Page:A Treasury of South African Poetry.djvu/196

 CAPE OF GOOD HOPE. is a land unknown to fame, A land whose heroes have no name In the grey records of past age; Unchronicled in hist'ry's page, Untamed by art, yet wild and free. That land lies in the southern sea, It laughs to heav'n which smiles on it; There midway in wild waters set, With suns serene and balmier breeze Than ever swept these northern seas, Its beetling crags rise vast, and war With oceans, meeting from afar, To break their billows on its shore With fearful, never-ending roar.

Bold mariners who sailed of old Through unknown seas in search of gold, Saw those dark rocks, those giant forms, And, fear-quelled, named them "Cape of Storms!" O land of storms, I pine to hear That music which made others fear; I long to see thy storm-fiend scowl, I long to hear the fierce winds howl, Hot with fell fires across thy plains.

Thou glorious land! where Nature reigns Supreme in awful loveliness.