Part 1

Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net

_Lundy's Lane

and Other Poems_

Duncan Campbell Scott

Author of "The Magic House," "In the Village of Viger," etc., etc.

McClelland, Goodchild & Stewart Publishers :: :: :: :: Toronto

Copyright, 1916, By GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY

Printed in the United States of America

To the Memory of My Daughter

ELIZABETH DUNCAN SCOTT

1895-1907

CONTENTS

Page

THE BATTLE OF LUNDY'S LANE 13

VIA BOREALIS-- Spring on Mattagami 25 An Impromptu 36 The Half-Breed Girl 38 Night Burial in the Forest 41 Dream Voyageurs 44 Song: Creep into My Heart 45 Ecstasy 46

LYRICS, SONGS AND SONNETS-- Meditation at Perugia 49 At William MacLennan's Grave. Near Florence 53 The Wood-Spring to the Poet 56 The November Pansy 63 The Height of Land 68 New Year's Night, 1916 77 Fragment of an Ode to Canada 79 Fantasia 84 The Lover to His Lass 86 The Ghost's Story 90 Night 92 The Apparition 94 At Sea 96 Madonna with Two Angels 98 Mid-August 100 Mist and Frost 105 The Beggar and the Angel 110 Improvisation on an Old Song 117 O Turn Once More 121 At the Gill-Nets 124 A Love Song 126 Three Songs: I Where love is life 128 II Nothing came here but sunlight 129 III I have songs of dancing pleasure 129 The Sailor's Sweetheart 131 Feuilles d'Automne 133 To the Heroic Soul: I Nurture thyself, O Soul! 135 II Be strong, O Warring Soul! 136 Retrospect 138 Frost Magic: I Now in the moonrise, from a wintry sky 139 II With these alone he draws in magic lines 140 In Snow-Time 142 To a Canadian Lad Killed in the War 143

THE CLOSED DOOR-- By a Child's Bed 147 Elizabeth Speaks 149 A Legend of Christ's Nativity 154 Willow-Pipes 163 Angel 164 Christmas Folk-Song 165 From Beyond 166 The Leaf 167 A Mystery Play 168

LINES IN MEMORY OF EDMUND MORRIS 179

THE BATTLE OF LUNDY'S LANE

THE BATTLE OF LUNDY'S LANE

Rufus Gale speaks--1852

Yes,--in the Lincoln Militia,--in the war of eighteen-twelve; Many's the day I've had since then to dig and delve-- But those are the years I remember as the brightest years of all, When we left the plow in the furrow to follow the bugle's call. Why, even our son Abner wanted to fight with the men! "Don't you go, d'ye hear, sir!"--I was angry with him then. "Stay with your mother!" I said, and he looked so old and grim-- He was just sixteen that April--I couldn't believe it was him; But I didn't think--I was off--and we met the foe again, Five thousand strong and ready, at the hill by Lundy's Lane. There as the night came on we fought them from six to nine, Whenever they broke our line we broke their line, They took our guns and we won them again, and around the levels Where the hill sloped up--with the Eighty-ninth,--we fought like devils Around the flag;--and on they came and we drove them back, Until with its very fierceness the fight grew slack.

It was then about nine and dark as a miser's pocket, When up came Hercules Scott's brigade swift as a rocket, And charged,--and the flashes sprang in the dark like a lion's eyes; The night was full of fire--groans, and cheers, and cries; Then through the sound and the fury another sound broke in-- The roar of a great old duck-gun shattered the rest of the din; It took two minutes to charge it and another to set it free. Every time I heard it an angel spoke to me; Yes, the minute I heard it I felt the strangest tide Flow in my veins like lightning, as if, there, by my side, Was the very spirit of Valor. But 'twas dark--you couldn't see-- And the one who was firing the duck-gun fell against me And slid down to the clover, and lay there still; Something went through me--piercing--with a strange, swift thrill; The noise fell away into silence, and I heard as clear as thunder The long, slow roar of Niagara: O the wonder Of that deep sound. But again the battle broke And the foe, driven before us desperately--stroke upon stroke, Left the field to his master, and sullenly down the road Sounded the boom of his guns, trailing the heavy load Of his wounded men and his shattered flags, sullen and slow, Setting fire in his rage to Bridgewater mills and the glow Flared in the distant forest. We rested as we could, And for a while I slept in the dark of a maple wood: But when the clouds in the east were red all over, I came back there to the place we made the stand in the clover; For my heart was heavy then with a strange deep pain, As I thought of the glorious fight, and again and again I remembered the valiant spirit and the piercing thrill; But I knew it all when I reached the top of the hill,-- For there, there with the blood on his dear, brave head, There on the hill in the clover lay our Abner--dead!-- No--thank you--no, I don't need it; I'm solid as granite rock, But every time that I tell it I feel the old, cold shock, I'm eighty-one my next birthday--do you breed such fellows now? There he lay with the dawn cooling his broad fair brow, That was no dawn for him; and there was the old duck-gun That many and many's the time,--just for the fun, We together, alone, would take to the hickory rise, And bring home more wild pigeons than ever you saw with your eyes. Up with Hercules Scott's brigade, just as it came on night-- He was the angel beside me in the thickest of the fight-- Wrote a note to his mother--He said, "I've got to go; Mother what would home be under the heel of the foe!" Oh! she never slept a wink, she would rise and walk the floor; She'd say this over and over, "I knew it all before!" I'd try to speak of the glory to give her a little joy. "What is the glory to me when I want my boy, my boy!" She'd say, and she'd wring her hands; her hair grew white as snow-- And I'd argue with her up and down, to and fro, Of how she had mothered a hero, and his was a glorious fate, Better than years of grubbing to gather an estate. Sometimes I'd put it this way: "If God was to say to me now 'Take him back as he once was helping you with the plow,' I'd say, 'No, God, thank You kindly; 'twas You that he obeyed; You told him to fight and he fought, and he wasn't afraid; You wanted to prove him in battle, You sent him to Lundy's Lane, 'Tis well!" But she only would answer over and over again, "Give me back my Abner--give me back my son!" It was so all through the winter until the spring had begun, And the crocus was up in the dooryard, and the drift by the fence was thinned, And the sap drip-dropped from the branches wounded by the wind, And the whole earth smelled like a flower,--then she came to me one night-- "Rufus!" she said, with a sob in her throat,--"Rufus, you're right." I hadn't cried till then, not a tear--but then I was torn in two-- There, it's all right--my eyes don't see as they used to do!

But O the joy of that battle--it was worth the whole of life, You felt immortal in action with the rapture of the strife, There in the dark by the river, with the flashes of fire before, Running and crashing along, there in the dark, and the roar Of the guns, and the shrilling cheers, and the knowledge that filled your heart That there was a victory making and you must do your part, But--there's his grave in the orchard where the headstone glimmers white: We could see it, we thought, from our window even on the darkest night; It is set there for a sign that what one lad could do Would be done by a hundred hundred lads whose hearts were stout and true. And when in the time of trial you hear the recreant say, Shooting his coward lips at us, "You shall have had your day: For all your state and glory shall pass like a cloudy wrack, And here some other flag shall fly where flew the Union Jack,"-- Why tell him a hundred thousand men would spring from these sleepy farms, To tie that flag in its ancient place with the sinews of their arms; And if they doubt you and put you to scorn, why you can make it plain, With the tale of the gallant Lincoln men and the fight at Lundy's Lane.

1908.

VIA BOREALIS

Pelham Edgar

SPRING ON MATTAGAMI