Page:A masque of poets 1878.djvu/114

108 And round them, lost in drifts of snow, The hills like blind guides seemed to go!

Yet still devout, through loss and doubt,
 * One woman's loyal heart—whose pain

Filled it with white celestial light— Shone starry-constant like the North,
 * And sacred like a fane.

But he whose ring Jemima wore, By want and weariness all unstrung, Though strong and honest of heart and young, Shrank at the blast that pierced so frore— Like a huge, invisible bird of prey Furious launch d from Labrador And the granite cliffs of Saguenay! Along the bleak Dead River's banks They forced amain their frozen way; But ever from the thinning ranks Shapes of ice would reel and fall, Human shapes, whose dying prayer Floated, a mute white mist, in air;— The crowding snow their pall.