ said Solomon Pike, 'Says 'Itler's such a fidget like; 'E steals the cows and 'ens from the Danes, 'E rummages France, 'e chases the Poles, And comes over 'ere with 'is blinkin' planes To drive us to the 'Yde Park 'oles Where there's nary a roof that isn't leakin', Swipin' the pillows right under our 'eads, Shooin' us out from our 'umble beds.' "E's a mug, I says, in a manner o' speakin'.' 'How lang d'ye ken it'll take to get through it?' Said a cautious drover, Angus Bain. 'It'll take a bit o' doin' to do it, The blighters are dropping bombs like rain/ Said the costermonger from Petticoat Lane. Out on the Channel -laughter died. Casual understatement Was driven back from its London haunts To its clinical nakedness Along the banks of the Ilissus. In front of the crew were rolling mountains of smoke Spilling fire from their Vesuvian rims; The swaying fringes of Borealis blue; The crimson stabs through the curtains; The tracers' fiery parabolas, The falling pendants of green from the Very lights; The mad colours of the murals of Dunkirk. Space, time, water, bread, sleep, Above all - sleep; Commodities beyond the purchase of the Rand. Space - a thousand pounds per foot! Not up for sale

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120 In the cabin suites or on the floors of the lighters. The single Mole was crammed with human termites, Stumbling, falling on the decks of the destroyers, Sleeping, dying on the decks of the transports Strung along the seaward end. The solid black queues on the sand waited their turn To file along the bridgehead jetties Improvised from the army lorries, Or waded out to swim Or clutch at drifting gangplanks, rafts and life-belts. Time - days, weeks of the balance of life Offered in exchange for minutes now. Stuff of the world's sagas in the heavens! Spitfires were chasing Heinkels, one to twenty. The nation's debt unpaid, unpayable, Was climbing up its pyramid, As the Hurricanes took on the Messerschmitts.

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THE MULTIPEDES ON THE ROADS

Born on the blueprints, They are fed by fire. They grow their skin from carburized steel. They are put together by cranes. Their hearts are engines that do not know fatigue In the perfection of their valves, In the might of their systolic thrusts. Their blood is petrol: oil bathes their joints. Their nerves are wire. From the assembly lines they are put on inspection. They pass tests, Are pronounced fit by the drill-sergeants. They go on parade and are the pride of the High Command. They take, understand and obey orders. The climb hills, straddle craters and the barbed barricades.

They defy bullets and shells.

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Faster than Genghis' cavalry they speed, Crueller than the hordes of Tamburlaine, Yet unknowing and uncaring. It is these that the rearguards are facing Creatures of conveyor belts, Of precision tools and schedules. They breathe through carburetted lungs; If pierced, they do not feel the cut, And if they die, they do not suffer death. And Dunkirk stands between the rearguards and the sea.

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Motor launches from the Port of London, Life-boats from the liners, Whale-boats, bottoms of shallow draught, Rammed their noses into the silt, Packed their loads and ferried them to scoots and drifters. Blood and oil smut on their faces, The wounded, dying and dead were hauled up Over the rails of the hospital carriers In the nets and cargo slings. IN THE SKIES

The world believed the trap was sprung, And no Geneva words or signatures of mercy Availed the quarry on the sands. The bird's right to dodge the barrels on the wing, The start for the hare, The chance for the fox to cross his scent, For the teeth to snap at the end of the chase, Did not belong to this tally-ho. The proffered sword disclaimed by the victor, The high salute at the burial of a foe Wrapped in the folds of his flag,

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The wreath from the skies, Were far romantic memories. As little chivalry here As in the peregrines chasing the carriers, As in the sniff of the jackals about a carcass! Here over the dunes The last civil rag was torn from the body of war The decencies had perished with the Stukas. From Dover to Dunkirk, From Dunkirk to Ramsgate, And back to the dunes. Power boats of the enemy Were driving torpedoes into transports and colliers, Lifting the engines clear from their beds, Blowing the boilers, sheering the sterns, And the jettisoned loads gathered up from the sea Were transferred to other decks And piled in steep confusion On the twisted steel of the listed destroyers, On the rough planks of the barges, Into the hatches of the freighters, Jammed against the bulkheads and riddled ventilators, On the coils of the cables, On quarterdecks and in the fo'c'sles, On the mess-tables and under them. 'Was that roar in the North from the Rodney! We hope to God it was/ Drip of the leadlines on the bows Two fathoms, sir, four feet, three and a half/ 'Wake up, you dead end. You're not on the feathers now. Make room for this 'ere bloke/ 'Stiff as cement 'e is/ 'Git a gait on, Or the Stukas'll be raisin' boils on your necks/

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'Ahoy, skipper, a can of petrol/ 'Compass out of gear - give us the line to Ramsgate/ 'Follow the scoots/ The great birds, carrying under their wings The black distorted crosses, Plunged, straightened out. Laid their eggs in air, Hatched them in fountains of water, In craters of sand, To the leap of flame, To the roar of avalanche.

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And in those hours, When Death was sweating at his lathe, When heads and legs and arms were blown from their trunks, When the seventh day on the dunes became the eighth, And the eighth slumped into the dawn of the ninth, 330 When the sand's crunch and suck under the feet Were sounds less to be endured than the crash of bombs In that coma and apathy of horror It was then that the feel of a deck, The touch of a spar or a halyard, Was like a hold on the latch of the heart of God. It's the Navy's job! It's their turn now, From the Beach to the ports. Let the Stukas break their bloody necks on the Mole; 340 Let the fires scorch the stars For now, whether on the burnished oak of the cabins, Or on the floor-boards of the punts, Or in the cuddies of the skiffs, Sleep at last has an even game with Death.

124 The blessed fog Ever before this day the enemy, Leagued with the quicksands and the breakersNow mercifully masking the periscope lenses, Smearing the hair-lines of the bomb-sights, Hiding the flushed coveys. And with it the calm on the Channel, The power that drew the teeth from the storm, The peace that passed understanding, Soothing the surf, allaying the lop on the swell. Out of the range of the guns of Nieuport, Away from the immolating blasts of the oil-tanks, The flotillas of ships were met by flotillas of gulls Whiter than the cliffs of Foreland; Between the lines of the Medway buoys They steamed and sailed and rowed, Back to the roadsteads, back to the piers Inside the vigilant booms, Back to the harbours, Back to the River of London, to England, Saved once again by the tread of her keels. Heydrich With rolling drum and funeral flag Befitting his Teutonic station, They laid his body out at Prague With full official confirmation. Deliverer of the Panegyric, Attended by a storm-troop staff, The gentle Himmler wove a lyric Into the Hangman's epitaph.

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'So pure of soul, so free of hate, His heart bled every time he slew A man in his Protectorate, Whether a Gentile or a Jew.

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To equal him in Nordic strain The Reich has never had another; He always wept at other's pain, And Adolf loved him as a brother ...' What tides of grief in Heydrich's heart, What blood-banks in his sympathy, Could wrench those arteries apart And compensate for Lidice?

June 1942

The Truant

'What have you there?' the great Panjandrum said To the Master of the Revels who had led A bucking truant with a stiff backbone Close to the foot of the Almighty's throne. 'Right Reverend, most adored, And forcibly acknowledged Lord By the keen logic of your two-edged sword! This creature has presumed to classify Himself - a biped, rational, six feet high And two feet wide; weighs fourteen stone; Is guilty of a multitude of sins. He has abjured his choric origins, And like an undomesticated slattern, Walks with tangential step unknown Within the weave of the atomic pattern. He has developed concepts, grins Obscenely at your Royal bulletins, Possesses what he calls a will Which challenges your power to kill.'

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'What is his pedigree?'

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'The base is guaranteed, your Majesty Calcium, carbon, phosphorus, vapour And other fundamentals spun From the umbilicus of the sun, And yet he says he will not caper Around your throne, nor toe the rules For the ballet of the fiery molecules/ 'His concepts and denials - scrap them, burn them To the chemists with them promptly/ 'Sire,

The stuff is not amenable to fire. Nothing but their own kind can overturn them. The chemists have sent back the same old story "With our extreme gelatinous apology, We beg to inform your Imperial Majesty, Unto whom be dominion and power and glory, There still remains that strange precipitate Which has the quality to resist Our oldest and most trusted catalyst. It is a substance we cannot cremate By temperatures known to our Laboratory"/ And the great Panjandrum's face grew dark 'I'll put those chemists to their annual purge, And I myself shall be the thaumaturge To find the nature of this fellow's spark. Come, bring him nearer by yon halter rope: I'll analyse him with the cosmoscope/

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Pulled forward with his neck awry, The little fellow six feet short, Aware he was about to die, Committed grave contempt of court By answering with a flinchless stare The Awful Presence seated there. The ALL HIGH swore until his face was black. He called him a coprophagite, A genus homo, egomaniac, Third cousin to the family of worms, A sporozoan from the ooze of night, Spawn of a spavined troglodyte: He swore by all the catalogue of terms Known since the slang of carboniferous Time. He said that he could trace him back To pollywogs and earwigs in the slime. And in his shrillest tenor he began Reciting his indictment of the man, Until he closed upon this capital crime 'You are accused of singing out of key, (A foul unmitigated dissonance) Of shuffling in the measures of the dance, Then walking out with that defiant, free Toss of your head, banging the doors, Leaving a stench upon the jacinth floors. You have fallen like a curse On the mechanics of my Universe. 'Herewith I measure out your penalty Hearken while you hear, look while you see: I send you now upon your homeward route Where you shall find Humiliation for your pride of mind. I shall make deaf the ear, and dim the eye, Put palsy in your touch, make mute

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128 Your speech, intoxicate your cells and dry Your blood and marrow, shoot Arthritic needles through your cartilage, And having parched you with old age, I'll pass you wormwise through the mire; And when your rebel will Is mouldered, all desire Shrivelled, all your concepts broken, Backward in dust I'll blow you till You join my spiral festival of fire. Go, Master of the Revels - I have spoken/ And the little genus homo, six feet high, Standing erect, countered with this reply 'You dumb insouciant invertebrate, You rule a lower than a feudal state A realm of flunkey decimals that run, Return; return and run; again return, Each group around its little sun, And every sun a satellite. There they go by day and night, Nothing to do but run and burn, Taking turn and turn about, Light-year in and light-year out, Dancing, dancing in quadrillions, Never leaving their pavilions. 'Your astronomical conceit Of bulk and power is anserine. Your ignorance so thick, You did not know your own arithmetic. We flung the graphs about your flying feet; We measured your diameter Merely a line Of zeros prefaced by an integer. Before we came

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You had no name. You did not know direction or your pace; We taught you all you ever knew Of motion, time and space. We healed you of your vertigo And put you in our kindergarten show, Perambulated you through prisms, drew Your mileage through the Milky Way, Lassoed your comets when they ran astray, Yoked Leo, Taurus, and your team of Bears To pull our kiddy cars of inverse squares. 'Boast not about your harmony, Your perfect curves, your rings Of pure and endless light - 'Twas we Who pinned upon your seraphim their wings, And when your brassy heavens rang With joy that morning while the planets sang Their choruses of archangelic lore, 'Twas we who ordered the notes upon their score Out of our winds and strings. Yes! all your shapely forms Are ours - parabolas of silver light, Those blueprints of your spiral stairs From nadir depth to zenith height, Coronas, rainbows after storms, Auroras on your eastern tapestries And constellations over western seas. 'And when, one day, grown conscious of your age, While pondering an eolith, We turned a human page And blotted out a cosmic myth With all its baby symbols to explain The sunlight in Apollo's eyes, Our rising pulses and the birth of pain,

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Fear, and that fern-and-fungus breath Stalking our nostrils to our caves of death That day we learned how to anatomize Your body, calibrate your size And set a mirror up before your face To show you what you really were - a rain Of dull Lucretian atoms crowding space, A series of concentric waves which any fool Might make by dropping stones within a pool, Or an exploding bomb forever in flight Bursting like hell through Chaos and Old Night. 'You oldest of the hierarchs Composed of electronic sparks, We grant you speed, We grant you power, and fire That ends in ash, but we concede To you no pain nor joy nor love nor hate, No final tableau of desire, No causes won or lost, no free Adventure at the outposts - only The degradation of your energy When at some late Slow number of your dance your sergeant-major Fate Will catch you blind and groping and will send You reeling on that long and lonely Lockstep of your wave-lengths towards your end. 'We who have met With stubborn calm the dawn's hot fusillades; Who have seen the forehead sweat Under the tug of pulleys on the joints, Under the liquidating tally Of the cat-and-truncheon bastinades; Who have taught our souls to rally To mountain horns and the sea's rockets

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When the needle ran demented through the points; We who have learned to clench Our fists and raise our lightless sockets To morning skies after the midnight raids, Yet cocked our ears to bugles on the barricades, And in cathedral rubble found a way to quench A dying thirst within a Galilean valley No! by the Rood, we will not join your ballet/ December 1942 The Stoics They were the oaks and beeches of our species. Their roots struck down through acid loam To weathered granite and took hold Of flint and silica, or found their home With red pyrites - fools' mistake for gold. Their tunics, stoles and togas were like watersheds, Splitting the storm, sloughing the rain. Under such cloaks the morrow could not enter Their gravitas had seized a geologic centre And triumphed over subcutaneous pain. Aurelius! What direction did you take To find your hermitage? We have tried but failed to make That cool unflawed retreat Where the pulses slow their beat To an aspen-yellow age. Today we cannot discipline The ferments ratting underneath our skin. Where is the formula to win Composure from defeat? And what specific can unmesh The tangle of civilian flesh From the traction of the panzers? And when our children cry aloud

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At screaming comets in the skies, what serves The head that's bloody but unbowed? What are the Stoic answers To those who flag us at the danger curves Along the quivering labyrinth of nerves?

Winter 1942

Father Time

Worry had crept into the old man's face. Why did he have to tilt the hour-glass So often? Strange, he thought, this hurried pace Of the atoms as they strove to pass From bulb to bulb, fighting their way From life to death in an unexplained stampede. He had measured many tempos in his season, But never cared for speed. He always liked the sanitary, slow, Grave manner of the mountains. He had seen them flow In rivulets of crystal grains Down through this very corridor To the deltas of the ocean shore. He had watched the plants and trees turn into coal; The marks of the fronds were in the veins Resembling those of his own hands and temples. He remembered how he used to while Away the aeons, pondering the roll Of the Amazon and Nile. The curve of the sand dunes of Sahara, The depositions of the layers of gneiss, The march of the granite boulders Under the control Of dynasties of ice.

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He thought of the prehistoric file Of the saurians, one long and leisured day, On the crumbling bridges from Australia to Malay. And now this new adventurer Which called itself a soul, With its melange of pride, Courage, honour, suicide, Pursuing an eternal goal Had come along to wreck His cool pre-Cambrian sense of sequence. He shot a last glance at the trek Of the human granules through the bottleneck, Then rose and smashed the glass, and with the dust Christened the knoll SEBASTOPOL!

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March 1943

Autopsy on a Sadist (after Lidice) The microscope was at a loss to tell The composition of his brain and glands Why blood should be like catnip to his smell, And paws be given him instead of hands. What toxins in a mammal's milk could serve To manufacture luxuries out of pains, Anesthetize the sympathetic nerve Or turn to sleet the fluids of his veins? Much less could it explain those pointed ears That caught the raptures of a werewolf's howl, The allegretto strains in human tears, The hallelujahs in a tiger's growl.

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Niemoeller God is my Fuehrer] What availed a phrase In such a camp, with such an armoury? A simple echo of Judean days Had now become the Nordic infamy: A look, a word, a gesture - his defence Against the frown of Essen battlements. No more, no less than these for allies Had Christ before the Procurator's seat Only the incandescence of his eyes, And the eternal pallor of his feet; Only his side, his forehead, and his hands To take the imprint of the Roman brands.

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August 1943

Der Fuehrer's Pot-Pourri At night infernal tunes ran through his head With alternating sweat and shiver: It was his meals, the doctors said, Which lay so heavy on his liver, And the abnormal rate At which he drank and ate. In lieu of prime beef of Yorkshire His most desired plate Had he not taken That Netherlandish bacon? Why did the butler serve That Danzig flounder as hors d'oeuvrel And then, ach Gott, That cramping stitch In the appendix, was it not Those gamey pheasants which Drug Tito or Mikhailovitch

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Had sent him from the Jugo-Slavian mountains? And had analysis not shown Bacilli in the Vichy fountains, And ptomaine in the Baltic tunny? Besides, his chef had coaxed him to devour A bannock made of raw Ukrainian flour, Corinthian currants and Hymettus honey. Thus with his stomach sated, His nightmare ran to tunes he hated: God Save the King and Auld Lang Syne Played havoc with Die Wacht am Rhein. 'Allons enfants de la patrie' Broke the Horst Wessel melody. 'Sprung from holy soil of Hellas, Hail we still sweet Liberty/ Were notes that struck like mortal pains. He turned for solace To Deutschland ueber Alles, But heard instead the strains T'm William of Nassau, Dutch blood in my veins'... . 'King Christian stood beside the mast, His glittering sword was swinging fast.' He tried some variations all his own O Tannenbaum! O Lebensraum! But gave them up with a dismal moan. Exiles returned, a million strong, To sing to the Fuehrer all night long. The waters with a thousand homes' Poured from a wild Norwegian throng. Poles who with Starzynski bled, Czechs whom Benes might have led, Mustered round his gory bed,

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i36 Singing lustily 'But we shall be free/ That Polish rota drove him mad 'We shall not leave our native land, Forsake our folk, nor stand An alien tongue. Each doorstep shall a fortress be/ And when he summoned Wagner for a chorus, With Siegfried and Bruenhilde at their head, To right a great Teutonic wrong And quell the rabble discord of this scene, The Master sent a Nibelung instead The scourging Alberich - but Hitler found Even the thunder of this aria drowned In the basso roar of a Volga song Led by the soul of Chaliapin Before the podium of Stalin.

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October 1943

Still Life To the poets who have fled To pools where little breezes dusk and shiver, Who need still life to deliver Their souls of their songs, We offer roses blanched of red In the Orient gardens, With April lilies to limn On the Japanese urns And time, be it said, For a casual hymn To be sung for the hundred thousand dead In the mud of the Yellow River.

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And if your metric paragraphs Incline to Western epitaphs, Be pleased to return to a plain Where a million lie Under a proletarian sky, Waiting to trouble Your lines on the scorched Ukrainian stubble. On the veined marble of their snows Indite a score to tether The flight of your strain; Or should you need a rougher grain That will never corrode with weather, Let us propose A stone west of the bend where the Volga flows To lick her cubs on the Stalingrad rubble. Hasten, for time may pass you by, Mildew the reed and rust the lyre; Look - that Tunisian glow will die As died the Carthaginian fire! Today the autumn tints are on The trampled grass at Marathon. Here are the tales to be retold, Here are the songs to be resung. Go, find a cadence for that field-grey mould Outcropping on the Parthenon. Invoke, in other than the Latin tongue, A Mediterranean Muse To leave her pastoral loves The murmurs of her soft Theocritean fold, Mimosa, oleander, Dovecotes and olive groves, And court the shadows where the night bedews A Roman mausoleum hung Upon the tides from Candia to Syracuse.

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138 Missing: Believed Dead: Returned Steady, the heart! Can you not see You must not break Incredulously? The dead has come back, He is here at the sill; Try to believe The miracle. Give me more breath, Or I may not withstand The thrill of his voice And the clasp of his hand. Be quiet, my heart, Can you not see In the beat of my pulse Mortality?

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1943

The Brawler in Who's Who The doctors claimed they never had A case to handle quite so bad A record weight, abnormal girth, And such disturbance at a birth. The infant murdered his twin brother And shortly after that his mother, To celebrate his debut on the earth. Defying pedagogic rules, He made a Bedlam of his schools, And wrecked them from the floor to rafter, As one by one, with insane laughter,

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Harrowed in soul and gaunt in feature, His nurse, his father, and his teacher Wasted, and passed into the great Hereafter. Then came the war! and soon his name Was but a synonym for fame; The allied armies and their foes Alike were stricken by his blows. And, peace declared, he took the thanks Of both; returned high in the ranks Lieutenant-Colonel with two D.S.O.S.

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He married and his three young wives In quick succession lost their lives A Gaul, a Teuton, and a Briton. Just how those marital blooms were smitten, The colonel never would confess: They say the tale, now with the Press, Remains by order of the Court unwritten. Thence to a fortress - whereupon He rounded up the garrison, Heading that great historic riot Concerning roaches in the diet. A witness swore a brigadier Gave him the bayonet from the rear Which laid the brawler flat and strangely quiet. For one whole day an undertaker Worked hard upon this mischief-maker To soften down the muscle twists, Then called in two evangelists Who managed somehow to erase The indentations of his face But failed to straighten out his knotted fists.

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They buried him. That very night With his left hook and lethal right He put a dozen shades to rout. The devil refereed the bout And spread the rumour - so I'm told That Death failing to get him cold, Had fouled him with a technical knock-out.

1943

They Are Returning Cease Fire! Again the order Had closed the campaigns of the Western world. The bugles are silent: the flags are furled. Only the requiems remain to be sung And the knells rung Over the dust of Europe. And with the order Ceased, too, those all but animate forms, Mechanic myths of man's creative act Transfigured into fact, Endowed with perfect suicidal skill, With power to fight unbleeding, yet to kill The robots that had changed tail-winds To head-on storms, Had coasted past the Spitfires And given the speed of sound a run These now to the last one Have fallen from their lightning thoroughfares, Or else spoored by the Lancasters Were caught and smoked out from their Calais lairs. Ceased, too, the official bulletin, "With deep regrets' sent to the next-of-kin, The papers' daily pyramid of losses, The mass production of the wooden crosses -

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The story of the unreturning. These put their bodies Between us and the flaming skies, Between us and a night as foul As ever fell on European eyes, And more incredible Than any picture lore of fables; Between us and a fear that tore apart The deepest instincts of the family ties, The Nazi deformation of the heart, The Quisling poison at the household tables, The son's metallic stare, the start At the troopers' rap upon the door, The bullet and the blood upon the floor, The camps, the pestilential breath That caught the thousands in the vans of death; Between us and the regimental boot Upon our altars, the enforced salute, The lie at the lips, the threat Of the unknown that kills the mind Before the body husk, the silhouette Of helmets on the window-blind, The laboratory shadow which combined Cunning of science, terror of the brute, And running back along the human tree, Could come up stemming from a simian root To learn how to congeal an infamy Like Buchenwald or Maidanek or Lidice Between us and all that they placed their whole Economy of body and of soul. We have known blood to run Like this before - blood of father, blood of son, And we had read That out of blood from hands and feet and side A faith once came to birth

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142 And found its test of worth, Or were we so misled And so unprofited, That in the self-same stream the faith has died, Lost in the periodic ebb and flow That left an aftermath upon the earth Of terror, greed and woe? And we have seen the way the sons of men Have passed through Moloch but to pass again Through Mammon - yet once more Out of the crumpled gunpits of a War, Faced with the sight of an entire Continent afire, We dare in this last phase of the eclipse To place the morning trumpets to our lips.

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They are returning. Was it five years ago or yesterday They spent their leisured hours at play, Were walking through the turnstiles To watch their heroes of the diamond smash Their homers, or a bantam flash Hang his opponent on the ropes? The world Was focused in the hit, the plate, the curled Pitch, in the yards won in the scrimmage, in the sight Of a puck flying through the posts. Then overnight The game was on another field With sacrificial gain and yield, The hedgerow inches grilling into yards Against the wire and the shrapnel shards. Five years ago, an age, Or yesterday, That with heads strained, Ears cocked, eyes on the sky,

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These boys were being trained To listen to the hum, identify By cut of wing, tail, fuselage, The models of the aeroplanes? So soon they found themselves with wings, And mingling in free comradeship with star And cloud and eagles, while far Below in microscopic spaces Were creeping things Like slugs and motor cars and trains. So short a time, That women too should take their places, Behind the steering wheel, In front of the micrometer Spinning threads as fine as gossamer For the rifle mountings, Guiding turret lathes, or welding plates, Spark-testing steel, Assembling fuses, wires in cables, grinding Lenses and prisms, or finding The death-range near the Lines in Italy Where, standing by a soldier's bed, They could direct the pale-gold Drip of the plasma or the mould Into a median vein and see It re-enact The Resurrection from the Dead. What brought the change? The rumble of the panzers into Poland, The stories of the camps, the latest tale Of the Gestapo, the Athenia, Rotterdam, That ominous thrust of the arrow-diagram Upon the maps, Dunkirk, and the fall Of Paris, following the ram

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Of the tanks against the civilian jam Upon the roads - (Of what avail The Lines against those fleet Arrows now east and south Towards Yugoslavia, Greece and Crete?) Was it but one of these, or all, The quick contagion of a bugle call, The highest note in the scale Of Churchill's voice - 'We shall not fail'? Or was it something more That made those children of the first World War, Scarce come to their majority, Those heirs of Vimy and of Passchendaele, Gather round to read a legacy And guard it to the last terms of the will, Almost, it seemed to us, before Their fathers' blood was dry upon the codicil?

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And so they went, those boys turned into men. One who had read of ancient Northern France, And sketched the district known as Normandy, Knew Carentan, Saint L6, Rouen, Crecy, As points within a pageant of Romance, Of Anglo-Gallic victory and defeat, Where longbows with their grey-goose feathers beat The crossbows - who knew Bayeux And its two hundred feet of tapestry Picturing the record of the Conqueror Could he have guessed the fateful chance That led his steps into an Abbey nave Where, with survivors of a battered corps, He would, with dust of Caen upon his tunic, Survey the Norman's grave?

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One who had followed in a Latin book The story of the Second Punic War, Of Hannibal's descent, and took As casual names - the Arno, Upper Tiber, Arezzo and Cassino Could he, Foretell that in two years or three He would be fighting On the Tyrrhenian shore, Or dying at the beach of Trasimeno?

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And those whose summer hands had known Only the oars and paddles on a bay, The rigging of a catboat or a smack, Turned into leading seamen, Stemming the winter in Atlantic waters On the Swansea or the Chilliwack, Or, in the Skeena-Athabascan way, Putting the hulls as buffers Between the convoy and the pack.

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And to those youngsters out of school Came honours higher Than that to which amibition could aspire, Ribbons and bars and crosses, In that proud hour of their investiture, For diving with their Typhoon rocket-fire Upon the panthers at Esquay, Pinpointing targets on the Ruhr, For chasing Messerschmitts, Conceding odds of three to one, Under the Malta sun, Or driving through the North Sea winds to seal The exits to the artery of Kiel.

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146 They have met dangers that outfaced Homeric myths, gone journeys that outpaced The farthest-leagued Ulyssean strides. For they have lodged In foreign lands with winds and tides And mountain pines; Set up their tents under the Apennines; Or, clothed in ice, were tossed In the storm pockets of the Himalayas; Climbed over Burma; crossed The Irrawady; entered Kiska; took the raw North air on the deck of the Iroquois; Exchanged the Scharnhorst's greetings; saw Murmansk; explored the reaches Of Scandinavian capes and Arctic seas; Came back; chugged through the Channel fogs to draw Around Gibraltar to Calabrian beaches Fresh lines upon the world's geographies. They are returning. No dole or bread line must await those hands That once had clawed at the Ortona sands, Or held that five-day bridgehead at the Scheldt, Those feet that raced to join The Haida and Assiniboine. The pilots of the aeroplanes, Who made the sky their thoroughfare, Must breathe on earth an unpolluted air And take the sunlight through the slumless panes, Their young hearts washed by a great cause Acclaimed at the world's barricades. Those craftsmen of the arts of flying, Those foremen of the modes of dying They shall come back to new crusades, To set the red pine to the whirring blades

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Along the sky lanes for the marts of peace, To take the produce of their toil, to say To the machine, the drills and cranes, The dynamos and lathes - Obey! To claim the right to reap the autumn stores And the shared yield of the earth's veins, Masters, not servants, of pre-Cambrian ores, To own their birthright as the free Citizens of earth and sky and sea.

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They are returning

To write a chapter on the history of beaches. To trace a line of Trojan spray Against the dawn of a Norman day; To draw the eyes that never looked on death, The frigid muscles and the cancelled breath; To coin the verb and seize the noun For the first stare as the bow doors opened And the ramp went down. To sing the songs for those whose names Were left unread In the citations of the hour The thousands of unsung amorphous dead, The sailors of the sweeper-craft, The ratings of the foc's'les, The stokers in the holds for whom no bells Tolled when they left their unberibboned toil Only to try their chances on a raft, Or plunge beneath the tanker's blazing oil. To squeeze the crimson from a tube And mix it with a natural green, To show how mortars, rockets, tanks, Could splash the khaki of the ranks -

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To paint that scene On a broken wave of live June corn Somewhere within the fields between The Odon and the Orne. To find the way the colour drains Out of the paratroopers' veins, The moment at the dropping zone; to catch The flicker of the pulses at the hatch Above a rendezvous that lay Behind the German rim at Carpiquet. To write a ballad on a crew of eight In a patrolling Canso flying-boat, Measure the stresses to relate The curves, the dive, the way they came, Passed through the storm of the U-boat flak, With starboard engine dead and wings aflame, And then came back To sink her; tell the hours of drift and wait Of the rubber dinghy with her double freight. They shall come back to build in stubborn rhyme, Out of Laurentian rock and Norman lime, Memorial towers Canadian Across a continental span; To mix a mortar that shall never crumble Before the blasts of war or wear of time. To native tunes They shall arrange the old-world runes, Fingering those names keyed to the sound of shells Above the Benedictine cells Foggia, Adriatic, and Ancona, Ceprano, Florence, Capua, Ortona And make them ring new notes in Western steeples. And from those tonic syllables, Dieppe, Authie, Falaise, and Carpiquet,

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149 Kleve, Emmerich, Antwerp and Groningen, They shall learn how to wind Their souls into the reeds and strings To reach their own Eroicas, and find The Chorals, Passions, Pathetiques,

To hymn their Iliad voyagings.

June 1945

Behind the Log There is a language in a naval log That rams the grammar down a layman's throat, Where words unreel in paragraphs, and lines In chapters. Volumes lie in graphs and codes, Recording with an algebraic care The idiom of storms, their lairs and paths; Or, in the self-same bloodless manner, sorting The mongrel litters of a battle signal In victories or defeats or bare survivals, Flags at half-mast, salutes and guards of honour, Distinguished crosses, burials at sea. Our navigators trained their astrolabes And sextants on the skies in lucky weather, Or added guesses to dead reckoning, Hauled up their lead, examined mud or shell Or gravel on the arming - fifty fathoms, Now forty, thirty, twenty-five, shallowing Quickly! 'Engines astern, reefs, keep your lead Going. Have plenty of water under you.' They did not wait till miracles of science Unstopped the naked ears for supersonics, Or lifted cataracts from finite vision To make night and its darkness visible. How long ago was it since sailors blew Their sirens at the cliffs while nearing land,

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Traversing channels, cocked their ears and waited? 'Where did you hear that echo, mate?' 'Right off The starboard quarter, Captain. Took ten seconds/ 'That's Gull Rock there a mile away. Where now?' Two seconds for the echo from port bow.' 'That's Porpoise Head I reckon - Hard a-port!' With echoes everywhere, stand out to sea. But when the winds deafened their ears or cloud And rain blinded their eyes, they were shoved back Upon their mother wit which either had To find the exits to the runs and round The Capes or pile their ships upon the reefs. And of that lineage are the men today. They still are calling to the rocks: they get Their answers in the same hard terms: they call To steel gliding beneath the sea: they pierce Horizons for the surface hulls: they ping The sky for the plane's fuselage: even The moon acknowledged from her crater sills. But though the radio bursts and vacuum tubes And electronic beams were miracles Of yesterday, dismissing cloud and rain And darkness as illusions of the sense, Yet always there to watch the colours, note The V-break in the beam's straight line, to hear The echoes, feel the pain, are eyes, ears, nerves: Always remains the guess within the judgment To jump the fine perfection of the physics And smell mortality behind the log. As weird a game of ping-pong ever played Was on the sea - the place, off Cape Farewell, With the back-curtain of the Greenland ice-cap: Time - '41 autumnal equinox.

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The crisis was the imminence of famine And the cutting of the ganglia and veins That vitalized the sinews, fed the cells Of lungs demanding oxygen in air. The wicks were guttering from want of oil, And without oil, the bread went with the light, And without bread, the will could not sustain The fight, piping its courage to the heart. Grey predatory fish had pedigreed With tiger sharks and brought a speed and power The sharks had never known, for they had been Committed to the sea under a charter Born of a mania of mind and will And nurtured by a Messianic slogan. They were not bounded by the parallels. They found their habitats wherever there Was open sea and keels to ride upon it. Off the North Cape they had outsped the narwhals, The sawfish of the Rios and the Horn. They did not kill for food: they killed that food Should not be used as food. They were the true Expendables - the flower of their type. They left their mothers for self-immolation, The penalty the same for being on Or off the target - for the first to join Their own combustion to that of the ships, And for the second, just to go the way Their victims went - a drunken headlong spiral, Shunted from an exhausted radius Down fifteen thousand feet or more of sea, Engines, propellers, gyros, rudders, dead. The 5.0.42 was being groomed To match a new suspected strategy. The sleuths till now had surfaced, stabbed and dived

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In lone attack. This convoy had to face The risk of concentrated ambush, meet it By leaving beaten sea-lanes, east and west, And in the ambiguity of the wastes To seek the harsh alliance of the ice And fog, where Arctic currents were more friendly, And long nights blanketed the periscopes. THE CONVOY CONFERENCE

In the Conference room the language dripped with brine. Veterans, who nearly half a century Ago had flown their flags on battle cruisers, Were busy grafting some new sprouts of Gaelic And Newfie-Irish on an English stump. They had saluted Fisher as cadets, Heard Open Fire under Jellicoe, Outridden typhoons off the Solomons And at the Falklands cancelled Coronel. 'Twas time they had a spell of garden peace, A time to trim their briers and colour Meerschaums. Those old days were the real days - now, by God They had to tread the decks of merchantmen, From flagships to dry cargo-ships and tankers. The Naval Control Service Officer Addresses the Masters: 'Good morning, gentlemen. It is a pleasure To see familiar faces here today. To such of you who have commanded ships In earlier convoys what I have to say Will be just dishing up the old instructions. But since to many it is the first adventure, I know you'll pardon me if I should cover With some precision the important points. Let me begin by saying that your convoy Has, in its Commodore, one of the most Renowned men in the Service. It is not

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For me to talk at length about his fine And honourable record. It is known To all of you. He has of his free choice Issued from his well-earned retirement To place at the disposal of the Allies His knowledge, skill, and practical seamanship. Here at this table, gentlemen: Rear-Admiral Sir Francis Horatio Trelawney-Camperdown!

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The Senior Naval Officer will have Escort and convoy under his command. An able and distinguished officer, He is through long and personal experience Well-versed in enemy tactics, and your safety Will be the escort's first consideration. N.C.S.O. Thumbing the Pages of "General Instructions'7: 'Being in all respects ready for sea, The ships will have steam up and hoist pennants At daybreak. Note - The Commodore will sound A prolonged blast. The ships will leave anchorage In single column and at intervals Of three minutes, and in the following order, The Commodore leading... You will shorten cables XX minutes before you heave up. Note You will be making seaward on the ebb. You start two columns after dropping pilots. Notice in Form Ai all the instructions Governing matters of sequence, columns and speed. 'May I now draw your most thorough attention To that important fire page, section B Of General Instructions (a voice - "regular page of bumph"); that complete Blackout at night. Only last week reports Came in of a ship sunk because she showed

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A light, and that despite the most emphatic Warnings at the conference prior to the sailing. Remember - have deadlights and scuttles closed, The blackout curtains checked, no cigarettes Or pipes lighted on deck and every measure To conceal the convoy put into effect. 'And likewise of the first significance, Page 3 at section D concerning "Smoke/' Advice is being received of ships making Black smoke which with good visibility May be observed for many miles at sea, And I may add for hours after a convoy Has passed a given point. I must repeat This warning - Do not make black smoke in daylight! 'Again. Your route has with the greatest care Been chosen by the Admiralty experts. But may I point out that such care and judgment Could be offset by so simple a matter As refuse-dumping over rails. Do not (Voices - "Wrap it around the bully beef." "God, that tomato soup needs body and flavor." "I'd put it in the kye to take the stink out/') Do NOT throw garbage in the sea in day time. That's a dead give-away. A crate or carton Floating astern a convoy might betray The existence and position of the ships. That practice must at all cost be avoided. And most important for internal safety Of convoy lines is that of station-keeping. A ship that's not in station is out of control; The turns in moments of emergency Cannot successfully be executed, Unless this measure strictly is observed. I do not need to emphasize this maxim.

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These measures are of front-line urgency. W/T silence must always be maintained Along the route. Occasionally it's broken, Not wilfully indeed but carelessly, By operators fresh from the radio school, Whose fingers have not lost the itch to tap The keys to break the tedium by listening To crackle on 500 kilocycles. A random da da dit dit dit might be An invitation to the U-boats ready To accept it. They are ever listening In on our frequencies and you know well The manner the Direction Finder Loop On a surfaced U-boat will follow a signal. It's like a human ear alerted, which Will turn to the source of a sound to get a bearing. You must remember that the enemy Will not relax his efforts to pick up Those waves, that German D/F stations even As far away as Occupied Europe Are taking bearings, plotting out our ships.

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'Now, gentlemen: here is the Commodore.' Sir Francis Horatio: 'Gentlemen: I shall be very brief and I hope To be as brief after we get to sea. I shall keep my signals to a minimum, But when a hoist does go up I shall Expect immediate acknowledgment. Many of us have sailed together already, And gone through several trying situations. But our success, such as it is, has sprung From absolute obedience to instructions And from endurance which must be assumed. While it is true that for the navigation

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Of his own ship each master must be held Responsible, there is but little room For rugged individualists. Elsewhere Perhaps the Nelson touch may be applied, And a captain's intuitions exercised, But not within the stations of a convoy. (Chuckles amongst the older masters.) The N.C.S.O. has referred to the matter Of showing lights. A match, lit on deck, has Been spotted by an escort at two miles, And last crossing, a thoughtless biped left A port open and failed to notice the signal From a destroyer. It required a burst From a machine-gun to close it. I am sure We shall require no such emphasis In this convoy but I should urge each master To make the business of lights a top concern, Particularly at the change of Watch. Men dropping in to a stuffy galley to make A mug of tea before going below Are the principal offenders. 'Do not wait Till you are deep in fog before you stream Your fog-buoys. That is generally too late. Your next astern by that time has lost touch. Good seamanship and team-play should prevent Avoidable collisions in thick fog. Tf you are new to convoy you may be Tempted to flash on at full brilliancy Your navigation lights when another ship Closes you. DON'T. You are as visible To him as he to you. Keep closed up. Keep Lights dimmed except in an emergency.

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'I shall say little here about the stragglers. The record of the losses says it much More clearly, and the escort cannot help You if you leave the family. They are good; They can work wonders but not miracles.

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'And now if you're uncertain of anything Emergency turns, for instance - come and have A chin with me at the close of the conference. And to repeat, we're in this business all Together, and in it up to the neck: For my part, I am bloody proud of it. Good morning, gentlemen, and a good voyage.' N.C.S.O.: 'Questions?' Chorus: 'Plenty.' Harvey Butt: 'I'm in the wrong position. Too far astern. I have a i2-knot ship. I want a place in first or second line To save me bumpin' into 6-knot tramps.'

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Jim Burdock: This convoy got no tramps.' Butt: 'Well, all I know The last one had 'em, and I knocked the sterns Off three of them, and I was always goin' Full speed astern to save my goddam neck.' 'John Knox' O'Flaherty: 'I could make 8 knots if I didn't have Such lousy coal. The bloody stuff won't steam. A half of it is gravel - wouldn't boil A kettle: looks like salvage from a wreck Picked up from sweepings left on Sable Island.'

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Charlie Shipside: 'And I don't like my place - gummed up between A couple of tankers. God, if I'm not fished I'll be run down/ Jack Doucette: 'Why should I be back there? Never did like the stern of columns. Suppose I'm in there just for picking up survivors. What do you take me for -an ambulance?' Jerry Payne: '8 knots would tear the guts out of my tub. I haven't had a refit for three years. Can't execute a turn of forty-five degrees. We'll be colliding every fifteen seconds.'

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Robert Fitzsimmons: 'My pumps were out of gear when she was built; Still out of gear; complained a hundred times, But can't get any action.' Michael Saltaway: 'I have this To say. I only got one boiler workin'; And that one's on half-time - the other half Is restin' - and I've only half a crew.' Norwegian Captain, leaning heavily on native speech: 1 kan ikke forstaa fordommt ord. How in helvete tink dey dat I kan Faa 8 knots ut of my old vaskelbalja. Har ikke hatt fullt mannskap for two year. I lar mig fan ikke fortelle what I Skal do. You go helvete alle mann.' N.C.S.O.: 'What did he say?' 'Any Stubbins: "E says the bleedin' hinstructions Are fine and quite clear to 'is hunderstandin'.'

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Robin MacAllister: 'Nae, nae, he canna' thole thae English turrms. He'd ken a' richt, gin you gae him the Gaelic. I wad respeckfully suggest the wurrds O' the Generral Instructions be convairted Into a ceevilized tongue so that a chiel Micht hae nae doots. Noo, let me spik mi thochts.'

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(Voices: 'Now, what did he say?' 'Noo's the day and noo's the hour.' 'Is this St. Andrew's Night?' 'Pipe in the haggis.') A Danish Captain: 'No, no. He sess he do not ikke know One word. His vaskelbalja - tub-tub, washtub, Das iss he mean his ship, can't make 8 knots. No crew mannskap full up for long long time. Ship had no refit since she left Bergen In 1894. He tol' me dat Himself. He not quite clear. He sess ve can All go to hella. Don't care damn. I got Complaints also. Want get dem off my chest. Goddam nuisance, I seh, dose para-a-vanes. Muss up de vurks. Crew don't like dem damn bit. Dey seh put hex on ship - a buncha Jonahs. And more also I seh. No compass checks. Dose D/G coils play hell wid compasses. De gear get loose on deck. Dey come adrift.' Cyrus Bumstead: 'I don't want anyone to tell me how To run my ship - been in the Services, Merchant and Navy, nigh come forty years. I was a Master when the most of them Were spottin' patterns on their diapers.'

