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We stood, as the helmeted horsemen
Formed up in the light of the sun;
We knelt, stretching bayonets towards them
As they charged, ere the battle was won.

I marked their young leader apparelled...

(Translated From The Gaelic. Taken down in Gaelic by Dewar.)

King Arthur on a journey went,
His men and he on hunting bent.

Came to the hill for victories known;
He, and Sir Balva, armed alone....

Is it Man alone who merits
Immortality or death?
Each created thing inherits
Equal air and common breath.

Souls pass onward: some are ranging
Happy hunting-grounds, and some...

Cherry bloom and green buds bursting
Fleck the azure skies;
In the spring wood, hungering, thirsting,
Faint an Indian lies.

To behold his guardian spirit
Fasts the dusky youth;...

With their deep voice, monotonous and slow,
The cannon's thunders roll along the sea;
But 'tis in reverence, and to work no woe
Those sounds here reach the shore and onward flee...

Among white peaks a rock, hewn altar-wise,
Marks the long frontier of our mighty lands.
Apart its dark tremendous sculpture stands,
Too steep for snow, and square against the skies....

[This Province was called after the Princess, one of whose Christian names is Alberta.]

In token of the love which thou hast shown
For this wide land of freedom, I have named...

Best beloved of ancient stories
Are our Diarmid's woes to me.
Like a mist, by breezes broken,
So this tale of olden glories
Floats in fragments, as a token
Of the song of Ireland's sea.
...

Grey-cowled monk, whose faith so earnest
Guides these Indians' childlike hearts,
As their hands to toil thou turnest,
Teaching them the Builder's arts,
Speak thy thought! as now they gather...

Not home to land and kindred wast thou brought,
Nor laid 'mid trampled dead of battle won,--
Nor after long life filled with duty done
Was thine such death as thou thyself had'st sought!...

An ancient cannon, finely cast.
Of bronze, all smooth and green with age,
A by-gone actor on the stage,
Yet fit to take, as in the past
A role in war, and be the last
Dread argument of kings!
...

I.

Where the snow-world of the mountains
Fronts the sea-like world of sward,
And encamped along the prairies
Tower the white peaks heavenward;
Where they stand by dawn rose-coloured...

[Taken from "Leabhar na Feinne," and a prose version written down from oral recitation by J. Dewar.]

OSSIAN.

This vale of Peace, this glen close by,
Where deer and elk would often cry,...

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

A camp is seen, and victims fall,
And none are left to flee;...

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

Look not for me at eventide,
I cannot come when work is done;
I go to wander far and wide,
For 'tis not here that gold is won.
Perchance where'er I go, these hands
May find me what I need to live;...

"They sow in tears who reap in joy,"
Was truly said of old:
We wandered far, but round us still
Stretched God Almighty's fold.

'Twas He who led us forth; our grief
Discerned His chastening hand,...

Bright are the countless isles which crest
With waving woods wide Huron's breast,--
Her countless isles, that love too well
The crystal waters whence they rise,
Far from her azure depths to swell,...

A brother's eye had seen the grief
That Duart's lady bore;
His boat with sail half-raised flies down
The sound by green Lismore.
Ahaladah, Ahaladah!
Why speeds your boat so fast?...

(Keewatin.)

A land untamed, whose myriad isles
Are set in branching lakes that vein
Illimitable silent woods,
Voiceful in Fall, when their defiles,
Rich with the birch's golden rain,...