Page:The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses.djvu/97



Around the purple, vine-clad slope the argent river dreams; The roses almost hide the house from view; A snow-peak of the Winterberg in crimson splendor gleams; The shadow deepens down on the karroo. He seeks the lily-scented dusk beneath the orange tree; His pipe in silence glows and fades and glows; And then two little maids come out and climb upon his knee, And one is like the lily, one the rose.

He sees his white sheep dapple o'er the green New Zealand plain, And where Vancouver's shaggy ramparts frown, When the sunlight threads the pine-gloom he is fighting might and main To clinch the rivets of an Empire down. You will find him toiling, toiling, in the south or in the west, A child of nature, fearless, frank and free;