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Mark Knee to Cyrus: 1 squeezed the Atlantic from my mitts before Those Juniors had their birthday buttons on/ Captain, The Honourable Guy Brimblecombe: 'Well, sir, you needn't worry about my ship. She went through this before: she'll go again. She's in good trim. I have a splendid crew. Signals will be acknowledged to the letter, And in the sea tradition, I assure you.' N.C.S.O.: 'Now, gentlemen, since it is quite apparent That we are all in utmost harmony On the main grounds, it is just left for me To wish "good-luck". Never have I attended A Conference where there was such fine feeling Combined with insight and rare technical grasp Of the problems of a convoy operation. Let me congratulate you. May I now Invite you, on behalf of a great friend Of the R.C.N., to the Periwinkle Club At Lobster Point where you may hoist a couple To take the chill from the September fog.'

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In a few hours from the time the blinds Were drawn upon the jags and the last lisp Against the universe and things marine Was but a reminiscence lapsed in rum, Those men were on the Bridge peering through fog And moving towards their ordered rendezvous. One half a million tons were in the holds, Cramming to the last precious cubic inch

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The slow-keeled merchantmen - the sixty-six. No longer were those ships an industry Run for peacetime returns upon investment. They took their line positions for defence. Against them mainly was the warfare waged Bulk cargo carriers with box-like sections, Ship side to ship side and the main deck to keel, Carrying their gross of ore and coal and grain; The ships with 'tween decks running the full length; Tankers equipped with special pumps for oil; Refrigeration ships, holds insulated For storage of the perishable goods; And hybrid types that had their bellies full Of oranges, aluminum and lint. How desperate the strait which would commit A treasure of this price to such a journey! Where find a steward who would risk his name To close the page of such accountancy When every mile along the ocean highway Was calling for protection, and in calling Demanded life and life's expenditure? And here the call was answered with a guard Whose substitute for numbers was its courage Four terriers slipped from the Canadian kennel: But one destroyer, Skeena; three corvettes, Kenogami, Orillia and Alberni. Upon their vigil hung the life of all, Of ships and men. Of sleeker, faster breed, The Skeena ranged a far periphery At thirty knots, now out of sight and now Closing the convoy as her nose tried out The dubious scents in narrowing ellipses. The slower guards kept closer to their broods, Pushing their way within the column lanes, Emerged to pace the port and starboard flanks Or nuzzled with a deep strategic caution

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The hulls of those whose tardy engine beats Brought down the knots of faster ships and made The gravest risk and worry for the fleet. They kept a special watch upon the tankers. No ships, no aeroplanes, no jeeps could stir Without this source of power and lubrication. Even the merchantmen must flank these ships, Herded like buffalo young inside the ring.

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Commodore to Signalman: 'Signal to pennants 73, relay To pennants 103, Stop Pouring Smoke!' Internal murmurings: 'Look at it tossin' like a Texas twister. That smoke is blacker than an Afghan's whiskers. I'd like to tell that Captain of the Heads He should have stayed at home with the kind of job That suited him - housebreakin' his Angoras.'

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Official: 'And pennants 114 is out of station.' Unofficial: 'That flappin' penguin from the Auckland Islands Has been a week on route, yet needs more time To get rid of that Newh'e-Crowsnest screech. He'll lose it when he's doused. Get back in station, For if you don't, the canaries will stop singinY The Master's thoughts: 'I told those sculpins at the conference I couldn't make that eight - a half a knot Above a six would blow my stinkin' boilers.

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I haven't had a cleanin' for a year, And there's a beach of sand inside the gears, And yet that bargee yells - GET BACK IN STATION!' Commodore: 'And pennants 74 by the Diet of Worms! He's waddlin' like an old barnyard merganser. Another hour by the way he's goin' He'll be out on the flanks duckin' his feathers, Or lost in fog and stragglin' back to Sydney. Keep pumpin' Morse into his ruddy blinkers.' The Master in question: 'I've got a twisted rudder - like a corkscrew, And if that poopin' punk there on the flagship Imagines he's Paul Bunyan or the devil, Tell him put on his shorts and straighten it/ P.O. to galley-boy: 'Gallagher, did your mother tell you nothin' On the way home? Stop pitchin' gash in daytime. Handin' the convoy on a platter to the subs. As bad as smoke to give the trail away. Just one more bad tomato over there, And all the ships will quit this lovely Service, And you'll go with the galley, do you hear?' Gallagher: 'Why won't that windpipe slitter tell me what I got to do with all that mouldy gash? 'Twas gash when it was brought aboard, 'twas gash When it was crated; now it's maggoty. Can't eat it and can't burn it and can't dump it. I'd like to foul his beak in those tomatoes/

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North of the sixtieth, they had, it seemed, Found refuge in a sea-berth where the foe, Finding the chill enter his crop, might seek More southern fodder. Least of all the hazards Were winds and waves: for these the ships were built. Their bows could bull the heavier seas head-on. Their hulls could stand the shock beam-to. The keels Had learned the way to bite into the troughs: Such was their native element. The acts Of God were taken as their daily fare Received alike with prayers or curses. These Were as the dice fell - whether luck of devil Or luck of God spilled on a shifting floor Close to the steady fringe of the Arctic Circle.

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For seven days and nights without attack! The asdic operator in his hut Had sent his ultra-sounds out and reported Echoes, but only such as might return As the dull, soft reverberation notes From seaweed or low forms of ocean life Or from a school of porpoises or whales. His hearing was as vital to the ship As was the roving sight in a crowsnest. His ear was as the prism is to light, Unravelling meanings from a skein of tone. Each sound might hold a threat, a Bremen slur, An overture to a dementia Of guns and rockets and torpedo hits Competing with the orders from the Bridge. He had to know that threat and not mistake it. For that his body was a sounding-board. Even his knees must feel it and his face Become a score for undetermined notes, As if a baton in his cortex played

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165 Wry movements on his neurones fiddle-taut, Twitched his reflexes into spasms, narrowed His pupils, kicked his heart into his throat. He had an instrument in his control Attested by the highest signatures of science. The echoes had traversed wide spans of time: Helmholtz and Doppler tapping to each other Through laboratory walls, and there was Rayleigh Calling to Langevin, he to Fresnel, The three hymning Pindarics to Laplace, And all vibrating from their resonators Salutes to Robert Boyle, halloos to Newton. And here, his head-phones on, this operator, Sleeve-rolled mechanic to the theorists, Was holding in his personal trust, come life, Come death, their cumulative handiwork. Occasionally a higher note might hit The ear-drum like a drill, bristle the chin, Involving everything from brain to kidneys, Only to be dismissed as issuing From the submerged foundations of an iceberg, Or classified as 'mutual interference.' The hopes were running higher the farther north The convoy steamed. Would this one get its break? The Arctic pressed into the human service, The Circle which had caught the navigators The hardiest in the annals of The Search, Willoughby, Chancellor, Hudson, Bering, Franklin Impounded them, twisted and broken them, Their ships and crews upon its icy spokes: This time through the ironic quirk of War Changed to an allied cordon sanitaire.

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166 The evening of the eighth day and a moon, High-sailing and impersonal, picked out The seventy ships, deriding the constrained Hush of the blackout. Was the latitude Itself not adequate watch? The sea was calm, Although with a beam swell the wallowing rate Was but five knots. The moon illuminated The Empire Hudson, leader of port wing, Loaded with grain, the Gypsum Queen with sulphur, The Winterswyck, the Garm, the Scania, Muneric (iron ore - sink like a rock

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And others with the same high names and pennants, Carrying at the load-water line their freight Twelve columns of them in their blueprint stations. A half an hour to dusk the bo'sun's mate Had piped his strictest order - Darken Ship. Thousands of sailors under decks were sealed As in vast envelopes. They ate and worked And slept within a world self-quarantined Against the pestilence of light by bolts, Bulkheads and battened portholes, for each cell Was like a tumoured brain, danger within, Danger without, divided from the world By an integument of iron bone. What chance for life the moment when a shell Trepanned the skull? What would release the pressure Of that stampede to reach the for'ard hatch That burial hole in the deckhead - and come up When the plates buckled in the lower mess? Danger within? Could not the magazines By a raffle flirt of fate be made to turn Against the convoy, striking through the escort,

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With final undeliberated measure, When the oil tanks would join the magazines To the last ton, to the last gram of blunder? The fires that warmed the galleys could cremate: For oil and fulminate of mercury, Nitrated cellulose and T.N.T. And the constituents of our daily bread, Fresh water and fresh air, could by a shift, Sudden and freakish in the molecules, Be transubstantiated into death. Added to this might come the blows where friend Struck friend with utmost shoulder energy Blows just as murderous as torpedo hits Where in the darkness, executing turns, Or in the fog, the convoy ships would find Their plates as vulnerable as cellophane: Or from excess of their protective zeal The fighting units with their double rate Of convoy speed might plough their sinuous way Up through the narrow lanes and turn too sharp, Presenting their full beams across the bows Of leading merchantmen. Lucky they were If they escaped with nothing but a blast Of roaring basso from the Commodore's lungs Those lousy, noisy, nattering sons o' badgers, Where do they think they're going - to Miami, Harpooning porpoises or flying fish?' The Silent Service never won its name With fairer title than it did this night. Evening at half-past nine and a fresh sound, An instant octave lift to treble pitch From the dull datum of 'reverbs' startled The ear. 'An echo bearing green four-o, Range 1500.'

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'Hold and classify/ The ping-g-g with its death's head identity! c.o. to Officer-of-Watch: 'Increase speed 250 revolutions/ (Officer-of-Watch repeats, calls down voice-pipe to coxswain who sets engine-room telegraph to speed. The Engineer Officer-ofWatch acknowledges. His chief E.R.A. swings wheel-throttlevalve open to make required revolutions. Engine-room telegraph confirms to wheelhouse and coxswain calls up voice-pipe 'Wheelhouse-Bridge: 250 revolutions on, sir/ Bridge Officer-ofWatch repeats to captain.) 590 The Skeena heeled to port on 'starboard ten' To keep the target on the bow. 'Steady On two-four-seven.' (Harry one at the dip.) 'Left cut on two-four-six. ...Right cut On two-five-three.' (Reporting Doppler) 'Echo high and inclination closing/ The range 1200. Target moving right: Centre bearing,two-five-five/ One thousand yards: 'extent of target - ten.' Not ice this time but moving steel submerged Two hundred feet of longitudinal plate, Forged at the Krupp's and tested in the Baltic, Were answering the taps. 'Stand by depth-charges/ Captain to Chief Yeoman: 'Take an emergency report to shore: "In contact with classified submarine"/ (Chief Yeoman repeats to W.T. office.) A crackle of Morse, and in bare space of seconds

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The warning goes to Admiralty, from there To allied ships in threatened area, And on the walls in Operations, where The swastikas and shadows of the U-boats Follow in replica the Atlantic movements, A red peg moves along the chart to plot The first of the disease spots that would pock The body of the s.c.42. Whatever doubt the eye might have imposed Upon the ear soon vanished with the signals. Jedmore reported two torpedoes passed Ahead, Muneric, fourth ship in port column, Attacked, dragged instantly, sank with her iron. The Commodore - "Saw U-boat on port bow/ Kenogami in contact with another, A third, a fourth. Suspicions which had wormed Their way along the vine were proved. The first Wolf-pack engagement of the Atlantic War Was on! A fifth ... a seventh! They had trailed The ships to Greenland waters. Moonlight full, Without the mercy of clouds, had turned A traitor to the convoy, cancelling The northern length of nights. Like teal not yet Surprised to wing, the silhouetted ships Awaited leisured barrels from the hunters, And the warheads drilled them as from open sights. Orillia, detailed to sweep astern, Picked up the few survivors, took in tow The S.S. Tachee, badly hit but still Afloat: rockets were seen in midst of convoy: A signal from the flagship - 'Empire Hudson Torpedoed on port side/ The triple task To screen the convoy, counter-attack, and then, The humane third of rescuing the sailors,

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Seemed far beyond the escort's hope or effort. To save to kill, to kill to save, were means And ends closely and bloodily allied. Hundreds of sailors un-lifejacketed Clawed at the jetsam in the oil and water. Captains and Commodore were well aware Of how a lame one in a chase could spatter With blood the entire herd. High strategy Demanded of the brain an execution Protested by the tactics of the heart. And there was only half an inch or less Of a steel skin upon the escort's hulls Not for self-safety were those ships designed. Just here the log with its raw elements Enshrined a saga in a phrase of action. The Empire Hudson listing badly, crew And officers were disembarked. Someone Reported - "Secret papers have not been Destroyed, mersigs, swept-channels, convoy route, And codes, the codesl" And as there was a chance The steamer might not sink, Kenogami Was ordered to embark an officer, Return him to the listed deck to find And sink the weighted papers - which was done/ This stark undecorated phrase was just An interlinear item in the drama, Three words spelling a deed unadvertised, When ships announced their wounds by rockets, wrote Their own obituaries in flame that soared Two hundred feet and stabbed the Arctic night Like some neurotic and untimely sunrise. Exploding tankers turned the sky to canvas, Soaked it in orange fire, kindled the sea, Then carpeted their graves with wreaths of soot. The sea would tidy up its floor in time, But not just now - gaskegs and rafts and mops,

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Oilskins, sou'westers, sea-boots, duffel coats Drifted above the night's burnt offerings. Only the names remained uncharred - Muneric, Ulysses, Baron Pentland, Sally Maersk, The Empire Crossbill, Empire Hudson, Stargard Merely heroic memories by morning. The early hours of daylight drove the subs To cover though the escort knew that eyes, As sleepless as their own but unobserved Behind the grey-green mesh of swell and lop, Were following the convoy's desperate plunge. All knew that no restrictive rules would hedge This fight: to the last ship, to the last shot, To the last man, for fair was foul and foul Was fair in that melee of strength and cunning. Tirpitz and Fisher thirty years before Had scanned the riddles in each other's eyes. What was the argument about the belt That drained the sophistry of principles Inside a ring? 'Hit first, hit hard, hit fast!' Tirpitz had trumped him with - 'Hit anywhere.' And here today only one point was certain Sailors above the sea, sailors below, Drew equally upon a fund of courage. No one might gamble on the other's fear Or waning will. Commander Schmidt might flood His tanks and dive when something on his mirror Called for discretion, but in his own shrewd time He could be reckoned on to blow the ballast And frame that picture on the glass again. He would come up with Botterschult and Rickert, Von Braundorff, Niebergall, Schippmann and Fritzsche. They knew their crews would never fail the switches Or rush the conning towers before the orders, Though the depth-charges pounded the blood vessels,

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Though combing rams just missed them overhead. In what proportions did the elements Combine to move those individual pawns Of power in their massed flesh-and-nerve formation Across a board? Grit human; bruinine; Habits that would not heckle a command, Obedience that sealed the breach of fear, A frenzy that would spurn the slopes of Reason Under a rhetoric of Will which placed Before the herrenvolk historic choices To scramble up a cliff and vandalize The sunlight or else perish on the ledges. These were the enemies the convoy fronted: Metal to metal, though in this arena The odds lay heavily with the pursuers, Even by day - for what were periscopes At distance of three thousand yards, that reared Their tiny heads curved like swamp moccasins? What was their smothered wake compared with that Propeller wash, that height and drift of smoke, Those lines of funnels with their sixty hulls? And so it was a safe bet on the sub When at high noon one left her nest and sped Her charge right at the S.S. Thistleglen, Dead at the waterline and full amidships. It took three minutes for the merchantman To dock her pig iron on the ocean floor. There, there he is!'

Seven cables from the spot Where suction swirled above the foundering, The periscope light-grey - one minute only! The Skeena carried out a pounce attack Of ten depth-charges fired with shallow settings. The asdic trailed the sub proceeding north

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173

At three-knot speed. Kenogami confirmed Echoes. Depth-charges with deep settings dropped, The echoes ceased, and a great patch of oil Surfaced, and a huge bubble like a blister Broke, close to the position of explosions. This time for keeps we pinged his bloody hide, sir: We've sent him down to join the Thistleglen.'

750

With this by day, what could another night Not call forth from the cupboard? Afternoon Wore on till dusk with that dramatic lull Which acted like narcotics on the heart, Yet put high-tension circuits in the brain. The Sally Maersk went down with bread enough To feed an army for a month/ 'But what A job the corvettes did in rescuing Them all - thefifty-fourunder that fire.' 'Most of the Baron Pentland too.' 'Her back Was broken though her lumber kept her floating.'

760

Could the same chance be taken the next night? An hour after nightfall and the convoy Had pierced the sixty-second parallel. Twelve shortened columns tightened up their gaps, All ships under instructions - (You will not - repetition Not break W.T. silence without deep suspicion of U-boat presence.) Owing to moon Rear ships of the port column were instructed To drop smoke floats should the enemy appear On the port side. Each minute passed, each mile Northward were credit items on a ledger. And now quickening the heart, two friendly shadows,

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Corvettes, steamed into shape - Moose Jaw, Chambly Two added to the four. But still the hope Was on evasion - on the North - to kick Them with their wounded heels and merge the spoors Within the Greenland-Iceland ocean tundras. And so the last night's vigil was repeated, Although more ominous the silences: More broken, too, the sleep as the ears buzzed Still with the dental burr of the point-fives, And the yellow cordite from the four-point-sevens Kept up its smart under exhausted eyelids. The average rate was lowered by three knots. The Tachee was in tow of the Orillia, Fumbling her rudder. From the Chambly's deck, Two miles away, the ships seemed fated targets. Silent and slow and dark as, clothed with crape, They journeyed on like mourners, having left The Saxon burial of their sister ships, And bearing on themselves the same contagion. The air was breathing out its prophecy. So was the water. There was mockery Within the sea's caress - the way a wave Would clamber up the bow of the Moose ]aw, scout Around the shadows of the foc's'le, Tattoo the face of the Bridge and lazily Slither along the deck and then hiss through The hawse-pipes as the corvette dipped her nose To the slow anaesthetic of the swell. Mockery it was on face and lips and fingers, For, after her reconnaissance, the sea, As urging death with a forensic fury, Would shed her velvet syllables, return With loaded fists to thunder at the gun-shields, Trying to crack defence before the battle Was joined between the 'patterns' and the 'tubes.'

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Eleven-thirty, and the navigator, His coat and boots on in his bunk, completes A nightmare with a steady mumbling curse. He thought the order was Abandon Ship It was an O.D. calling Middle Watch. He wakes, turns over, and again turns over, Yawns, stretches and turns out, proceeds to Bridge, Peers through the blackout curtains, and in dim Blue battle-light he squints and notes night orders, The toughest order of the toughest Watch (Maintain tail sweep from two to four thousand yards). He focuses binoculars to range The horizon arcs. 'A lot of whales about Tonight.' The echoes picked them up. Four hours! He has to fight that Middle Watch fatigue, And as the minutes crawl he sucks life-savers, Or cracks one on his teeth for company. A line of spray leaps up above the dodger And like rawhide cuts him across the face. Then, too, that phosphorescence on the sea Is easily mistaken in its darts, Flashes and curves for what the lookout fears. Two hours are gone: another two to go. (That wrist-watch ticks off hours instead of seconds.) His eyelids blink to ease the strain that falls Like mist upon a telescopic lens. A starboard lookout yell jerks back his senses Torpedo bearing green-four-o.' Lookout Recoils from an expected blow that does Not strike. "Damn porpoises: they always home

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In on thp bow/

(The navigating officer wipes the sweat from his forehead with his sleeve, tells the sub-lieutenant to take over for a few minutes as he wants to go to Heads. Then he calls to a stand-by.)

176

A mug of kye?'

'Say, Spinney, what about

'Yes, Sir/

Spinney had not Yet found his legs. Less than six months before He had been learning Latin and the classRoom smell had not been kippered from his system. To him the ocean was a place of travel, A blue-green oriental boulevard Round unknown continents - up to this year; And even to last night the illusion stayed, When for his benefit the Borealis Staged a rehearsal of the Merry Dancers Before the blood-red footlights till it paled The myth upon a tracery of starshell. He now goes to the galley, fills a jug With kye, picks up a half a dozen mugs, Stumbles, skates, splashes half of it on deck. Some drops of rain and sea-foam tincture it. Along the way a leading-hand of the Watch And a rheumatic coder cadge a drink, And by the time that Spinney finds his balance On the bridge only a soapy seawash greets The navigator's throat. 'What in the name Of all buck goats is this? Where did you get This swill?' (He hands it to the sub to drink.) 'Go back and fill her up again, And keep her clean/ Spinney steps down from bridge, Staggers, makes for the ladder, cracks the jug Against the signal-box before he slides, Reaches the galley and returns, tries hard To wean his legs from the quadrangle walk, Does a Blue Danube on the deck, and then Revokes his quondam heroes (what a bunch Of fools those ancients were to travel,

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Aeneas was the biggest ass on earth!) And flinging out his last accusative At what is limned on the horizon, he Remeasures his Virgilian cadences In terms of stresses gliding queasily Along the black ramps of the North Atlantic. At ten to four Lieutenant Snell takes over, And the two victims of the Watch slope down With brains of fog and eyes of fractured glass. Their legs go aft by instinct to their bunks, Their minds well in advance entering a coma Beyond gun-cotton shock or Gabriel's horn. Twas only in a stupor that O'Leary Recalled his reprimand. When did it happen? 'Yeoman, you dropped no markers with that pattern. That's standing orders now - smoke-floats to mark Areas attacked. Ever heard it? Don't you know Your drill? You'll be in my report in the morning.' O'Leary gagged upon his chewing quid, Hiccupped, sending a spurt of nicotine And hydrochloric acid on the sea. 'He said to me, said he, "O'Leary, don't You know your drill?" -Say, how the hell would I know? Nobody tells me nothing in this Navy.' A bo'sun caught the Peggy with a fag. 'Gripes, do you want to bitch this midnight show? That lighted butt is visible for miles, And on the starboard wing, too. Don't you know The one and only moral law of Moses Is never light a fag on deck at night? A law you got to learn while in the Service. A light can be machine-gunned by the escort. They'd ping your fag and teeth at the same time.'

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Peggy, out of earshot: 'I didn't light it on the deck. I cupped My hands and took three drags and that was all. That jockey groomed for donkeys thinks he's got The whole world by the tail in a down pull. When I get back to Civvy Street, I'll call him.' O'Meara, Steele and Casey had a lot To say. They'd gab it when the day came round The day the Stargard reached her port - but somehow The water and the salt got in their throats The moment when the Stargard took them under. The dark was sedative and irritant. How easy was it for an interval To muffle the senses with a hushed blackout, And the diminuendo of the run Could well delude the reason. This was not The rate that marked the fever of pursuit, And nothing from the decks was visible To show the way the trimmest escort unit Could be in shackles to a lubber keel, And have to be replaced in precious moments; Nothing to show how gyros and magnetics Could be ungeared by submarine explosions. For this was information undiffused Among the crew or countered by illusions, Or by resumption of the normal tasks. No one from the Ulysses lived to cite The witness of the E.R.A.S and firemen, Pounding the steel rungs in that inner trap When the torpedo struck her gas and oil.

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179

The drama of the night before was over. No headlines would record as news the toil, As stokers every hour took temperatures Of bearings, scribbled them on pads, transferred Them to the logs and then resumed their rounds To watch for popping valves, to check the flow By turning wheels when the full head of steam Was hitting the square inches of the boilers. There was no spotlight on the items when A leading seaman of the watch reported The temperature of the sea forty degrees, The lowering falls are clear, boats off the pins, The watertight compartments are all closed/ No one would mould the linotype for such A mass that might survive or not survive Their tedium of watches in the holds The men with surnames blotted by their jobs Into a scrawl of anonymity. A body blow at the boilers would untype All differentiations in the blood Of pumpmen, wipers, messmen, galley boys Who had become incorporate with the cogs On ships that carried pulp and scrap to Europe. Desire invoking for the memory Amnesia for the nightmare that had passed, It might have been a run in peaceful times. The sounds seemed casual enough - lookouts Reporting to the officers on watch, Got back the usual laconic answers. The turbine notes ran up from C to G And down according to the scale of speed. The scraps of speech from duffel-coated forms, Huddled beneath the after-canopy, Had by tacit agreement in the eyes Nothing to do with present urgencies.

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180

A rating 'in the rattle' salved his mind By giving his opinion of a buffer, Casting suspicion on the buffer's birth And pedigree. His b's and g's and s's, Delivered through his teeth in confidence To the high winds and seas from A-gun deck, Had all the symptoms of a normal trip. Only the action-station gongs could jar That gentle wishful thinking - and they did. Horse-power to the limit on the engines, Levied for scout assault and close defence, Was routed quickly to defence, for short Beyond believing was the interval Between the echoes and torpedo hits, Between them and the spotted periscopes. The Commodore reported, 'Gypsum Queen Torpedoed and sunk.' Alberni gets an echo, Five hundred yards, Kenogami confirming. Chambly and Moose Jaw get a definite kill With prisoners, and then a 'probable'. The peril of the night before was doubled. This time the subs had dived within the convoy, 'Attacking from within the lines' - the fear Above all fears, for, out to sea, the lairs Might be discerned and the protective screens Be interposed between them and the convoy. But now the hazards of the fight were weighted In favor of the foe. Seven or eight Out of the estimated twelve were there Inside or hanging on to flank or rear. Even blindly they could not miss - on port And starboard bow, amidships, on the quarter.

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181 Upon the Skeena's Bridge the judgment fought With chaos. Blindness, deafness visited The brain. Through a wild paradox of sight And sound, the asdic echoes would not fall Within their ribbon-tidy categories. They bounded in confusion from the hulls Of tankers and corvettes: the ash-can sounds Were like those of explosions from torpedoes. Wake-echoes and reverbs, and quenching caused By pitch and roll of a heavy following sea, Had blended with the sharper pings from steel To give the effect of a babel and a brawl. But blindness was the worst. To find the foe By starshell served indeed to spot the target, But carved in white the escort's silhouette. The need called for the risk. A megaphone Informed the Skeena that a sub was seen Between the columns seven and eight, its course Marked by a steady hail of tracer bullets. The Skeena tried to ram; the sub escaped To an adjacent lane and turned right angles In opposite direction to destroyer. The shelter of the dark was now a threat Holding collision as the convoy ships Made their sharp turn of forty-five degrees. Her fighting and her navigating lights Were switched on to identify the Skeena, Scratching the paint upon the merchant hulls, As orders pelted down the voice-pipe, helm And engines answering - 'Full speed ahead ... Starboard twenty ... Stop both ... Half-ahead port... Half-astern starboard ... Stop starboard ... Half-ahead starboard ... Full ahead both. ...'

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Thhhhhhhhhh The issue grew more leaden as the night Advanced, and what relief could daylight offer Against the weary arithmetic count? The Winterswyck blown up, sunk with her phosphate; Stonepool torpedoed on both sides, gone down With general cargo and a fleet of trucks. And matching the confusion on the decks Was the confusion in the ether, ships Torpedoed, burning, sinking, hammering out Their cryptocodes. What listeners could sort them, Solve those recurring decimals of dots And those long dashes when the operators Screwed down the keys - their last official acts To give the drowning wails of instruments? What rescuers could hurry to position? Only the fighting ships - and they were fighting.

1050

'Which one was that?'

'A tanker bad enough, But not as bad as that; a flame that would Frizzle a glacier/ 'Aviation gas?' 'It could create that light but not that roar, 'Twould cause stokehold concussion miles away, And wake up Julianehaab/ "Twas ammunition.' The Garm and Scania with their lumber lost! Rockets observed from Randa and Benury The signals ceased - both missing in the morning! The fourteen sunk and others just afloat, The remnant staggered on still north-by-east.

1060

i83 Last night, the second night, and must there come A third? The ratio of loss had climbed Beyond all normal fears. The logs themselves Might not be legible on that third morning. So far the tale was grim enough - but six Saved of the Jedmore's crew; eight from the Stonepool; Less than half from the Garm; six from the Stargard; Two from the Winterswyck; and a great blank The fate of crew unknown - was logged for Scania, The Empire Springbuck, Crossbill, Thistleglen, Muneric and Ulysses. The third night To come! Those hammerheads were off there still, Hiding, biding. How many? How those freighters Foundered! How fast? Minutes or seconds?

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'Did You see the way the Crossbill took her dive? Her cargo steel, she went down like a gannet.' 'The Muneric beat her to it. A life-belt Would have no chances in that suction-hole, Say nothing of a man. I saw her blades Rise, edge themselves against the Alberni gunfire/ Why should those phobias of speed, colour And shape belonging to the night alone Return to plague the mind in open daylight? Would those fires start again? A chemistry That would incinerate its own retort Raged round the Stonepool when she sank. Water And fire, water and oil, blood, fire and salt Had agonized their journey through nerve-endings To char themselves upon a graphite-grey Precipitate. Survivors from the Stargard, Who would for life carry their facial grafts, Told of the scramble from the boiler rooms,

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184 Up canted ladders and the reeling catwalks, Only to find their exit was the sea, And there to find their only exit from Its cauldron surface was its drowning depth. Where find the straws to grasp at in this sea? Where was the cause which once had made a man Disclaim the sting of death? What ecstasy Could neutralize this salt and quench this heat Or open up in victory this grave? But oil and blood were prices paid for blood And oil. However variable the time, The commerce ever was in barter. Oil Propelled the ships. It blew them up. The men Died oil-annointed as it choked the 'Christ!' That stuttered on their lips before the sea Paraded them as crisps upon her salver. This was the payment for the oil designed To sleek the gears and punch the pistons in And over Alamein and Normandy. And blood mixed with the sea-foam was the cost Of plasma safely carried in the holds Across an ocean to a continent, There to unblanch the faces on the fields, There to revein the vines for fresher fruits In a new harvest on a hoped tomorrow; And over all, the purchase of the blood Was that an old dishonoured postulate, Scrubbed of its rust, might shine again - Granted That what the mind may think, the tongue may utter. Three morning hours were gone and no attack. Were the U-boats destroyed or shaken off Or still awaiting night? What mattered it? What mattered the rotation of the earth? The clock had struck in seasons those two nights,

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185

And Time was but a fiddler off his key, Treading the youth through middle age towards death. From the lookout a signal - Smoke aheadl Was it a surface raider? This would mean Extinction, still another word for sleep. The smoke took shape - five funnels pouring it. Binoculars from the crowsnests and bridges Of all the ships, escort and convoy, swept The horizon: dots turned into lines, the lines To hulls and decks and guns and turrets - five British destroyers making thirty knots. This was the restoration for the hearts Of fifty ships - the maimed, the blind, the whole. Around them raced the fighters, plotting out Suspicious zones whenever asdic sweeps Reported doubtful contacts, searching far Afield, then closing to resume position On screen. And so the s.c.42, With mutilated but with fashioned columns, Covered the lap across the Denmark Strait With that same chivalry of knots which meant Rescue for hundreds in the Greenland battle. For with the battered Tachee still in tow Of the Orillia, they reached the two Most northern outposts of the Old World havens, Rock-armoured Hvalfjord and Reykjavik, Then took their southern stretch until the convoy Sighted Inishtrahull and there dispersed. And the fighting ships, miraculously unscathed, Proceeded to Molville, to Lishahally, Thence up the winding Foyle to seek their berths Around the crowded docks of Londonderry.

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1947

186

Summit Meetings Why hurry? Stow your jackets in the lockers! A bloodless argument could dry its rage Upon an igneous or a glacial page. Some day the pterodactyls may return. What warden whispered that a lizard dwells In the green suburbs of your syllables? Caesar aut nihil. Deserts lie between. Covet the lulls in your penultimates Made up of aspirates and carbonates. The sand drifts round the black and white, the Yes And No. Check well before you leave your chairs The journey straps between those camel pairs.

10

Delay decisions. Visit the museums, The markets, public squares, the parks and beaches For convalescent moments after speeches. Observe all signals - green, red, stop, go. Note last - This way to the memorial plaques To find the exits to your cul-de-sacs.' Rumble your bellyfuls and crack your chins; 20 But let the thunder like a thousand Babels Bark its black knuckles on the oak of tables. This is the summum that the dead may wish That these, their broods not yet entombed, may snatch A loaf of life before their canines hatch. Summer 1948 Newfoundland Calling Out of the fog along a strip of shore, Out of the surf from some uncharted rock, The coastline from Cape Race to Labrador

i87

Has traced the sagas of their life and stock. Where human hands and the storm sinews met Ballads have built their salty alphabet. From the sea's font their births were solemnized Random, Seldom-Come-By and Come-By-Chance The names caressed, rebuked, warned or chastized With the drum's beat or hiss of sibilance. The labials and the dentals worked to cut The Topsails, Joe Batt's Arm, Bay Bulls, Turk's Gut.

10

But when two months from the last anchor hold The landfalls blessed the navigators' eyes, When bluffs and promontories enclosed a fold And harbour ripples strung their lullabies 'Twas then the words in a high ritual fell Like music cradled in a syllable. 'Cape Bonavista' - Cabot's hail! Secure The Matthew would ride out the gale that night. This chiming name was just the overture To Heart's Content, Bonne Bay and Heart's Delight. What psalm made luminous the captain's face When double-reefed his ship made Harbour Grace? Who did the christening at those hallowed spots Under the sunset's rose and purple changes Spread Eagle Peak, Blue Hills and Butter Pots, Transfiguring the Avalonian Ranges? What magic stopped the breath of boatmen rowing With Gander-Gambo-Terra Nova flowing? The names will know their cousins when they see Them, greet them with the same sonorous hail: Red Indian Lake will call Timagami; The Humber, Restigouche; Codroy won't fail The Saguenay; nor will that Avalonian Be outsung by Laurentian or Huronian.

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Nor will the consonants refuse to mix Their lusty breeds and march with cymbal and fife Pugwash, Tignish, Flin Flon, Medonegonix, Exploits, Whitehorse, Chinook and Yellowknife, Twin Butte - tapped by the same baptismal quirk That spattered adult drops on 'Mother Burke/

40

By birth certificates of race or weather, Bare Need and Empty Basket, Joliette And Annieopsquotch howled or laughed together With Skookumschuck, Ha Ha Bay, Lillooet, While Bumble Bee Bight and Pinch Gut Tickle cried With God Almighty Cove and Stepaside. They have survived through strains of genes and blood Storms, fishing admirals and dust-bowls; rolled On decks and log-jams; watched pitheads; withstood The prairies' drought, blizzard and rust, and told The explorers' yarns through a long Arctic night Till dawn broke with a soft Pacific light. Listen - across the Rockies, tunnel and gorge, Sir Humphrey Gilbert calls to Captain George! Newfoundland Seamen This is their culture, this - their master passion Of giving shelter and of sharing bread, Of answering rocket signals in the fashion Of losing life to save it. In the spread Of time - the Gilbert-Grenfell-Bartlett span The headlines cannot dim their daily story, Nor calls like London! Gander! Teheran! Outplay the drama of the sled and dory.

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31 March 1949

189

The wonders fade. There overhead a mile, Planes bank like gulls: like curlews scream the jets. The caravans move on in radar file Scarce noticed by the sailors at their nets, Bracing their bodies to their tasks, as when, Centuries before Argentia's smoking funnels, That small ancestral band of Devon men Red-boned their knuckles on the Squirrel gunwales. As old as it is new, as new as old, Enduring as a cape, as fresh as dulse, This is the Terra Nova record told Of uncontractual blood behind the pulse On sea or land. Was it but yesterday That without terms and without drill commands, A rescue squad found Banting where he lay With the torn tissues of his healing hands?

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20

31 March 1949

The Last Watch

The sea had opened up its bag of tricks To dispossess a property of earth To him the room was as a reeling berth: To us as steady as a crucifix. His hands were fumbling something in the dark, Tracing a chart, it seemed, or logging knots. The pupils of his eyes like codein dots Roved with a lantern measuring its arc. His head was bowed as to a sudden gale, Though not a jib could stir in that night air, And though the aneroid was pointing Pair, We listened to an order - 'Shorten Sail!'

10

190

We waited for a token. We could feel A swallow's wing brushing the window-pane: Something had hammered at the weather-vane, A master's voice had called - 'Hard-down the wheel!'

Summer 1949

Displaced It is not sadness that invades you now Romantic figure for a creed fixation A tougher noun is needed for the sough Of surf on limestone at your embarkation. A jumpy needle just points 'outward-bound/ Uncertain of its adjectival use: From roots and rubble let the word be ground And mixed with ashes from the hemlock spruce. Watchman! We cannot hear your voice or bell, Stationed so far away on the world's ledges: How can we sift your midnight's 'All is well' From faiths confronting faiths with slit-throat edges?

10

Sailor! Can you forecast the day? Tell what Those lava-troughs and peaks like Everest Mean by scotching the sunset? You can not Decipher black-and-scarlet palimpsest. To you with wisdom culled from Board Room sessions, Who curved the cycles, carved their epitaphs Are these the tidal booms and their depressions Mirrored in driftwood polish of your graphs? Woman! The limit of your husbandry May be exacted by yon myrmidons: Go, gather up the children's crumbs and free Those tapered fingers for your orisons.

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191

Perhaps an ancient God who dealt in wonders Trading a heart of flesh for one of stone Will offer benedictions, not his thunders, Bending his ear to catch a cradle moan.

June 1949

Blind from Singapore ('Our orders are to burn the city') Only in memory is petroleum burning: Why do you keep your lids turning Upward as though you feared light from the sun? There was economy In what was said, in what was done: A second just to read The signal, just an hour for the deed. As for your memory, Was not six years enough to have consumed the city? The physical fear has gone A substitute has come: You find it hard to take our pity, This the hardest of all - better the dumb Gestures you cannot see.

10

Your enemy Is light, Although withdrawn In ambush through the stars. Your friend is Night. Wise to the clock in candid ambiguity, 20 She sidles to your bed at dawn, Carries no mirror for your scars And stays with you till dewfall. We Alone can read those figures on the page That multiplied your age. December-January 1949-50

192 A Call So quiet was the place, it teemed With peace invasions of the shore The sky and sea were undisturbed By ruffle of wing or riffle of oar. Only the chatter of surprise Of children gathering ear-lobed shells Was teasing silence when the foam Let go the handrope of its bells. The air grew morbid with a load Of clam and balsam smells like musk: Veils of chiffon hung in the west While afternoon was threading dusk.

10

I hastened to the shore and called, Their blue eyes wondering - 'Why, come home! There is no danger in the tide, There is no threat of rain or foam/ 'Come home!' There was no reason given. Nor could I give it. I alone Could penetrate that sign of rain, The stalking thunder in that drone.

20

Despite the Sandman's aid, I knew No barbiturates in those skies Would join the solvent of the musk To wash the daylight from their eyes. I have forgotten now the peace That held the tides without a foam: All I remember is the cry, Unanswered still - 'Come home, come home!' December-January 1949-50

193 The Good Earth

Let the mind rest awhile, lower the eyes, Relieve the spirit of its Faustian clamour: An atom holds more secrets than the skies; Be patient with the earth and do not cram her With seed beyond the wisdom of her soil. She knows the foot and hoof of man and ox, She learned the variations of their toil The ploughshare's sensitivity to rocks. Gather the stones for field and garden walls, Build cellars for your vegetable stores, Forgo the architecture of your halls, Until your hands have fashioned stable doors.

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She likes the smell of nitrates from the stalls, She hates a disciplined tread, the scorching roar At the grain's roots: she is nervous at the calls Of men in panic at a strike of ore. Patient she is in her flesh servitude, Tolerant to curry ticklings of the harrow, But do not scratch past her agrarian mood To cut the calcium in her bone and marrow. Hold that synthetic seed, for underneath Deep down she'll answer to your horticulture: She has a way of germinating teeth And yielding crops of carrion for the vulture. Myth and Fact

We used to wake our children when they screamed; We felt no fever, found no pain, And casually we told them that they dreamed And settled them in sleep again.

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Summer 1950

194

So easy was it thus to exorcise The midnight fears the morning after. We sought to prove they could not literalize Jack, though the giant shook with laughter. We showed them pictures in a book and smiled At red-shawled wolves and chasing bruins Was not the race just an incarnate child That sat at wells and haunted ruins?

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We had outgrown the dreams, outrung the knells Through voodoo, amulet and prayer, But knew that daylight fastened on us spells More fearful than Medusa's hair. We saw the bat-companioned dead arise From shafts and pipes, and nose like beagles The spoors of outlaw quarry in the skies Whose speed and spread made fools of eagles.

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We shut our eyes and plugged our ears, though sound And sight were our front-line defences, The mind came with its folly to confound The crystal logic of the senses. Then turned we to the story-books again To see that Cyclopean stare. 'Twas out of focus for the beast was slain While we were on our knees in prayer. Who were those giants in their climbing strength? No reason bade us calibrate These flying lizards in their scaly length Or plumb a mesozoic hate. The leaves released a genie to unbind Our feet along a pilgrimage: The make-believe had furnished to the mind Asylum in the foliage.

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Draw down the blinds and lock the doors tonight: We would be safe from that which hovers Above the eaves. God send us no more light Than falls between our picture covers. For what the monsters of the long-ago Had done were nursery peccadilloes To what those solar hounds in tally-ho Could do when once they sniffed the pillows.

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Spring 1951

Cycles There was a time we knew our foes, Could recognize their features well, Name them before we bartered blows; So in our challenges could tell What the damned quarrel was about, As with our fists we slugged it out. When distance intervened, the call Of trumpets sped the spear and arrow; From stone and sling to musket ball The path was blasted to the marrow; But still we kept our foes in sight, Dusk waiting for the morning light. We need no more that light of day, No need of faces to be seen; The squadrons in the skies we slay Through moving shadows on a screen: By nailing echoes under sea We kill with like geometry.

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Now since the Lord of Love is late In being summoned to the ring To keep in bounds the range of hate, The Lord of Hosts to whom we sing As Marshal of both man and brute May be invoked as substitute. Whether from heaven or from hell, May he return as referee, And, keen-eared to an honest bell, Splitting the foul from fair, feel free To send us forth into the lists, Armed only with our naked fists. And then before our voice is dumb, Before our blood-shot eyes go blind, The Lord of Love and Life may come To lead our ebbing veins to find Enough for their recovery Of plasma from Gethsemane. The Deed Where are the roadside minstrels gone who strung Their fiddles to the stirrup cavalcades? What happened to the roses oversung By orchard lovers in their serenades? A feudal dust that draggle-tailed the plumes Blinded the minstrels chasing cavaliers: Moonlight that sucked the colour from the blooms Had soaked the lyrists and the sonneteers.

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Fall 1951

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Where is the beauty still inspired by rhyme, Competing with those garden miracles, When the first ray conspires with wind to chime The matins of the Canterbury bells?

