Page:Canadian poems of the great war.djvu/166

 S. Morgan-Powell

He never swerved from his appointed way, However grim the danger or the doom That seeming loomed ahead.

He never failed,

Because his will to DO was adamant. So, late, when honours all unsought were his, He turned at duty s summons to his last And greatest task to sound the call to arms Through all the land his pride had been to serve. And millions came in answer to the call, From lives of wealth and penury alike, Farm hand and city clerk, beggar and peer, Because HE sounded loud the urgent need Of Britain in her hour of dark distress The clarion call to strike for Liberty.

His work was done ; a Nation stood to arms. Then struck the unseen, unsuspected Death. An Empire mourns his loss.

But not in vain

Dies such a man. The record he has left Lies luminous upon our Empire s roll Of those who served and found their best reward In quiet knowledge of stern duty done. O warrior of steel heart and eagle eye, Death has but made your service greater yet; Your spirit marches still, and leads the land You lived to serve to deathless Liberty!

�� �