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Not in the fruit or flower nor in the whir Of linnet's wings or plaint of nightingales, Nor in the moonstruck latticed face of her Who cracked the tenor sliding up his scales. We saw that beauty once - an instant run Along a ledge of rock, a curve, a dive; Nor did he count the odds of ten to one Against his bringing up that boy alive.

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This was an arch beyond the salmon's lunge, There was a rainbow in the rising mists: Sea-lapidaries started at the plunge To cut the facets of their amethysts. But this we scarcely noticed, since the deed Had power to cleanse a grapnel's rust, transfigure The blueness of the lips, unmat the weed And sanctify the unambiguous rigour. For that embrace had trapped the evening's light, Racing to glean the red foam's harvestings: Even the seagulls vanished from our sight, Though settling with their pentecostal wings. Magic in Everything How freely came belief when we were young! Unruffled by an argument, the tongue Had left the mind a garden where the seeds Sprouted and grew and blossomed without weeds.

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Summer 1952

198

From parents who were wise and old We simply took what we were told. That Santa with his reindeer should arrive From his far northern drive, Seek out our very house and come Down through the chimney and deposit Around the hearth or in the bedroom closet His gifts that left us saucer-eyed and dumb But miracles had happened on this earth And we had thrived on wonders from our birth. And here was one, for we regarded him, His ruddy-apple cheeks and snowy beard, With the same sanctity that we revered The chubby pictures of the cherubim. 'Twas true that those who matched their faith with wit, And wanted legends proved, Looked at the fire-place and measured it. To ease the downward journey they removed The ashes and the logs, Cleared out the soot and shoved away the 'dogs/ 'Santa must come down clean' - that we could follow And clean must be the presents that he brought. We felt the reindeer story hard to swallow, Yet to our minds there was no need for proofs: Twelve months ago that night our ears had caught The 'hail!' of Santa and the thud of hoofs. A few years passed and we began Half furtively to question one another, And still more warily our dad and mother: And this is how our questions ran How did the old man stand that polar race, Enter a house that with no fire-place Had but a kitchen stove? This point was hard. Only the Lord could push a body through A passage narrow as the kitchen flue.

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Were windows open? Was the door unbarred? This sacrilege of doubt assailed The toughening spirit of our thought. Those letters we had written, sealed and mailed A week or month before - what post had brought Them to the north? Was it the right address? Had Santa seen them? Yes, He must; for there upon the tree or floor Were the crammed stockings, trains that ran On tracks, a Jack-in-the-box: outside the door A pair of snow-shoes and a catamaran Just what we asked. Yes, these were real, but why Did other things escape his eye Gifts we had pondered on for many a day? Was there a limit to his Christmas sleigh? And when our parents could not satisfy The older sceptics with a sane reply, They winked and smiled, grew restless or were bored, Or ended with one answer long prepared, An answer which we dared Not question - 'Back of Santa was the Lord/ The Lord! He knew all wherefores, all the whys. Was He not Lord of earth and skies? In some strange way He was related to the Christmas day. For early on that morn The steeple chimes were ringing And choirs were singing 'Unto us a child is born/ Under the charm of that celestial sound, Within the story of his life we found The riddles of our youth Were tongued from higher ground And solved by proclamation of an Act. A myth took refuge in a fact,

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A fairy tale into a truth. For painlessly the changes came Though Santa Claus was still allowed his name. We banished reindeer with our smiles, Their voyage through those northern miles. We closed the argument About the way the gifts were sent. No longer did we measure The chimney width for fear he might be burned Or ashes smother up the Christmas treasure. And so completely vanished all our doubt That we forgot to put the fire out. What mattered it when in due time we learned The givers were our parents who, as wise As Santa, offered to our dawning eyes That spruce tree with its gay surprise. Nor did we bother much to reconcile The ancient fable with a father's smile. And even if the youngest of us tried To get a smattering of sense Out of the Santa Claus 'pretence/ It wasn't long before his tears were dried By what he saw: the gifts were real as bread, Something to touch and taste and eat. No apples were more fresh and red, No candy was more sweet; The wooden horse was there to ride, And magic was in everything The Jacks popped with the spring, And there were shining runners on the slide. So, when we found ourselves bereft Of childhood fantasies we still had left The memories that years could not corrode Behind the celebration of the Day Were living hands that had bestowed

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The gifts, and love behind the hands, and then Something our reasons could not rub away The story of a Birth bequeathed to men. How could we question that under the spells Woven around us by the Christmas bells?

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December 1952

Towards the Last Spike It was the same world then as now - the same, Except for little differences of speed And power, and means to treat myopia To show an axe-blade infinitely sharp Splitting things infinitely small, or else Provide the telescopic sight to roam Through curved dominions never found in fables. The same, but for new particles of speech Those algebraic substitutes for nouns That sky cartographers would hang like signboards Along the trespass of our thoughts to stop The stutters of our tongues with their equations. As now, so then, blood kept its ancient colour, And smoothly, roughly, paced its banks; in calm Preserving them, in riot rupturing them. Wounds needed bandages and stomachs food: The hands outstretched had joined the lips in prayer 'Give us our daily bread, give us our pay/ The past flushed in the present and tomorrow Would dawn upon today: only the rate To sensitize or numb a nerve would change; Only the quickening of a measuring skill To gauge the onset of a birth or death With the precision of micrometers. Men spoke of acres then and miles and masses, Velocity and steam, cables that moored

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Not ships but continents, world granaries, The east-west cousinship, a nation's rise, Hail of identity, a world expanding, If not the universe: the feel of it Was in the air - 'Union required the Line/ The theme was current at the banquet tables, And arguments profane and sacred rent God-fearing families into partisans. Pulpit, platform and floor were sounding-boards; Cushions beneath the pounding fists assumed The hues of western sunsets; nostrils sniffed The prairie tang; the tongue rolled over texts: Even St Paul was being invoked to wring The neck of Thomas in this war of faith With unbelief. Was ever an adventure Without its cost? Analogies were found On every page of history or science. A nation, like the world, could not stand still. What was the use of records but to break them? The tougher armour followed the new shell; The newer shell the armour; lighthouse rockets Sprinkled their stars over the wake of wrecks. Were not the engineers at work to close The lag between the pressures and the valves? The same world then as now thirsting for power To crack those records open, extra pounds Upon the inches, extra miles per hour. The mildewed static schedules which before Had like asbestos been immune to wood Now curled and blackened in the furnace coal. This power lay in the custody of men From down-and-outers needing roofs, whose hands Were moulded by their fists, whose skins could feel At home incorporate with dolomite, To men who with the marshal instincts in them, Deriving their authority from wallets, Directed their battalions from the trestles.

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203 THE GATHERING

('Oats - a grain which in England is generally given to horses, but in Scotland supports the people/ -Dr Samuel Johnson. True, but where will you find such horses, where such men?' -Lord Elibank's reply as recorded by Sir Walter Scott.) Oatmeal was in their blood and in their names. Thrift was the title of their catechism. It governed all things but their mess of porridge Which, when it struck the hydrochloric acid With treacle and skim-milk, became a mash. Entering the duodenum, it broke up Into amino acids: then the liver Took on its natural job as carpenter: Foreheads grew into cliffs, jaws into juts. The meal, so changed, engaged the follicles: Eyebrows came out as gorse, the beards as thistles, And the chest-hair the fell of Grampian rams. It stretched and vulcanized the human span: Nonagenarians worked and thrived upon it. Out of such chemistry run through by genes, The food released its fearsome racial products: The power to strike a bargain like a foe, To win an argument upon a burr, Invest the language with a Bannockburn, Culloden or the warnings of Lochiel, Weave loyalties and rivalries in tartans, Present for the amazement of the world Kilts and the civilized barbaric Fling, And pipes which, when they acted on the mash, Fermented lullabies to Scots who. hue. Their names were like a battle muster - Angus (He of the Shops) and Fleming (of the Transit), Hector (of the Kicking Horse), Dawson, 'Cromarty' Ross, and Beatty (Ulster Scot),

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Bruce, Allan, Gait and Douglas, and the 'twa' Stephen (Craigellachie) and Smith (Strathcona) Who would one day climb from their Gaelic hide-outs, Take off their plaids and wrap them round the mountains. And then the everlasting tread of the Macs, Vanguard, centre and rear, their roving eyes On summits, rivers, contracts, beaver, ledgers; Their ears cocked to the skirl of Sir John A., The general of the patronymic march.

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(Sir John revolving round the Terms of Union with British Columbia. Time, late at night.)

Insomnia had ripped the bed-sheets from him Night after night. How long was this to last? Confederation had not played this kind Of trickery on him. That was rough indeed, So gravelled, that a man might call for rest And take it for a life accomplishment. It was his laurel though some of the leaves Had dried. But this would be a longer tug Of war which needed for his team thick wrists And calloused fingers, heavy heels to dig Into the earth and hold - men with bull's beef Upon their ribs. Had he himself the wind, The anchor-waist to peg at the rope's end? Twas bad enough to have these questions hit The waking mind: 'twas much worse when he dozed; For goblins had a way of pinching him, Slapping a nightmare on to dwindling snoozes. They put him and his team into a tug More real than life. He heard a judge call out Teams settle on the ropes and take the strain!' And with the coaches' heave, the running welts Reddened his palms, and then the gruelling backlock Inscribed its indentations on his shoulders.

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This kind of burn he knew he had to stand; It was the game's routine; the other fire Was what he feared the most for it could bake him That white dividing rag tied to the rope Above the centre pole had with each heave Wavered with chances equal. With the backlock, Despite the legs of Tupper and Cartier, The western anchor dragged; the other side Remorselessly was gaining, holding, gaining. No sleep could stand this strain and, with the nightmare Delivered of its colt, Macdonald woke. Tired with the midnight toss, lock-jawed with yawns, He left the bed and, shuffling to the window, He opened it. The air would cool him off And soothe his shoulder burns. He felt his ribs: Strange, nothing broken - how those crazy drowses Had made the fictions tangle with the facts! He must unscramble them with steady hands. Those Ranges pirouetting in his dreams Had their own knack of standing still in light, Revealing peaks whose known triangulation Had to be read in prose severity. Seizing a telescope, he swept the skies, The north-south drift, a self-illumined chart. Under Polaris was the Arctic Sea And the sub-Arctic gates well stocked with names: Hudson, Davis, Baffin, Frobisher; And in his own day Franklin, Ross and Parry Of the Canadian Archipelago; Kellett, McClure, McClintock, of The Search. Those straits and bays had long been kicked by keels, And flags had fluttered on the Capes that fired His youth, making familiar the unknown. What though the odds were nine to one against, And the Dead March was undertoning trumpets,

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There was enough of strychnine in the names To make him flip a penny for the risk, Though he had palmed the coin reflectively Before he threw and watched it come down heads. That stellar path looked too much like a road map Upon his wall - the roads all led to market The north-south route. He lit a candle, held It to a second map full of blank spaces And arrows pointing west. Disturbed, he turned The lens up to the zenith, followed the course Tracked by a cloud of stars that would not keep Their posts - Capella, Perseus, were reeling; Low in the north-west, Cassiopeia Was qualmish, leaning on her starboard arm-rest, And Aries was chasing, butting Cygnus, Just diving. Doubts and hopes struck at each other. Why did those constellations look so much Like blizzards? And what lay beyond the blizzards? Twas chilly at the window. He returned To bed and savoured soporific terms: Superior, the Red River, Selkirk, Prairie, Port Moody and Pacific. Chewing them, He spat out Rocky grit before he swallowed. Selkirkl This had the sweetest taste. Ten years Before, the Highland crofters had subscribed Their names in a memorial for the Rails. Sir John reviewed the story of the struggle, That four months' journey from their native land The Atlantic through the Straits to Hudson Bay, Then the Hayes River to Lake Winnipeg Up to the Forks of the Assiniboine. He could make use of that - just what he needed, A Western version of the Arctic daring, Romance and realism, double dose. How long ago? Why, this is '71.

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Those fellows came the time Napoleon Was on the steppes. For sixty years they fought The seasons, 'hoppers, drought, hail, wind and snow; Survived the massacre at Seven Oaks, The Temmican War' and the Red River floods. They wanted now the Road - those pioneers Who lived by spades instead of beaver traps. Most excellent word that, pioneers! Sir John Snuggled himself into his sheets, rolling The word around his tongue, a theme for song, Or for a peroration to a speech.

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THE HANGOVER AT DAWN

He knew the points that had their own appeal. These did not bother him: the patriot touch, The Flag, the magnetism of explorers, The national unity. These could burn up The phlegm in most of the provincial throats. But there was one tale central to his plan (The focus of his headache at this moment), Which would demand the limit of his art The ballad of his courtship in the West: Better reveal it soon without reserve.

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THE LADY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA

Port Moody and Pacific! He had pledged His word the Line should run from sea to sea. 'From sea to sea/ a hallowed phrase. Music Was in that text if the right key were struck, And he must strike it first, for, as he fingered The clauses of the pledge, rough notes were rasping 'No Road, No Union/ and the converse true. East-west against the north-south run of trade, For California like a sailor-lover

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Was wooing over-time. He knew the ports. His speech was as persuasive as his arms, As sinuous as Spanish arias Tamales, Cazadero, Mendecino, Curling their baritones around the Lady. Then Santa Rosa, Santa Monica, Held absolution in their syllables. But when he saw her stock of British temper Starch at ironic sainthood in the whispers 'Rio de nuestra senora de buena guia/ He had the tact to gutturalize the liquids, Steeping the tunes to drinking songs, then take Her on a holiday where she could watch A roving sea-born Californian pound A downy chest and swear by San Diego. Sir John, wise to the tricks, was studying hard A fresh proposal for a marriage contract. He knew a game was in the ceremony. That southern fellow had a healthy bronze Complexion, had a vast estate, was slick Of manner. In his ardour he could tether Sea-roses to the blossoms of his orchards, And for his confidence he had the prime Advantage of his rival - he was there.

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THE LONG-DISTANCE PROPOSAL

A game it was, and the Pacific lass Had poker wisdom on her face. Her name Was rich in values - British; this alone Could raise Macdonald's temperature: so could Columbia with a different kind of fever, And in between the two, Victoria. So the Pacificwith its wash of letters Could push the Fahrenheit another notch.

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She watched for bluff on those Disraeli features, Impassive but for arrowy chipmunk eyes, Engaged in fathoming a contract time. With such a dowry she could well afford To take the risk of tightening the terms 'Begin the Road in two years, end in ten' Sir John, a moment letting down his guard, Frowned at the Rocky skyline, but agreed.

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(The Terms ratified by Parliament, British Columbia enters Confederation July 1871, Sandford Fleming being appointed engineer-in-chief of the proposed Railway, Walter Moberly to co-operate with him in the location of routes. 'Of course, I don't know how many millions you have, but it is going to cost you money to get through those canyons.' - Moberly to Macdonald.) THE PACIFIC SCANDAL

(Huntingdon's charges of political corruption based on correspondence and telegrams rifled from the offices of the solicitor of Sir Hugh Allan, Head of the Canada Pacific Company; Sir John's defence; and the appearance of the Honourable Edward Blake who rises to reply to Sir John at 2 a.m.) BLAKE IN MOOD

Of all the subjects for debate here was His element. His soul as clean as surf, No one could equal him in probing cupboards Or sweeping floors and dusting shelves, finding A skeleton inside an overcoat; Or shaking golden eagles from a pocket To show the copper plugs within the coins. Rumours he heard had gangrened into facts Gifts nuzzling at two-hundred-thousand dollars, Elections on, and with a contract pending.

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The odour of the bills had blown his gorge. His appetite, edged by a moral hone, Could surfeit only on the Verities. November 3, 1^73

A Fury rode him to the House. He took His seat, and with a stoic gloom he heard The Chieftain's great defence and noted well The punctuation of the cheers. He needed all The balance of his mind to counterpoise The movements of Macdonald as he flung Himself upon the House, upon the Country, Upon posterity, upon his conscience. That plunging played the devil with Blake's tiller, Threatened the set of his sail. To save the course, To save himself, in that five hours of gale, He had to jettison his meditation, His brooding on the follies of mankind, Clean out the wadding from his tortured ears: That roaring mob before him could be quelled Only by action; so when the last round Of the applause following the peroration Was over, slowly, weightily, Blake rose. A statesman-chancellor now held the Floor. He told the sniffing Commons that a sense Keener than smell or taste must be invoked To get the odour. Leading them from facts Like telegrams and stolen private letters, He soared into the realm of principles To find his scourge; and then the men involved, Robed like the Knights of Malta, Blake undressed, Their cloaks inverted to reveal the shoddy, The tattered lining and bare-threaded seams. He ripped the last stitch from them - by the time

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Recess was called, he had them in the dock As brigands in the Ministry of Smells, Naked before the majesty of Heaven. For Blake recesses were but sandwiches Provided merely for cerebral luncheons No time to spread the legs under the table, To chat and chaff a while, to let the mind Roam, like a goblet up before the light To bask in natural colour, or by whim Of its own choice to sway luxuriously In tantalizing arcs before the nostrils. A meal was meant by Nature for nutrition A sorry farinaceous business scaled Exactly to caloric grains and grams Designed for intellectual combustion, For energy directed into words Towards proof. Abuse was overweight. He saw No need for it; no need for caricature, And if a villainous word had to be used, 'Twas for a villain - keen upon the target. Irrelevance was like a moral lesion No less within a speech than in a statute. What mattered it who opened up the files, Sold for a bid the damning correspondence That Montreal-Chicago understanding? A dirty dodge, so let it be conceded. But here the method was irrelevant. Whether by legal process or by theft, The evidence was there unalterable. So with the House assembled, he resumed Imperial indictment of the bandits. The logic left no loopholes in the facts. Figures that ran into the hundred-thousands Were counted up in pennies, each one shown To bear the superscription of debasement.

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Again recess, again the sandwiches, Again the invocation of the gods: Each word, each phrase, each clause went to position, Each sentence regimented like a lockstep. The only thing that would not pace was time; The hours dragged by until the thrushes woke Two days, two nights - someone opened a window, And members of the House who still were conscious Uncreaked their necks to note that even Sir John Himself had put his fingers to his nose.

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(The appeal to the country: Macdonald defeated: Mackenzie assumes power, 1874.) A change of air, a drop in temperature! The House had rarely known sobriety Like this. No longer clanged the 'Westward Ho!' And quiet were the horns upon the hills. Hard times ahead. The years were rendering up Their fat. Measured and rationed was the language Directed to the stringency of pockets. The eye must be convinced before the vision. 'But one step at a time/ exclaimed the feet. It was the story of the hen or egg; Which came before the other? "Twas the hen/ Cried one; 'undoubtedly the hen must lay The egg, hatch it and mother it.' 'No so/ Another shouted, ' 'Twas the egg or whence The hen?' For every one who cleared his throat And called across the House with Scriptural passion 'The Line is meant to bring the loaves and fishes/ A voting three had countered with the question 'Where are the multitudes that thirst and hunger?' Passion became displaced by argument. Till now the axles justified their grease, Taught coal a lesson in economy. All doubts here could be blanketed with facts, With phrases smooth as actuarial velvet.

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For forty years in towns and cities men Had watched the Lines baptized with charters, seen Them grow, marry and bring forth children. Parades and powder had their uses then For gala days; and bands announced arrivals, Betrothals, weddings and again arrivals. Champagne brimmed in the font as they were named With titles drawn from explorers' routes, From Saints and Governors, from space and seas And compass-points - Saints Andrew, Lawrence, Thomas, Louis and John; Champlain, Simcoe; Grand Trunk, Intercolonial, the Canadian Southern, Dominion-Atlantic, the Great Western - names That caught a continental note and tried To answer it. Half-gambles though they were, Directors built those Roads and heard them run To the sweet silver jingle in their minds. The airs had long been mastered like old songs The feet could tap to in the galleries. But would they tap to a new rhapsody, A harder one to learn and left unfinished? What ear could be assured of absolute pitch To catch this kind of music in the West? The far West? Men had used this flattering name For East or but encroachment on the West. And was not Lake Superior still the East, A natural highway which ice-ages left, An unappropriated legacy? There was no discord in the piston-throbs Along this Road. This was old music too. That northern spine of rock, those western mountains, Were barriers built of God and cursed of Blake. Mild in his oaths, Mackenzie would avoid them. He would let contracts for the south and west, Push out from settlement to settlement. This was economy, just plain horse-sense.

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214 The Western Lines were there - American. He would link up with them, could reach the Coast. The Eagle and the Lion were good friends: At least the two could meet on sovereign terms Without a sign of fur and feathers flying. As yet, but who could tell? So far, so good. Spikes had been driven at the boundary line, From Emerson across the Red to Selkirk, And then to Thunder Bay - to Lake Superior; Across the prairies in God's own good time, His plodding, patient, planetary time. Five years' delay: surveys without construction; Short lines suspended, discord in the Party. The West defrauded of its glittering peaks, The public blood was stirring and protesting At this continuous dusk upon the mountains. The old conductor off the podium, The orchestra disbanded at the time The daring symphony was on the score, The audience cupped their ears to catch a strain: They heard a plaintive thinning oboe-A That kept on thinning while slow feeble steps Approached the stand. Was this the substitute For what the auditorium once knew The maestro who with tread of stallion hoofs Came forward shaking platforms and the rafters, And followed up the concert pitch with sound Of drums and trumpets and the organ blasts That had the power to toll out apathy And make snow peaks ring like Cathedral steeples? Besides, accompanying those bars of music, There was an image men had not forgotten, The shaggy chieftain standing at his desk, That last-ditch fight when he was overthrown, That desperate five hours. At least they knew

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His personal pockets were not lined with pelf, Whatever loot the others grabbed. The words British, the West instead of South, the Nation, The all-Canadian route -these terms were singing Fresher than ever while the grating tones Under the stress of argument had faded Within the shroud of their monotony.

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(Sir John returns to power in 1878 with a National Policy of Protective Tariff and the Transcontinental.) Two years of tuning up: it needed that To counterpoint Blake's eloquence or lift Mackenzie's non-adventurous common sense To the ignition of an enterprise. The pace had to be slow at first, a tempo Cautious, simple to follow. Sections strewn Like amputated limbs along the route Were sutured. This appealed to sanity. No argument could work itself to sweat Against a prudent case, for the terrain Looked easy from the Lake to the Red River. To stop with those suspensions was a waste Of cash and time. But the huge task announced Ten years before had now to start afresh The moulding of men's minds was harder far Than moulding of the steel and prior to it. It was the battle of ideas and words And kindred images called by the same name, Like brothers who with temperamental blood Went to it with their fists. Canyons and cliffs Were precipices down which men were hurled, Or something to be bridged and sheared and scaled. Likewise the Pass had its ambiguous meaning. The leaders of the factions in the House And through the country spelled the word the same:

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The way they got their tongue around the word Was different, for some could make it hiss With sound of blizzards screaming over ramparts: The Pass - the Yellowhead, the Kicking Horse Or jam it with coureur-de-bois romance, Or join it to the empyrean. Eagles, In flight banking their wings above a fish-stream, Had guided the explorers to a route And given the Pass the title of their wings. The stories lured men's minds up to the mountains And down along the sandbars of the rivers. Rivalling the 'brown and barren' on the maps, Officially 'not fit for human life,' Were vivid yellows flashing in the news 'Gold in the Cariboo,' 'Gold in the Fraser.' The swish of gravel in the placer-cradles Would soon be followed by the spluttering fuses, By thunder echoing thunder; for one month After Blake's Ottawa roar would Onderdonk Roar back from Yale by ripping canyon walls To crash the tons by millions in the gorges. The farther off, as by a paradox Of magnets, was the golden lure the stronger: Two thousand miles away, imagined peaks Had the vacation pull of mountaineering, But with the closer vision would the legs Follow the mind? Twas Blake who raised the question And answered it. Though with his natural eyes Up to this time he had not sighted mountains, He was an expert with the telescope.

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THE ATTACK

Sir John was worried. The first hour of Blake Was dangerous, granted the theme. Eight years

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Before, he had the theme combined with language. Impeachment - word with an historic ring, Reserved for the High Courts of Parliament, Uttered only when men were breathing hard And when the vertebrae were musket-stiff: High ground was that for his artillery, And there, despite the hours the salvos lasted. But here this was a theme less vulnerable To fire, Macdonald thought, to Blake's gunfire, And yet he wondered what the orator Might spring in that first hour, what strategy Was on the Bench. He did not mind the close Mosaic of the words - too intricate, Too massive in design. Men might admire The speech and talk about it, then forget it. But few possessed the patience or the mind To tread the mazes of the labyrinth. Once in a while, however, would Blake's logic Stumble upon stray figures that would leap Over the walls of other folds and catch The herdsmen in their growing somnolence. The waking sound was not - 'It can't be done'; That was a dogma, anyone might say it. It was the following burning corollary: To build a Road over that sea of mountains.' This carried more than argument. It was A flash of fire which might with proper kindling Consume its way into the public mind. The House clicked to the ready and Sir John, Burying his finger-nails into his palms, Muttered - 'God send us no more metaphors Like that - except from Tory factories.'

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Had Blake the lift of Chatham as he had Burke's wind and almost that sierra span Of mind, he might have carried the whole House With him and posted it upon that sea Of mountains with sub-zeros on their scalps, Their glacial ribs waiting for warmth of season To spring an avalanche. Such similes Might easily glue the members to their seats With frost in preparation for their ride. Sir John's 'from sea to sea' was Biblical; It had the stamp of reverent approval; But Blake's was pagan, frightening, congealing. The chieftain's lips continued as in prayer, A fiercely secular and torrid prayer 'May Heaven intervene to stop the flow Of such unnatural images and send The rhetorician back to decimals, Back to his tessellated subtleties.' The prayer was answered for High Heaven did it. The second hour entered and passed by, A third, a fourth. Sir John looked round the House, Noticed the growing shuffle of the feet, The agony of legs, the yawn's contagion. Was that a snore? Who was it that went out? He glanced at the Press Gallery. The pens Were scratching through the langour of the ink To match the words with shorthand and were failing. He hoped the speech would last another hour, And still another. Well within the law, This homicidal master of the opiates Loosened the hinges of the Opposition: The minds went first; the bodies sagged; the necks Curved on the benches and the legs sprawled out. And when the Fundy Tide had ebbed, Sir John, Smiling, watched the debris upon the banks, For what were yesterday grey human brains

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Had with decomposition taken on The texture and complexion of red clay.

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(In 1880 Tupper lets contract to Onderdonkfor survey and construction through the Pacific Section of the mountains. Sir ]ohn, Tupper, Pope, and Mclntyre go to London to interest capital but return without a penny.)

Failing to make a dent in London dams, Sir John set out to plumb a reservoir Closer in reach. He knew its area, Its ownership, the thickness of its banks, Its conduits - if he could get his hands Upon the local stopcocks, could he turn them? The reservoir was deep. Two centuries Ago it started filling when a king Had in a furry moment scratched a quill Across the bottom of His Royal Charter 'Granting the Governor and His Company Of Gentlemen Adventurers the right Exclusive to one-third a continent/ Was it so easy then? A scratch, a seal, A pinch of snuff tickling the sacred nostrils, A puff of powder and the ink was dry. Sir John twisted his lips: he thought of London. Empire and wealth were in that signature For royal, princely, ducal absentees, For courtiers to whom the parallels Were nothing but chalk scratches on a slate. For them wild animals were held in game Preserves, foxes as quarry in a chase, And hills were hedges, river banks were fences, And cataracts but fountains in a garden Tumbling their bubbles into marble basins. Where was this place called Hudson Bay? Some place In the Antipodes? Explorers, traders,

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Would bring their revenues over that signet. Two centuries - the new empire advanced, Was broken, reunited, torn again. The fleur-de-lis went to half-mast, the Jack To the mast-head, but fresher rivalries Broke out - Nor'-Westers at the Hudson's throat Over the pelts, over the pemmican; No matter what - the dividends flowed in As rum flowed out like the Saskatchewan. The twist left Sir John's lips and he was smiling. Though English in ambition and design, This reservoir, he saw there in control Upon the floodgates not a Londoner In riding breeches but, red-flannel-shirted, Trousered in homespun, streaked and blobbed with seal-oil, A Scot with smoke of peat fire on his breath Smith? Yes: but christened Donald Alexander And loined through issue from the Grants and Stuarts. To smite the rock and bring forth living water, Take lead or tin and transmute both to silver, Copper to gold, betray a piece of glass To diamonds, fabulize a continent, Were wonders once believed, scrapped and revived; For Moses, Marco Polo, Paracelsus, Fell in the same retort and came out Smith. A miracle on legs, the lad had left Forres and Aberdeen, gone to Lachine Tell Mr Smith to count and sort the rat-skins.' Thence Tadoussac and Posts off Anticosti; From there to Rigolet in Labrador, A thousand miles by foot, snowshoe and dog-sled. He fought the climate like a weathered yak, And conquered it, ripping the stalactites From his red beard, thawing his feet, and wringing

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Salt water from his mitts; but most of all He learned the art of making change. Blankets, Ribbons and beads, tobacco, guns and knives, Were swapped for muskrat, marten, fox and beaver. And when the fur trade thinned, he trapped the salmon, Canned it; hunted the seal, traded its oil And fertilized the gardens with the carcass. Even the melons grew in Labrador. What could resist this touch? Water from rock! Why not? No more a myth than pelts should be Thus fabricated into bricks of gold.

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If rat-skins, why not tweeds? If looms could take Raw wool and twill it into selling shape, They could under the draper's weaving mind Be patterning gold braid: So thought George Stephen. His legs less sturdy than his cousin Donald's, His eyes were just as furiously alert. His line of vision ran from the north-west To the Dutch-held St Paul-Pacific Railway. Allied with Smith, Kitson and Kennedy, Angus, Jim Hill and Duncan Mclntyre, Could he buy up this semi-bankrupt Road And turn the northern traffic into it? Chief bricklayer of all the Scotian clans, And foremost as a banking metallurgist, He took the parchments at their lowest level And mineralized them, roasted them to shape, Then mortared them into the pyramid, Till with the trowel-stretching exercise He grew so Atlas-strong that he could carry A mountain like a namesake on his shoulders.

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(The Charter granted to The Canadian Pacific Railway, February 17, 1881, with George Stephen as first President... One William Cornelius Van Home arrives in Winnipeg, December 31,1881, and there late at night, forty below zero, gives vent to a soliloquy.) Stephen had laid his raw hands on Van Home, Pulled him across the border, sent him up To get the feel of northern temperatures. He knew through Hill the story of his life And found him made to order. Nothing less Than geologic space his field of work, He had in Illinois explored the creeks And valleys, brooded on the rocks and quarries. Using slate fragments, he became a draughtsman, Bringing to life a landscape or a cloud, Turning a tree into a beard, a cliff Into a jaw, a creek into a mouth With banks for lips. He loved to work on shadows. Just now the man was forcing the boy's stature, The while the youth tickled the man within. Companioned by the shade of Agassiz, He would come home, his pockets stuffed with fossils Crinoids andfish-teeth- and his tongue jabbering Of the earth's crust before the birth of life, Prophetic of the days when he would dig Into Laurentian rock. The morse-key tick And tape were things mesmeric - space and time Had found a junction. Electricity And rock, one novel to the coiling hand, The other frozen in the lap of age, Were playthings for the boy, work for the man. As man he was the State's first operator; As boy he played a trick upon his boss Who, cramped with current, fired him on the instant; As man at school, escaping Latin grammar, He tore the fly-leaf from the text to draw

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The contour of a hill; as boy he sketched The principal, gave him flapdoodle ears, Bristled his hair, turned eyebrows into quills, His whiskers into flying buttresses, His eye-tusks into rusted railroad spikes, And made a truss between his nose and chin. Expelled again, he went back to the keys, To bush and rock and found companionship With quarry-men, stokers and station-masters, Switchmen and locomotive engineers. Now he was transferred to Winnipeg. Of all the places in an unknown land Chosen by Stephen for Van Home, this was The pivot on which he could turn his mind. Here he could clap the future on the shoulder And order Fate about as his lieutenant, For he would take no nonsense from a thing Called Destiny - the stars had to be with him. He spent the first night in soliloquy, Like Sir John A. but with a difference. Sir John wanted to sleep but couldn't do it: Van Home could sleep but never wanted to. It was a waste of time, his bed a place Only to think or dream with eyes awake. Opening a jack-knife, he went to the window, Scraped off the frost. Great treks ran through his mind, East-west. Two centuries and a half gone by, One trek had started from the Zuyder Zee To the new Amsterdam. 'Twas smooth by now, Too smooth. His line of grandsires and their cousins Had built a city from Manhattan dirt. Another trek to Illinois; it too Was smooth, but this new one it was his job To lead, then build a highway which men claimed Could not be built. Statesmen and engineers

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Had blown their faces blue with their denials: The men who thought so were asylum cases Whose monomanias harmless up to now Had not swept into cells. His bearded chin Pressed to the pane, his eyes roved through the west. He saw the illusion at its worst - the frost, The steel precision of the studded heavens, Relentless mirror of a covered earth. His breath froze on the scrape: he cut again And glanced at the direction west-by-south. That westward trek was the American, Union-Pacific - easy so he thought, Their forty million stacked against his four. Lonely and desolate this. He stocked his mind With items of his task: the simplest first, Though hard enough, the Prairies, then the Shore North of the Lake - a quantity half-guessed. Mackenzie like a balky horse had shied And stopped at this. Van Home knew well the reason, But it was vital for the all-land route. He peered through at the South. Down there Jim Hill Was whipping up his horses on a road Already paved. The stations offered rest With food and warmth, and their well-rounded names Were tossed like apples to the public taste. He made a mental note of his three items. He underlined the Prairies, double-lined The Shore and triple-lined Beyond the Prairies, Began counting the ranges - first the Rockies; The Kicking Horse ran through them, this he knew; The Selkirks? Not so sure. Some years before Had Moberly and Perry tagged a route Across the lariat loop of the Columbia. Now Rogers was traversing it on foot, Reading an aneroid and compass, chewing

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Sea-biscuit and tobacco. Would the steel Follow this trail? Van Home looked farther west. There was the Gold Range, there the Coastal Mountains. He stopped, putting a period to the note, As rivers troubled nocturnes in his ears. His plans must not seep into introspection Call it a night, for morning was at hand, And every hour of daylight was for work.

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(Van Home goes to Montreal to meet the Directors.)

He had agenda staggering enough To bring the sweat even from Stephen's face. As daring as his plans, so daring were His promises. To build five hundred miles Upon the prairies in one season: this Was but a cushion for the jars ahead. The Shore - he had to argue, stamp and fight For this. The watercourses had been favoured, The nation schooled to that economy. He saw that Stephen, after wiping beads From face and forehead, had put both his hands Deep in his pockets - just a habit merely Of fingering change - but still Van Home went on To clinch his case: the north shore could avoid The over-border route - a national point If ever there was one. He promised this As soon as he was through with buffalo-grass. And then the little matter of the Rockies: This must be swallowed without argument, As obvious as space, clear as a charter. But why the change in Fleming's survey? Why The Kicking Horse and not the Yellowhead? The national point again. The Kicking Horse Was shorter, closer to the boundary line; No rival road would build between the two.

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He did not dwell upon the other Passes. He promised all with surety of schedule, And with a self-imposed serenity That dried the sweat upon the Board Room faces.

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NUMBER ONE

Oak Lake to Calgary. Van Home took off His coat. The North must wait, for that would mean His shirt as well. First and immediate This prairie pledge - five hundred miles, and it Was winter. Failure of this trial promise Would mean - no, it must not be there for meaning. An order from him carried no repeal: It was as final as an execution. A cable started rolling mills in Europe: A tap of Morse sent hundreds to the bush, Where axes swung on spruce and the saws sang, Changing the timber into pyramids Of poles and sleepers. Clicks, despatches, words, Like lanterns in a night conductor's hands, Signalled the wheels: a nod put Shaughnessy In Montreal: supplies moved on the minute. Thousands of men and mules and horses slipped Into their togs and harness night and day. The grass that fed the buffalo was turned over, The black alluvial mould laid bare, the bed Levelled and scraped. As individuals The men lost their identity; as groups, As gangs, they massed, divided, subdivided, Like numerals only - sub-contractors, gangs Of engineers, and shovel gangs for bridges, Culverts, gangs of mechanics stringing wires, Loading, unloading and reloading gangs, Gangs for the fish-plates and the spiking gangs, Putting a silver polish on the nails.

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But neither men nor horses ganged like mules: Wiser than both they learned to unionize. Some instinct in their racial nether regions Had taught them how to sniff the five-hour stretch Down to the fine arithmetic of seconds. They tired out their rivals and they knew it. They'd stand for overwork, not overtime. Faster than workmen could fling down their shovels, They could unhinge their joints, unhitch their tendons; Jumping the foreman's call, they brayed 'Unhook' With a defiant, corporate instancy. The promise which looked first without redemption Was being redeemed. From three to seven miles A day the parallels were being laid, Though Eastern throats were hoarse with the old question Where are the settlements? And whence the gift Of tongues which could pronounce place-names that purred Like cats in relaxation after kittens? Was it part of the same pledge to turn A shack into a bank for notes renewed; To call a site a city when men saw Only a water-tank? This was an act Of faith indeed - substance of things unseen Which would convert preachers to miracles, Lure teachers into lean-to's for their classes. And yet it happened that while labourers Were swearing at their blisters in the evening And straightening out their spinal kinks at dawn, The tracks joined up Oak Lake to Calgary.

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NUMBER TWO

On the North Shore a reptile lay asleep A hybrid that the myths might have conceived, But not delivered, as progenitor Of crawling, gliding things upon the earth.

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She lay snug in the folds of a huge boa Whose tail had covered Labrador and swished Atlantic tides, whose body coiled itself Around the Hudson Bay, then curled up north Through Manitoba and Saskatchewan To Great Slave Lake. In continental reach The neck went past the Great Bear Lake until Its head was hidden in the Arctic Seas. This folded reptile was asleep or dead: So motionless, she seemed stone dead - just seemed: She was too old for death, too old for life, For as if jealous of all living forms She had lain there before bivalves began To catacomb their shells on western mountains. Somewhere within this life-death zone she sprawled, Torpid upon a rock-and-mineral mattress. Ice-ages had passed by and over her, But these, for all their motion, had but sheared Her spotty carboniferous hair or made Her ridges stand out like the spikes of molochs. Her back grown stronger every million years, She had shed water by the longer rivers To Hudson Bay and by the shorter streams To the great basins to the south, had filled Them up, would keep them filled until the end Of Time. Was this the thing Van Home set out To conquer? When Superior lay there With its inviting levels? Blake, Mackenzie, Offered this water like a postulate. 'Why those twelve thousand men sent to the North? Nonsense and waste with utter bankruptcy.' And the Laurentian monster at the first Was undisturbed, presenting but her bulk To the invasion. All she had to do

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Was lie there neither yielding nor resisting. Top-heavy with accumulated power And overgrown survival without function, She changed her spots as though brute rudiments Of feeling foreign to her native hour Surprised her with a sense of violation From an existence other than her own Or why take notice of this unknown breed, This horde of bipeds that could toil like ants, Could wake her up and keep her irritated? They tickled her with shovels, dug pickaxes Into her scales and got under her skin, And potted holes in her with drills and filled Them up with what looked like fine grains of sand, Black sand. It wasn't noise that bothered her, For thunder she was used to from her cradle The head-push and nose-blowing of the ice, The height and pressure of its body: these Like winds native to clime and habitat Had served only to lull her drowsing coils. It was not size or numbers that concerned her. It was their foreign build, their gait of movement. They did not crawl - nor were they born with wings. They stood upright and walked, shouted and sang; They needed air - that much was true - their mouths Were open but the tongue was alien. The sounds were not the voice of winds and waters, Nor that of any beasts upon the earth. She took them first with lethargy, suffered The rubbing of her back - those little jabs Of steel were like the burrowing of ticks In an elk's hide needing an antler point, Or else left in a numb monotony. These she could stand but when the breed Advanced west on her higher vertebrae, Kicking most insolently at her ribs,

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Pouring black powder in her cavities, And making not the clouds but her insides The home of fire and thunder, then she gave Them trial of her strength: the trestles tottered; Abutments, bridges broke; her rivers flooded: She summoned snow and ice, and then fell back On the last weapon in her armoury The first and last - her passive corporal bulk, To stay or wreck the schedule of Van Home.

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NUMBER THREE

The big one was the mountains - seas indeed! With crests whiter than foam: they poured like seas, Fluting the green banks of the pines and spruces. An eagle-flight above they hid themselves In clouds. They carried space upon their ledges. Could these be overridden frontally, Or like typhoons outsmarted on the flanks? And what were on the flanks? The troughs and canyons, Passes more dangerous to the navigator Than to Magellan when he tried to read The barbarous language of his Strait by calling For echoes from the rocky hieroglyphs Playing their pranks of hide-and-seek in fog: As stubborn too as the old North-West Passage, More difficult, for ice-packs could break up; And as for bergs, what polar architect Could stretch his compass points to draught such peaks As kept on rising there beyond the foothills? And should the bastions of the Rockies yield To this new human and unnatural foe, Would not the Selkirks stand? This was a range That looked like some strange dread outside a door Which gave its name but would not show its features, Leaving them to the mind to guess at. This

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Meant tunnels - would there be no end to boring? There must be some day. Fleming and his men Had nosed their paths like hounds; but paths and trails, Measured in every inch by chain and transit, Looked easy and seductive on a chart. The rivers out there did not flow: they tumbled. The cataracts were fed by glaciers; Eddies were thought as whirlpools in the Gorges, And gradients had paws that tore up tracks. Terror and beauty like twin signal flags Flew on the peaks for men to keep their distance. The two combined as in a storm at sea 'Stay on the shore and take your fill of breathing, But come not to the decks and climb the rigging/ The Ranges could put. cramps in hands and feet Merely by the suggestion of the venture. They needed miles to render up their beauty, As if the gods in high aesthetic moments, Resenting the profanity of touch, Chiselled this sculpture for the eye alone.

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(Van Home in momentary meditation at the Foothills.)

His name was now a legend. The North Shore, Though not yet conquered, yet had proved that he Could straighten crooked roads by pulling at them, Shear down a hill and drain a bog or fill A valley overnight. Fast as a bobcat, He'd climb and run across the shakiest trestle Or, with a locomotive short of coal, He could supply the head of steam himself. He breakfasted on bridges, lunched on ties; Drinking from gallon pails, he dined on moose. He could tire out the lumberjacks; beat hell From workers but no more than from himself.

1OOO

232 Only the devil or Paul Bunyan shared With him the secret of perpetual motion, And when he moved among his men they looked For shoulder sprouts upon the Flying Dutchman. But would his legend crack upon the mountains? There must be no retreat: his bugles knew Only one call - the summons to advance Against two fortresses: the mind, the rock. To prove the first defence was vulnerable, To tap the treasury at home and then Untie the purse-strings of the Londoners, As hard to loosen as salt-water knots That job was Stephen's, Smith's, Tupper's, Macdonald's. He knew its weight: had heard, as well as they, Blake pumping at his pulmonary bellows, And if the speeches made the House shock-proof Before they ended, they could still peal forth From print more durable than spoken tones. Blake had returned to the attack and given Sir John the ague with another phrase As round and as melodious as the first: The Country's wealth, its millions after millions Squandered - LOST IN THE GORGES OF THE PHASE A beautiful but ruinous piece of music That could only be drowned with drums and fifes. Tupper, fighting with fists and nails and toes, Had taken the word scandal which had cut His master's ballots, and had turned the edge With his word slander, but Blake's sea, how turn That edge? Now this last devastating phrase! But let Sir John and Stephen answer this Their way. Van Home must answer it in his.

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INTERNECINE STRIFE

The men were fighting foes which had themselves Waged elemental civil wars and still Were hammering one another at this moment. The peaks and ranges flung from ocean beds Had wakened up one geologic morning To find their scalps raked off, their lips punched in, The colour of their skins charged with new dyes. Some of them did not wake or but half-woke; Prone or recumbent with the eerie shapes Of creatures that would follow them. Weather Had acted on their spines and frozen them To stegosaurs or, taking longer cycles, Divining human features, had blown back Their hair and, pressing on their cheeks and temples, Bestowed on them the gravity of mummies. But there was life and power which belied The tombs. Guerrilla evergreens were climbing In military order: at the base The ponderosa pine; the fir backed up The spruce; and it the Stoney Indian lodge-poles; And these the white-barks; then, deciduous, The outpost suicidal Lyell larches Aiming at summits, digging scraggy roots Around the boulders in the thinning soil, Till they were stopped dead at the timber limit Rock versus forest with the rock prevailing. Or with the summer warmth it was the ice, In treaty with the rock to hold a line As stubborn as a Balkan boundary, That left its caves to score the Douglases, And smother them with half a mile of dirt, And making snow-sheds, covering the camps, Futile as parasols in polar storms. One enemy alone had battled rock

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And triumphed: searching levels like lost broods, Keen on their ocean scent, the rivers cut The quartzite, licked the slate and softened it, Till mud solidified was mud again, And then, digesting it like earthworms, squirmed Along the furrows with one steering urge To navigate the mountains in due time Back to their home in worm-casts on the tides. Into this scrimmage came the fighting men, And all but rivers were their enemies. Whether alive or dead the bush resisted: Alive, it must be slain with axe and saw, If dead, it was in tangle at their feet. The ice could hit men as it hit the spruces. Even the rivers had betraying tricks, Watched like professed allies across a border. They smiled from fertile plains and easy runs Of valley gradients: their eyes got narrow, Full of suspicion at the gorges where They leaped and put the rickets in the trestles. Though natively in conflict with the rock, Both leagued against invasion. At Hell's Gate A mountain laboured and brought forth a bull Which, stranded in mid-stream, was fighting back The river, and the fight turned on the men, Demanding from this route their bread and steel. And there below the Gate was the Black Canyon With twenty-miles-an-hour burst of speed. (Onderdonk builds the 'Skuzzy' to force the passage.) Twas more than navigation: only eagles Might follow up this run; the spawning salmon Gulled by the mill-race had returned to rot Their upturned bellies in the canyon eddies.

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Two engines at the stern, a forrard winch, Steam-powered, failed to stem the cataract. The last resource was shoulders, arms and hands. Fifteen men at the capstan, creaking hawsers, Two hundred Chinese tugging at shore ropes To keep her bow-on from the broadside drift, The Skuzzy under steam and muscle took The shoals and rapids, and warped through the Gate, Until she reached the navigable water The adventure was not sailing: it was climbing. As hard a challenge were the precipices Worn water-smooth and sheer a thousand feet. Surveyors from the edges looked for footholds, But, finding none, they tried marine manoeuvres. Out of a hundred men they drafted sailors Whose toes as supple as their fingers knew The wash of reeling decks, whose knees were hardened Through tying gaskets at the royal yards: They lowered them with knotted ropes and drew them Along the face until the lines were strung Between the juts. Barefooted, dynamite Strapped to their waists, the sappers followed, treading The spider films and chipping holes for blasts, Until the cliffs delivered up their features Under the civil discipline of roads. RING, RING THE BELLS

Ring, ring the bells, but not the engine bells: Today only the ritual of the steeple Chanted to the dull tempo of the toll. Sorrow is stalking through the camps, speaking A common mother-tongue. 'Twill leave tomorrow To turn that language on a Blackfoot tepee, Then take its leisurely Pacific time

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1 o tap its fingers on a coolie s door. Ring, ring the bells but not the engine bells: Today only that universal toll, For granite, mixing dust with human lime, Had so compounded bodies into boulders As to untype the blood, and, then, the Eraser, Catching the fragments from the dynamite, Had bleached all birthmarks from her swirling dead.

114H

Tomorrow and the engine bells again! THE LAKE OF MONEY

(The appeal to the Government for a loan of twenty-two-and-a-half million, 1883.) Sir John began to muse on his excuses. Was there no bottom to this lake? One mile Along that northern strip had cost - how much? Eleven dollars to the inch. The Road In all would measure up to ninety millions, And diverse hands were plucking at his elbow. The Irish and the Dutch he could outface, Outquip. He knew Van Home and Shaughnessy Had little time for speeches - one was busy In grinding out two thousand miles; the other Was working wizardry on creditors, Pulling rabbits from hats, gold coins from sleeves In Montreal. As for his foes like Blake, He thanked his household gods the Irishman Could claim only a viscous brand of humour, Heavy, impenetrable till the hour To laugh had taken on a chestnut colour. But Stephen was his friend, hard to resist. And there was Smith. He knew that both had pledged Their private fortunes as security

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For the construction of the Road. But that Was not enough. Sir John had yet to dip And scrape further into the public pocket, Explore its linings: his, the greater task; His, to commit a nation to the risk. How could he face the House with pauper hands? He had to deal with Stephen first - a man Laconic, nailing points and clinching them. Oratory, the weapon of the massed assemblies Was not the weapon here - Scot meeting Scot. The burr was hard to take; and Stephen had A Banffshire-cradled r. Drilling the ear, It paralysed the nerves, hit the red cells. The logic in the sound, escaping print, Would seep through channels and befog the cortex. Sir John counted the exits of discretion: Disguise himself? A tailor might do much; A barber might trim down his mane, brush back The forelock, but no artist of massage, Kneading that face from brow to nasal tip, Could change a chunk of granite into talc. His rheumatism? Yet he still could walk. Neuralgia did not interfere with speech. The bronchial tubing needed softer air? Vacations could not cancel all appointments. Men saw him in the flesh at Ottawa. He had to speak this week, wheedling committees, Much easier than to face a draper's clerk, Tongue-trained on Aberdonian bargain-counters. He raised his closed left hand to straighten out His fingers one by one - four million people. He had to pull a trifle on that fourth, Not so resilient as the other three. Only a wrench could stir the little finger Which answered with a vicious backward jerk.

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The dollar fringes of one hundred million Were smirching up the blackboard of his mind. But curving round and through them was the thought He could not sponge away. Had he not fathered The Union? Prodigy indeed it was From Coast to Coast. Was not the Line essential? What was this fungus sprouting from his rind That left him at the root less clear a growth Than this Dutch immigrant, William Van Home? The name suggested artificial land Rescued from swamp by bulging dikes and ditches; And added now to that were bogs and sloughs And that most cursed diabase which God Had left from the explosions of his wrath. And yet this man was challenging his pride. North-Sea ancestral moisture on his beard, Van Home was now the spokesman for the West, The champion of an all-Canadian route, The Yankee who had come straight over, linked His name and life with the Canadian nation. Besides, he had infected the whole camp. Whether acquired or natural, the stamp Of faith had never left his face. Was it The artist's instinct which had made the Rockies And thence the Selkirks, scenes of tourist lure, As easy for the passage of an engine As for the flight of eagles? Miracles Became his thought: the others took their cue From him. They read the lines upon his lips. But miracles did not spring out of air. Under the driving will and sweltering flesh They came from pay-cars loaded with the cash. So that was why Stephen had called so often Money - that lake of money, bonds, more bonds.

(The Bill authorizing the loan stubbornly carries the House.)

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DYNAMITE ON THE NORTH SHORE

The lizard was in sanguinary mood. She had been waked again: she felt her sleep Had lasted a few seconds of her time. The insects had come back - the ants, if ants They were - dragging those trees, those logs athwart Her levels, driving in those spikes; and how The long grey snakes unknown within her region Wormed from the east, unstriped, sunning themselves Uncoiled upon the logs and then moved on, Growing each day, ever keeping abreast! She watched them, waiting for a bloody moment, Until the borers halted at a spot, The most invulnerable of her whole column, Drove in that iron, wrenched it in the holes, Hitting, digging, twisting. Why that spot? Not this the former itch. That sharp proboscis Was out for more than self-sufficing blood About the cuticle: 'twas out for business In the deep layers and the arteries. And this consistent punching at her belly With fire and thunder slapped her like an insult, As with the blasts the caches of her broods Broke -nickel, copper, silver and fool's gold, Burst from their immemorial dormitories To sprawl indecent in the light of day. Another warning - this time different. Westward above her webs she had a trap A thing called muskeg, easy on the eyes Stung with the dust of gravel. Cotton grass, Its white spires blending with the orchids, Peeked through the green table-cloths of sphagnum moss. Carnivorous bladder-wort studded the acres, Passing the water-fleas through their digestion. Sweet-gale and sundew edged the dwarf black spruce;

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And herds of cariboo had left their hoof-marks, Betraying visual solidity, But like the thousands of the pitcher plants, Their downward-pointing hairs alluring insects, Deceptive - and the men were moving west! Now was her time. She took three engines, sank them With seven tracks down through the hidden lake To the rock bed, then over them she spread A counterpane of leather-leaf and slime. A warning, that was all for now. Twas sleep She wanted, sleep, for drowsing was her pastime And waiting through eternities of seasons. As for intruders bred for skeletons Some day perhaps when ice began to move, Or some convulsion ran fires through her tombs, She might stir in her sleep and far below The reach of steel and blast of dynamite, She'd claim their bones as her possessive right And wrap them cold in her pre-Cambrian folds.

1280

THREATS OF SECESSION

The Lady's face was flushed. Thirteen years now Since that engagement ring adorned her finger! Adorned? Betrayed. She often took it off And flung it angrily upon the dresser, Then took excursions with her sailor-lover. Had that man with a throat like Ottawa, That tailored suitor in a cut-away, Presumed compliance on her part? High time To snub him for delay - for was not time The marrrow of agreement? At the mirror She tried to cream a wrinkle from her forehead, Toyed with the ring, replaced it and removed it. Harder, she thought, to get it on and off This like the wrinkle meant but one thing, age.

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So not too fast; play safe. Perhaps the man Was not the master of his choice. Someone Within the family group might well contest Exotic marriage. Still, her plumes were ruffled By Blake's two-nights' address before the Commons: Three lines inside the twenty thousand words Had maddened her. She searched for hidden meanings 'Should she insist on those preposterous terms And threaten to secede, then let her go, Better than ruin the country.' 'Let her go/ And 'ruin' - language this to shake her bodice. Was this indictment of her character, Or worse, her charm? Or was it just plain dowry? For this last one at least she had an answer. Pay now or separation - this the threat. Dipping the ring into a soapy lather, She pushed it to the second knuckle, twirled It past. Although the diamond was off-colour, She would await its partner ring of gold The finest carat; yes, by San Francisco!

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BACK TO THE MOUNTAINS

As grim an enemy as rock was time. The little men from five-to-six feet high, From three-to-four score years in lease of breath, Were flung in double-front against them both In years a billion strong; so long was it Since brachiapods in mollusc habitats Were clamping shells on weed in ocean mud. Now only yesterday had Fleming's men, Searching for toeholds on the sides of cliffs, Five thousand feet above sea-level, set A tripod's leg upon a trilobite. And age meant pressure, density. Sullen With aeons, mountains would not stand aside;

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Just block the path - morose but without anger, No feeling in the menace of their frowns, Immobile for they had no need of motion; Their veins possessed no blood - they carried quartzite. Frontal assault! To go through them direct Seemed just as inconceivable as ride Over their peaks. But go through them the men Were ordered and their weapons were their hands And backs, pickaxes, shovels, hammers, drills And dynamite - against the rock and time; For here the labour must be counted up In months subject to clauses of a contract Distinguished from the mortgage-run an age Conceded to the trickle of the rain In building river-homes. The men bored in, The mesozoic rock arguing the inches. This was a kind of surgery unknown To mountains or the mothers of the myths. These had a chloroform in leisured time, Squeezing a swollen handful of light-seconds, When water like a wriggling casuist Had probed and found the areas for incision. Now time was rushing labour - inches grew To feet, to yards: the drills - the single jacks, The double jacks - drove in and down; the holes Gave way to excavations, these to tunnels, Till men sodden with mud and roof-drip steamed From sunlight through the tar-black to the sunlight. HOLLOW ECHOES FROM THE TREASURY VAULT

Sir John was tired as to the point of death. His chin was anchored to his chest. Was Blake Right after all? And was Mackenzie right? Superior could be travelled on. Besides,

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It had a bottom, but those northern bogs Like quicksands could go down to the earth's core. Compared with them, quagmires of ancient legend Were backyard puddles for old ducks. To sink Those added millions down that wallowing hole! He thought now through his feet. Many a time When argument cemented opposition, And hopeless seemed his case, he could think up A tale to laugh the benches to accord. No one knew better, when a point had failed The brain, how to divert it through the ribs. But now his stock of stories had run out. This was exhaustion at its coma level. Or was he sick? Never had spots like these Assailed his eyes. He could not rub them out Those shifting images - was it the sunset Refracted through the bevelled window edges? He shambled over and drew down the blind; Returned and slumped; it was no use; the spots Were there. No light could ever shoot this kind Of orange through a prism, or this blue, And what a green! The spectrum was ruled out; Its bands were too inviolate. He rubbed The lids again - a brilliant gold appeared Upon a silken backdrop of pure white, And in the centre, red - a scarlet red, A dancing, rampant and rebellious red That like a stain spread outward covering The vision field. He closed his eyes and listened: Why, what was that? 'Twas bad enough that light Should play such pranks upon him, but must sound Crash the Satanic game, reverberate A shot fifteen years after it was fired, And culminate its echoes with the thud Of marching choruses outside his window:

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'We'll hang Kiel up the Red River, And he'll roast in hell forever, We'll hang him up the River With a yah-yah-yah.' The noose was for the shot: 'twas blood for blood; The death of Riel for the death of Scott. What could not Blake do with that on the Floor, Or that young, tall, bilingual advocate Who with the carriage of his syllables Could bid an audience like an orchestra Answer his body swaying like a reed? Colours and sounds made riot of his mind White horses in July processional prance, The blackrobe's swish, the Metis' sullen tread, And out there in the rear the treaty-wise Full-breeds with buffalo wallows on their foreheads. This he could stand no longer, sick indeed: Send for his doctor, the first thought, then No; The doctor would advise an oculist, The oculist return him to the doctor, The doctor would see-saw him to another A specialist on tumours of the brain, And he might recommend close-guarded rest In some asylum - Devil take them all, He had his work to do. He glanced about And spied his medicine upon the sideboard; Amber it was, distilled from Highland springs, That often had translated age to youth And boiled his blood on a victorious rostrum. Conviction seized him as he stood, for here At least he was not cut for compromise, Nor curried to his nickname Old Tomorrow. Deliberation in his open stance, He trenched a deep one, gurgled and sat down.

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What were those paltry millions after all? They stood between completion of the Road And bankruptcy of both Road and Nation. Those north-shore gaps must be closed in by steel. It did not need exhilarated judgment To see the sense of that. To send the men Hop-skip-and-jump upon lake ice to board The flatcars was a revelry for imps. And all that cutting through the mountain rock, Four years of it and more, and all for nothing, Unless those gaps were spanned, bedded and railed. To quit the Road, to have the Union broken Was irredeemable. He rose, this time Invincibility carved on his features, Hoisted a second, then drew up the blind. He never saw a sunset just like this. He lingered in the posture of devotion: That sun for sure was in the west, or was it? Soon it would be upholstering the clouds Upon the Prairies, Rockies and the Coast: He turned and sailed back under double-reef, Cabined himself inside an armchair, stretched His legs to their full length under the table. Something miraculous had changed the air A chemistry that knew how to extract The iron from the will: the spots had vanished And in their place an unterrestrial nimbus Circled his hair: the jerks had left his nerves: The millions kept on shrinking or were running From right to left: the fourth arthritic digit Was straight, and yes, by heaven, the little fifth Which up to now was just a calcium hook Was suppling in the Hebridean warmth. A blessed peace fell like a dew upon him, And soon, in trance, drenched in conciliation, He hiccuped gently - 'Now let S-S-Stephen come!'

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(The Government grants the Directors the right to issue $35,000,000, guarantees $20,000,000, the rest to be issued by the Railway Directors. Stephen goes to London, and Lord Revelstoke, speaking for the House of Baring, takes over the issue.) SUSPENSE IN THE MONTREAL BOARD ROOM

Evening had settled hours before its time Within the Room and on the face of Angus. Dejection overlaid his social fur, Rumpled his side-burns, left moustache untrimmed. The vision of his Bank, his future Shops, Was like his outlook for the London visit. Van Home was fronting him with a like visage Except for two spots glowing on his cheeks Dismay and anger at those empty pay-cars. His mutterings were indistinct but final As though he were reciting to himself The Athanasian damnatory clauses. He felt the Receiver's breath upon his neck: To come so near the end, and then this hurdle! Only one thing could penetrate that murk A cable pledge from London, would it come? Till now refusal or indifference Had met the overtures. Would Stephen turn The trick? A door-knock and a telegram With Stephen's signature! Van Home ripped it Apart. Articulation failed his tongue, But Angus got the meaning from his face And from a noisy sequence of deductions: An inkstand coasted through the office window, Followed by shredded maps and blotting-pads, Fluttering like shad-flies in a summer gale; A bookshelf smitten by a fist collapsed;

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Two chairs flew to the ceiling - one retired, The other roosted on the chandelier. Some thirty years erased like blackboard chalk, Van Home was in a school at Illinois. Triumphant over his two-hundred weight, He leaped and turned a cartwheel on the table, Driving heel sparables into the oak, Came down to teach his partner a Dutch dance; And in the presence of the messenger, Who stared immobilized at what he thought New colours in the managerial picture, Van Home took hold of Angus bodily, Tore off his tie and collar, mauled his shirt, And stuffed a Grand Trunk folder down his breeches.

1510

(The last gap in the mountains - between the Selkirks and Savona's Fern/ - is closed.) The Road itself was like a stream that men Had coaxed and teased or bullied out of Nature. As if watching for weak spots in her codes, It sought for levels like the watercourses. It sinuously took the bends, rejoiced In plains and easy grades, found gaps, poured through them, 1520 But hating steep descents avoided them. Unlike the rivers which in full rebellion Against the canyons' hydrophobic slaver Went to the limit of their argument: Unlike again, the stream of steel had found A way to climb, became a mountaineer. From the Alberta plains it reached the Summit, And where it could not climb, it cut and curved, Till from the Rockies to the Coastal Range It had accomplished what the Rivers had, 1530 Making a hundred clean Caesarian cuts, And bringing to delivery in their time Their smoky, lusty-screaming locomotives.

248 THE SPIKE

Silver or gold? Van Home had rumbled Iron/ No flags or bands announced this ceremony, No Morse in circulation through the world, And though the vital words like Eagle Pass, Craigellachie, were trembling in their belfries, No hands were at the ropes. The air was taut With silences as rigid as the spruces Forming the background in November mist. More casual than camera-wise, the men Could have been properties upon a stage, Except for road maps furrowing their faces. Rogers, his both feet planted on a tie, Stood motionless as ballast. In the rear, Covering the scene with spirit-level eyes, Predestination on his chin, was Fleming. The only one groomed for the ritual From smooth silk hat and well-cut square-rig beard Down through his Caledonian longitude, He was outstaturing others by a foot, And upright as the mainmast of a brig. Beside him, barely reaching to his waist, A water-boy had wormed his way in front To touch this last rail with his foot, his face Upturned to see the cheek-bone crags of Rogers. The other side of Fleming, hands in pockets, Eyes leaden-lidded under square-crowned hat, And puncheon-bellied under overcoat, Unsmiling at the focused lens - Van Home. Whatever ecstasy played round that rail Did not leap to his face. Five years had passed, Less than five years - so well within the pledge.

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The job was done. Was this the slouch of rest? Not to the men he drove through walls of granite. The embers from the past were in his soul, Banked for the moment at the rail and smoking, Just waiting for the future to be blown. At last the spike and Donald with the hammer! His hair like frozen moss from Labrador Poked out under his hat, ran down his face To merge with streaks of rust in a white cloud. What made him fumble the first stroke? Not age: The snow belied his middle sixties. Was It lapse of caution or his sense of thrift, That elemental stuff which through his life Never pockmarked his daring but had made The man the canniest trader of his time, Who never missed a rat-count, never failed To gauge the size and texture of a pelt? Now here he was caught by the camera, Back bent, head bowed, and staring at a sledge, Outwitted by an idiotic nail. Though from the crowd no laughter, yet the spike With its slewed neck was grinning up at Smith. Wrenched out, it was replaced. This time the hammer Gave a first tap as with apology, Another one, another, till the spike Was safely stationed in the tie and then The Scot, invoking his ancestral clan, Using the hammer like a battle-axe, His eyes bloodshot with memories of Flodden, Descended on it, rammed it to its home. The stroke released a trigger for a burst Of sound that stretched the gamut of the air. The shouts of engineers and dynamiters,

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250 Of locomotive-workers and explorers, Flanking the rails, were but a tuning-up For a massed continental chorus. Led By Moberly (of the Eagles and this Pass) And Rogers (of his own), followed by Wilson, And Ross (charged with the Rocky Mountain Section), By Egan (general of the Western Lines), Cambie and Marcus Smith, Harris of Boston, The roar was deepened by the bass of Fleming, And heightened by the laryngeal fifes Of Dug McKenzie and John H. McTavish. It ended when Van Home spat out some phlegm To ratify the tumult with 'Well Done' Tied in a knot of monosyllables. Merely the tuning up! For on the morrow The last blow on the spike would stir the mould Under the drumming of the prairie wheels, And make the whistles from the steam out-crow The Fraser. Like a gavel it would close Debate, making Macdonald's 'sea to sea' Pour through two oceanic megaphones Three thousand miles of Hail 'from port to port; And somewhere in the middle of the line Of steel, even the lizard heard the stroke. The breed had triumphed after all. To drown The traffic chorus, she must blend the sound With those inaugural, narcotic notes Of storm and thunder which would send her back Deeper than ever in Laurentian sleep. The Unromantic Moon The radar pinged the moon one starlit night 'Good evening!' the operator meant. Less than 'good evening' did the satellite Reply - its echo quite indifferent.

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Only the echo! Could it be that she Had never trod the court of our conventions? And learned the art in her simplicity To ask - 'My lord, just what are your intentions?' Oho, ye lovers! Many centuries Have written the inscriptions of your tender Pledges - the cardiograms of your disease To that pale maiden with a neuter gender.

10

And so nocturnes might have been sung forever By swains and courtiers equally dejected, Had not a new Minerva chanted - 'Never Have lover-lunar orbits intersected/ Take up your lyres, but tune your orchard trills To other ears than those of Heaven's queen: Dead Letter Offices are crater sills Surrendering to the prose of a machine.

June 1953

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Textual Variants and Emendations

This list is a record of all substantive variants between the poem chosen as copy-text (designated with an asterisk) and all other authoritative printed versions; it also makes reference to all emendations made by the editors and may, at times, offer interesting variants from manuscript sources. Not accepted as authoritative versions are poems included in minor anthologies, unless they occur nowhere else or are first versions; and not included in this list of variants are the accidentals - the typographical errors and minor punctuation changes (of which there are very few). If titles are missing from this list, the reader is to understand that no variants exist (ie, no major errors have occurred in previous printings or revisions been made by the author after the first printing), and no emendations have made to the copy-text. A detailed bibliographical description and textual transmission of all poems can be found in the descriptive bibliography included in this volume. ABBREVIATIONS

CF CP CPM FG HTF NF

Canadian Forum Collected Poems (1944 & 1958) Canadian Poetry Magazine Fable of the Goats Here the Tides Flow, ed. D.G. Pitt New Frontier

NP NW QQ SL SW TSP VV

New Provinces New World Queen's Quarterly Still Life Star Weekly Ten Selected Poems Voice of Victory

Silences CF (1936), FG (1937), CP (1944), CP* (1958), HTF (1962)

254 Textual Variants and Emendations 5 growth] worth, CP (44) 24 pairs] pair, CF Seen on the Road NF (1936), NP (1936), FG (1937), CP (1944), CP* (1958) 2 spring-time] springtime, CF & FG 6 a road] the road, NP 11 planet-eyed] planet-wise, CF & FG The Baritone CF (1936), FG (1937), CP (1944), CP*(i958) Alternate title: 'Dictator (Baritone)/ CF Puck Reports Back CPM (1937), 937)rc*(i 30 This line omitted from CPM 48 but when] and when, CPM 52 caparison] comparison, FG 125 tautness] tartness, FG; the latter is an obvious error The Fable of the Goats FG (1937), CP*(i944) 71 corporate enterprise] a state enterprise, FG 119 His stroke] This stroke, FG 119 His coup d'etat] This coup d'etat, FG 143 mangage to domesticate] Learn so to domesticate, FG 144 and] to, FG 176 One had appeared like this to show] Had not one just appeared to show, FG 194 Moreover, Nature - quirky dame -] Moreover, had this quirky dame, FG 195 Had planted] Implanted, FG 306 His sires - grands and great-grands - fall] His sires, grandsires, and great-grands fall, FG 376 A steadying] That steadying, FG The Illusion FG (1937), CP*(i958) Alternate title: The Drowning/ FG

255 Textual Variants and Emendations The Dying Eagle QQ (1939), SL (1943), CP (1944), TSP (1947), CP*(i958) Alternate title: The Old Eagle/ QQ & TSP. Pratt considered 'The Dying Eagle' to be in error. See Gingell, On His Life and Poetry, 113. 43 Andes] Rockies, TSP 71 sloven] slattern, QQ The Radio in the Ivory Tower CF (1939), SL (1943), CP (1944), CP*(i958) 90 cobbles] rubble, CF 98-9 (September 1939)] omitted from CF 118 mortar] rubble, CF Dunkirk Maclean's* (1940), CPM (1940), NW (1941), VV (1941) 13 Attending] Desperate, VV Brebeuf and His Brethren Distinct first edition (Toronto: Macmillan), 1940; distinct second edition (Toronto: Macmillan), 1940; 2nd ed. rpt, 1941; distinct edition (Detroit: Basilian), 1942; CP (1944), CP*(i958) 2071 In the first edition only (Toronto: Macmillan 1940), the poem ended in this fashion: The wheel had come full circle with the visions In France of Brebeuf poured through the mould of St Ignace. Lalemant died in the morning at nine, in the flame Of the pitch belts. Flushed with the sight of the bodies, the foes Gathered their clans and moved back to the north and west To join the the fight against the tribes of the Petuns, And, with the attack to be made on Sainte Marie, Secure no less than the death of the Huron tribes. Gamier was at the mission of St Jean, Covering again the ground which he and Jogues Had pioneered nine years before. The town Under the impact of the Iroquois Broke like St Joseph and the fate of Daniel The fate of Gamier. Chabanel, Ordered by his Superior to return

256 Textual Variants and Emendations From St Matthias was the last to add His name to the great roll when in the woods, Exhausted on his knees, he was discovered And murdered through the treachery of a Huron. Within a year dispersion was complete. The nation perished with its priests. Ragueneau, To avoid the capture of the fort, applied The torch himself. Tnside an hour/ he wrote, 'We saw the fruit of ten years' labour end In smoke. We took a last look at the fields, Put our belongings on a raft of logs, And made our way to the Island of St Joseph.' But even there the old tale was retold Of hunger and the search for roots and acorns, Of cold, of persecution unto death By Iroquois, of Jesuit will and courage As Ragueneau and Chaumonot led back The remnant of a nation to Quebec.

Three hundred years have gone, but the voices that led The martyrs through death unto life are heard again In the pines and elms by the great Fresh Water Sea. The Mission sites have returned to the fold of the Order. Near to the ground where the cross broke under the hatchet, And went with it into the soil to come back at the turn Of the spade with the carbon and calcium char of the bodies, The shrines and altars are built anew; the Aves And prayers ascend and the Holy Bread is broken.

Dunkirk

Distinct edition (Toronto: Macmillan), 1941; CP (1944), TSP (1947), CP* (1958) 46-7 The following extra lines were included in the 1941 edition: It reasoned well Brutality, an art which had been bogged In some stray corner of the field

257 Textual Variants and Emendations In that Gallic-Anglo-Saxon fumble of the game. 212 Very] Verey, 1941, CP (44) and TSP 295 sheering] shearing, TSP. The TSP reading seems to make better sense, but since 'sheer' is a well-known nautical term, meaning to deviate from course, it is possible that Pratt intended this word. 315 scoots] skoots, 1941 & CP (44) The Truant CF (1942), Voices (1943), SL (1943), CP (1944), CP*(i958) 6 forcibly] universally, CF, Voices 7 This line omitted from CF and Voices 122 mileage] mumu's, CF, Voices, SL, CP (44) Autopsy on a Sadist Voices (1943), SL (1943), CP (1944), CP* (1958) Subtitle omitted from Voices Still Life SL (1943), CP (1944), CP* (1958) This poem first appeared as a single stanza in SN, 54 (28 October 1939). It reads as follows: To the poets who have fled To pools where little breezes dusk and shiver, Who need still life to deliver Their souls of their songs There are roses blanched of red In the Orient gardens, Japanese urns to limn With delicate words, and enough wrongs To exhaust an Olympian quiver, And time, be it said, For a casual hymn To be sung for the hundred thousand dead In the mud of the Yellow River. Pratt subsequently revised the stanza,and added others, for the Still Life (1943) publication. The Brawler in Who's Who SL (1943), CP (1944), CP* (1958) 32 concerning roaches] touching cockroaches, SL

258 Textual Variants and Emendations They Are Returning Maclean's (1945), distinct edition (Macmillan), 1945 41 regimental] Prussian, Maclean's 51 congeal] refine, Maclean's 52 Like Buchenwald or Maidanek or Lidice] Like Oradour, Distomo, Lidice -, Maclean's 104-44 Omitted from Maclean's 177 Or, in the Skeena-Athabascan way] Or, in the Athabascan way, Maclean's 236-76 Omitted from Maclean's 292 Kleve, Emmerich, Antwerp and Groningen] Kleve, Emmerich, Xanten, Antwerp, Groningen, Maclean's Behind the Log CPM (1947), distinct edition (Macmillan), 1947, CP* (1958) 2 the] omitted from 1947 3 unreel] unwind, CPM 6 The idiom of storms, their lairs and paths] The ways of storms, their lairs, habits and paths, CPM 15-19 Omitted from CPM 31 Hard a-port] Hard-a-starboard, CPM 35 mother] native, CPM 42 ping] hail, CPM 43 The sky for the plane's fuselage] The sky at night for the plane's fuselage, CPM 43-4 'even / The moon acknowledged from her crater sills/ omitted from CPM 53 fine] fire, 1947; an obvious error. 57-8 'Back-curtained by the Greenland ice-cap - time, The '41 autumnal equinox,' CPM 90-6 In the CPM version this is abbreviated to: The convoy s.c. 42 had tried To circumvent the foe's new strategy The concentrated ambush of the pack By leaving beaten sea-lanes, east and west.' 100-358 Omitted from CPM 362-74 Omitted from CPM 400-46 Omitted from CPM

259 Textual Variants and Emendations 449 crop] guts, CPM 463 Had sent his ultra-sounds out and reported] Had sent his sound waves out and had reported, CPM 469 crowsnest] crow's nest, CPM 472-5 'Each sound might hold a threat, an overture To a dementia of guns and rockets, Torpedo hits, cries of distress, and all Competing with the orders from the Bridge,' CPM 476-83 Omitted from CPM 489-90 'Calling to Tyndale, Tyndale answering Kelvin, And all vibrating from their resonators/ CPM 497-512 Omitted from CPM 519 five] six, CPM 522-31 Condensed in CPM to: The VJinterswyck with phosphate; And Scania with lumber; the Muneric Loaded with iron ore (sink like a rock She would if hit); and others with deep freight, Twelve columns of them in their ordered stations. 547 Against the convoy, striking through the escort] Against the convoy as against the foe, CPM 558-76 Omitted from CPM 584-93 Omitted from CPM 600-1 These lines omitted from 1947 and CP: 'Centre bearing, two-five-o' 'Starboard ten. Steady on two-five-o' 607-18 Omitted from CPM 623-4 These lines omitted from 1947 and CP: Whatever hope had lingered in the brain That one alone was on the prowl was gone. 626-30 Condensed in CPM to: A third, a fourth. The pack had trailed and found Them in the Greenland waters. Moonlight full, 637 Tachee] Tascee, CPM; spelled that way through the CPM version 658-71 Omitted from CPM 670 When] The, CPM 679-82 Omitted from CPM

260 Textual Variants and Emendations 691-729 Omitted from CPM 743-5 Condensed in CPM to: But seven cables from the foundered ships, The killer's light-grey periscope was sighted, Remaining visible one minute only. 761-7 Omitted from CPM 783 Within the Greenland-Iceland ocean tundras] Within the rolling Greenland-Iceland tundras, CPM 792-8 The section from 'From the Chambly's deck' to 'So was the water' omitted from CPM 813-923 Omitted from CPM 985 Horse-power to the limit on the engines] Horse-power to the limit on the engines, CPM 1008 Upon the Skeena's Bridge the judgment fought] Within the captain's brain the judgment fought, CPM 1010 brain] Bridge, CPM 1050-65 Omitted from CPM 1072-82 The section from The ratio...' to'... to come!' omitted from CPM 1087-92 Condensed in CPM to I saw the blades of the Muneric rise And edge themselves against the Alberni gunfire. 1107-11 Omitted from CPM 1134-8 Omitted from CPM 1167 'From there up the Loch Foyle to seek their berths/ CPM Summit Meetings Outposts (1948), CP* (1958) Alternate title: 'Lake Success/ Outposts 3 a] omitted from Outposts 12 The journey straps between those camel pairs] The straps between those dromedary pairs, Outposts 18-19 In the Outposts version there was an extra stanza between three and four: But keep the rivals from the garden where, Upon the latch click as each session closes, They could stroll in to pollinate the roses. For be the years one hundred, seven or thirty, A howling larynx can endure this strain Of effluent more readily than a vein.

261 Textual Variants and Emendations 19 bellyfuls] hulls, Outposts Newfoundland Calling SW* (1949), HTF (1962) Stanzas two, three, six, seven, eight, and nine omitted from HTF The final stanza in HTF is as follows: The Eastern Maritimes will learn anew The silver rise in the barometer. What power in the heavens could so subdue St. Lawrence, Gulf and River, or defer The hurricane speed? - only the Island's door Is latched against the North Atlantic's roar. Newfoundland Seamen Winnipeg Free Press (1949), CP* (1958), HTF (1962) The holograph version of this poem, now in the Lome Pierce Collection at Queen's, was published as the frontispiece to This is Newfoundland, ed. Ewart Young (Toronto: Ryerson Press 1949). The title of that version was 'Newfoundland Sailors/

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Annotations Sandra Djwa, Robert Gibbs, David Savage

The notes, which are intended to provide a general guide for the student of Pratt's poetry, include explanations of archaic words, some proper names, nautical terms, and Newfoundland dialect words as well as brief references to biblical, literary, mythological, and historical allusions. ABBREVIATIONS

EJP: EV EJP: MY EJP: TY NV OHLP TSP UTQ

E.J. Pratt: The Evolutionary Vision, by Sandra Djwa E.J. Pratt: The Master Years 1927-1964, by David G. Pitt E.J. Pratt: The Truant Years 1882-1964, by David G. Pitt Newfoundland Verse E.J. Pratt: On His Life and Poetry, ed. Susan Gingell Ten Selected Poems, ed. E.J. Pratt University of Toronto Quarterly

Silences For Pratt's explanations of the poem, see OHLP 108-9. See also Charles G.D. Roberts' The Haunters of the Silences (Boston: Page 1907), 202, 299. 'It was a life of noiseless but terrific activity, of unrelenting and incessant death, in a darkness streaked fitfully with phosphorescent gleams from the bodies of the darting, writhing, or pouncing creatures that slew and were slain in the stupendous silence.' 4 'milt': roe of male fish 4 'spawn': in this context, eggs of female fish 6 'bonitoes': predatory fish about two feet long 9 'molluscs': series of invertebrate animals that includes such varied creatures as snails, oysters, and cuttle-fish. Giant squids are a species of cuttle-fish.

264 Annotations Seen on the Road 10 'tumbril': type of cart that had acquired an ominous connotation from Charles Dickens's use of it in describing transportation of the condemned to the guillotine in A Tale of Two Cities The Baritone Title: alludes to Benito Mussolini (1883-1945), Italian dictator and leader of the fascist movement 18 'the Marseillaise': French national anthem, sung by the volunteers of Marseilles when they entered Paris to support the French Revolution 19 The Giovanezza' (usual spelling 'Giovinezza'): 'Giovinezza' is Italian for 'youthfulness,' but the usual English title for this song is 'Song of the Blackshirts.' 20 The Deutschlandlied": 'Deutschland iiber Alles/ or 'Germany Over All/ national anthem of the Third Reich. An abridged version is now the national anthem of West Germany. 21 'stretto': portion of a fugue in which one voice follows closely on the preceding one 22 'the Dead March': from Handel's oratorio Saul 25 'codetta': short coda. A coda is a passage introduced at the end of a musical composition to bring the latter to a satisfactory conclusion. 31 'Orion': In the signs of the zodiac, the constellation Orion is pictured as a hunter with a belt and sword. Puck Reports Back Title Tuck': merry sprite in Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream Oberon: king of the fairies in A Midsummer Night's Dream 7 'Lysander and Hermia': lovers in A Midsummer Night's Dream 8 'Bottom': conceited weaver in A Midsummer Night's Dream 20 'Hyrcanian': of Hyrcania, province of ancient Persia on the shores of the Caspian Sea 21 'scrip': traveller's satchel or an alternate word for 'scrap' and associated with the word 'script.' It means a small scrap of paper or, in this instance, a small scrap of writing. 24 'love-juice of a herb': See A Midsummer Night's Dream n, i, 166-8, 176-8. Oberon quarrels with his wife Titania and, when she is asleep, anoints her eyelids with 'Love-in-Idleness/ a potion which causes the recipient to fall in love with the first person seen on waking. 52 'caparison': horse's harness 56 'beavers': In this context, a beaver is the lower face-guard of a helmet.

265 Annotations ii9 'Hallowtide': season encompassing All Saints' Day 125 'Parthian': Parthia was an ancient kingdom in western Asia. The Parthians fought on horseback with bow and arrow, and after each shot turned their horses as if fleeing. Thus 'Parthian shot' became a phrase meaning a cutting or telling remark made as one left. 130 'county's': count's 137 'Zounds': archaic oath, short for 'God's wounds/ meaning the wounds of Christ upon the cross 140 'Olympian': Mount Olympus was the home of the ancient Greek gods; thus the term implies that someone is superior or superhuman. 170 'Nestor': In Greek legend, Nestor was the king of Pylos in Greece, and the oldest and most experienced chieftain involved in the siege of Troy. 174 'distaff: cleft stick on which wool or flax is wound for spinning. It came to denote women's work or women. The Fable of the Goats For Pratt's account of the poem's sources and composition, see OHLP, 109-12. There he mistakenly attributes authorship of 'Les deux chevres' to Aesop when, in fact, the author is La Fontaine. D.G. Pitt speculates that Pratt first read this fable in translation in a school text, where it was printed anonymously. 2 'Aralasian' - 8. 'Carolonian' - 99. 'Fallopian' - 99. 'Ovidian' - 100: 'The geographical names are fictitious but euphonic, suggesting central Europe.' OHLP 108 30 'Dolomites': mountain range in northern Italy 46 'Kyber Route' (usual spelling 'Khyber'): Khyber Pass, a narrow gorge between northwest India and Afghanistan 47 Thermopylae': narrow pass in northern Greece. In 480 B.C. Leonidas and his 300 Spartans made their last stand at Thermopylae against invading Persians. 53 'argalis': An argali is a wild sheep of Asia. 73 'Cyrus': The head of the goats perhaps was named Cyrus after King Cyrus of Persia, who founded the Persian empire in the sixth century B.C. 113 'Caliphate': rank or government of a caliph, who is a Mohammedan ruler 124-5 'Ipomoea Purga': species of creeping plant 128 'Croton Tiglium': castor oil tree 131 'ballista': ancient military engine for hurling stones 139 'Abimelech': king of Gerar. See Genesis 2o:2ff.

266 Annotations 182 'jerboa': rodent of the African deserts 185 'fourteenth point': 'Point' is here used to mean a characteristic in appraising the qualities of an animal, as in a show. 269 'ExcelsiorV: (L.) 'Higher!' 297 'Carthaginian rams': Carthage was an ancient African city whose power threatened Rome. A ram was a projecting beak beyond the bows of a war vessel that enabled it to ram and batter the side of an opposing ship. 300 'milcher dams': in this context, milk-giving female goats with young 324 'witenagemot': Old English national council 370 'Irish Moss and carrageen': two names for the same object, a kind of purplish seaweed from which is extracted a jelly used in food and medicine 376 'digitalis': medicine derived from the foxglove, used as in treating the heart 414 'phagocyte': type of leucocyte, a colourless corpuscle of blood that guards the system by absorbing disease-producing microbes Under the Lens 10 'hamadryads': in this context, venomous Indian serpents The Old Organon (1225 A.D.) Title 'Organon': system of logic or a treatise on logic. Organon was the title of Aristotle's logical treatises. In 1620, English philosopher Francis Bacon wrote Novum Organum (The New Organon). 1225 A.D.: The empire of Genghis Khan reached its height then with the conquest of southeastern Europe. 3-4 Bokhara, Otrar, and Samarcand fell to the Mongols in 1220, and Herat in 1221. 9 'Mohammed': Shah Muhammad n (?-i22i), Turkish ruler of the Khwarismian Empire, which included much of the present-day Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan 9 'Jehal-ud-Din': son of Shah Muhammad n. In 1221 he made a successful stand against the Mongols in Afghanistan, but in 1222, with the Indus behind him and after a violent struggle, he was forced to flee into India. In 1230 he fled westward before a horde of 30,000 Mongols.

The New (1937 A.D.) The meeting described in the poem refers generally to contemporary international conferences. Pratt may have had in mind the assemblies of the League of Nations, the seventeenth of which in

267 Annotations 1937, by accepting the credentials of an Ethiopian delegation, led to Italy's withdrawing from the League. Ironically, however, despite sanctions from the League of Nations, oil continued to be supplied to Italy by the international cartels controlled by England and France. See also The Prize Cat/ The Impatient Earth 16 'blood-root': popular name for various plants, especially tormentil, a low-growing herb The Submarine For Pratt's accounts of the poem, see OHLP 112-13. Old Harry See OHLP 113: 'Old Harry is a name given to a rock, responsible for a number of shipwrecks/ The Dying Eagle See OHLP 113: The next is called 'The Old Eagle": It is entitled in the collection The Dying Eagle' but that is an error. It might have been more properly called "The Old Eagle Has His First Sight of an Aeroplane"/ 41 'pterodactyls': extinct flying reptiles The Radio in the Ivory Tower For Pratt's comments on the poem, see OHLP 113. 10 'this Rock': The hermit persona of this poem, like Robinson Jeffers, builds himself a castle on the Californian coast (OHLP 113). In addition, the island of Newfoundland is sometimes called 'the rock/ 12 'Lord of Misrule': Master of the Revels at Twelfth Night, or the officer in charge of entertainment at the court. See Alfred Noyes's poem, 'Lord of Misrule/ 116 'Gotterdammerung': in Germanic mythology, the apocalyptic 'twilight of the gods/ Gotterdammerung is also the title of Wagner's 1876 opera, one of four in the cycle called The Ring of the Nibelung. 143 'Apollyon': Greek word meaning 'destroyer/ Apollyon was the angel of the bottomless pit; see Revelation 9:11. Dunkirk 14 'Corunna': La Coruna, port in northwest Spain from which the Spanish Armada sailed in 1588. It was sacked by the British fleet under Drake in 1589.

268 Annotations 14 'Verdun': garrison town in northwest France, site of a protracted battle in World War i. The area around it contains 70 Allied and German military cemeteries. Brebeuf and His Brethren For Pratt's five accounts of the poem's background and composition, see OHLP 114-26. Brebeuf, Jean de (1593-1649) 10 'St Francis of Assisi': St Francis (1182-1226) founded the Franciscan order, based on vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Assisi is a city in Umbria, Italy. 12 'plague-infested towns': Epidemics of bubonic plague occurred in Europe from the sixth to the twelfth centuries. 16 'Vincent de Paul': St Vincent de Paul (1581-1660), founder of the Congregation of the Mission and the Sisters of Charity 17 'Francis de Sales': St Francis of Sales (1567-1622), who founded the Order of the Visitation in 1610. He wrote the widely read Introduction & la vie devote in 1608. 20 The architect of the palaces': St Augustine 24 'Kempis through the Imitatio': St Thomas Kempis was a fifteenthcentury German ecclesiastic who wrote Imitatio Christi (The Imitation of Christ) in 1417-21. 28 Theresa': sixteenth-century Sp. nun known for religious visions 29 'Carmelites': members of a religious order founded in the twelfth century at Mt Carmel, Palestine 30 'John of the Cross': sixteenth-century Spanish religious reformer. With St Theresa he founded the order of the discalced (meaning barefooted or wearing sandals) Carmelites and was imprisoned by the older order of Carmelites. 33 'Xavier': St Francis Xavier, sixteenth-century missionary who helped St Ignatius Loyola (1. 35 below) establish the Society of Jesus in 1534. 36 'Pampeluna': St Ignatius Loyola, a Spaniard, was severely wounded in the Spanish siege of Napoleonic forces in Pampeluna, the old name for Pamplona, Spain. 37 'Montserrata': Montserrat is an island of the Leeward Group, in the West Indies federation. 39 'Company of Jesus': Jesuits 58 'Bayeux': near the coast of Normandy 62 'Via Dolorosa': the mile Jesus walked from the Mount of Olives to Golgotha

269 Annotations 68 'per ignem et per aquam': through fire and water 74 'Brule': Etienne Brule (6:1592-1633), adventurer and explorer, probably the first white man to enter Huron territory. He lived among the Hurons from 1610 until his death and became an interpreter of their language. 74 'Viel': Fr Nicolas Viel (7-1625), Recollet priest, missionary to the Hurons, 1623-5, assassinated by them at Riviere des Prairies 75 'Sagard': Fr Gabriel, Recollet friar, missionary to the Hurons 1623-4, author of Le grand voyage au pays des Hurons (1632) and L'histoire du Canada (1636) 75 'Le Caron': Fr Joseph (6:1586-1632), Recollet priest, first missionary among the Hurons 104 'the Crusades': The Crusades, also known as the Wars of the Cross, were a series of religious wars between the Christians of the West and the Mohammedans of the East in an attempt by the Christians to guarantee safe passage for Christian pilgrims to Jerusalem. There were nine crusades, the first starting in 1097 and the last in 1271. 104 'Hastings': Battle of Hastings, 1066 105 'Howards': family name of the Dukes of Norfolk. The family's earlier name was Hereward. Here ward the Wake held out against William the Conqueror after the Battle of Hastings. 117 'Mass': Fr Enemond Masse (1575-1646), Jesuit priest and missionary to Acadia, 1611-13, and to Quebec from 1625 until his death 117 'Charles Lalemant': (1587-1674). First superior of the Jesuits in Quebec and responsible for setting up a Jesuit mission in Canada, he came to Quebec with Fathers Masse and Brebeuf in 1625. 121 'Daillon': Fr Joseph de la Roche Daillon (7-1656), Recollet priest who came to New France in 1625 to assist Fr Viel in his mission to the Hurons 150 'sagamite': kind of gruel made from coarse hominy, which is hulled corn. 153 'Turk's cap': flower, commonly called the American swamp lily 161 'de Noue': Fr Anne de Noue (1587-1646), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1626-7 251 'Arendiwans': Huron medicine men 266 'Kirke': Sir David Kirke (1597-1654), British adventurer who with his four brothers seized Tadoussac in 1627 and in 1629 forced the surrender of Quebec 306 'La Rochelle': French seaport which during the Reformation became a centre of Protestantism. In 1628 it was besieged and taken by Richelieu's forces.

270 Annotations 306 'Fribourg': city now in Switzerland that during the Thirty Years War was on the French-German border 308 'Richelieu': Cardinal Armand Jean du Plessis Richelieu (1585-1642) 308 'Mazarin': Cardinal Jules Mazarin (1602-61) 308 'Conde': Louis n de Bourbon Conde (1621-86), French general during the Thirty Years War 309 'Turenne': Henri De La Tour D'Auvergne, Vicompte de Turenne (1611-75), French general during the Thirty Years War 314 'Le Jeune': Fr Paul Le Jeune (1591-1664), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1639-49 314 'Biard': Pierre Biard (1567-1622), Roman Catholic missionary who went to Acadia in 1611 319 'Chastellain': Fr Pierre Chastellain (1606-84), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1639-49 320 'Pijart': Fr Claude Pijart (1600-83), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Nipissings and Algonkins, 1637-44 320 'Le Mercier': Fr Francpis-Joseph Le Mercier (1604-90), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1635-50 320 'Isaac Jogues': (1607-46), Jesuit priest, missionary among the Hurons, 1637-42, and among the Iroquois from 1646 until his death at their hands 321 'The Lalemants': Jerome and Gabriel, brothers of Charles Lalemant. Fr Jerome Lalemant (1593-1673), a Jesuit priest, succeeded Brebeuf as superior of the Huron mission and served in that capacity until 1645. Fr Gabriel Lalemant (1610-49), also a Jesuit priest, was a missionary to the Hurons from 1648 until his death at the hands of the Iroquois. 323 'Ragueneau': Fr Paul Ragueneau (1608-80), Jesuit priest, superior of the mission to the Hurons 1645-50, and of the Jesuits in Canada 1650-3 333 'Gamier': Fr Charles Gamier (01605-49), Jesuit priest, missionary to the Hurons from 1636 until his death at the hands of the Iroquois 342 'Chabanel': Fr Noell Chabanel (1613-49), Jesuit priest, missionary to the Hurons from 1644 until his death at their hands 370 'Chaumonot': Fr Pierre Joseph-Marie Chaumonot (1611-93), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1639-50 375 'the Lady of Loretto' (usual spelling 'Loreto'): the Virgin Mary. Santa Casa, a famous chapel of the Virgin in Loreto, Italy, is a place of pilgrimage.

271 Annotations 384 'Davost': Fr Amboise Davost (1586-1643), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1634-6 384 'Daniel': Fr Antoine Daniel (1601-48), Jesuit priest, missionary to the Hurons from 1634 until his death at the hands of the Iroquois 430 'Martin': presumably a donn, or lay assistant, pledged to serve the Jesuit order, identified in the Relations only as 'little Martin/ who was Very roughly treated, and at last left behind with the Bissiriniens.' The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents ed. R.G. Thwaites et al. (Cleveland: Barrows Bros. 1897) vm> 81 431 'Baron': Simon Baron, a Jesuit donn, who served in Huronia 1634-7 453 'arquebuses': early type of portable gun 457 'Echon': name given to Brebeuf by the Hurons, signifying one who pulls a heavy load 463-74 'No Louvre ... vessels of the Mass': verse paraphrase of parts of a letter from Brebeuf to Fr Le Jeune. See The Jesuit Relations vni, 105-9. 500 'Uoki': Huron spirit or demon 513 'A moon eclipse was due ...': See OHLP 118. 568-84 'Brebeuf prepared a sermon ... "dirty"': paraphrased from 'Instructions for the Fathers of Our Society Who Shall Be Sent to the Hurons.' See The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents xn, 115-23. 609 'How often ... written story': suggests Wilhelm Wundt's stimulusresponse theory 623 'kibes': chilblains 737-813 '"Herein I show you" ... "Enough, O Lord!"': See The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents x, 88-115. 756 'Saint Thomas': St Thomas Aquinas, thirteenth-century theologian and teacher 823 'Du Peron': Fr Francois Du Peron (1610-65), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1639-49 828 'Patmos': See Revelation 1:9. 905 'Saracen': Arab or Moslem nomad who attacked Christians during the Crusades 969 'Poncet': Fr Joseph-Antoine Poncet De La Riviere (1610-75), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1639-40 970 'Le Moyne': Fr Simon Le Moyne (1604-65), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1638-49 970 'Charles Raymbault': (1602-42), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1637-40

272 Annotations 970 'Rene MenarcT: (1605-61), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, Algonkins, Nipissings, and Iroquois from 1641 until his disappearance in 1661 972 'Le Coq': (7-1650), donn of the Jesuits, who was supervisor of buildings and equipment at Sainte-Marie-des-Hurons from 1634 to 1649 972 'Christophe Reynaut': Jesuit donn, who assisted in building the fort 972 'Charles Boivin': one of three brothers who came as donns of the Jesuits to assist in building the fort in 1640 973 'Couture': Guillaume Couture (7-1701), donn who served in Huronia from 1641 to 1642. Captured by the Iroquois in 1642, he later became an ambassador to the Mohawks. 973 'Jean Gurin': donn who assisted in building the fort 1225 'Goupil': Rene Goupil (1608-42), surgeon, possibly a Jesuit donn, who accompanied Isaac Jogues into Huron country in 1642, where he was captured and killed by the Iroquois 1230 'Eustache': Ahatsistari Eustache (1602-42), Huron warrior, baptized Eustache in 1642. A resident of Saint-Joseph n, he was killed by the Iroquois while accompanying Fr Jogues back to Huronia. 1439 'Montmagny': Charles Huault De Montmagny (ci583~i653), first governor of New France from 1636 to 1648 Before 1461 'Bressani': Fr Francois-Joseph Bressani (1612-72), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1644-50 1548 'Garreau': Fr Leonard Garreau (£^609-56), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1644-54 1661 'astrolabe': instrument formerly used for measuring altitude 1679 'Benin': Fr Jacques Bonin (1617-?), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1648-50 1679 'Daran': Fr Adrien D'Aran (1615-70), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1648-50 1679 'Greslon': Fr Adrien Greslon (1617-97), Jesuit priest and missionary to the Hurons, 1648-50 1925 'maniple': vestment worn hanging from the left arm 1933 Talestrina': Giovanni Palestrina, sixteenth-century Italian composer 1997 'cidreries'\ French for cider-houses 2124 '... the ashes of St Ignace are glowing afresh': For Pratt's account of the excavations at Huronia, see OHLP 120-1.

273 Annotations

h Title: The song, 'Come away, come away, death/ is sung by Feste, a clown in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night, 2.1.52-68. 1 'Willy-nilly, he comes or goes/: See the chop-logic of the First Clown, the gravedigger, in Hamlet, 5.1.17-19 and also his song, 5.1.69-105. 2 'Comic in epitaph, tragic in epithalamium/: See Hamlet, 5.1.236-9 and 267-9. 3 'mused rhyme': See Keats's 'Ode To a Nightingale' 53. 5-6 'Whatever the course of the garden variables / . . . the constant': In mathematics it is possible to construct a grid to determine the occurrence of irrational factors. Human reason considers life a constant and death an irrational interruption, but the argument of the first stanza is that such a grid would demonstrate the reverse: that death rather than generation, or life, is the constant factor. 7 'poppy seeds': The narcotic properties of the poppy have been associated with death since ancient times. In Canada the poppy is particularly associated with the war dead; see Colonel John McCrae's 'In Flanders Fields.' 8 'he came in formal dress': allusion to Death knocking on man's door, possibly the medieval figure of The Dance of Death' 12 'sacramental wine': as in the last rites of the Catholic Church or in Methodist communion 17 'cool longitudes': distance east or west on the earth's surface, measured by the angle which the meridian of a particular place makes with a standard meridian, as that of Greenwich; by extension, a gravepit 20 'the flame of the capitals': Capital letters were illuminated in medieval manuscripts. Pratt also may have intended to make a secondary pun on the medieval sacking of capital cities. 21 'turn of the thumb': literally, turning of a page, but also, perhaps, reference to the thumbscrew, an instrument of torture sometimes used by the medieval church 24 'Venetian mosaics': A revival of Byzantine mosaic art in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries A.D. in Italy produced many fine examples of the art; among the best known are those in the Basilica of St Mark, Venice. 28 'clay to clay': This phrase parallels the burial service, 'ashes to ashes, dust to dust/ but may also refer to God's modelling man from clay.

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Annotations

See Isaiah 46:9, 64:8, and Job 10:9. See also Pratt's verse drama 'Clay/ 30 'the gride of his traction tread': With World Wars i and n death came in a new and mechanical form - the tank. 31 'one September night': possibly a double allusion: World War n began on 3 September 1939 with the bombing, by Germany, of Poland. However, the poem was prompted by the Battle of Britain of August and September 1940. On 7 September, the date of the heavier raid, 400 bombers struck London. 41 'the sound of the motor drone': This suggests the ¥2 buzz bombs of World War n; when the sound of the motor stopped, the bomb had begun its descent. 52 'Piltdown': At Piltdown, England, 1911-15, parts of a fossilized skull were found and claimed to be the remains of the oldest known human in Europe. But in 1953, 12 years after this poem was written, the skull was discredited. 53 'Java': Java ape man, discovered in 1891, the remains of what was thought to be one of the earliest humans 56 'stylus': ancient writing instrument for use on clay or papyrus 57 'Apocalypse': generally refers to a revelation, and here alludes to one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (conquest, war, famine, and death) as described in Revelation 6:1-8 Date 'April, 1941': exceedingly bleak point in the war. In this month there were heightened air attacks by Germany on London and other British cities, resulting in heavy civilian casualties. Simultaneously, German forces overran Greece while British forces in North Africa lost Derna and Bardia. Dunkirk For Pratt's accounts of the events and of the intent of his poem, see OHLP 126-32. On 10 May 1940, Germany invaded Belgium, Holland, and Luxembourg. British and other forces were soon trapped in Dunkirk, France, on the Strait of Dover. Between 28 May and 3 June, 222 ships of the Royal Navy, aided by 665 yachts and other small civilian boats, under heavy air attack evacuated 224,585 British soldiers and 112,546 French and Belgian troops to Britain. 6 'nightingales' throats': The nightingale is traditionally a symbol of natural art; in addition, one of the best-known English

275 Annotations

11

14 50 57 60 63 63 63 63 66 67 70 71 75 77 81

84

songs of World War n was 'A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square.' 'Churchill and Bevin': In 1940 Winston Churchill, a Conservative, became Prime Minister and Defence Minister of Britain's wartime Coalition government, which included Labour MP Ernest Bevin as Minister of Labour and National Service. 'adversatives': words such as 'but/ 'yet,' 'however' which introduce debate 'Stonehenge': prehistoric stone circle or solar temple in England 'Caractacus': British chieftain who led the struggle against the Romans around 50 A.D. 'Boadicea': (1-62 A.D.), British queen of the Icenti who led a revolt against the Romans 'Alban': Saint Alban (0300), British martyr 'Alfred': King Alfred (849-99) 'Athelney': King Alfred's stronghold, in 878 his hiding place from the Danes 'Edington': in Wiltshire, site of Alfred's decisive victory over the Danes 'Ball' and Tyler': John Ball (7-1381) was an instigator of the Peasants' Revolt, which was led by Wat Tyler (7-1381). 'Enclosures': enclosing of common land, formerly used by peasants, for private use in the twelfth to seventeenth centuries in England 'Hawkins': Sir John (1532-95), British mariner who fought with Drake against the Spanish Armada, 1588 'Morgan-mouthed': Sir Henry Morgan (1635-88), British buccaneer and leader of the Barbados pirates, was known for his strong language. Trobisher': Sir Martin (15357-94), English mariner, associated with Sir Francis Drake in the defeat of the Spanish Armada 'Marne': Marne River in France, site of two major battles in World Wan 'Charters': In England a charter is an instrument granted by the Crown and conferring certain privileges or immunities. Magna Carta (Great Charter), granted by King John at Runnymede in 1215, established the fundamental principles of English law. 'Royal Yacht squadrons': Royal Yacht Squadron, Cowes, Isle of Wight, and any other yachting group granted the royal appointment

276 Annotations 85 'wave-line theory': theory held by some naval architects that a certain type of hull facilitates movement through the waves 87 'Genesta and the Galatea': British yachts, famous on both sides of the Atlantic. The Galatea, a large cutter, raced for the America's Cup in 1865. The Genesta lost her bowsprit in a race for General Paine's Cup in 1885. 88 'racing spinnakers': large three-cornered sails carried by racing yachts and used in running before the wind 90 'Cutters': small single-masted sailing vessels 91 'press balloon-jibs': triangular staysail that balloons out in a press (strong push) of wind 99 'luggers': small ships with four-cornered sails set fore and aft 101 'Deal': port on the east coast of Kent 102 'Smacks': small one-masted vessels often used for fishing 102 'Grimsby': port on the coast of Lincolnshire, and England's chief fishing port 103 'Yawls': two-masted fore and aft sailing boats, with a mizzenmast stepped abaft the rudder post 105 'spritsail-rigged with jigger booms': A spritsail is a sail extended by a sprit (a small boom that crosses the fore and aft sail diagonally from the mast to the upper hindmost corner of the sail, which it extends and elevates). A boom is a spar run out to extend the foot of a sail. A jigger boom is one fitted with a jigger, which is a type of rigging. 106 'Bluff-blowed billyboys': billyboy, or river barge, presenting a broad flattened front; echoes phrase from Trelawney's book (1. 115) 106 'wherries': light shallow rowboats 108 'scoots' (or 'scouts'): flat-bottomed boats used in the river trade of Holland 108 'bawleys' (or bauleys'): south coast of England dialect word for small fishing smacks 114 'Collingwood': Admiral Cuthbert Lord Collingwood, 1750-1810, second in command under Admiral Lord Nelson at Trafalgar 115 Trelawny': Edward John Trelawny, 1792-1881, English sailor and adventurer, author of Recollections of the Last Days of Shelley and Byron, 1858 115 'Grenville': Sir Richard Grenville, 71541-91. Off Flores in the Azores in 1591 he commanded the British ship Revenge, which battled alone against a number of Spanish ships. He was captured

277 Annotations and died of his wounds. The battle inspired Tennyson's poem, The "Revenge"/ 133 'Boodles': famous club in London 140 'Harrow': English public school, founded 1541 172 'mesen': variant of 'myself 174 'Dardanelles': strait between Europe and Asiatic Turkey, scene of an Allied defeat in World War i 179 'Bapaume': in Northern France, scene of fighting in World War i 185 'Armenteers': British slang name for Armentieres, northern France, scene of fighting in World War i 192 '"Yde Park"': Cockney for Hyde Park, London 201 'costermonger': seller of fruit and other food from a barrow in the street 201 'Petticoat Lane': street in London 206 Tlissus': river in ancient Greece, flowing east and south of Athens 216 'the Rand': region of Transvaal in South Africa where a third of the world's gold is produced 219 'the single Mole': pier at Dunkirk 252 'Tamburlaine' (or 'Tamerlane'): Tartar, 13367-1405, who conquered vast parts of Asia and India 288 'Stukas': German dive bombers 308 'leadlines': lines with lead attached to measure the depth of the water 353 The peace that passes understanding': See Philippians 4:7. 359 'Medway': the Medway river in Kent Heydrich Title: Reinhard Heydrich (1904-42) was a German Nazi official and chief deputy to Heinrich Himmler. As Nazi 'protector' of Czechoslovakia he was assassinated by Czech patriots on 27 May 1942. 20 'Lidice': a village in Czechoslovakia razed by the Germans on 10 June 1942 in retaliation for the assassination of Heydrich The Truant For Pratt's summary of the poem's theme, see OHLP 132-3. See also W.H.D. Rowse's introduction to and translation of Lucretius: De Rerum Natura (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, and London: William Heinemann 1924, 3rd ed., 1966) and T.H. Huxley and Julian Huxley, Evolution and Ethics 1893-1943 (London: Pilot Press 1947) 68. Compare notes to The Iron Door.

278

Annotations

i 'Panjandrum': See Brian Traherne, 'A Possible Source for "The Truant"' Canadian Poetry 7 (1980) 73-9, where he argues that the concept of the truant and the name Panjandrum may well be derived from the British comic strip The Noah Family.' 20-9 'Pedigree': compare discussion of the elements of man in Lord Byron's Manfred i, ii, 39-44 43 'thaumaturge': worker of miracles 54 'coprophagite': eater of dung 58 'troglodyte': prehistoric caveman 107 'anserine': stupid as a goose 127-8 'your rings / Of pure and endless light': See Henry Vaughan's 'The World/ 143 'eolith': stone tool from the earliest age of man 150 'caves of death': See Byron's Manfred ii.ii.8o. 155 'Lucretian atoms': See De Rerum Natura, 159 'chaos and Old Night': See John Milton, Paradise Lost. 180 'cat-and-truncheon bastinades': 'cat' is short for 'cat-o'-nine-tails/ a rope whip with nine knotted lashes, once used for flogging. A 'bastinade' is a blow with a stick or whip, especially on the soles of the feet. The Stoics For Pratt's comment on this poem, see OHLP 133. 5 'pyrites': sulphide of iron, sometimes called 'fool's gold' because it is mistaken for gold 9 'gravitas': Latin for gravity or sober dignity 11 'Aurelius': Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, 121-80, a Roman emperor and disciple of the Stoics (1. 27 below). Stoicism was a branch of Greek philosophy founded about 308 B.C. Of this poem Northrop Frye writes: 'the stoic is the most impressive example of a man who tries to find some kind of moral order behind nature, and so tries to keep neutral in the struggle of human heroism and natural indifference: a neutrality always dubious and in the twentieth century entirely impossible/ (Silence in the Sea, The Pratt Lecture, St John's, Memorial University of Newfoundland, 1969) 23 'panzers': German word for 'armour,' used in World War n to describe armoured divisions. The most important panzer vehicle was the tank, hence Pratt's reference to 'the traction of the panzers/

279 Annotations Father Time 22 'gneiss': layered rock of quartz, feldspar, and mica 40 'SEBASTOPOL': The Black Sea port of Sebastopol resisted British, French, and Turkish forces for eleven months during the Crimean War and resisted German forces for eight months during World War ii. It fell on 3 July 1942, and was recaptured in May 1944. Autopsy on a Sadist Subtitle: 'after Lidice' suggests the sadist was modelled after Reinhard Heydrich. See notes to 'Heydrich/ Niemoeller Title: Martin Niemoeller (1892-1984), a German Protestant churchman, was imprisoned in 1938 for his anti-Hitler views, and was liberated by the Allies in 1945. 6 'Essen': centre of the German steel industry of the Ruhr, and site of the Krupp armament works 8 'Procurator': officer or attorney. See Matthew 26:5yff. Der Fuehrer's Pot-Pourri 17 'Drug Tito': Comrade Tito (1892-1980). Born Josip Broz, Tito led the Yugoslavian partisans' resistance to the Germans during World War ii. He became head of state in 1943 and was Yugoslavia's first elected president from 1953 to 1980. 17 'Mikhailovitch': Dragoljub Mihajlovic (1893-1946), leader of a rival underground resistance movement in Yugoslavia during World War ii and committed to restoring the Serbian dynasty. Captured in 1946 by Tito's partisans, Mihajlovic was sentenced to death by hanging. 28 'Die Wacht am Rhein': 'The Watch on the Rhine,' German national song 29 '"Allons enfants de la patrie"': first line of 'La Marseillaise' 30 'Horst Wessel melody': Horst Wessel (1907-30), a German student composer and member of the Nazi party, wrote the song known as 'Horst-Wessel-Lied,' which with 'Deutschland ueber Alles' was accepted as a national song of the Nazi ss 31-2 "'Sprung from the soil... Liberty"': from the Greek national anthem 37-8 "T'm William ... in my veins'": from 'Wilhelmus von Nassouwe,' The Netherlands national anthem

280 Annotations 39-4° '"King Christian stood ... swinging fast"': from 'Kong Kristian/ Danish national anthem 42 'O Tannenbaum': 'O Fir Tree/ German Christmas song 43 'O Lebensraum': 'O Living Space.' Lebensraum was a slogan adopted by Hitler from the German geographer Friedrich Ratzel (1844-1904). Pratt is obviously punning here on Liszt's Liebenstraum. 47 '"The waters ... homes'": from Norway's national anthem 49 'Starzynski': Stefan Starzynski (1893-1940), mayor of Warsaw from 1937 to 1939. For his stand against the German invasion he became known as 'stubborn Stefan.' After the fall of his city, he was captured by the Germans and executed at Dachau in 1940. 50 'Denes': Eduard Benes (1887-1948), president of Czechoslovakia, 1935-8 and 1945-8. Exiled after the Munich Pact, he headed the Czech provisional government in London during the war. Re-elected following the war, he resigned after the Communist coup in 1948. 53 '"But we shall be free"': from the Czech national song 54 'rota': round 55-8 '"We shall not leave ... a fortress be"': from a Polish national song 64 'Alberich': King of the Dwarfs in the Nibelungenleid. In Wagner's Ring he is the ugly gnome who steals the Rheingold 67 'Chaliapin': Fyodor Ivanovic Chaliapin (1873-1938), renowned Russian basso, known particularly for his role as Boris Godunov in the Modest Moussorgsky opera Still Life 2 'little breezes dusk and shiver': from Tennyson's The Lady of Shalott/ 1. 11 30 'that Tunisian glow': refers to the fighting in Tunis during the North African campaign in World War n 31 'Carthaginian fire': Carthage was destroyed by the Romans in 146 B.C. 41 Theocritean': of Theocritus, Greek pastoral poet of the third century B.C. They Are Returning Poem commissioned by Maclean's Magazine in honour of the returning Canadian servicemen 35 'Quisling': term created in World War n to mean a traitor or collaborator. Vidkun Quisling became head of the puppet government of Norway after the German invasion of 1940.

281 Annotations 52 'Maidanek': town in Poland, site of Jewish labour camp in World Warn 52 'Lidice': See 'Heydrich/ 1. 20. 68 'Moloch': god of the Ammonites, who sacrificed children to him. Thus, any influence which demands sacrifice of what we hold most dear. See 2 Kings 23:10 and Milton, Paradise Lost i, 392-8. 117 'the mould': penicillin 124 'Athenia': British passenger ship sunk by a German U-boat 3 September 1939 124 'Rotterdam': heavily bombed by the Germans in their invasion of Holland in World War n 140 'Vimy ... Passchendaele': sites of major battles in World War i 148 'Carentan': ancient town in the canton of La Manche in Normandy 148 'Saint L6': town in Normandy almost completely destroyed by Allied bombings in World War n. It was taken by u.s. forces in June 1944. 148 'Rouen': ancient port in Normandy, part of which was completely destroyed in World War n 148 'Cr£cy': ancient town in Normandy, site of the battle between the French and the English in 1346 156-9 'an Abbey nave ... the Norman's grave': Abbeye aux Hommes in Caen, site of William the Conqueror's tomb 162 'Hannibal's descent': Hannibal (247-^:182 B.C.), Carthaginian general who descended into Italy to invade in 217 B.C. 163 'the Arno': river in northern Italy, scene of fighting in World War ii 163 'Upper Tiber': river flowing into the Tyrrhenian Sea on Italy's west coast 164 'Arezzo': in Italy, south of Rome 164 'Cassino': The Benedictine abbey of Monte Cassino, southeast of Rome, was destroyed by Allied air attack on 14 February 1944, as it was an important observation post for the Germans. But the German defenders held the ruins until 18 May 1944, when Polish forces occupied the hill. 169 Trasimeno': large lake in northern Italy 175 'Swansea': HMCS Swansea, frigate 175 'Chilliwack': HMCS Chilliwack, a corvette 176 'the Skeena-Athabascan' (usual spelling 'Athabaskan'): HMCS Skeena, destroyer sunk by torpedo 26 April 1944, and HMCS Athabaskan, also a destroyer, were both convoy escorts on the Atlantic.

282 Annotations 184 Typhoon rocket-fire': The Hawker Typhoon was a British fighterbomber, late models of which each carried eight rockets. 185 'panthers at Esquay': The Panther was a German medium-heavy tank. Esquay, short for Esquay-sur-Seulles, is a small town near Le Havre, a French port on the English Channel. 187 'Messerschmitts': various series of German fighter planes, of which the ME109 was produced in greater numbers than was any other warplane in World War n 189 'Malta': Malta was under such heavy and frequent bombardment by German aircraft that King George vi awarded the George Cross, Britain's highest decoration for civilian valour, to 'the island and people of Malta.' 191 'the artery of Kiel': The Germans built submarines at the Baltic port of Kiel. The 'artery' was the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal, which ends at Kiel. 198 'Appenines': principal mountain range of Italy 202 'Irrawady' (usual spelling 'Irrawaddy'): chief river in Burma 203 'Iroquois': HMCS Iroquois, destroyer. Because the ship served as a convoy escort on the run to Russia's northern port of Murmansk, it encountered the extreme cold of 'the North air' mentioned in this line. 204 'Scharnhorst's greetings': The German light battle cruiser Scharnhorst exchanged 'Greetings' in the form of gunfire with Canadians operating motor torpedo boats (MTB'S) in the English Channel in 1942. The Scharnhorst was sunk on 26 December 1943. 208 'Calabrian beaches': Calabria is the southernmost province of Italy. 212 'Ortona': Italian port on the Adriatic. In August 1943, Canadian troops participating in the assault on Italy. They entered Ortona at the end of that year. 213 'Scheldt': The estuary of the Scheldt River in Belgium gave access to Antwerp, 55 miles inland. In 1944, Allied troops captured Antwerp from the Germans, but then had to clear the enemy from the banks of the Scheldt estuary. This was accomplished after fierce fighting in which the Allies, mainly Canadians, suffered 13,000 casualties. 215 'Haida': HMCS Haida, destroyer 261 'Odon,' 'Orne': French rivers, scenes of fighting in the invasion of Normandy 267 'Carpiquet': town west of Caen in Normandy and scene of fighting in the summer of 1944

283 Annotations 287 'Foggia': capital of the Italian province of that name 287 'Ancona': northern Italian port on the Adriatic 288 'Ceprano': in Italy, south of Rome 288 'Capua': in Italy, south of Rome 291 'Dieppe': French port on the English Channel. Allied forces, mainly Canadian, raided Dieppe on 19 August 1942. Three-quarters of the 5,100 Canadians were killed or wounded. 291 'Authie': river in Flanders, on the boundary between France and Belgium, that empties into the North Sea 291 'Falaise': city in Normandy. The Argentan-Falaise Gap was the gap between the Canadian and American forces in France in August 1944. 292 'Kleve,' 'Emmerich': towns close to one another in West Germany 292 'Groningen': Dutch city in the province of that name 293-7 A comparison of the 'music' of the returning servicemen's deeds to great music. 'Eroicas' suggest Beethoven's Eroica symphony; this is apt, as 'eroica' is the feminine form of the Italian word 'eroico,' meaning 'heroic.' 'Chorals' may refer to Beethoven's Choral symphony, 'Passions' perhaps to J.S. Bach's Passion of St Matthew, and Pathetiques' to the Pathetic/tie of either Beethoven or Tchaikovsky. Behind the Log For four accounts of the background and genesis of the poem, see OHLP 133-44105 'Fisher': British Admiral Sir John Fisher (1841-1920) 106 'Jellico': John Rushworth, ist Earl (1859-1935), Commander in Chief of the British fleet in World War i 108 'Coronel': port on the Pacific Ocean, site of a naval battle in 1914 in which the British were defeated 132-3 'Rear Admiral Sir Francis Horatio Trelawney-Camperdown': See OHLP 136: 'The names of the ships are authentic but the personal names are fictitious.' 201 'da da dit dit dit': dash-dash-dot-dot-dot, the number 2 in the Morse Code 299 T Kan ikke ...': Translated from the Norwegian, this means 'I cannot understand a damned word. / How in hell do they think I can / get eight knots out of my old washtub. /1 haven't had a full crew for two years. / The devil knows what I'm going / to do. You can all go to hell.'

284 Annotations 315-17 'A Danish Captain ...': The Danish captain helps the Norwegian with language because Danish and Norwegian are very similar. In 316-23 the words requiring translation are 'ikke': not; 'vaskelbalja': washtub; 'mannskap': crew. 385 'Skeena': HMCS Skeena, destroyer 386 'Kenogami/ 'Orillia,' 'Alberni': three Royal Canadian Navy ships, all corvettes 409 'Captain of the Heads': The heads are the ship's toilets. 415 'Newfie-Crowsnest screech': Screech is overproof rum. The Crowsnest was the celebrated RCN Officers' Club in St John's, Newfoundland. 424 'Diet of Worms': meeting at Worms, Germany, of the Diet, meaning representatives of the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century German Empire. The most famous in 1521 heard Martin Luther end his defence of his position with the words 'Here I stand. I cannot do otherwise. God help me. Amen.' 462 'Asdic': device giving the range and bearing of a metallic object under water 487 'Helmholtz': Hermann von Helmholtz (1821-94), German scientist noted for his theory about the conservation of energy and for his work on nerve cells 487 'Doppler': Christian Doppler, nineteenth-century Czech scientist, who discovered the Doppler Principle that motion changes the refrangibility of light 488 'Rayleigh': John William, Lord Rayleigh, nineteenth-century English physicist 489 'Langevin': Paul Langevin (1872-1946), French mathematician who developed the Langevin theory of paramagnetism 489 'Fresnel': Augustin Jean Fresnel (1788-1827), French physicist and pioneer in optical theory 490 'Pindarics': odes in the style of Pindar (522-442 B.C.), Greek lyric poet 490 'Laplace': Pierre Simon, Marquis de Laplace (1749-1829), great French mathematician and astronomer 492 'Robert Boyle': the Honourable Robert Boyle (1627-91), Irish physicist, and a founder of modern chemistry 512 'cordon sanitaire': French for 'sanitary cordon.' Russia's tsarist government collapsed in 1917 and the Bolsheviks took over. After World War n the Allies hoped the small nation states of Eastern

285 Annotations Europe would provide a 'cordon sanitaire' against the spread of Communism in Europe. 581 'green four-o': starboard forty degrees 582 The ping-g-g with its death's head identity': echo from the asdic, which gives the range and bearing of a metallic object underwater such as a submarine 587 'E.R.A.': engine room artificer 603 'Krupp's': German steel manufacturers 694 'Tirpitz': Alfred von Tirpitz (1849-1930), German admiral who began the construction of submarines in World War i 718 'bruinine': an invented word meaning 'bruinlike' or 'bearlike.' 'Bruin' was the name given the bear in the medieval English beastfable, Reynard the Fox. 723 'herrenvolk': master race 811 'patterns': patterns of depth charges dropped by the escorting ships 816 'O.D.': ordinary seaman 816 'middle watch': midnight to four A.M. 879 'Aeneas': hero of Virgil's epic, The Aeneid, who fought against the Greeks in the Trojan war 903 'the Peggy': seaman on lookout duty, often called upon to do odd jobs in a watch 1119 Alamein': The 23-4 October 1942 Battle of Alamein in North Africa saw the British 8th Army penetrating the German commander Rommel's positions, and on 3 November the Germans started to retreat westward. 1119 'Normandy': The landings for the D-Day invasion of France were in Normandy. Summit Meetings 7 'Caesar aut nihil': (L.) 'Caesar or nothing.' This was a motto used by Cesare Borgia (1475-1507), a Spanish noble who became Pope Alexander vi. 22 'summum': (L.) 'chief or 'supreme' Newfoundland Calling 20 'Matthew': name of the small ship in which John Cabot sailed in 1497 from Bristol to Canada's east coast. He landed on 24 June, but it is not established if he made his first landfall in Labrador, Newfoundland, or on Cape Breton Island.

286 Annotations 28 'Avalonian': of the Avalon Peninsula, Newfoundland 56 'Sir Humphrey Gilbert': English seaman (1539-83) who took possession of Newfoundland for Queen Elizabeth i in 1583 56 'Captain George': Captain George Vancouver (1758-98), British navigator who explored the northwest coast of North America in 1791-2 Newfoundland Seamen 5 'Grenfell': Sir Wilfred Grenfell (1865-1940), English medical missionary who served in Labrador and Newfoundland for forty years 5 'Bartlett': Robert Abram Bartlett (1875-1965), arctic explorer, native of Newfoundland 23-4 'A rescue squad ... healing hands': Sir Frederick Banting (1891-1941), co-discoverer of insulin, and a good friend of Pratt, died in Newfoundland when the plane on which he was travelling to Britain crashed near Gander. The Last Watch 7 'codein dots': Codein is a drug that contracts the pupils of the eyes. Myth and Fact 26 'Cyclopean': Cyclops was a legendary giant with only one eye, in the centre of his forehead. The Deed For Pratt's comments on this poem, see OHLP 145. Magic in Everything For Pratt's comments on this poem, see OHLP 49. Towards the Last Spike For Pratt's accounts of the poem's genesis and intention, see OHLP 145-53 • 40 Thomas': See John 2o:25ff. 75 'fell of Grampian rams': hide of rams in the Grampians, Scottish mountains 82 'Bannockburn': In the battle of Bannockburn, Scotland, on 24 June 1314, the Scots under Robert Bruce defeated the English forces of Edward n.

287 Annotations 83 'Culloden': On 16 April 1746, England's Duke of Cumberland defeated the Scots under Prince Charles Edward Stuart at Culloden, Scotland. 83 'the warnings of Lochiel': See Thomas Campbell's 'Lochiel's Warning.' The hero of the poem is Donald Cameron, 'the gentle Lochiel/ who, against his better judgment, supported Prince Charles Edward Stuart at Culloden. 88 'Scots wha hae': See the 1793 poem 'Scots, Wha Hae' by Robert Burns. 'Wallace' is Sir William Wallace, 0.272-1305, Scottish warrior in wars against the English. 89 'Angus': Richard B. Angus (1836-1922), banker and financier. A former general manager of the Bank of Montreal, he helped to form the Canadian Pacific Railroad syndicate in 1880 and remained a director until his death. 90 'Fleming': Sir Sandford Fleming (1827-1915), appointed chief engineer to the CPR in 1871 91 'Hector': Sir James Hector (1834-1907), geologist, discoverer, in 1857, of the Kicking Horse Pass 91 'Dawson': Simon James Dawson (1820-1902), road builder, commissioned in 1868 to build a corduroy road between Lake of the Woods and the Red River, which became known as the Dawson Route 92 '"Cromarty" Ross': James Ross (1843-1913), engineer born in Cromarty, Scotland. In 1883 he took charge of the construction of the CPR west of Winnipeg. 92 'Beatty': Henry Beatty (1834-1914), a Scot who in 1882 resigned as manager of the Northwest Transportation Company to take charge of a Great Lakes steamship line being organized by the CPR. 93 'Bruce': James Bruce, 8th Earl of Elgin (1811-63), Governor-General of Canada from 1847 to 1854 93 'Allan': Sir Hugh Allan (1810-82), financier who with the backing of American financiers founded the Canadian Pacific Railway Company in 1871, of which he was president from 1872 to 1873, when the Pacific Scandal broke in the House of Commons 93 'Gait': Sir Alexander Tilloch Gait (1817-93), first minister of finance in the new Dominion, a man with strong interests in the Grand Trunk Railroad 93 'Douglas': Sir James Douglas (1803-77), tne 'Father of British Columbia/ first governor of the province from 1858 to 1863

288 Annotations 94 'Stephen': Sir George Stephen (1829-1921), president of the CPR 1881-8. A Montreal businessman, president of the Bank of Montreal, he, along with Richard Angus and Donald Alexander Smith, formed the syndicate that organized the CPR in 1880. 94 'Smith': Sir Donald Alexander Smith, Lord Strathcona (1820-1914), commissioner of the Hudson's Bay Company 1870-4. As independent MP for Selkirk, 1871-88, he voted against Macdonald in the debate over the Pacific Scandal. As a member of the syndicate he gave crucial support to the CPR in 1880 and drove the last spike in 1885. 100 'Sir John A.': Sir John A. Macdonald (1815-91), first Prime Minister of Canada 112 bull's beef: bully beef, which is canned beef 131 Tupper': Sir Charles Tupper (1821-1915), premier of Nova Scotia 1864-67, a Father of Confederation, MP 1867-84. As Minister of Railways and Canals, 1879-84, he introduced the bill that gave the CPR its charter in 1881. 131 'Cartier': Sir George Etienne Cartier (1814-73), Joint Premier of United Canada 1857-62 and Father of Confederation, one of Macdonald's chief supporters in building the CPR 151-4 'Hudson ... McClintock of The Search': a roll-call of Arctic explorers, which includes Henry Hudson (?-i6n), John Davis (ci55O-i6o5), William Baffin ^1584-1622), Sir Martin Frobisher (^1535-94), Sir John Franklin (1786-1847), Sir James Clark Ross (1800-62), Sir William Edward Parry (1790-1855), Sir Henry Kellett (1806-75), Robert John Le Mesurier McLure (1807-73), and Sir Frederick McClintock (1819-1907) 159 'Dead March': from Handel's sacred oratorio Saul, C1739. See 2 Samuel i\vjit. 171 'Capella': one of the brightest three stars in the northern hemisphere 172 'Cassiopeia': a constellation 174 'Aries,' 'Cygnus': constellations 183 'Selkirk': Lord Selkirk's Red River Colony, known also as the Selkirk Settlement, was settled by Scottish immigrants in 1812. 198 'the massacre at Seven Oaks': near Winnipeg, 19 June 1816, in which the Metis killed Robert Semple, the governor of the Red River Colony, and twenty of his men 199 Temmican War': the conflict between the Northwest Company and the Red River settlers. Pemmican was dried meat, together with

289 Annotations melted fat and dried fruits, pounded into a paste and made into cakes. It was originally a native Indian food. 228 'Cazadero/ 'Mendecino' (usual spelling 'Mendocino'): California towns 230 'Santa Rosa/ 'Santa Monica': California towns 234 '"Rio de nuestra senora de buena guia"': Spanish for 'river of our lady of safe conduct' 239 'San Diego': short for San Diego de Alcala, a Spanish saint after whom San Diego, CA is named. 257 'Disraeli': Sir John A. Macdonald resembled Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield (1804-81), prime minister of England in 1868 and 1874-80 Notes following 264 'Moberly': Walter Moberly (1832-1915), engineer, who in 1853 sought a route through BC for a transcontinental railway and in 1865 discovered Eagle Pass. In 1870 he took charge of mountain surveys for the CPR. 'Huntington': Lucius Huntington, Liberal MP 264 'Blake': Edward Blake (1833-1912) was premier of Ontario 1871-2. He became federal Liberal party leader in 1880, being succeeded by Laurier in 1887. 303 'Knights of Malta': Originally known as Knights Hospitallers, they were organized in the nth century to aid Christian pilgrims in Palestine. 330 'damning correspondence': the correspondence between Sir Hugh Allan of Montreal and George W. McMullen of Chicago. McMullen and his Chicago group wanted a large part of the CPR to be in the U.S. and controlled by Northern Pacific. Sir Hugh wanted to run the line and profit from it. 331 'That Montreal-Chicago understanding': In 1871 Sir Hugh Allan signed an agreement with the Chicago group that the line would run from below Sault Ste Marie, Ontario, through the u.s. and thence up to Winnipeg. After 351 'Mackenzie': Alexander Mackenzie (1822-92), Liberal prime minister, 1873-8 368 'loaves and fishes': See Luke 9:i6ff. 370 'Where are the multitudes ...': See Luke 9:i2ff. 419 'Emerson': in southern Manitoba, just above the u.s. border 444 'the Pass had its ambiguous meaning': double pun on the pass through Rockies and the 'pass' of legislation through the House

290 Annotations 483 'coureur-de-bois': literally, 'wood runner/ an unlicensed fur trader and explorer during the French regime in Canada 487 'the title of their wings': In 1865 Walter Moberly saw eagles flying through a pass in the Gold Range of the Rockies, so named it Eagle Pass. 497 'Onderdonk': Andrew Onderdonk (1848-1905), engineer and contractor, who received from the Canadian government in 1879 the contract to build the railway through the Thompson and Fraser canyons. His headquarters for the project was in Yale, BC. 543 'Chatham': William Pitt, first Earl of Chatham (1708-78) 544 'Burke': Edmund Burke (1729-97), leader of the Whig party in England in the eighteenth century, an opponent of William Pitt and his Tory government's policy on the American colonies 552 'from sea to sea': See Zachariah 9:10. 560 'tessellated': arranged in a mosaic or chequered pattern 576 'Fundy Tide': the Bay of Fundy, an Atlantic inlet between New Brunswick and Maine on the west and Nova Scotia on the east. In its upper reaches the tides rise as much as 70 feet from low water to high. After 580 'Pope': John Henry Pope, Macdonald's minister of agriculture After 580 'Mclntyre': Duncan Mclntyre, Montreal financier and builder of the Canadian Central Railway 588-90 'when a king ... His Royal Charter': charter granted to the Hudson's Bay Company on 2 May 1670. The 'king' was Charles n. 632 'Paracelsus': alternate name for Phillipus von Hohenheim (1493-1541), Swiss physician and alchemist 636 'rat-skins': muskrat pelts 647 Tadoussac': in Quebec, near the St Lawrence 647 'Anticosti': Quebec island in the Gulf of St Lawrence 662 'Kitson': Norman Wolfred Kitson (1814-88), a fur-trader who developed the line of Red River steamers in the i86os and later became an associate of James Hill in railway building 663 'Jim Hill': James Jerome Hill (1838-1916), railway builder 672 'Kennedy': Sir John Kennedy (1838-1921), chief engineer of the Great Western railway system, president of the u.s. Great Northern railway 1893-1907, member of the board of the CPR 1880-3. 673 'Duncan Mclntyre': a native of Scotland who came to Canada in 1849. A financier and railway builder, owner of the Canada

291 Annotations Central line, he was one of the signatories to the preliminary agreement of 14 September 1880, for construction of the CPR. After 683 'William Cornelius Van Home': Van Home (1843-1915) was appointed general manager of the CPR in 1882, was vice-president in 1884, president 1888-99, and chairman 1890-1910. 691 'Crinoids': Crinoid means 'lily-shaped' and is a term applied to fossilized sea-urchins. 691 Terry': Albert Perry, a mountaineer who assisted Walter Moberly and was credited by him with discovering in 1866 the pass later explored by and named after Major Rogers 732 'Zuyder Zee' (usual spelling 'Zuider Zee'): Dutch for 'Southern Sea,' a former shallow inlet of the North Sea now divided by a dam 733 'Oak Lake': Manitoba town west of Brandon 773 'Rogers': Major A.B., explorer of Rogers Pass in 1881 826 'Shaughnessy': Thomas George, first Baron Shaughnessy (18531923), president of the CPR, 1899-1918). Having joined the company as a purchasing agent in 1882, he was credited with maintaining the flow of supplies during the construction period. 839 'fish-plates': A fish-plate is a steel plate joining two railway rails. It is secured to the sides of each rail to connect them end to end. 989 'molochs': Australian thorn-lizards 989-90 'Stay on the shore ... climb the rigging': See the last four lines of the ballad The Wreck of the "Julie Plante",' by W.H. Drummond. 1052 'stegosaurs': huge dinosaurs 1070 'Douglases': Douglas firs After 1102 'Skuzzy': steamboat named after a stream draining into the Fraser which served on the Fraser between Lytton and Boston Bar 1215 'diabase': dark igneous rock 1268 'bladder-wort': type of water plant with small bags, filled with air, on its roots and stems 1290 The lady's face was flushed': Contemporary political cartoons identified the province of British Columbia as a reluctant lady and Sir John A. Macdonald as her eager suitor. 1329 'brachiapods' (usual spelling 'brachiopods)': (L.), 'arm-footed,' two-shelled water creatures are so-called because each has two spirally coiled arms around its mouth 1334 'trilobite': fossilized crustacean 1352 'mesozoic': of the geological era belonging to the age of reptiles

292 Annotations 1404 'Kiel': Louis Kiel (1844-85), Metis leader of the Red River Resistance in 1870 and of the Riel Rebellion in 1885. Riel was hanged in 1885. 1409 'Scott': Irish immigrant shot by Riel's men when he attacked some of them and threatened to kill Riel 1411 'that young, tall, bilingual advocate': Sir Wilfrid Laurier, later Prime Minister of Canada After 1483 'Revelstoke ... Baring': Lord Revelstoke, British peer, after whom Revelstoke, BC was named to honour him for his banking house, Baring's, help in financing the CPR 1485 'Athanasian': of Athanasius (£296-373), who championed the authorized Christian faith against all other interpretations, thus earning the proverb 'Athanasius contra mundum' ('Athanasius against the world') 1490 'shad-flies': flies, especially mayflies, that appear when the fish, shad, common on the Atlantic coast, are running 1507 'sparables': small, headless, wedge-shaped iron nails used in the soles and heels of boots and shoes 1593 'Flodden': In the battle of Flodden in Northumberland, 9 September 1513, English soldiers defeated James iv of Scotland's forces. 1604 'Egan': John M. Egan, General Superintendent of the CPR'S western division in 1885 1615 'Cambie': Henry I. Cambie, a government engineer engaged in building the CPR 1605 'Marcus Smith': (1815-1905), engineer-in-chief of the CPR during the absence of Sandford Fleming, 1876-8 1605 'Harris of Boston': George R. Harris, a director of the CPR 1608 'Dug McKenzie': Dugald McKenzie, locomotive engineer 1608 'John H. McTavish': land commissioner, among those present at the ceremony on 26 September 1885

Appendix A: Miscellaneous

Poems EJ. Pratt published, during his lifetime, a number of occasional poems, in such sources as World Friends and The Missionary Monthly, which he clearly did not intend as part of his serious corpus. Still others, which existed in manuscript (and which Pratt never intended to publish), were published posthumously by the Tamarack Review in 1966. These, which we have been reluctant to include in the text of his definitive work, are offered here in the interest of a complete text. That Night There Came to Bethlehem That night there came to Bethlehem Three wise men from afar, And found the manger where He lay Under the Eastern Star. No flickering lamp or candle played Its light upon the bed; A far more lovely radiance cast Its glory on his head. Though sheep and cattle were inside, Those three wise men knelt down In adoration to a king Who wore no earthly crown; And out of their heart's store they gave A love a thousand-fold More rich than what they offered there In incense or in gold.

10

World Friends, December 1930

294 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems January the First My deep resolve, this New Year's Day, As written on a page of life, Will be with honest heart to pray The world be cleansed of hate and strife. Nor shall my resolution end In empty phrases as the air The stranger shall become my friend, Not less in deed than in my prayer. There shall be neither east nor west, Nor mountain range, nor ocean tide, Where there is hunger in the breast For that which my hands may provide. To human need I pledge my part This New Year's Day in loyal pact Lord, may the motive of my heart Find no betrayal in the act.

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World Friends, January 1932

Thanksgiving Father of life that cometh from the sun And from the rain, Giver of every perfect gift enwrought With loss and gain, Lord of the spring-time - this we humbly ask, Our hands be faithful to the sowing task. Lord of the summer when with warmth and light The days are long, Sustain the labourer's will, and may his faith Be ever strong. That, with the Master's measure, shall the yield Reward the honest tillage of the field.

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295 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems Lord of the autumn, when the soul's ripe grain Is garnered in, And Christ's great heart rejoices as the world Puts by its sin, Into thy love shall all thy people come With glad thanksgiving at the harvest home. The Missionary Monthly, October 1936 Mother and Child 'We haven't a room, we haven't a bed, The inn is full' - the keeper said. In Bethlehem no place at all, But a manger of straw in a cattle stall. Not even a ray from a candle-light To pierce the darkness of the night; But from that manger and that stall The world has reared a palace hall, And from the darkness of that night The glory of celestial light. Out of the morning of that birth The loneliest mother of the earth, The woman of the Shadowed Face, Of all the mothers of our race Became the most exalted one That human eyes have looked upon. And the child from that lowly town Was destined for a finer crown Than any monarch might command From pearls and stones of sea and land.

The Manger Under the Star Of all the Father's children The lowliest ever born Was Jesus, son of Mary On that first Christmas morn.

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World Friends, December 1936

296 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems In a Judean stable Far from the world's highway, Companioned by the oxen, And cradled in the hay! And yet before that manger The wisest of the earth Came with their royal presents To celebrate His birth; While voices in the starlight Rang out in glad acclaim Hosannas in the highest And glory to His name.

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World Friends, December 1938

The Nativity Around this scene our race tried to surpass The angels in their praise, tying our tongue To anthems, building language to amass Our hopes and creeds: bells by the millions swung Where statues stood and master paintings hung And arts were found and lost in the stained glass. With all things bright and lovely on this earth And in the skies we made his diadem, And then repented for the lack of worth Within the heart-fire of each precious gem To pay our tribute there at Bethlehem, Hailing His coronation from His birth. As Morning Star, as Sun, as King - to those Emblems of light and honour to acclaim Him We added the Good Shepherd to enclose Us in His fold: still further did we name Him By the most fragrant titles that became Him The Valley Lily and Judean Rose.

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297 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems From crib to cross, from that three days' decrease Of mortal breath within a mortal shrine To that ascending hour of His release We have forgotten much, but let this line Of song - 'for He shall have dominion' - shine On our memorial flags, O Prince of Peace!

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No other name in the prophetic scroll Carries such music to the world today. For this, two thousand years ago, the whole Creation groaned: for this the peoples pray. To send this score on its triumphant way Is still the utmost travail of his soul. Canadian Home Journal, December 1949

Lines on the Occasion of Her Majesty's Visit to Canada, 1959 Landfall ahead! Throughout four centuries From deck and crow's-nest, navigators heard That call, and sailing westward reached St John's. So now a giant plane comes to rest on Torbay's earth Bright with the magic omen of nature's welcome. The fog had lifted suddenly; the clouds Dispersed, while a shaft of sunlight turned to silver The wings and body of the burnished sea-bird, And Heart's Delight and Heart's Content Were Newfoundland's once more. Then through the ancient motherlands of steadfast men The Maritimes and the princely Island And so to Joan of Arc's sweet Canadian earth Where old proud memories linger And ancient faith shines forth undimmed, Upon the St Lawrence through the locks and lakes Each mile enshrined a human saga writ Under a dynasty of names and deeds Carrier, Champlain, Brule and Nicolet, La Salle, La Verendrye, Wolfe and Montcalm, And names which left the loom of history

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298 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems But yesterday - St Lambert's Lock which trapped The cataracts and out-manoeuvred rapids, The healing waters of the fraternal Seaway Which made the inland cities ocean ports, And brought together through Queen and President Two nations and at their core a never fading dream That would not die with the night. The fervour of this international deed Was but a symbol of the glowing family hearths That greeted Queen and Prince throughout their journey. Millions lined the streets; children would carry In the impregnable treasure-house of their hearts and minds The memory of a glance, a wave of the hand, A word, a smile; singing and cheering The grace of pity and the loveliness of flowers. Leaving the seaways for the skies, The Royal guests through clouds could watch The illuminated manuscript of the prairies Unrolling through the prelude to the foothills Into the stampede's merry shivaree And Calgary's meeting place of the clear running waters. 'Damn Braces! Bless Relaxes!' wrote William Blake And certainly no hours in the Queen's procession Has less protocol and pomp and so much uninhibited joy. Much to the Queen's delight, the Prince put on A hat which like an Arab tent enclosed One half the dais. As he stood up to answer A salute, the frightened horses Threatened a premature stampede. And when the song 'Home on the Range' was sung By seventy thousand tireless throats In stanzas endless as a sailor's song, Its burden on the lips of those who sang With the accents of Alberta salted with the tang of Texas Was 'Better lo'ed ye canna' be. Will ye no come back again?' So an unheard whisper rustled through the crowd. From Calgary to the Foothills, and from there The prospect of the Rockies and the Selkirks!

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299 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems Range after range on to the Coastal Mountains. And every mile of travel to the ranges, Whether by train or car, had long been matched By the feet of prospectors, pioneers Who cut the trails through bush and forded rivers, Turned passes into thoroughfares - Selkirk With his small colony of Highland crofters Made the Red River delta, with its black Alluvial mould, the site of Winnipeg, Then added land made fertile by the flow Of the Assiniboine. Then Hearne, the first To found the posts on the Saskatchewan, The first to see the Great Slave Lake, the first To trek across the Barren lands and reach The Arctic, there to set his signature With Davis and Baffin, Franklin, Melville and Parry. And so it was when the Foothills had been crossed Great things were done when men and mountains met. At dusk the haggard hills kept their nightly vigil, But dawn and sunlight woke their radiant grandeur. Terror and wonder like twin signal flags Flew on the peaks for men to keep their distance. They needed miles to render up their beauty As if the gods in high artistic moments, Resenting the profanity of touch Chiselled this sculpture for the eye alone. Over the primeval way followed by David Thompson, Indomitable, religious, just to all men, Who mapped the lariat loop of the Columbia And traced the Fraser to its source, The Queen and Prince reached the sea, And spanned the continent. Fitting it is that resounding names of territories and realms Should mark the progress of a Queen. North by east They soared over the Coastal Range, traversed The Yukon and the great Mackenzie River, The Tundras to the Arctic's high auroras, And then south-eastward to the sea again.

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300 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems But it was not the spacious sense of distance, The eagle flight of fifteen thousand feet Above the explorers' trails 100 That made us breathless at the end. It is not easy to define what stirs the heart But this we knowWhatever it is that so becomes a Queen, Whatever it is that so becomes a Prince, Was there at its full blossoming. And now we offer love and cry Godspeed! Wishing a happy journey home through untroubled skies Nor yet is it too late to pledge their health The golden mintage of our common wealth. CBC Information Service, August 1959 ToG.B.S. How did you learn, jester and sage, The mood imperative of 'come'? Irrational was it at your age To cue your exit from the stage: More time we wished to find our sum Of knowledge - topsy-turvydom. Your clothes-line humour aired our shocks On science, social life and God, When these were pitched upon the rocks. O weird Hibernian paradox, 10 You smiled when cupboarding the rod You and your ninety years and odd. Tamarack Review, Autumn 1966 The Doctor in the Boat His talk shortened the trip across the channel. I had the sculling oar: four others rowed. The silent skipper cushioned in the foresheets, His white lips like a vise, clutched at his side.

301 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems We wore forebodings like our mitts and oilskins. A flight of waterfowl, a patch of fog, A shape of cloud at evening, meant Tomorrow. We breathed beliefs out of the air and vapour. The doctor spent his time in shredding them. A hundred yards ahead a bird was swimming, The foulest thing in feathers - land or sea, With sepia wings, black tips, and crest of quill. We knew the ledge cleft where it nested, smelled The thing before we saw it, often watched The bird take off with slow laborious vans Against the wind, tumbling, fumbling the air, Until it straightened out. Now there it was, A running blister on the water's face, Keeping its distance, matching webs with oars, Skiff, bird, and hospital - the same dead line. An omen, sure of that. The doctor spoke Of things like balance, purpose - balance? Yes, We got that from a dory in a gale, From weights and springs and piling rock in holds Through lack of cargo. Purpose? Faith - we knew that; Assumed it in the meshes of a net, Or else denied it when a child was drowned. But these were matters past the doctor's 'Sharks too had purpose for the sea would rot Without them/ This too strong a dose for us; As well defend the devil, and this bird Was of like brood. We knew it raised foul weather; It would not eat clean things, lived on disease, Decay and death. The doctor caught our thoughts And countered them - 'And so does radium.' The sea was blue except for streaks of red Like gashes in an abbey afternoon, Ripples of blood around the Mission point. The bird still swam ahead, its purpose dark. An automatic faith broke from our lips: God moves in a mysterious way, but why

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302 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems Cannot he shake this omen from our minds Or keep that man from clutching at his side. Tamarack Review, Autumn 1966

To D.H. Lawrence Philosophers, what makes you so perplexed? The record is that reason has outstripped The midriff. Have you not misread your text? Has the ink faded on the manuscript? And doctors of the state who moralize On wisdom in the higher vertebrates Study the jungle for an exercise And write this older ethos on your slates. There is a blessed mercy for the sick, No mind engaged in vivisecting prey; No needles have been found probing the quick To linger in that luxury of delay.

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Not yet evolved the ceremonial dance When all night the raw cuts were building scars: They say that in Malaya kringi ants Shortened the route to death through jugulars. Tamarack Review, Autumn 1966

But Mary Kept All These Things, and Pondered Them in Her Heart Madonna! What has locked within your heart Beyond the turn of the apostle's key, Baffling the brushsweep, bankrupting the art To round the fourth upon the symphony? How much tomorrow was there in today? And did your dawn herald his setting sun?

303 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems

And did you know who shaped the tragic play With the fifth act implicit in act one? They counterpointed shadows on your face With haloes, cherubs and angelic glory. The aves were to find prophetic place With the Christ-child's fulfillment of a story: Isaiah with his blow-torch oracles, David with lineage of loins and song, And Jeremiah with his minute bells Sounding a racial heritage of wrong. 'Sufficient to this day/ he might have said, Had he but understood, could he have spoken. The mother's cheek was pressed against his head Of what solicitude was this the token? Not yet has the Transfiguration rhymed The lyric manger with the epic skies, Nor has the dusky Angelus outchimed The murmurs of the Marian lullabies. Sufficient! Was it not indeed enough That his birth, life and death should be the themes Of Israel, and not as now the stuff Of kings - a nightmare packed in Herod's dreams? And topping this were Caesar's bulletins Which meant the stripes and prison to refuse: The taxes cut into the household bins And lowered the oil level in the cruse.

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Did these El Greco hands tighten to clutch Him when he stumbled? Did the heightened pace Of pulse, the spasm of breath, call forth as much Maternal worry as madonna grace? Who slaked those torrid hours as they went by Before he reached his three-years' thoroughfare, And ended it with that Golgotha cry Through which he passed into another's care. Tamarack Review, Autumn 1966

304 Appendix A: Miscellaneous Poems The Head of the Firm Formed out of oil and gas - his local fame, The vulgar had it that he 'rolled in dough/ A self-made man, such was his boast - his name Was Puff sky, head of Fungus, Rotte and Co. His eyes were beady and his head was swollen, He was the law of God unto himself, He posed alike as Croesus and as Solon, Lord of the county town by right of pelf. His vesper prayer was that he should increase In wealth and power so that his name should pass Around the earth - a household word for grease, For fats and all varieties of gas.

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And so one night it happened that his name Broke through the confines of this mortal ken, Ballooned into the Stardust and became The gossip of the gods as well as men. Above his head, creating day from night, The milkmaid's path shone like a drift of snow, Millions of suns, and stars yet sending light Had quenched their fires a thousand years ago.

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'Who's that?' growled out the Great Bear to the Lion; Quoth Leo, one eye cocked, 'Hanged if I know!' But Aldebaran whispered to Orion, That's Puff sky, Head of Fungus, Rotte and Co.' Tamarack Review, Autumn 1966

Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Edited by Susan Gingell Clay PERSONS Julian. Thaddeus, a seer. Friends of Julian. Merrivale, a traditionalist. Penrose. Travellers. Donaldson. Voices and Echoes. Scene: Near a village situated on the rocky shore of an island in the Atlantic. Act i. Scene i. Time: The fall of 1913 A.D. Penrose and Donaldson travelling along the shore in the direction of the village. Penrose: A lonely figure is this Julian. He dwells somewhere along that stretch of shore, Within a rough-shaped cabin. By himself He lives, is not a native to these parts. His earlier history is unknown to men Inhabiting the coast. Some twenty years Ago he landed here; lodged for a time

306 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama In a small village, then moved out, Made for himself a home around those bluffs To gain more freedom from inquiring eyes.

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Donaldson: Has he no friends? Penrose: But two. One - Thaddeus, By name - as himself, who speaks Like some great prophet of the past, whose ear, Attuned to utterance of the winds, obeyed Articulate voices that to common minds Were sounds. He claims the gift of second sight, And talks as though the future could be read As easily as the past. He is beloved Of Julian; comes and goes at will; for months He may be absent, roaming, heaven knows where, But ever like a tired bird he seeks These rocks as if they were his only home.

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Donaldson: But Julian? Does he not in confidence Reveal himself? What brought him here? Penrose: His life Is as a folded scroll. It's said - and this Inferred from chance remarks and acts that speak With more insistence - that in earlier years Sorrow had taken hold upon his heart, Death or betrayal, ruined hopes or such, For none has seen him laugh, or heartily Enter upon those common joys that bind Together men in groups; yet is he kind; Men take their injured to him, for his hand Is skilful as a surgeon's, and he knows, They say, the secret of all herbs. He heals Their sick, and by his silent craft he weaves A spell upon their minds. Sometimes a lad Is taken from the water, stiff and cold, And drowned for aught they know. He stretches out His body, moves his arms, and blows a stream

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307 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Of breath through the lad's nostrils, and the lad Revives. They claim he calls him from the dead. They love him with a feeling bred of awe, For often do they see him stand at night Upon the shore, and with no audience But waves and rocks declaim as unto men. Or sometimes near his hut will villagers Pass by, and hear him holding with his friends An eager converse. Donaldson: Know you anything About the matter of their speech? Penrose: I met This Julian once, by accident, some years Ago. It was while travelling down the coast, In search of stories of the famous wrecks In which these parts abound. He bade me stay A night before proceeding to the town Ten miles to the south. Of all the men That ever crossed my path he was the strangest. Guarded at all times when he thought I tried To stir a memory; masterful in mind He was, as I remember, when with speech Most trenchant, he descanted on those themes That ever burn within the hearts of men. A nature fierce and passionate; his soul Smoked with the hottest vapours of revolt Against the ground-plans of our mother-earth. His face was of fine cast; his stature tall; His eyes took on the bluer edge of flame Beneath grey brows; this was at times displaced By softer hues, for he was as a child In singleness of heart and guileless ways; And vulnerable to pain - another's pain. Strange that he looked obliquely on the world He lived in; everywhere that human feet Had trod he saw the Satyr's hoof; a core Malevolent inhered in life; the ape

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308 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Was grinning through men's eyes and teeth, and this Marked all his utterance with a tragic note. Donaldson: Has he abandoned all that men call faith In human goals? Penrose: Yes. It would seem that pain Had crushed it out, nor was there, so I thought, A Stoic side to which he might retreat, As a last refuge from his ills. His head Though bowed beneath white hair was often raised Rebellious when I hinted at control. Control! Restraint! That did not give but took Away the final weapon of defiance.

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Donaldson: With what new scaffolding would he then rebuild This world, how take revenge on nature's laws, When these are governed only by obedience? Penrose: He may disclose that when we visit him.

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Donaldson: What was the manner of his life when left Alone within his house? Penrose: He was well versed In lore of bird and beast; a naturalist, But with a deeper interest in the life Of men. He studied sinews, nerves and joints, Pored over charts of arteries and veins, And casts of human brain and skull and heart, His house was full of closets tenanted By ghastly forms, some dried, some spirit-soakedWith these his time was spent. Donaldson: Of whom you spoke.

There was another

Penrose: Ah, pardon - Merrivale; A different sort who does not understand

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309 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama The moody genius of his friend, is given To argument, is fond of statutes, saws, Rescripts and sanctities, 'it hath been said,' Or 'written down/ and other volubles, Wherewith he must defend a stable world Against this heady challenger. These three In an odd strand of friendship mingle here Upon occasion. I am told that now They are here. Shall we visit them? Donaldson:

Agreed.

Act i. Scene ii. Evening. The shore. A storm brewing. Julian: Swift has the darkness settled on the deep; A moment past, and lurid streaks of day Were casting fitful splendours on the waves. Retiring, they have left the greying sea Mantled in gloom. With slow and laboured hands The crawling waters tumble round the shore, Or swung upon the pivot of the tides Against the frontal basement of the cliffs, They shudder and recoil. Black fissured crags That hugely range along the tortuous coast, The eternal bulwarks of the earth's domain, Loom silent, and with sides encased with mail Of streaming basalt intercept the sea. Within the narrowing gulch that sunders cliff From cliff, the rising sea-gulls veer and scream, And for a moment on the boulders worn By ceaseless surge, small phantom-flitting birds Of mottled pinions - vanguards of the storm Alight, and soon are gone. Now overhead Breaks loud the thunder, and in blazing scrawl, The lightning burns its signet on the clouds. Now rain, and squally winds like birds of prey Pounce on the feathering waves, while from the shore,

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310 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama From breakers, and from lightless caverns rise The rebel inquisitions of the night, Strange querulous cries, half-dumb, half-understood ... And so does man's existence find its form Envisaged in the ocean's eyeless face Swept by the besom of the winds. Its lines, Its furrows, all its corrugated cares Are mirrored in its gulfs. Dark Nature's minions Break from the leash of law, and each with each Contending, joins the universal strife; Winds claw rebellious seas; the billows spit Their salted rheum upon the rocks, are cuffed, And broken in return. The Atlantic plants Its heel of death upon the transport's hull, Strides over the breaker's line; bludgeons the Cape, And flung in thunder from the embattled brows Of jag and bluff, reels with a drunkard's tread Along the shore, and falls upon the beach. (Julian goes in.)

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i Voices of Wind and Wave: Who calls when the winds Sweep forth from their lair? What chariots are those That plunge through the air? What utterance, what mien Attends the wild form Of the rider that sits On the back of the storm? Whose feet and whose wings Contend for the prize? Seraphs and dragons Harrow the skies. What riot, what clamour Comes in from the waves?

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311 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Triton is lashing His brook in the caves. What medley of voices? A strange chorus - this, Anguish and rapture, Frenzy and bliss.

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Sea-nymphs are dancing In mad festal glee, As the winds tear down On the face of the sea. Loud bugles are sounding The death of the day; The Furies have driven The Pities away. Hark! through the orgy Escapes a low tone; Death draws from the heart Of life's laughter a moan.

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There - on the stones Of a desolate shore, A cry would out-bid The night and its roar. Two hands are outstretched On the grey waters wild Grey waters that roll By the grave of a child. ii

A man speaks: Was that a cry you say you heard? Where? No. The winds would drown it quite. No sound would reach the shore tonight, Except the scream of some wild bird.

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312 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama A flash you say that cut the rain Like a red knife? It could not be; There's nothing living in this sea. Don't look so frightened. What - again! The life-boat! They are hailing me. They need a man for the stern oar; The wind drives dead upon the shore; A rudder's helpless in this sea.

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A woman speaks: No. That was not a scream I heard; One could not hear so far away. That flash was but the breaker's spray, That cry - the note of some wild bird. in

Aha! the might of the winds; They are up and awake, On the land and the sea, How they crash, how they break

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On the cedar and oak, On the pine and the elm, On the mast and the sail, On the boom and the helm. They were here and are gone, Have you hounds that may find them? If they come when you call, Have you cords that can bind them?

Be there cedars torn down By the pull of the blast, And the tempest-reared oaks Uprooted at last?

no

313 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama

Still shall be planted The sapling and seed; On the dews of the night Shall the acorn feed. Are there wrecks on the sea, Is there spoil on the land, That the lord of the storm Has flung from his hand?

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Yet peace shall descend When the tempest is stilled On the sea, and man's hands On the land shall re-build.

But tell me - Can you build the heart again, When it lies shattered by a mortal pain, Set its wine of life a-flowing, And the springtime breezes blowing Through its crust? Raise up the tendrils of life's young desires, Freshen its leaves, make red its streams, When death has crushed the trellis, when its dreams, Its flashing ardours and exultant fires Lie smothered in the dust? How soothe bereaved reason With the folded bloom of sleep, Through winter's changeless season And the night wind's sweep? Call back the heart's lost passion To a once triumphant throne, That is now grey and ashen, Untenanted, alone? Tell how - from trampled altars Smitten with the god's disdain, On the dead and formless embers Raise the sacrifice again?

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3M Appendix B: Unpublished Drama IV

What is that colour on the sea, Dotted by the white sails of ships? It is blue, you say. We know it not, and yet We know the blue of violet, The hue of mid-day skies, And the sapphire of young children's eyes, But that we do not know - unless it be The pallor of dead lips.

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That band upon the sea? A sash of green that in a moment's time Becomes a girdle of wrought gold, Held by a silver clasp of surge. It cannot be. That green is now a belt of slime, And now - an iron-knotted scourge, And now - the form of some anguineal fold. That crimson core with sepia fringe, And orange tints between, Shows how the sun's white alchemy Distils an aniline, To paint a pansy on the sea. That red is not the pansy's red, Nor what the garden poppy shows, Nor the vermilion that is spread Upon the pastel of the rose. But some deep smear that has its name In the sprawled characters of the flood, A slash of fire - a troubled flame That takes its colour from man's blood, Or from some wound in the sunset's side That bled itself dry upon the tide. v

Tarry! you flaming crests

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315 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama That with spume-gathering wings, Leap from the green-arched waves In lines of python springs.

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Is not your home, the sea? Why then with clamorous greed Do you mass upon this shore With such insatiate speed? There are no serpent's fangs, As mortal as yours are, No poison, leap and fold, But yours are deadlier far.

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The Last Voice: Hush those wild strings! nor wait until tomorrow, The wind blows in no music from the sea, The bars are noises full of gusty sorrow That filch the waters of their harmony. The hours weave no web of life's young rapture, Caught is the spirit in a deadlier snare, And Time for me shall never more recapture Lost notes that once were resonant on the air. The gull shakes back the spray with shrilling laughter, Its grace more poignant than its gay disdain; Storm clouds are banked upon the east - and after, Winds barb their lyrics with unwonted pain. Hush then the lyre! the heart knows not its singing, Let the cords snap; it were better so to be, Than this cold lure of waters, endless, bringing The bye-gones of pale faces home to me. Act i. Scene iii. A few days later.

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316 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama The house of Julian. Enter Thaddeus. Julian: Ah, Thaddeus, welcome! A full week has passed Since I expected you, and when the storm Broke down upon this coast I little thought You would be here tonight. What tidings, say? Thaddeus: The winds have spoken ill along these shores Since last I left - the old and deadly feud, Man's hand and Nature's. Everywhere on land Have tempests raged. The fighting's strange at times; The issues so confused that one mistakes Alignments in the quarrels. Thunders speak Of clashes in the clouded zones of heaven; Lightnings are hurtled on the hills, and oaks Reared at the alternate knees of sun and storm, And brought to fullest stature have been snapped, As though some hand grown jealous of their strength Had struck them with design. Floods scoured the plains, And with fast-swelling rivers caught alike The roots of plants and trees, bearing them down In drift and eddy to the futile sea. And on the labour of man's hands was sent The hail. It threshed the summer's ripening grain Upon the eve of autumn's garnering. The worm was busy in the leaf, and frost Caught unawares the greenness of the herb. The labourer brought his horses to the stalls At fall of night and weary went to sleep, Dreaming of harvests at the morn, and woke To find his dreams elusive as the clouds That rolled their mocking shadows on the wheat The day before. Upon the land was lost The harvests of the fields; upon the sea, A vaster ruin, for the littoral Was strewn with broken masts and plated shards Of hull and funnel.

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317 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Julian:

Life?

Thaddeus: The loss was great Beyond the count. Transport and battleship, Light sloop and open boat all yielded up Their freight of life. The weaker ships were caught Close to their ports and paid the penalty Of weakness, while the iron-framed that staked Their bulwarks up against the mightier winds, Lost on their daring; - so for great and small, A common ending.

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Julian: No one yet has learned To trick the mastery of her clenched hand, By force or by evasion, whether spars Or heads of humans. Thaddeus: There's no bias shown, No mercy but an even-graded scale Whereby the distribution goes to all Alike - unless it be for those white forms, The spotless models of her workmanship, The native sea-gulls artless as the foam On which they ride.

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Julian: But other things of shape Less cunning, structures of the brain of men, Are with their authors hideous to her eye, Vain pictures of the things they seem, but meant For frolic and derision. Thaddeus: Losses grow Each hour the toll comes in. The seamen ask Among themselves - 'Was ever such a storm?' Then shake their heads. Lighthouses, docks and quays Were washed away, and nothing left but piles And pitiable clumps of ruined masonry. The finest monuments of the builder's craft Fell far below their calculated might.

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318 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Julian: Thus ever has it been. The raft, the skiff, Pinnace and coracle knew no worse fate When men a thousand years ago tried out Their perilous chances on the ocean lanes. Thaddeus: The oar, the sail, the paddle and the screw Are patterns of a moving tragedy That men misread. They think by laboured art They have snared the magic of the wind's uprising, And its down-sitting. Shall it blow today, Tomorrow and the next? They answer 'Yes/ Pointing to zones and pressures, isobars, Circles and lines they smugly pencil out Upon a map a hand-breadth square. 'Here are,' They say/the treasuries of the snow, and here, The chambers of the hail and rain, and lo! The East will soon be garmented with clouds, And a thick darkness. Then shall be driven out The thunders from their lair, and lightnings loosed Shall travel in these paths. The line is stretched Upon the flood and all the measures laid. Listeth the wind to blow? Nay, it is set By a determinate birth, passes and dies; So whence it comes and whither goes are known By place and time appointed.' While they speak, The winds commence to blow, and answering, say 'Come, we will make you one with the driven foam, And throw you on the breakers and the reefs, With our wet fingers will we comb your hair, And paint you with the blood of sea-weed, glaze Your brows upon the beach until they glow With the inveterate pallor of the coral. When found you out the swiftness of our feet, Or took the measure of our spread of wing? When snatched you from our hands the keys of death? Lo - here the gates are open, pass you through. Julian: Aye, every step upon the grade seems vain, And every boast a signal of distress.

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319 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama The halliard, and the rocket, roar of gun, The code's weird speech that would out-wit the air Are helpless blazons when the tempest stops The ear and seals the sight. For now tonight, Upon the waves, Death flags the running storm With signs of more imperious beckoning, Than those which from the wireless deck flash out Their dots and dashes of a giant loss.

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Thaddeus: At every gust a heart breaks. Julian: Yes, that is The final victim of all shock. Thaddeus! A gambler's been at work upon this job, Or else a journeyman that did not learn His trade too well, and left somewhere a flaw, Spoiling a nobler plan. Look you at this, (Showing him the model of a heart) This crimson floodgate of our human life, Where beat all mortal currents - strife and fear, Despair and anguish, guile and false pursuits, The sport of flotsam and of eddying ends. Within these sluices run the world's lost tides, Its passions smothered under stress of years Forgotten. Shadows leap upon the floods Cain's ruthless hand still clenched in bloody thrust Against a brother; Saul's dark javelin poised In silhouette against a curtain fold; The furtive bend of Borgia over a vial; Attila's sword and heel of Tamerlaine All governed by this little vagus here. Dark hidden pourings! In these cloistered depths, What strange essay of life - the noon-tide flush Bears the high pulse of challenge, that out-go Of hope and purpose infinite, life's crests, Its far horizons and resplendent goals. This nerve gets weak, the tides fall to the ebb, And the dim prescience of untrod tomorrows Steals in upon our dreams. But wait - a drug

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320 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Is brought, a poison with your leave, and look! What chances toss again within the veins, An empire or a scaffold, throne or cell; Pleasure, a foundling on the steps of pain, Life at close grips with death; the backward sway Of hope within a treacherous grasp; a slip, An errant step that turning from the road A hair-breadth, unretrieved, moves into night, And vacancy, wherein no moon nor stars Cast any light. Is it not so, my friend? This shapely auricle, you see, is deaf To all the tragic meanings of its beats. What wayward laws! Whose codes? Whose fond caprice? Where triumphs, gains, fulfilments follow sharp Upon the heels of loss, and these again Pursued by strivings unachieved. What race, What conflict, this, wherein the one who wins Must watch the many fall, the weary fail, Where love must freely take, for what it gives, Its fair requital in the loved one lost. Who bargained for these ends, staged life's regrets, Its issues in the gambler's leaded throw?

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Act i. Scene iv. Penrose, Donaldson and Merrivale in Julian's house. Julian: You cleared the channel in the nick of time, My friends. I know that piece of water; twice I crossed it in a stouter skiff than yours, And found that, though the wind was moderate, The tide-rips swung the tiller side to side, Lurching the steersman up against the gunwales. Penrose: The glass was dropping heavily when we left, But yet we took our chances as the wind, Though east, and rising fast, was in our favour. Donaldson: By the time we were half-way across, the sea

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321 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Was breaking high over the stern. We ran Nigh water-logged into a neighbouring cove Where, in a fisherman's home we stayed, storm-bound Till yesterday. Penrose: We go to Copper Cliff Donaldson has interests there - thence to Gull River, And finally to Whale Harbour where we spend The winter. But remembering my last trip To this place six or seven years ago, The shelter of this roof, I turned aside To see you once again, and brought my friend.

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Julian: You are welcome to what modest cheer this house Affords. Penrose: Your kindness leaves us in your debt. (A little later) Donaldson: How the sea must scourge this shore in heavy wind! Your house withstood the storm. Julian: That dusky crag Lay right athwart its path and happily Shattered its force. Donaldson: Upon our way we saw Many a house in ruin. Julian: Ruin! No. That is a word that seaman never use For such a loss. It is too light a thing To count when they are dragging for their dead. Donaldson: Does such destruction always mark the wake Of storms? Julian:

I have not known it otherwise.

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322 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Donaldson: I talked with old sailors as we came Along the shore. They spoke in simple words About the winds and fog and heavy seas, Much as they did about the calm and sunshine. There must be compensations in their life To take it so. Julian: The words belie their feelings. They know one language - that of resignation. It is the common tongue the world, in part, Has learned. It's mastered here.

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Donaldson: It is a phase Of struggle merely - still to be out-run; It's nature's way, were it so known, to match Each harm with good. Julian: The key to that fine mood Of hers, if ever in man's grasp, is lost; For such a temper rarely finds its lines Engraved on nature's strategy. She strikes Beneath masked skies, and takes a fouler hold, When man is on his knees - a suppliant. Penrose: I spoke to one who years ago had lost His craft in mid-Atlantic. It was manned By his four sons and others next of kin. He spoke as if his life was somehow reared Above the incident of pain. He lived Within a house so near the shore the spray Could swish the window-panes, and yet his eye, It seemed, saw not the sea, nor was his ear Touched by the louder winds.

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Julian: I have known such eyes That do not see, such ears that do not hear. Penrose: It is a discipline that men have learned To brace the soul against life's heavier blows.

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323 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Julian: And this contentment you would make the balm To human ill, to live, yet to forget Life's sorrows as in isolation? Penrose:

Yes.

Julian: It is a lesson that before it's learned, A man must first unman himself to read. Teach him to think without his brain, to walk Without his legs, to lift lead-weighted hours With shoulders paralysed. It is an art Whose subtlety is such as human wit May not unravel - how so to pronounce Commands, 'Do this, be that,' that the achievement Shall follow on the vocals. Life moves not Upon such strange and jointless steppings. See That cabin yonder by that wind-torn shore. Till yesterday, a lamp was placed upon the sill; Each regular night it cast its beams to sea. It was a beacon to a skiff that ran Its daily hazards in the fog and storm. Last night it was not lit. Say to the heart Of her whose care it was to tend the flame 'You must now journey forth alone; gird up Your strength; your loss is but an accident That touches not the vitals of your being; The soul may now in fortitude declare Aloofness to the earth; its dignity Is brought to stature here.' Is not the voice That prattles off such nursery rhymes as these Reduced to impotence by those stern tones, With which the sea makes answer to the shore? The lamp is out. The heart that lighted it Died with the smoulder of the wick. Merrivale: How now? You do not reckon well your words, nor know Within whose hands are light and darkness held, At whose command the storm leaps, by whose breath

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324 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Silence and peace, when the loud tumult ends, Are ushered on the deep. A Monarch's voice Speaks, and the challenged sea obeys His will. Julian: The North wind calls the waters and they rise; The East wind thunders and the deeps are stirred; They know no other voice - no mastery Save that of wind, and man's uplifted hands, Clutching in frenzy at the spray, sink down As helpless as his cries, and there is found No eye to pity and no will to save.

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Merrivale: Is not this treason's speech? Julian: There is no power Above the winds, or else those pale drawn faces Would not be tossed in eddies on the waves. Merrivale: It is not given us to understand Those devious paths that mark His sovereignty. His ways are dark, yet are His counsels good.

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Julian: What Shepherd, this, that so attends his flocks, As leads them out into the wilderness, Up bramble-steeps and cliffs and pathless moors, Where they are caught within the storms white drifts, Or scattered by the wolves? What Father, this, Who cares so little for his children's fate, That though he holds the sea within his hands, He pours its floods upon their heads, lets loose His lightnings, blasts and stalking pestilences, Although, it's said, that by his name's great power, They could be held, mute, harmless, near his throne, Chained to its pillars? Why his children's cry Less urgent than the thunder's reckless laugh, Or the unheeding foam upon the reef? Who calls him Father; hears his Shepherd's voice; Knows him as Friend, Physician, Master, King? The subject's head falls crushed within the wheels

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325 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Of some immaculate law. The sower swings A tiring arm on arid soil bestrewn With thorns and stones. A sufferer calls in pain, In the lone watches of his couch, and hears No answer save the leaden brush of wings Against the window-pane. The son's last right To heirship, to inheritance of love Is spurned upon the doorstep of his home, His kinship cancelled, and his brother's ties Dissolved in mutual blood. Named you him Father? God? No. Rather a Potter with some clay.

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Act n. Scene i. Two years later. In a small harbour town. An old man speaks: Great lads those! Every one reliant, firm, Steady of step - muscle and bone storm-hinged, Yet supple as the fine battalion's lines In which he swings. Straight-eyed with face clean-bronzed In the clear sparkle of the morning's light. How well the khaki takes the October sun, Fits the square shoulders, matches cheek and hand. That lad there, see! third line, first on the left Mine! youngest one of four, turned twenty-one, Blue eyes, and hair light-brown. Two months ago, He left the ship, and with two other brothersThe second and the oldest, both big lads He joined the colours. Soon, at dawn, they say, Tomorrow, they are off. God wish them well. Fragments from a Field i

Action - tomorrow! So the make-believe Is ended. Well! This mock manoeuvring Grows flat month in and out, this bodiless thrust

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326 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama At sand-bags, punch and parry, battledore, Sniping at dummies; capturing, paper-planned, Your country's trenches. Rain, parades and mud, Your daily menu. Front lines then tomorrow. Game, are you for the show?

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No - Yes. What's that You said? I didn't hear. Why, yes, I'm game. Say, did you post that letter, yesterday, I gave you? Thanks. I wanted to make sure. 2

A dud! God! what a narrow shave. Twas big Enough to clean the dug-out up, and make A crater where a regiment could hide At a sharp pinch. They're counter-strafing now. Wonder how long it will last. Must be barrage.

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Here - two of them. Locked close together. Ha! Black Watch and Brandenburger. Heavens! The Scot Knew well his bayonet's trick - Clear cut, right through; Must have been struck himself, same time, to fall Like that. Yes - shrapnel through the neck and shoulder, A vicious cut. Pull back his arm and head. You would not think they had the strength or life To come to grips like that, after being hit. A husky chap the Scot. The stretcher - Lift! 4

Here, on the double. Cut that out. That shell Is half a mile off. What's in this pit? A clear half-dozen - tangled up in skeins; The first one dead, and this, ... and so, the sixth, That's all. Make for that clump of wire.

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327 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama This rain

Beats like a flood.

The smoke's too thick to see. The slime's a mile deep. Here, over here, Three - four, alive; let's get this fellow out, He's got it worst. Another - looks like dead. Eh? Take no chances that way. Get him out. They are all alike, except for size. This grime Has plastered them, you'd never know by face, Which one was which.

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This fellow's come to life He says his leg is broken. Easy there. 5

(At the base) Gangrene! Why, how is this? Must have remained Some time on field - Three days he must have been. Expected something big, but hardly thought The show would last so long. The padres said They couldn't account for all. The fire was hell. The bases are all crammed to overflow, The stream's unending. Will that fellow live?

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328 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama The chances are against. Must amputate At thigh. He'd stand a chance one out of ten, But for his lungs. The lethal struck him hard. 6

(Next morning) How is that fellow - number 6, Ward A? Dead, sir. He died two hours ago. Fine lad, Big-shouldered, tall. It's just the kind they kill; A game sport, so they said - from overseas. A sailor. I was near him when he died, And heard him in his dreams talk broken words About a ship his father owned, and seals, And ice, and the big pay he got one spring.

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Cries Afar Off

i Now let the earth take Into its care, All that it travailed for, All that it bare. Leaves of the forest, Yellow and red, The drifting and scattered, The dying and dead. Grass of the hill-slopes, Sickled and dried, Vines that over-night Blasted and died. Blossoms and flowers Nipped with the cold,

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329 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Trees that have fallen A century old. Moths of the candle-flame, Gnats from the stream, Wraiths from the moonlight, Spectres of dream.

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All that the earth gave, All that it bare With all its wide kindred Of water and air. 2

White lilies of death, Fragrant and mild Can you sweeten the breath Of this little child? Your petals so waxen, So moist in the air, Lie strewn in the flaxen Folds of her hair.

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Pale lilies, pale leaves! Can you add to her grace, To the paleness that cleaves To her brow and her face? Bring rather wild roses, That the sunlight distils From the wine of the morn,From the dew of the hills. Quick! Scatter them faster On her brow and her hair, Her face is too pale, Her brow is too fair.

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330 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Only the red ones, The richest, the best, Bring hither - and shed On her hands and her breast. Blood of the rose, Heart of the wild! Why will you not beat In the pulse of this child?

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O rose of dreams That blooms at night, Shedding thy crimson Shafts of light! On whose dark web Was this magic caught? Out of what ray Was this loveliness wrought?

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Day - with its glooms That wearily creep, Night - with full colours, Fragrance and sleep. Rose! what legend is this? Heartache and pain Changed by a charlatan's touch To garlands again. Midnight and rest When must it cease, This union of shadow With gladness and peace? Rose! thy petals are ash.

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331 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Remains now the thorn With the passing of dreams, With the coming of morn. 4

Snowfall on a battle-field Compassion of heaven, From night's crystal bars, Falling so gently In wreaths of white stars;

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Petals of mystery, Culled in far lands, Crosses of Calvary, Wrought by strange hands. Why do they lovingly Leave their fair home These leaves of God's gardens, To stray on earth's loam? See how they hover Over faces so cold, How reverently cover The young and the old! Compassion of heaven, Tears from God's eyes, Falling so gently Out of the skies. Act n. Scene ii. Julian, Thaddeus and Merrivale. Thaddeus: The world has been in travail, Julian, Through many moons of blood. The sight that struck My eyes lay not within my dreams, and caused

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332 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama My brain to stagger. Fields remote and near, Hills, ridges, valleys, lowlands, marsh and plain, Far to the horizon's utmost rim were filled With clashing millions. All earth's tribes Had by some common instinct gathered there, Peopling the shadows of the awful zone The forest shades, the fissures of great rocks, The caverns cut within the rotten mold; Each nation's youth, its lithest, strongest, best, Closed up the crimson rendezvous. The streams That ran their livid washings through the clefts Of spade or nature's highways, fouled and choked With drifted foliage of a year grown old Too soon, with autumn's hectic leaves and limbs, And sheddings rare of dearer castaways. As leaves fall, so upon the plains fell men; Some tossed awhile within the gust of combat, High on the sweltered air, returned to earth As flesh and blood and bone unrecognized, And indistinguishable dust. Some swayed, Not knowing why they did, as if a breath Of unnamed pestilence had touched their senses, Robbed them of aim and guidance. Thus they drooped And fell; and others could not die till hours Wore into days and nights. Restless they moved, And shuddered, clutched convulsively at stones Or roots, and clenched their teeth upon their hands, Stifling their moans. Young lads of growing years, Who pain or weariness had never known, Lay in strange sleep upon the fields, alone, Or huddled up in ghastly heaps where death Had flung them. Night winds gambolled with their hair, Golden and brown and dark - they heeded not. And far along the distant battle lines, I saw the fierce insurgent tides, the rise, The flow, the swift recessions of despair; Huge gaps that rendered void the toil of years, The lines re-formed and the price paid; strong men Who lunged and parried thrusts and lunged again,

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333 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Struck and were struck, unknown to each the foes, Save in the general quarrel and its cause. And through the lulls of intermittent fight Was blown death's bitterest music - the low sob Of brothers mourning brothers dead, the curse Of fallen men that had not seen their foes, The unavailing moan that answers moan At night in the far comradeship of wounds. Then, strangest of all sights - the harvest moon A moment broke through misty cloud, and shed Upon the fields a sickly yellow light, Disclosing pallid faces, blue strained lips, And eyes that stared, amazed, through open lids That had no time to shut - that looked and asked But one eternal question. Then the moon Grew dimmer as the mist increased, and showed In hazy outlines hurrying forms that moved In twos and threes, from place to place, and laid Upon the stretchers, one by one, the dead, Torn, jagged, mud-smeared and crumpled, carrying them To rows of damp deep trenches newly-dug, Where they were placed in groups of eight or ten, In order, side by side, and face to face And the moon shone full again - the harvest-moon. Julian: O Thaddeus! there is an iron in the will Of Him who shapes the times. His power is seen Within the flash that cleaves the oak; it germs Within the hidden matrix of the earth, When cities rock before convulsing fires Prepare their tombs; it lurks within the fang Of shrike and puma, in the slanted stroke Of the vulture's break upon the escarpment's flint, In every coil and spring and furtive eye Watching a desert pool. What jealous hands Are these, that ever closing in their grasp On bird and brute, must henceforth seek to hurl Hell's jungle-statutes on the race of men. What barren foot-prints, these, that mark the steps

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334 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Of human treading, endless labyrinths Of fatuous gleams that beckon here and there, Disclosing but too late the precipice. And must life's journey by some mocking fate Just end where it began, where men, their eyes Blindfolded, every slip mistake for gain? Sterile progression! where each life repeats The racial circuit, and finds unrepealed The acrid law by which its parent died. Each loss, they say, is countered by its gain; The steep ascent repays the mountaineer In healthy pulse-beat, when the blue clear air Wipes from his brow the sweat, and the high peaks Summon his soul. Vain reason of the winds! The height is but the instrument of the fall; Each loss a gain, each gain a loss. How then? What matters which goes first, a point of speech The fairer syllable of the two, or worse? These never-breaking cycles yield no faith To him who blindly trusts. The scarlet thread Snaps nowhere in its bonds, and everywhere Life bends beneath the sacrificial scourge. Time was, when on the altar-stones, the priest As Daysman for the multitude would place The wheaten loaf or wine or the sweet milk Drawn from the mountain-goat, an offering For grievous sins, for wrath appeased, Thanksgiving, or to send the sun and rain Upon the seedling corn - and when the heart In sterner syllables laid bare its zeal Before the mount of Heaven, an angel spake: 'Lay not thine hand upon the lad. Behold! A ram caught in the thicket by the horns.' The voice speaks not again. The heavens close Against the suppliant's cries. The long slow climb Of all our vaunted progress leads to shame, And Moloch's fires light up the spiral stairs Which, being scaled, yet no alternative shows, But horrid regress lurid with the flames. ...

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335 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama There was a hill once climbed, on which the world Had built the warrant of a grander faith, A hope more excellent. A cross was raised, And at its foot a river ran whose fount Welled from the noblest veins that ever bore Imperial tides. This was the last great stream; The hill - the final altar of the world; The tender hands upraised in death had made High intercession, closing once for all The scourge that bled the heart, scouring the soul. ... O broken reed! O spirit! treble-crushed By the barbed insult where the iron failed, By dreams o'ershot and courage spent for nought; Still are the stones laid and the shambles spread, The candles lighted and the censer swung, The inner courts are thronged with multitudes, And crosses - Ah! In cluttered heaps they rise, Stacked pile on pile, until they twist and sag The rivets on the bolted doors of God; And Calvary - is but a peak that flared An evanescent torch whose light was quenched In a red mist of sweat, and man's tired feet When once they scale the summit must, in shame, Re-walk the bloody gradient to the grave.

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Merrivale: Wild words are these, that break like heedless foam At the wind's breath. Julian: Was ever this wide world So plunged in unmeasured desolation? Thaddeus: Death - Death stalked everywhere on land and sea, In clouds that banked the sun, in mists that hid The stars, or half disclosed the swollen moon. No cavern sunk beneath the earth but bore His foot-prints. Deep below the water's rim Great fish had trailed his scent. Earth's myriad forms Had felt the plague-spot of his rampant touch, From the small field-mouse caught within the fumes

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336 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Of sulphurous air that crept from knoll to knoll, Withering the grass-blades, to the giant fighter Of storm and wave, that, planked and sheathed with steel, Felt the swift scorpion in her sides, then rocked, And plunged with bellowing nostrils till she sank In a wild litany of guns, with wind, And night, and flame. But busier was his hand With subtler workmanship. On eye and brow And cheek were delved the traces of his passing Blindness that like a thunder-clap at noon Closed on the sight, furrows that struck the veins, Turning the red sap from its wonted course, Sharp lines of pain and fury and quick hate That on the instant changed to graven stone, Callous and motionless. And deadlier still, With flying leap he strode a continent, Or the wide prairies of a sea, and snatched The cup from the wan fingers of a life That slaked its thirst upon the wine of hope; So sure his hand - light as with finger-tips, He touched the hair and wove the grey and white Within the brown, or hard, with rough-spurred heel, He mauled the bosom till its heavings ceased. Merrivale: For every grave that's shut shall one be opened. Hath God not spoken so? Does not each year Declare his trumpet-pledges at the spring? Julian: Think you so to convince the heart with words Like these - to mesh it with a logic meet For bloodless ends? What though the winds of May Call to the springing rootlets, lure the bud From the rose-stem, and chase the resinous sap From the pine's trunk to branch and topmost twig Who yields to such delusion? Does the spring Forget November's hecatombs, the last Convulsion of the leaf, the gale-torn limbs Of trees scarred to the death, the flowers that danced Upon the fields scythed by the autumn's hands,

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337 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama The writhen spectres of earth's quick decay Flashed out upon the winds? All these as dust Around the season's tombs - dust-heaps, no more; As sands that eddy in the desert - these! For these no resurrection. What amends Does summer make for winter's numbing stroke? It's death He gives, not slumber. His pale forms Breathe not again, and eyelids that have closed On the congealing air reflect no more The warm glance of the sun. The swallows build Their nests once more within the eaves; the thrush, The red-breast and the lark cover again Their young in bush and tree and meadow-grain They have not died. But weak ones that impaled Upon the thorn screamed out their notes of pain, Or dashed, wing-broken, by the wildering blast, Fell when their strength had failed them on far plains, On treeless hills, or dazed in homeward flight, Fluttered and sank in furrows of the sea Their song has ended; they return no more.

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Merrivale: There is inscrutable wisdom in His plans, We may not read. Is not the spirit of living, Its very essence, faith? Destroy that flame, And this old earth becomes a charnel-house, A tomb for slaggy refuse, embers spent And cold. Julian: Is faith an empty thing that needs No richer food than the invisible air? Must it not have embodiment; at least, Some form from which the mind may take conviction? Or is it such an alien to the mind, That it must look as coldly on fruition As does the cruder sense on disappointment? Show me, I say! Let these high gifts of man, The eye, the mind, the natural faculties Those, which we claim, are God's best workmanship Be exercised upon their functionings.

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338 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Whence did the Galilean win his right To ground earth's faith upon a soldier's rood? That he did earn it, none may offer question. But whose the hand that made the strange award? The prize was earned, and yet the proffered crown Was but the shadow of the substance sought. Who made him Conqueror, Prince of Peace, that he Should rule a kingdom of death-skulls that stare Rebuke at all his titles? Power to act, To back the Cross with sovereign energy, To mould a world as fits a monarch, fell Most tragically in far arrear of claims. There somewhere near the hill on which he died, Does not his dust blend with the earth he loved, But nobly failed to save? The charge, not his, Must elsewhere lie. If God's, then sovereignty Is as a sorry fable - shells of words, Without a kernel.

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Merrivale: Does the fault not rest At mortal doors? Julian: Then wherefore speak of hope? Since, if you will or not, the thing goes out On two disastrous counts. What follows hard, You say, as consequence, has happened - graves, And jungle-heaps, foul pits whose stench exhausts The lavender of heaven. If the one, Who was the very rose-ray of all dreams The world's imagination fed upon, Yearned for through centuries before he came, And raised in retrospect to rank of God, Worshipped by many whom the world, in turn, Has canonized as saints and demi-gods, Crowned with a lustre comparable with the might Imputed to him - if he failed, as failed He has with the momentum of the years Of twenty centuries to make his name The lode-star of the race - pray, tell me then,

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339 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Is there another yet to come, endowed With more resistless weapons of offence, With panoply more cunningly devised To stay the onslaught? Merrivale: No, that may not be. The mind collapses at the effort made To frame a nobler mould. Julian: Then ruin waits Upon his shrine, and dogs all pilgrim steps That, flocking thither, search for peace and rest.

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Act ii. Scene iii. A year later. Thaddeus: Like some fair crocus in the swamps of spring, I saw life push its way through mire of death, Triumphant. Julian: How? Thaddeus: A ship lay motionless, Not anchored, nor becalmed, but held in spell Of some great shock. She listed heavily, As though a wound had gripped her loins. And in the rain and chill were lowered boats, So filled, they lacked the margin of an inch To meet the water's edge. A law well known To men who live upon the sea, here ran Its old and honoured course. The boats were few And small, and there was left upon the deck A sturdier throng who stretched out willing hands To save the weak. One boat hung yet suspended, Filled short of obvious risk, and a slim girl Stepped out, and gave an aged woman left Unnoticed in the crowd, her place. Her lips Were closed, and her face pale, but yet a smile

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340 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Made soft and sweet the pallor of her cheeks. Then out into the night the boat was rowed, Steadily and silently. No clamour broke The stillness on the deck, nor was there sound Of voiced farewell, but here and there, A hand was raised, and a white fluttering Answered the distant rhythm of the oars. Julian: Chaos indeed may well disclose a star, Caught unawares within the tangled drift Of cloud and chasing glooms. Earth's wastes are full Of miry swamps and quicksands. Compensates The flower, rare and lovely though it be, For the death-suctions of the stretching void? It lessens not; it only swells the sum Of terrors. Then the virtue lies in this The rarity of the bloom, for were it much, Our mourning for the good would never cease. But if the great destroyer rake the earth, It were better that he gather verminous leaves, And chaff and sapless roots than opening buds With the bright light of morn upon their dew. Donaldson: Rare? No, not rare indeed. The firmament Is studded with its stars untold, and flowers Thrive hardiest near huge boulders, hemming them With softest hues, or where damp airs invite Their subtler fragrance. Thaddeus: Look upon the plains Again. Charred ruins not of nature's hand Lie deep within unfathomable slime. How foul the wreckage stands - a spectacle So ill that it might seem to bar forever The lily's right to grow therein again. And yet a few short hours before when death Was taking in his most exacting toll Of this, his bloodiest year, were women seen Strange forms indeed, with red insignia

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341 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Stamped clear upon their brows, fulfilling well Their pledge of office. Lovingly their hands Cooled the hot flush of temple and of wound, Made by the steel of surgeon and of foe. They beat the angels, at the angels' game These women. God might well His embassage Forego - His feudals of pure space - and take In chartered ministry those lovelier forms, That know the ravelled driftings of our life, And hence God's art of salvage all the more.

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Julian: These are fine colours woven in the grey And tattered fabric. Thaddeus: Grant you not as well The value of the life that's lost. The lad That struck out in the storm without a star, Or faintest glimmer of a port, that took His orders with blanched cheeks yet with a heart That pumped its resolution through young limbs, Untaxed till now by paths wherein the errand Failed by fore-doom of the sure goal - think you, That with his eyes made blind before he struck The highway, when his senses clouded fast With the delusions of ungoverned winds; That falling here somewhere around the place Of starting, he should then be counted out, His life not worth the value of a smile, Much less redeemed by forfeit? Is there not, In the unvisioned queries of our faith, A phrase whose pregnant utterance commends The will, exalts the aim, wherein the power To do falls heavily short of its achievement; Whose bare pronouncement is the servant's meed, Albeit the drought consumed the harvest yield, And the far labour of the spring appeared But days of idle story, hours devoid Of mirth and promise, without song or dreams.

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342 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Julian: Of what account the sowing when the grain Is threshed by hail, or the young blade is nipped By the quick frosts of night? Does courage tell In the last sum of things when strength is gone, And the rent form resigns its shredded flesh To the planned stealth of him whose wiles outmatch The weaker's zest? What does the partridge gain With its wild flap and rush against the hound, When brood and mother fail despite the dare Of helpless wings? Is there for human kind A scale that weighs the profit differently, A higher calculus that measures loss By hidden worths and meanings to the brute Denied? Those bones out yonder to the earth Give up their lime; their rotted flesh transforms By subtler alchemies the laboured soil, Until from grass and shrub and flower the air Is scented with rich odours. Is the gain Not this, and this alone? Thaddeus: Were this the end, That one might take the overplus of might, Transmute it into something handled, seen, Bow down before its image, whether stone, Iron or gold and say - 'Let this be Good, Or God/ call it what name you please, The Law, The Natural Statute, That by which the race Is ruled, by which it comes to be/ Were this The sum of all advantage that a slip On ground unequal gives the victor right To wear his laurel, while the soul of contest Is pushed aside by rude arbitrament Of power, or blackened so that greed alone Is common by acknowledgement, the Earth Might justly say to all her seedlings - 'Grow! Let the herbs multiply their kind; the grass Make yet more beautiful its green; the trees With unaccustomed pride spread to the winds The glory of their foliage; let the grape

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343 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Take from the soil its redder sap, for now The ground is succulent with buried weeds Things that possessed no function when alive, But to despoil the tiller of his bread With stifling growths, but dead they serve the spade Of nature in the turn-out of her seasons/ Were this the sequel of man's birth, the shrub Could boast a fairer destiny, could call Him 'servant' without jester-play of rank. Julian: Does not the fact overwhelm the abstract right, Clad as it is in robes of tragedy? Look well upon the plains. There sinews, bones Of friend and alien fast are interlocked In mutual conquest. There the overlord Of this fair earth's the grave. Lo! triumphs there The worm, and evolution reaches thus Its final phrasing - 'From the dust to dust/ The purple rots into the matted clay, And majesty is a weak word that, cut Adrift from sounding consonants and vowels, Is but an echo of the noise it made. So Death still keeps its ancient sting, the Grave Its victory. Man's proud investiture Of place and species, title, dignity Are mock heroics playing round his name, Whose birth is in the winds, whose death rides out Upon the whirlwind. Donaldson: Do these human dreams Long cherished at exhausted wells, by paths That form and close within stark desert sands, On which the sun beats down his pitiless ray, Portray their night's dark origin when morn, That should bring light, strips them of beauty, shows How truth is but the dupe of fancy's making, That colour is destroyed by light of which It should be author? Mad the artisan, Who slays while fashioning, that turns the axe

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344 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Upon his chiselled models. Then the dream Is less than parable; then priest and seer, Bound to this world by ties of prayer and promise, Have found their moorings, threads of gossamer, That snapped as the grey light of morn revealed The snare. It cannot be. The heart knows not Such cordage. Julian: If the dream be ne'er fulfilled, But ever broken with the reassertion Of day's compelling hours, what reasoning Shall buoy the heart with tidings more assured, That the hid future shall awake with joy, Than those on which its hopes had split And foundered? Ground the future in the past; What warrant had those great historic hopes. Failure is writ upon them, nor need be Erased the word on those that come. Belief, A wish, a dream - where is its leverage To raise the dead, to make those bones knit joint To joint and leap, to pry until the mountains Remove their base, or force the heart's wide wastes, Where hate was sown, that love shall blossom there. What has been, will be. Time has proved it so. Donaldson: Marks he the issue well, who sees here naught Save huge world-fires upon whose smouldering ruins Man's hand has lost its cunning to re-build, Or that the piles new-reared shall fall once more In the mad blasts that periodic run Their cycles of decay? May not the eye Range over those dun fields of death, and see From vile putrescence, Beauty rise in light Unquenchable? May not the scars remind The sufferer of his healing as of wounds? Julian: Man's life feeds like a fever on his hopes; Eternal yearning gnaws his heart - a plague, More than a blessing when the end he seeks

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345 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Becomes a withering drought. What plan is this, So wise and fair, as can with beauty clothe Those bleached frames that rattle in the air, When the winds swoop. Enswathe it as you may, That touches it. Thaddeus: No. Lime and ash tell not The story of all struggle. Causes lost Awhile on earth, at stake or cross, try out On new arenas fiercer qualities. They are re-born upon the air; they storm The souls of men; find homes in thunder-peals; Are hitched to lightnings. Slain, they rise again With such forged temper that they turn aside The opposing edge of armouries of steel. And every life that guideless though it seemed, And blinded to the very sockets, joined The losing issue swings again to play, With falcon vision and its speed of wing, A winning game. Penrose: Reasons that manifold Lie in the petty judgments of man's mind, That crawl from step to step, prompting the sight, That the touch apprehends, that hearing, taste Admit as natural, known - these may be weighed, And counted as a string of silver coins, Figures that undisputed draw the lines Of profit set against minuter loss. Herein the argument - This is currency; Behold the stamp, the image genuine, Safe venture, this! The morning's sun or rain Is in the evening's tracery of the West. May one not read the signs? A fool may read.' Julian: The latter is our human heritage. Why given eyes and ears, fingers that touch Sharp thorns and bleed may man not feel His pain? It's his to avoid the edge. His tongue

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346 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Abhors the myrrh, the bitter cup. Why place The poison to his lips? The end of fire Is flesh consumed, is charcoal cold and dead. Gold purified is allegory in life, A myth for blooded things. Man's step is short, His vision bounded, why then make him leap? Penrose: The leap's the symbol of his daring. More! There are great promptings planted, mightier Than what the sense enfolds; they bid him cross Spans unexplored, gulfs where the plumb-line hangs; Try for vast title-holdings where the hands Are bankrupt for the bids. Hence will the fires Burn until all the dimmer eye beholds As left, is what a half-filled urn contains Charred residue. So will be welcomed pain, And wounds, hunger and the hot coals of thirst, Outlawry, persecution, banishments, Lapsed friendships, open enmities and hate All that may follow life to sepulchres.

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Julian: This to what end? Is pain an element In which he lives, or that to which perhaps He would return therein to find his pleas.ure, As some gill-breathing creature strayed to sea Might with as good a reason seek the land? Is beggary a choice, and nakedness, And homeless sojourn? Penrose: No - but if the goal Dark, heavily clouded as it is, demands Those unblazed trails, those foot-falls by the way, The challenge is the warrant in itself For the adventure. Does the heart not know Such voices, whether in the blasts they come Like stern reveilles at the dawn, or low Like inarticulate sounds that rise at night From the deep swellings of a quiet sea?

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347 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Julian: And the answer is a sea that's strewn with spars And riven hulls. And yet were waves and gales The only agents of man's ruin, then The chances range upon his side; the fight With nature grows more simple every hour Her ways are known, but when the struggle takes Hell's routes and ends in bloody fratricide Not once, nor twice, as though an incident Of casual kind had touched man's history, But as a baffling epidemic strikes A thousand times his life, failing of cure; How strike this foul insistent integer Clean from his life? The taint is in the blood, Try surgery there! Find the right scalpel first.

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Act n. Scene iv. Julian, Penrose, Donaldson and Merrivale. Merrivale: Only a man whose soul was sick to death Would so bedaub this world with drab. The face Would always turn to sunlight, were the eyes Not blind. Penrose (to Merrivale): There is a sickness that yields not To acids. Donaldson: It's a deeper malady. Julian: My step is slow, and a thick film over-spreads My sight, yet does my mind bend back its gaze With an unwonted keenness on the past For nearly twice a score of lonely years. I travelled far through many lands and knew This earth as well as most that travel it; I knew its peoples, and their customs, ways Of living. Life was like an open road A glorious highway, with by-paths that stirred

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348 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama The mettle of adventure. Then the winds Such as the desert only feels swept down; Yet as a pool within the sands was left A solace, a companion, one who kept A memory green who, as he grew, became A very fountain of live hope. Time seemed To shape itself about his future; years Were planned without misgiving. Here was one So ran my thought - who would in time achieve The promises that lay within his youth, And these were golden. Never was a nature More finely strung to touch or glance or word, For like a harpsichord it registered All moods - the flame of passion in just cause, Anger and quick revulsion when a deed Showed foul at core, and yet his soul could breathe Such adoration for a cherished friend, Such warmth of fealty for a cause held high, That he could lose the temper of restraint With lavish offering; as generous in heart, As keen in mind. Then suddenly, well... a blank, A veil hangs that may not be lifted here. ... I saw him dead, his face all passionless, cold. The luminous shafts that kindled in his eyes, Sparkless as flint in loam, his head, his brow, The flexions of his body - graven stone. So cloud and dust have since companioned me; There's nothing left. Donaldson: The memory of love Remains. His was a nature that you prized, That having loved was worth the years of living. Is it not so? Julian: Worth? Who may speak of worth, When the wrought gem is cast into the sea? Where is its value if you may not take That self-same jewel in your hands and let Its facets glow in sunlight?

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349 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Donaldson: Would you then Have been the richer had it not been yours To have and lose? Julian: How otherwise? I am The poorer for the loss, have suffered more, And mark you - that fine quality of your code That makes his rarer attributes a gain For him, a virtue as you smoothly say, Was his undoing. I could tell you now, Were but my heart to speak, how that high pride Of his, that scorn of baser things that stamped His sterling put the anguish in his soul When fires played at last upon his will.

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Donaldson: Would you have had him formed of rougher grain, Safer perhaps for life as living goes, But with wings clipped or leaden, vision dulled? Julian: Where is the ground of preference if his life, Being fashioned like a sensitive plant, should die By some rude sting, having but known the power To feel the wound? Donaldson: The coarser fibre stands The keenness of the cut; as well knows not The joy unfolded in achievement. Julian: Ah! Within that word lies all the bitter root. Where has great striving ever found its goal Save in mischance? These more than four-score years Have taught their lessons. If this baffling life Could give the lie to age, and prove mistrust A whim, with youth's fair hopes well realized, And courage laurelled on the hard-fought field, A father mourning for a son laid low Might lift his head. But no - the tides are set. Out there upon the shore today they move,

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350 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama With fixity of bounds as yesterday. And so within the veins the lines are drawn As hard, as fast, and hidden processes In cell and tissue play their destined part. This organism dies; its functions called By divers names as goodness, duty, right These fail; the other lives because to it Was added marrow. Bring then sackcloth - ash.

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Act in. Scene i. A Later Spring A flash of indigo in the air, A streak of orange edged with black! A blue-bird skimmed the spruces there, A redstart followed in his track. The light grows in the eastern skies, The deeper shadows are withdrawn, From marsh and swamp the vapours rise, In the cool cloisters of the dawn. What loom - a-weaving on the land, Such colour and fragrance fuses, Magenta and white on moss and sand Azaleas, arethusas?

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And higher up along the steeps, The pink of mountain-laurel; While lower down the yellow creeps From celandine and sorrel. Sea-foam or snow-drift - flecked with spurt Of flame - upon the grasses spread; The snow is foam of mitre-wort, The flame - the ragged robin's red.

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351 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Where sips the lily of the morning dew When light winds waken, And gems that the violets hold Gently are shaken To crystalline purple and blue; And emerald, crimson and gold From the heart of the rose unfold, And burst into view: There at the dawn's first blush The notes of a brown thrasher fall, And the importunate voice of the thrush Blends with a tanager's call; There under a dragon-fly's wings A stream carols by with sweet noise, And slowly a daffodil swings Beneath a humming-bird's marvellous poise.

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(Thaddeus, walking through a field in the direction of Julian's home. The day is warm and sunny. A rapid stream, a short distance away, flows through a valley whose banks slope down from small hills covered with evergreen. Afar off, the land is high and forest-clad. At a bend of the stream he suddenly meets Julian.) Thaddeus: There is a quality in this air that stirs The blood as readily as the balsam sap. What brow, what chemistry; what hand is this That grips the pestle? Never was the grass Throughout arterial nature marble-cold, And pale, are heard the joyous sounds of life Revived; earth's wells are opened in the vales; Through ice-clad mountains chiselled by the hands Of northern blasts the gurgling waters run, In stream and torrent, and in the mad plunge Of cataract. Beyond the snow-capped ranges, Lusty young rivers tear and strain at the dugs Of the foot-hills, and parting force their pace Through gorge and valley to the open sea. Life boundless, keen, ecstatic, uncontrolled!

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352 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Vast, heaving, surging life, strung to great thews, Rapt in wide wonderments. Hail, life of Spring! Born of prophetic gales and plangent shocks, That rouse the torpor of earth's granite veins, And sluggard eyes. Glorious in resurrection! Thou peerless colourist of nature's life! With what unrivalled hands the lines are drawn, The shadows set, and the rich hues enwrought Upon how great a canvas! The far climb Majestic of fresh-foliaged ash and elm Along the mountain crags; the river banks Where the white spray falls softly on the iris, And violets creep along the sides; the gift Of minted treasure on the open fields Where bloom those golden legions of the earth The daffodils and lowland marigolds Cerulean tints that light our common paths, That bless our road-sides, cheer our vacant wastes; Bluets and hare-bells and the lilac bloom; Orchards aflame beneath a setting sun And trailing slow around moss-covered rocks, The flower of May superlatively veined. Come! Leave your tents, O mortals, gather here In Nature's high rotunda crystal-domed, And offer praise!. ... O Julian, give me Your hand. We meet under new skies today. The times are changed; the earth renews her face; There is a fine contagion in the spring For heavy hearts. Julian: You would infect the blood Of an old man. Thaddeus: Come, Julian! In this life, There is an unslain good that has outlived All floods and fires. There are undaunted spirits The age has not destroyed. I have seen them breathe Upon dry bones until they leaped with sinew; Even flotsam by their touch was salvable.

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353 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama No life however craven at the face But found a courage stirring at the core. The groundwork's there to build a structure on; The hand that yesterday tore like an eagle's claw Now pours in balm today, blesses and cures. There is a restoration in a smile We knew not of; we had forgotten it But wings unseen were flying in the night. Julian: I would there was a rock from which man's hopes Might never more be swept, or that his blood Might always bathe his heart with healthy stream. But those alternate currents like the seasons Have been our fateful legacy through all time. What power is this you speak of that the dark May sudden blaze with light before the morn Is ushered in at nature's call? Is this The ultimate conquest of her will that day Shall not know supersession by the night, With earth's diurnal axis over-ruled? Thaddeus: Have you not noticed, standing in the aisles Of some high-vaulted temple when the massed And reverent throngs were hushed in expectation, How a great organ poured forth like a flood Its spells of music as the master's hands Swept the wide boards? What power over the soul To lift its hopes, to plant its aspirations In the rich soil of heaven came from the touch! But let untutored fingers meet the keys, And the rapt ear is split by discords, airs That bray their grovelling kinship with the clay. Are not the strings, the instrument, the same With either press? But how extremes depend Upon the craft of him who plays. Life's songs From baser jars and fretted failures range Along the gamut of their enterprise, In spiral movement to such high refrains As could, with buoyant amplitude of roll,

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354 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Lift up the souls of sinking men, and float The world's grey cares on seas of evening calm. ... Have you not heard God's music when His winds Are given boundless space wherein to blow Upon the greenness of the earth? They pass, And from the meadows and the valley-slopes The latent rhythms of the daisies blend With the low rustle of the sedge. They pass Again, and lo, in grander orchestra, The pines lift up their voices on the hills. ... The human heart is such a lute, a harp Of many strings, an organ that may roll To the strong pull of a mighty diapason. Today, the keys are pressed and a sharp hiss, As of some jealous flame leaps on the sense, And the bewildered mind is stung by jets Of unexpected pain. Tomorrow comes, And the vexed reeds acclaim a nobler master. Vibrating passions purged of gross appeal Move up along the pipes, and storm the nave And the far arches. There is not a scale Can measure the full quality of life's deeds When human souls, that hitherto had known But wayward flaws and barren purposes, Are touched to wonder by those knowing hands, And motivated by his breathings. Acts that loom High on the horizon of our mortal range, That never pale in retrospect of time, While others blur on faded scrolls, take on The ripened glow and colour of their greatness From this, the self-same source of all that holds Its upward course in human destiny. Julian: Dust gathers in my mouth. I cannot speak What I would say. Whether it is the drought Of age, or some strange filtrate of the past That sets a parched seal upon the lips, I do not know. It may be that from thistles I tried to gather figs, or, where I looked -

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355 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Before I plucked, I said the vines were dry. Now I am old. I find the roadways blocked, And memory ranging through the fungus years Finds but the husks where it would take the fruit. And yet, there is a knocking in this clay A restless flame - something that, if it could, Would leap the grammared confines of slow speech, And give the echo to your dancing words.

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Act m. Scene ii. Two days later. (Penrose and Donaldson about to take their final departure from the coast.) Donaldson: Well, Penrose, how the last five years have sped! They should be rather scaled as centuries In calendars of deeds and thoughts and passions; I did not think - that day you brought me here I would have been so often to this coast, Lured by that lonely sage. Is this the last That we shall see of him? Penrose: The last - I fear. We must be gone some time. Should we return, At length, we shall not find him here. He is old, Beyond the age of men. Did you not see How yesterday he scarcely spoke a word, When we were there? His step was weaker far, His face, though kindly as before, was changed, And when we shook his hand and said 'Farewell/ His speech was thick. Donaldson:

Thaddeus remains with him?

Penrose: Yes - to the end. Donaldson: A father.

He loves him as he would

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356 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama Penrose: Thaddeus is no longer young; But he maintains a gracious blend of years And hope, of seer and child - a crutch of love To the old man. ... This way - our boat has come.

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NOTES

This text of Clay is based on a complete typescript (referred to below as 'ts i') in the E.J. Pratt Collection (Box 8, No. 62) at Victoria University Library. The spelling has been made consistent with that of the poems, a few obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected, and a small number of format and essential punctuation changes made. Pratt did not include act designations for each new scene, but for clarity's sake these have been added. For similar reasons, Pratt's erratic changes from Arabic to Roman numerals for scene designations have not been preserved; otherwise the text remains unaltered. There is also an incomplete typescript of Clay ('ts 2') in the same file, and parts of the verse drama were published as individual poems in Newfoundland Verse (1923). i.i. The identification of Thaddeus as 'seer/ Merrivale as 'traditionalist/ and Penrose and Donaldson as 'travellers' were holograph additions to ts 2. i.ii.heading. The Rocky shore upon an island in the Atlantic. Evening/ tS2

i.ii.82-97. These lines were published as 'On the Shore/ The Rebel (1920), reprinted as 'Later/ NV (1923), and as 'Signals/ VS (1930). See Bibliography. 1.11.148-78. These lines were published as The After-Calm/ NV (1923). 1.11.178-9. Between these two lines, in ts 2, there was a heading: 'A woman's voice (Still later. Chanted).' i.iii.53. In ts i 'hideous' was inserted over crossed-out 'gargoyles.' i.iii.H4. This line was added to ts i, written at the bottom of the page, its place being indicated by an arrow. i.iii.i2iff. Cain is the Biblical archetype of the fratricide (Genesis 4:1-17); the Israelite king Saul, jealous of the favour David (the future king) had found with Saul's people and the Lord, thrice attempted to slay his rival with a javelin (i Samuel 18:7-16 and 19:8-10); Cesare Borgia (1476-1507), son of Pope Alexander vi, was a notorious criminal and

357 Appendix B: Unpublished Drama murderer. The historically unsubstantiated tradition exists that the Borgias possessed the secret of a mysterious deadly poison, which they used to promote selfish interests and papal power; Attila the Hun (A.D. 4067-453), notorious for ravaging the Byzantine Empire, earned the epithet 'Scourge of God'; Tamerlaine (d.1405), a corruption of Timur-Leng, meaning Timur the Lame, employed terror and devastation to extend his rule to include Turkestan, Siberia, Persia, and India. i.iii.i26. The vagus nerve innervates the larynx, lungs, heart, esophagus, and most of the abdominal organs. 11.1.71-94. These lines, with the addition of an eight-line closing stanza, were published as 'A Dirge/ NV (1923). 11.1.147-66. These lines, with the addition of an extra stanza between two and three, were published as 'Snowfall on a Battlefield/ NV (1923). n.ii.4-66,147-77, 181-211; ii.iii.i-28, 45~77> 203-79; 111.1.1-134, 157-70 were, with added material to aid transition, published as 'Fragment From a Story/ NV (1923). 11.11.113. See Genesis 22:12-14. ii. 11.117. Moloch was a Semitic deity whose worship required the sacrifice of children. n.iii.i42. Pratt is here paraphrasing a passage from The Burial of the Dead' in The Book of Common Prayer. See also Genesis 3:19. ii.iii.i48. See i Corinthians 15:55. n.111.183. See Ecclesiastes 1:9. ii.iv.i5. 'the winds': 'cloud and wind/ ts 2 111.1.1-36. These lines were published as 'Anticipations/ CF (June 1921), and then as part of 'Fragment From a Story/ NV (1923). 111.1.75. 'tents, O mortals': 'tents, mortals/ ts 2

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Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry Edited by Susan Gingell

Poems included in this section, found among Pratt's manuscript materials (housed in the Pratt Library, Victoria University), are those which are either in manuscript or holograph form or are seemingly fair copies. The numbers in square brackets refer to the Pratt Collection listing (see Bibliography) except those numbered [7.50 Un] which are from Viola Pratt's private collection. To Pelham Edgar

Pelham, old dear, if I only knew Some kind of a drink which in your view Possessed the kick of a kangaroo, A fiery draught that might outdo The strength and taste of The Witches' Brew, And raise the hell of a hullabaloo, How gladly I'd pass it on to you. [1.4.150] A Breadliner's Prayer

Forgive O Lord if one presumes To ask a question over-bold, Why wool and cotton glut the looms And yet our children die from cold? 'Give us this day our daily bread' -

360 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry There was a need for such a prayer When thy disciples went unfed Because of withered harvests there But here with world bins stacked and crammed I cannot feed my family; Forgive me Lord but I am damned If I can keep from blasphemy. [2.14.86]

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A Strip of Sea Coast Come life or death, come peace or war, The moon has never failed the tide Here where the ocean meets the shore. On this forsaken coast Only the ancient things abide: The blue-green-salmon tints in the glide And dive of the dolphin; The silver of the gull's ride Outmatching the sun's rays On the foam against the black Of the basalt boulders; The down on the curlew's breast, The vertical cut of her wings Back to back And tip to tip Before resolving into rest As the last wave curls on the beach. These have remained, And shall remain While human blood boils in its pain And the adagio of the dulse Rebukes the fevers of our pulse. Here shall the sea Answer our tossing nights With patience in its face, And in the Logos of its voice, Its co-eternal cool antistrophe. [4.30.181]

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361 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry But One Way

If you should go to meet your enemy, Go not encumbered with your wrongs and causes, Nor let your reinstating pardon be Conditioned by the damnatory clauses; Nor halt your steps upon the road, mid-way, Hailing him from afar in battle-mood To come and take your wrath before the day Descend upon a longer sterner feud. And if you go to take his anger, go Unhelmeted, and the full road, prepared With all the odds conceded to his blow But fear - hands empty, heart and body bared: Then watch the sword of the antagonist Waver and clatter from his nerveless wrist. [7.50.Un]

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[Today and Yesterday] Today To the 'jet/ the riding lord of the continents, The plane far below him which stumbles and crawls Is an eagle left-banking over the Falls With a brood of fifty attached to her ligaments. To the bird those are beetles and ants that are scurrying To their hills and holes upon the earth's floor Those men that are chasing the hours and worrying About God and the devil and atoms and war. Yesterday With the rise of the curtain the years take flight From the Hydro back to the candlelight. The birds that make up the sky's patrols Are thrushes and robins and orioles. The ear-drums are safe from the static and yammer

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362 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry In the throats of the radio gramophones. Rather the ring of the blacksmith's hammer Is heard on the axles of carioles Twisted by jolts from the cobblestones. At the corner store with a lull in the trade, The son of a Family Compact dictator Fights with a miller in a word fusilade On the treatment of Gourlay of the Spectator. The miller is losing, until a debater Trained by a Methodist comes to his aid With the Irish Chief of the Fire Brigade. Lured by the swing of a hurricane lamp They swarm to the tavern on Saturday nights To evaporate Niagara damp, And to hear the latest account of the fights How Foul Weather Finnegan and Pat McGuire Bore the whole brunt of the Waterloo fire, How Hector, a sabre-trenched guardsman, won a Commission for holding the rear at Corunna. And the air becomes thick like the speeches, while Becky the barmaid serves Demerara To a handsome creature called Captain O'Hara Or 'chin-chucking Charlie,' late of the Nile. With Sunday morning's release from work, The country and town turn out to the Kirk, And envy is stamped on the rustic faces At all the imported wealth of attire At the march of the satins and silks and laces, At every poke-bonnet as tall as a spire. Curved like a staircase, in Empire style, The wife of the Colonel glides up the aisle, Attended by fighting Patrick McGuire. The daughter comes next in a brilliant tiara, Leading the dandy, Charlie O'Hara, But salter by far than the waters of Marah Is the worship divine to Captain O'Hara, For the sermon is preached by no less a person

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363 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry Than the Reverend Jasper Andrew MacPherson. He takes as his text 'the sheep and the goats/ Dividing them up with stern canonicity, And after two hours he adds a few notes Of his own containing a blast of publicity On captains and drummers, and the town's use Of taffeta, perfumes, and Sabbath abuse. And damning them all to extreme infelicity, He closes his sermon with thoughts on lubricity, And the unrepentant churchful of sinners, Smelling of brimstone, go home to their dinners.

[y^o.Un]

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'First-Born of England' First-born of England! Lo, out there she lies! Storm-flung upon the Western world, apart, Rooked in the thunder, 'neath the clouded skies, The foster-waif of the Atlantic's heart; Laired in the surges where the Gulf Stream joins The torpid clasp of the great Arctic's hand. Mothered of Britain, sprung of Nature's loins, Isled in the Ocean's grandeur - Newfoundland. Well had she stood the capital tests of Time, The urge of tempest and the roll of flood, Her sailor sons were nurtured in a clime That forged the iron deep within the blood; Stripped were her ramparts all along her shores, Scatheless beneath the brunt of ageless shocks, The billows ripping up the ocean floors Were rent in smitten fragments on her rocks. Four centuries of rich full-tided life Had beat within her ports, had winged the seas, Had triumphed over Nature's winds and strife, Outsped her chariots, probed her mysteries, Roamed o'er the ice floes of the frozen North, Had pierced Gibraltar, and the Eastern world, Had touched the Indies, and had voyaged forth Under the banners of the South unfurled.

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364 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry To struggle was the birthright of her race, The glory of their failure and their gain, To fight against great odds, strongly to brace The soul's undaunted sinews under strain Of tide and tempest; faith unquenchable Was theirs; it drew the sunlight from the clouds, It spoke of dawn whenever midnight fell, It brought forth music from the whistling shrouds. Life had they known, its bounding pulse, its feel Of vibrant wonder, morning and the call Of waters springing at the vessel's keel, The eager hoist of sail, and the proud haul Of ensign to the mainmast top, the flap Of canvas toying with the rising breeze, The answering plunge of the ship's bows, the snap Of ruddy spray slung by the chasing seas.

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Love had they known, for under winter skies The hearth was warm, and tender light undying Shone from the stainless iris of blue eyes To the leal gaze of other eyes replying; And they had heard the laugh of children, known The soft press of a babe's cheek, the strong grip Of brother's hand - life's richest gifts bestrown Within the haven of love's comradeship. Death had they known - those lads of Newfoundland The bitter sweetness of its sacrifice, Well had they learned in that high hour to stand Unbleached upon the ships, and pay the price It sought, and when the night from evening came, And the swift darkness wrapped up Nature's form, They sank with noble, unrecorded fame, Clothed in the grand insignia of the storm. Fell the great storm of ages! Broke amain The thunder from the hills, and from the skies

50

365 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry Once more the wind and hail and once again The lightning: and above them all the cries That spring from shattered bulwarks. Far away The flooded waters heaved, and ever higher, Stabbing the East - its dark and trackless grey, The signal rockets of a world on fire. And those who life and love had known and death Within the island compass of their home, Now felt upon their face a ruder breath Than ever scoured a thousand leagues of foam; And once again the parting kiss was given, As round the altars of their homes they met, For life and love with death once more had striven, And once again their children's eyes were wet. They sailed again - those lads of Newfoundland Towards the grey East with lines of flashing red, With thrice four thousand in their gallant band, Over the ocean's barriers they sped, Daring the hazards of the day and night, The baffle of the current with the blow Of billow falling thunderous in its might, And the swift shaft that lurked in stealth below. And never was a life-boat launched and manned On such a night and by so brave a few, Never a rudder steered by swarthier hand, Never returned to port so small a crew; Never the fog so chill, never the rain, Never the call of love with death so rife, Never the loss so keen, never the pain, For love through death to seek the port of life. They sleep - those island sailors - far away, Some close to where the blue Aegean swells, And where the Mediterranean waters play Around the reaches of the Dardanelles; Beneath the heather and the gorse they lie, Beneath the crumpled marl and drifted sand,

60

70

80

90

366 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry It was their fortune lonely thus to die Far from the hills and coves of Newfoundland. And those whose lot it was, deep-scarred to foil War's ultimate precision and its chance, Survived but to enrich another soil Made precious by the flowing wounds of France; And round their crosses on the flowering sod The hare-bells and the cowslips now unfold, And everywhere the roses grow - and God Has added daisies with their hearts of gold. And others are there yet who sleep apart Beneath the North Sea's wide and roughening wave, Within the shadow of great England's heart, They did not seek a more triumphant grave; For out of the winds and out of the tides they came, Out of the waters rolling full and free, Back to the tides again their life, their name, Back to their cradle first and last - the sea. [y^o.Un]

100

no

Moonlight A magic lake the heavens! No rude stir Flutters a fragile cloud that sleeps on high A weft of frosted rue and gossamer. The greater stars in tints of gold, Sprinkling the far-off spaces, Hang pendulous like jonquils of the sky, And silent, soon, In slow ascent crawls the moon, And golden, too, its face is. Upon the sea, Vast replica of the arch of night Silence and light. Stilled now upon its tongue Its ponderous rune, Unsung

10

367 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry Its harp-caught melody, Its throbbing bars Closed. On its face The heavens trace The cloudlet and the moon, And the bright stars.

20

Upon the land - one sound, One strain of music falling Tremulously, The waters of a brooklet calling To the sea. One light, One lamp alone. Steadily Its gleams are thrown Clear out to sea. Long does it burn, Watchful and bright, Will he return?... Late is the night. [y^o.Un]

30

The Fisher Boy The moon has come up Like a silver-wrought crown, The stars have come out, The wind has gone down; Bestrewn is the ocean, With diamonds afloat, No foam and no motion, And still is the boat. With his day's work all over, To the cuddy he crept, Lay down 'neath its cover, And dreamless he slept;

1O

368 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry Close, close to his father, His head near his breast, So deep in his slumber, So sweet in his rest. [7-5O.Un] [The Toucan] If you go to a place along the shore Of a region known as Ecuador And enter the fringe of the forest you can Discover a creature called Toucan. Of all wild birds the greatest freak Its voice can range from chatter to roar, No matter how long and far you seek There's nothing can match its terrible beak. [7.52.39] (To Cornie) An arc of azure dipping from the sky, Fringed by green hills and glades and rising brake Changing to orange as the sunbeams die It is the lake. A curve of sapphire with a splash of green, The form of some sleek serpent coiled in slumber, There, through the tangled trees it may be seen It is the Humber. A quiet haunt where friends are wont to stay, It lies upon the Humber's crested dome, There glad ones greet you at the close of day It is the home. [7.52.51] The Inexpressible There is no earthly shrine which may enfold

10

369 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry A worship of this spirit flight, whose aim Would soar above all symbols that proclaim A love the heart itself could never hold. For words and looks and gestures are a mould Too frail to stand the casting of a name, Which in the tropic centre of its flame Would make a deed involving death seem cold. Therefore, let not these holy vows be scarred By flint of speech, by priests put on parade Before stone altar-steps, witnessed and marred By oath, but given under an acolade Of night with its unuttered language starred Against a deep Uranian facade. [7-52.53]

10

The Yeas and the Nays (The Yeas) They dotted i's and crossed the t's, Secured the periods and apostrophes Within their credal paragraphs of power. And with their affirmations of salute They slew their souls down to the root. Then with their hands withered by spoil They found their hour Of death in spate of blood and rut of soil. (The Nays) These are the recusants who, having learned The negatives of speech and spurned The articles of power, Have joined the hosts Who gave their bodies to be burned. They took their hour Of life in death, Bartering the vapour of their breath For immortality On roads starred with direction posts Nach DACHAU, a ROUEN, to CALVARY. [7.52.57]

10

370 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry His Last Voyage Batten down the hatches; reef the sails, And knot the gaskets well. I do not know The port that lies ahead, the seas, the gales. But still this touch of night, this glass that's low Those signs that never failed my senses yet Won't fail them now. Come bosun! Have me feel The lead of your hand to the aftdeck, then let The cable slip and lash me to the wheel. [7.53.12] The Osprey He swept the full circumference of the lake, With leisured flight, Then with a light And careless spiral swung To the centre where he hung One hundred feet above the water, At perfect rest. He dropped and dived: And when he rose he flung A colour riot through the air Brown of his wings, white of his breast, Gold of the lilies, green of the pads, And the silver flash Of a bass Against the backdrop of a rainbow Woven by the sun with the threads of the splash. [7.57.1] St John's, Newfoundland: Steep Are Thy Cliffs Steep are thy cliffs that stand like bolted doors, Hinged to the iron columns of the earth, Encircled by the sea thy tortuous shores, Like those of that far-off isle that gave thee birth;

10

371 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry The north winds girt thee with their rougher mail, The east winds drench thee with their climbing foam, The surge of tidal wave, the thresh of hail Have battered at the lock-gates of thy home. But not within thy jagged thews alone, Thy strength resistant; for these latter years When bugle notes across the sea are blown, And the loud surge with unfamiliar tears Is piping -have revealed how strong thou art, How staunch the granite fibres of thy heart. [8.62.92]

10

TEXTUAL NOTES

To Pelham Edgar Occurs as a holograph on the inside back cover of a notebook but in a more final form on a fly-leaf of The Witches' Brew presented to Pelham Edgar, now in the possession of his daughter, Jane Conway of New Westminster, British Columbia. A Breadliner's Prayer 4 Pratt wrote and then crossed out 'sleep' before settling on 'cold/ A Strip of Sea Coast 11 The word 'sleek' is written in the left-hand margin beside this line and was perhaps to have been inserted before 'basalt.' 21 'adagio' was written in over the crossed-out words 'slow rhythms/ 21-2 In the holograph these lines actually appear in parentheses after line 25, but their present position is indicated by an arrow. 27 'The echo of its cool antistrophe' crossed out [Today and Yesterday] One complete and two incomplete typescripts are extant. Ts i (the copy text) is a xerox of an unidentified copy; ts 2 is p. 2 of an earlier typescript; ts 3 is identical to ts 2 but also contains a third page. The Pratt Collection has xerox copies of ts 2 and ts 3, the originals being in the possession of Viola Pratt.

372 Appendix C: Unpublished Poetry 3 'To soften the chill of Niagara damp' crossed out 23 'Methodist' written over crossed-out 'parson' First Born of England Taken from a typescript in the possession of Viola Pratt Moonlight Taken from a typescript in the possession of Viola Pratt Fisher Boy Taken from a typescript in the possession of Viola Pratt The Toucan Taken from a holograph; the poem was written to accompany Viola Pratt's collection of bird stamps. For each stamp Mrs Pratt sought a poem about the bird depicted on it, but unable to find one about the toucan she pressed her husband to write one. (To Cornie) Taken from a typescript (7.52.51), the poem is a companion piece to Tn a Beloved Home' published in Newfoundland Verse (1923). In the typescript this latter title heads the two poems or sections which bear the dedications '(To Cornie)' and '(To Hubert).' Cornie and Hubert are Cornelia and W. Hubert Greaves. The Osprey Taken from a framed typescript (7.57.1), the poem was written for Pratt's friends, Mr and Mrs Robert Fennell. It was also used on a card illustrated with a woodcut by Claire Pratt. St John's, Newfoundland: Steep Are Thy Cliffs Taken from a typescript (8.62.92),the words in the title, 'St John's, Newfoundland,' are written in.

Descriptive Bibliography Lila Laakso

INTRODUCTION

This bibliography consists of seven sections: A / Books and Pamphlets arranged in chronological order. The quasifacsimile transcriptions are based on Fredson Bowers' Principles of Bibliographical Description (Princeton 1949). For each entry, the following information is provided whenever possible: quasi-facsimile transcription of title page; collation (with height measurement given first); contents supplemented by a literary contents note in quasi-facsimile transcription; typography and paper, with all paper being white wove unwatermarked unless otherwise indicated (all laid paper is machine-made); all pagination is centred at foot of page unless otherwise noted; illustrations; description of binding and dust wrappers utilizing the system outlined by G. Thomas Tanselle in The Bibliographical Description of Patterns' (Studies in Bibliography, 23 [1970], 71-102); the colour designations follow the ISCC-NBS Centroid Color Charts as outlined by Tanselle's 'A System of Color Identification for Bibliographical Descriptions' (SB, 20 [1967], 203-34); publication information; publishing history notes; manuscript collections (since most of Pratt's books are available in major libraries across Canada, only the locations of copies examined are indicated). Publication dates are given whenever known. When they are unknown, and often when known, other dates are also given: date printed, date delivered to publisher from printer, date review copies mailed, date copies were made available to dealers, and date when copies were made available to the public. B / Broadsides chronologically arranged. Broadsides with unknown publishing dates are arranged alphabetically by title following the chronological listing.

374 Descriptive Bibliography c / Individual Poems in Books and Periodicals is a chronological listing of every Pratt poem with its transmission history for the authoritative period. Anthology occurrences are listed here only when a poem appears for the first time in such a work. See Section F for anthology contributions. Manuscript locations are noted. D / Prose Published in Books and Periodicals is a chronological listing of all first appearances in print of Pratt's prose material. Unsigned book reviews have been attributed to Pratt by Mrs Viola Pratt. E / Audio and Video Recordings, Sheet Music, and Miscellaneous. This section includes dramatizations of Pratt's works, poems set to music, pageants and hymns written by him, readings of his work (by himself), interviews with Pratt, and tributes to him. F / Poems in Anthologies and Textbooks inclusive to 1967 is arranged chronologically and alphabetically within a particular year. G / Pratt as Editor and Consultant. Because of space limitations books edited by Pratt are presented in a brief bibliographical listing (not in quasi-facsimile) with publishing history notes. Where Pratt's name does not appear on the title page, his involvement in the editorial work has been verified by actual notes in extant copies, by correspondence in the Macmillan Archive (OHMA) and by Mrs Pratt. H / Manuscript Sources is a guide to holdings of manuscripts and correspondence; detailed finding aids exist in each of the libraries which house the manuscripts. An Index of Titles and Names concludes the bibliography. It is not our purpose to include secondary materials; these are available in Volume H of The Annotated Bibliography of Canada's Major Authors, edited by Robert Lecker and Jack David (ECW Press 1980). ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

From the beginning of my bibliographic work on Pratt I have had the support of the late Mrs Viola Whitney Pratt and Miss Claire Pratt. For their interest and assistance in answering innumerable questions, and for calling to my attention information which I could not have known about, I am deeply grateful. In the preparation of this bibliography I have had the generous assistance of many librarians and institutions, and although individually unnamed, I wish to acknowledge my indebtedness to them. For help and advice provided in various ways, I wish to express gratitude to Sandra Djwa, a General Editor of The Collected Works ofE.J. Pratt, Susan Gingell, Rachel Grover, Richard Landon, Douglas Lochhead, Desmond Neill, and

375 Descriptive Bibliography Bruce Whiteman. I wish to thank the following: for their co-operation, book-dealers Nelson Ball, William Hoffer; for their research help, Debbie Green, Janice La very, Don McLeod; for her typing, Gwen Peroni. To my co-workers, the staff of the E J. Pratt Library, Victoria University, I extend my appreciation. I am grateful to Victoria University for its support of this project. Finally I wish to offer special thanks to Robert Brandeis, Chief Librarian, Victoria University, for invaluable assistance; Gordon Moyles, a General Editor of The Collected Works of E.J. Pratt, for expertise and patience; Jean Wilson and Gerry Hallowell of the University of Toronto Press for professional assistance; David G. Pitt for his timely additions and advice; Raymond, my husband, for unfailing support. Location Abbreviations BVAU University of British Columbia, Vancouver BVIV University of Victoria, Victoria LML Collection of Lila Laakso MWU University of Manitoba, Winnipeg OHMA Archives and Special Collections Division, McMaster University, Hamilton OKQ Queen's University, Kingston OONL National Library, Ottawa OTMC Massey College, Toronto OTMCL Metropolitan Toronto Library, Toronto OTNY North York Public Library, Willowdale OTR Ryerson Polytechnical Institute, Toronto OTU University of Toronto, Toronto OTUTF Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, University of Toronto OTV Victoria University, Toronto OTW Wycliffe College, Toronto VCP Collection of Claire Pratt

A / Quasi-Facsimile Title Pages of Published Works AI

Studies in Pauline Eschatology 1917 STUDIES IN / PAULINE ESCHATOLOGY / AND ITS BACKGROUND / By I EDWIN J. PRATT, M. A., Ph.D. / Accepted by the University of Toronto as a Thesis / for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy / [rule 2.1 cm.] / TORONTO / WILLIAM BRIGGS /1917

376 Descriptive Bibliography (Cut: 19 x 12.5 cm.) i-i38 [$i (-1, 2)], 104 leaves, pp. [1-2] 3 [4] 5-203 [204-208]. P. i: title page as above; p. 2: [lower left margin] 'Copyright, Canada. 1917, / by EDWIN J. PRATT.'; p. 3: contents; p. 4: blank; pp. 5-10: introduction; pp. 11-203: text; pp. 204-208: blank. Signatures at foot of page against inner margin; running titles on verso; running chapter titles on recto. Facing p. 11, three tipped-in folding charts entitled: 'FROM THE MIDDLE OF THE FIRST CENTURY B.C. TO THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM JO A.D.'

[25.3 x 73.5 cm.]; 'ANALYSIS OF THE CONCEPTS IN THE APOCALYPTIC PERIOD FROM THE RISE OF THE MACCABEES TO THE MIDDLE OF FIRST

CENTURY B.C.' [24.1 x 73.5 cm.]; 'ANALYSIS OF JEWISH RELIGIOUS CONCEPTS FROM THE EIGHTH CENTURY B.C. TO THE BEGINNING OF THE GREEK PERIOD.' [21.6X 73.5

cm.]

Material: diagonal fine rib (io2be), dark olive green (Centroid 126); upper cover: [enclosed within a frame, 3.3 x 9 cm.] 'Studies in [underscored] PAULINE / ESCHATOLOGY; [enclosed within a frame 1.7X9 cm.] E.J. PRATT; [the whole enclosed within frame, 5 . 5 X 9 cm.]; all in gilt; spine: [lettered horizontally in gilt] 'Studies in / Pauline / Eschatology / [rule 6 mm.] / E. J. Pratt / [at foot] BRIGGS'; lower cover: blank. Dust wrapper: not seen. 200 copies published in 1917 at $1.00. Notes: Lome Pierce (January 12, 1932) asked Pratt for 'written authority ... to consign your Pauline Eschatology to the Eschatological incinerator/ Pratt replied, 'You are most welcome to consign these Eschatological monstrosities to the everlasting flames where they should have gone in the first place ... This is your authorization to give them a hasty and fiery despatch' (Lome Pierce Collection, OKQ). In a letter to E.K. Brown (April 20, 1942) Pratt details how Pauline Eschatology was published: Tn an unguarded moment I consented with the publisher; Ryerson against the victim.' He also confides to Brown that he would like to have forgotten this work because it 'was done to a formula - and not a naked expression of the spontaneous

377 Descriptive Bibliography poetic spirit.' Mrs Viola Pratt related how two hundred copies were published by Pratt on the promise that the Methodist Church would advertise and sell them for $5.00 a copy. In error, the book was advertised and sold at $1.00. Pratt was out of pocket for the publication; in 1925, tired of the whole project, he burned fifty of the books. Copies examined: OTV (2); OTU; OTW; OONL; MWU; BVAU; VCP. As above except for title page as follows: STUDIES IN / PAULINE ESCHATOLOGY / AND ITS BACKGROUND / By I EDWIN J. PRATT, M.A., B.D. / A Thesis I Submitted in Conformity with the Requirements for I the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in I the University of Toronto / February, 1917 / [rule 2.1 cm.] / TORONTO / WILLIAM BRIGGS /1917 Copies examined: OTUTF; OTU. A2

Rachel: A Sea Story of Newfoundland in Verse 1917 As there is no title page, the following description is taken from the cover: [within a single-rule frame (14 x 7.7 cm.) all enclosed within a double-rule frame (15.6 x 9.3 cm.)] fcaeftel / & &ea fttorp of UEtofouitiilan& / in bertfe / [flower ornament] / [all in gilt] (Cut: 18 x 12 cm.): [unsigned, i8], 8 leaves, pp. 1-15 [16]. P. i: title as above at head of text; pp. 2-15: text; p. 16: blank. Material: printed wrappers (morocco 402), black (Centroid 267), stapled; upper cover: as described above in quasi-facsimile; lower cover: blank. 500 copies privately printed in New York, 1917. Notes: an ornament (1.3 x 1.3 cm.) appears at the end of the poem, p. 15. An insert consisting of one leaf (18.5 x 11.5), double rule at top and foot of page [8.9 cm.], untitled page (35 lines of text) of biographical information on Pratt. Insert seen only in OTV copy. In a letter to Viola Whitney (July 5, 1917) Pratt writes: 'I have just finished typewriting "Rachel," and am now sending a copy to your dear self. I am also this morning sending one to Dr. Edear at Camp

378 Descriptive Bibliography Kapuskasing. I am anxious to see what he has to say. Shall send you his report just when I get it' (OTV). Pratt wrote in a letter to E.K. Brown in April 1942 that 'It was a private printing limited to 500 copies and done in New York' (OTV). In a letter to David G. Pitt, dated 18 February 1958, he stated that 'A few friends of mine got together, and unknown to me, printed privately 500 copies in New York for personal and non-commercial distribution.' Mrs Pratt claimed that only 100 copies were printed and considering the scarcity of the poem, this figure seems correct. Manuscripts, typescript: OTV, Box 1.1, 1.2, 8.62. Copies examined: OTV; OTUTF; OTNY; OHMA. a3

A3

A / Newfoundland Verse 1923

[Within ornamental frame 15 x 9.6 cm.] Newfoundland / Verse I by IE [dot] J / Pratt / DECORATIONS / BY [dot] FREDK [dot] H / VARLEY / [illustration 2.5 x 2 cm.] The [dot] Ryerson [dash] Press / Publishers [dash] Toronto (Cut: 18.5 x 12.5 cm.) [i]10 2-9® [$i signed, -i] 74 leaves, pp. [i-vi] [1-4] 5-6 [7-8] 9-140 [141-142]. Pp. i-iv: blank; p. v: half-title [double rule thick thin 4.6 cm.] / 'NEWFOUNDLAND/VERSE'; p. vi: blank; p. i: dedication [begins 6.3 cm. from top of page], To my [star-shaped decoration 2.2 x 3.8 cm.] / MOTHER' [underlined with ornamental rule 4.2 cm.]; p. 2: blank; p. 3: title page as above; p. 4: at lower left margin [rule 3.2 cm.] / 'COPYRIGHT, CANADA, 1923 / BY THE RYERSON PRESS'; pp. 5-6: contents; p. 7: fly-title [double rule thick thin 4.6 cm.] / 'NEWFOUNDLAND / VERSE'; p. 8: blank; pp. 9-140: text; p. 141: THIS BOOK IS A PRODUCTION OF / THE RYERSON PRESS, / TORONTO, CANADA'; p. 142: blank. Contents: 9: 'Sea Variations'; 15: The Toll of the Bells'; 17: The GroundSwell'; 18: 'Magnolia Blossoms'; 20: The Ice-Floes'; 27:'?'; 28: The Shark'; 30: The Fog'; 31: The Big Fellow'; 33: The Morning Plunge'; 34: Tn Absentia'; 35: The Flood Tide'; 36: The Pine Tree'; 37: 'In Lantern Light'; 38: The Secret of the Sea'; 40: 'Loss of the Steamship Florizel'; 41:

379 Descriptive Bibliography 'The Drowning'; 42: 'Monologues and Dialogues /1 / CARLO'; 46: 'n / OVERHEARD BY A STREAM'; 47: 'ill / OVERHEARD IN A COVE / (The Old Salt

Talks Back)'; 63: 'iv / THE PASSING OF JERRY MOORE / (Juniper Hall answers the critics).'; 71: 'v. / THE HISTORY OF JOHN JONES'; 73: 'Creatures of Another Country III THE BIRD OF PARADISE'; 74: '11 / THE EPIGRAPHER'; 77: 'Ode to December, 1917'; 87: 'Newfoundland'; 91: 'Flashlights and Echoes / From the Years of 1914 and 1915 /1 / A COAST'; 92: '11 / LATER / (A man speaks}'; 93: 'HI / (A woman speaks}.'; 93: 'iv / MORNING'; 94: 'v / GREAT TIDES'; 94: 'vi / THE AFTER-CALM'; 96: 'VH / SCENES FROM AFAR / (A Battlefield}'; 99: 'VIH / A DIRGE'; 100: 'ix / THE SEED MUST DIE'; 102: 'x / COME NOT THE SEASONS HERE'; 103: 'XI / ON THE SHORE'; 104: 'XII / BEFORE A

BULLETIN BOARD / (After Beaumont-Hamel)'; 105: 'xm / BEFORE AN ALTAR / (After Gueudecourt)''; 106: 'xiv / SNOWFALL ON A BATTLE-FIELD'; 108: The Great Mother'; no: TnMemoriam'; 112: 'The Hidden Scar'; 113: 'Evening'; 114: 'In a Beloved Home / (To w. H. G.}'; 115: The Conclusion of "Rachel" / (A story of the sea)/ IN MEMORY OF R. s. LE D.'; 122: 'A Fragment from a Story III (THADDEUS, a traveller, speaking to Julian, I an old man}'. Pagination at bottom right margin of type page on recto and at bottom left margin of type page on verso; headlines on recto and verso of poem titles; signed on inner margin of type page on recto. Top edge tinted light reddish brown (Centroid 42). Material: printed imitation black quarter binding which extends 2.8 cm. on to upper and lower covers; paper covered boards with whorl pattern (412) greyish brown (Centroid 61); upper cover: [lettered in black within a light yellowish brown (Centroid 76) scroll-designed compartment (10.5 x 9 cm.)] 'NEWFOUNDLAND / VERSE / [illustration of seagulls 4.6 x 4 cm.] / by E I} I Pratt'; lower cover: blank; spine: paper label (9.6 x 2.2 cm.) whorl pattern (412), greyish brown (Centroid 61) [ornamental rule (1.3 x 2 cm.) greyish yellow (Centroid 90)] 'NEW / FOUND / LAND / VERSE / [illustration of seagulls (2 x 1.5 cm.] / by / EDWIN / J / PRATT' [ornamental rule (i x 2 cm.) greyish yellow (Centroid 90)]; at foot of spine: paper label (2 x 1.3 cm.) greyish brown (Centroid 61) with publisher's device, 'The [illustration] / Ryerson / Press / Founded /1829'; endpapers: [within frame (17.7 x 24 cm.) extending over two pages, (sepia) illustration of seashore and seagulls in slightly yellowish brown (Centroid 74) on whorl pattern (412) paper, greyish yellow (Centroid 90)]; signature in lower left-hand corner,

380 Descriptive Bibliography 'F.H. / VARLEY / . . . . 23'. Dust wrapper: not seen. (Taper jacket' referred to in a note in the McGraw-Hill-Ryerson archival copy.) 1,000 of contracted 2,500 printed in April 1923 at $1.50 (the number printed was given to David G. Pitt by Mrs Viola Pratt in an interview in 1969). Notes: The contract for the publication of Newfoundland Verse was signed in January 1923. The royalty was set at 10% for the first 2,500 copies sold and 15% for the rest. The illustrator was named in the agreement as F.H. Varley (McGraw-Hill Ryerson Archives, Toronto). In a letter to Lome Pierce (January 16, 1923) Pratt noted that Varley was almost finished his designs. He had indicated to Varley that he preferred 'a design having the quality of spaciousness befitting ocean themes/ He also warned Pierce that in publicity he wished not to be identified by 'such an ugly, stiff term as "Professor" ... the term is sufficient to stultify any poetic claims which a writer may, in all modesty, put forth.' A week later Pierce replied that Varley's sketch for the end-papers and other material for NV were satisfactory. He continued: 'I shall do my best to secure for your book an English publisher and have their name associated with ours in the first edition. We were unsuccessful a week ago in New York.' On March 16, Pierce wrote to Pratt that he had seen 'a sample page of your book this morning ... [Publication] is earmarked for Easter; [our] salesmen [will] dodge around the city and load up the Merchants here in plenty of time.' After publication, Pratt wrote Pierce (May 16) that before a 'second edition or a first English or American Edition, I'd like to make a few small but important corrections. "Magnolia Blossoms" must certainly be integrated. "Newfoundland" must have its last stanza spatially articulated to the body of the poem. Two or three misspellings and some punctuations must be corrected. Wherever the errors are due to my oversight in proof, I shall gladly put up the coin.' A Ryerson Press production sheet for NV (February 29, 1924) records the binding of 512 copies at 20 cents each for Educational Department purchase. This lot was indicated to be the 'balance of [the] edition' (Lome Pierce Collection, OKQ). Manuscripts, typescript: OTV, Box 1.2; Lome Pierce Collection, OKQ, Box 72.003.

381 Descriptive Bibliography Holograph draft: OTV, Box 7.52. Typescript drafts: OTV, Box 7.54, 7.55, 8.62. Holograph commentaries: OTV, Box 6.44, 7.60, 8.63, 9.63, 9.64, 9.86.5. Copies examined: McGraw-Hill Ryerson Archives; OTNY; MCL. B / Identical to A except for: (Cut: 18.5 x 12.5 cm.) [i (-i3.4 + 13)10'1] 2-98 [$i signed, -i] 73 leaves, pp. [i-iv] [1-4] 5-6 [7-8] 9-140 [141-142]. Pp. i-iv: blank; p. i: dedication [begins 13.3 cm. from top of page]; p. 2: blank; p. 3: title page as above; p. 4: copyright as above; pp. 5-6: contents; p. 7: half-title [double rule thick thin 4.6 cm.] / 'NEWFOUNDLAND/VERSE'. Copies examined: OTV (3); OTU; OONL; OKQ; VCP. c / Identical to B except for: (Cut: 18.5 x 12.8 cm.): [i8] 2-98 [$i signed, -i] 72 leaves, pp. [i-ii] [1-4] 5-140 [141-142]. Pp. i-ii: blank; p. i: dedication [begins 11.8 cm. from top of page]. Copies examined: OTV (2); OTU; OTMCL; OTNY; OHMA; VCP; LML. Notes: The states of this issue can probably be attributed to dissatisfaction with the placement of the dedication and the additional half-title; amending these necessitated the changes indicated in the collations. In the first state, the dedication appears 6.3 cm. from the top of the page; it was then moved to 13.3 cm. from the top, and finally to 11.8 cm. from the top. The additional half-title was removed. The width of the page also changed from 12.5 to 12.8 cm. The changes appear to have been made very early in the issue as the McGraw-Hill Ryerson file copy is the first state and is designated 'first copy' by an in-house note inserted into the copy. In addition, very few copies of the first state appear to have been issued. a4

A4

A / The Witches' Brew

THE WITCHES' BREW / BY / E.J. PRATT / With Decorations / BY JOHN

382 Descriptive Bibliography AUSTEN /[engraving of a black cat 2 x 3.8 cm.] LONDON:/SELWYN& BLOUNT, LIMITED, / 21, York Buildings, Adelphi, W.C. 2. (Cut: 18.2 x 12 cm.): i-28, 16 leaves, pp. [1-8] 9-31 [32]. P. i: half-title, THE WITCHES' / BREW; p. 2: 'By the same Author I NEWFOUNDLAND VERSE / By EJ. PRATT / With Decorations / By FREDK. H. VARLEY / The Ryerson Press I Toronto.'; p. 3: blank; p. 4: frontispiece; p. 5: title page as above; p. 6: [at centre] 'First Printed in 1925 / [at foot of page] Made and Printed in Great Britain by I John Wright & Sons Ltd., Stone Bridge, Bristol'; p. 7: dedication, TO MY WIFE'; p. 8: blank; p. 9: engraving of underwater scene of fish, seaweed, sunken ship (5 x 7.5 cm.), above THE WITCHES' BREW / E.J. PRATT' followed by text; pp. 10-32: text. Contents [Section Headings]: 13: 'OTHER INGREDIENTS'; 16: 'DEFENSIVE MEASURES'; 17: 'THE SEA-CAT'; 18: 'THE FLIGHT OF THE IMMORTALS'; 19: 'INVENTORY OF HADES'; 20: 'AN HOUR LATER'; 22: 'THE MIDNIGHT REVELS AS OBSERVED / BY THE SHADES'; 25: 'THE CHARGE OF THE SWORDFISH'; 27: 'THE SUPREME TEST'; 31: 'THE RETURN OF THE CAT'. Signed numeral at foot of page against outer margin. Pagination enclosed in brackets centred at foot of page. Frontispiece only (12 x 9 cm.) facing title page (p. 4): engraving of three witches by John Austen. Material: light greyish brown (Centroid 60) paper covered boards; printed pale orange yellow (Centroid 73) paper label on upper cover (6.4 x 7.9 cm.) [within a double ruled frame; outer frame very red (Centroid 11), 2 mm. wide; inner frame thin black rule] THE / WITCHES' BREW / BY E.J. PRATT' / [an engraving in a triangular shape (2.6 x 5.3 cm.) of three women with long, flowing hair]; spine: sand patterned cloth (408), black (Centroid 267), which extends 1.8 cm. to front and back covers; printed paper label (4 x i cm.) horizontal letters [i cm. double rule: ornamental red and thin black] / The / Witches' / Brew / [5 mm. rule] / E.J. / Pratt' / [i cm. double rule: thin black and ornamental red]; lower cover: blank. Glassine wrapper. 1,000 copies were to be published February 1926 and sold for one half-

383 Descriptive Bibliography crown (60 cents) (letter, Pratt to Pierce, Sept. 24, 1924); of these, 520 copies were sent to Macmillan of Canada. Notes: On January 17, 1924 a letter to Ryerson Press from a representative of Frederick A. Stokes Co., New York, refused The Witches' Brew: 'I really do not think there would be a market for this volume, so I am returning the manuscript to you herewith.' Writing to Lome Pierce (Sept. 24, 1924), Pratt stated that Selwyn & Blount would 'instantly ... publish one thousand copies, cloth cover with illustrations. Professor Gordon of Oxford wrote enthusiastically about it and sent a copy of it to Squire of the Mercury. Squire may print it in parts. In any case it took well wherever it was presented, both in London, Oxford and Leeds. Selwyn & Blount were to write you to see if you would represent it over here.' (Evidently Pratt paid 50 pounds to Selwyn & Blount for publishing the poem [receipt, dated Sept. i, 1924].) In a letter (Dec. 16,1924) headed 'PROFESSOR! HOW COULD YOU?', Pierce wrote that The general feeling is that a publishing house so closely connected with the Methodist Church could not very well act as Canadian distributor of [The Witches' Brew]. Personally, I should like very much to be able to do something for you with this book ... I hope that the timidity of our house is not prevalent among other publishers in town. ... There is only one change that I would make if I were you. On page two I would strike out your name and on page 9 I should do the same kind service.' Pratt replied (Dec. 18): 'Sorry the vintage proved a little too stimulating for regular consumption. I understand the situation in which you are placed, as a firm, by reason of ecclesiastical affiliations' (Lome Pierce Collection, OKQ). Manuscripts, holograph, drafts: OTV, Box 1.3, 1.4. Typescripts: Lome Pierce Collection, OKQ, Box 72.004. Copies examined: OTV (2); OTMC; OHMA; OONL; VCP; LML . B / The Witches' Brew - First Canadian Edition - 1926 THE WITCHES' BREW / BY / E.J. PRATT / With Decorations / BY JOHN AUSTEN I [engraving of a black cat 2 x 3.8 cm.] TORONTO / THE MACMILLAN COMPANY OF CANADA, LTD., / AT ST. MARTIN'S HOUSE. / MCMXXVI.

384 Descriptive Bibliography Identical to the London edition except for title page reset imprint at foot: TORONTO: / THE MACMILLAN COMPANY OF CANADA, LTD., / AT ST. MARTIN'S HOUSE. / MCMXXVI/ 520 copies published in 1926 at $1.00. Copies examined: OTV (2); OTMCL; OTNY (2); OTUTF; OHMA; VCP; LML. A5

A/Titans 1926 [The whole within thick-thin rule (13.8 x 8.3 cm.)]: TITANS / By / E.J. PRATT / [acorn ornament 7 X 5 mm.] / MACMILLAN & CO. LIMITED / ST. MARTIN'S STREET, LONDON / MCMXXVI (Cut: 18.5 x 12.7 cm.): A-D8 E4 [$i signed], 36 leaves, pp. [1-6] 7 [8] 9-67 [68-72]. P. i: half-title, TITANS'; p. 2: in upper left corner, 'Awtfzoro//"Newfoundland Verse" / "The Witches' Brew"'; p. 3: title page as above; p. 4: at centre, 'COPYRIGHT / [at foot of page] 'PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN'; p. 5: dedication, TO / THE BOYS / OF THE / STAG PARTIES'; p. 6: acknowledgement, 'The Author begs to acknowledge permission I to reprint "The Cachalot," which appeared I in "The Canadian forum" for I November 1925'; p. 7: contents; p. 8: blank; pp. 9-68: text; p. 69: blank; p. 70: [at centre] publisher's ornament [1.9 x 1.5 cm.] / The Westminster Press / 4113 Harrow Road / London W.9'; pp. 71-72: blank. Contents: 9: 'THE CACHALOT'; 27: 'THE GREAT FEUD / (^4 Dream of a Pleiocene Armageddon}'; 43: [Section Heading] 'WITH THE PASSAGE OF THE MOONS /THE MUSTER'. Signed upper case Roman letters at foot of type page against outer margin. Laid paper, vertical chain lines 2.4 cm. apart. Watermark of a crown above 'Sbbep Wills I