Part 21

She fed them, and led them away, through tempest and tropical heat, Till they reached the far regions of day, and sweet-scented spaces of wheat. She hath made them a home with her hand, and they bloom like the summery vines; For they eat of the fat of the land, and drink of its glittering wines.

Mount Erebus

(A Fragment)

A mighty theatre of snow and fire, Girt with perpetual Winter, and sublime By reason of that lordly solitude Which dwells for ever at the world's white ends; And in that weird-faced wilderness of ice, There is no human foot, nor any paw Or hoof of beast, but where the shrill winds drive The famished birds of storm across the tracts Whose centre is the dim mysterious Pole. Beyond--yea far beyond the homes of man, By water never dark with coming ships, Near seas that know not feather, scale, or fin, The grand volcano, like a weird Isaiah, Set in that utmost region of the Earth, Doth thunder forth the awful utterance, Whose syllables are flame; and when the fierce Antarctic Night doth hold dominionship Within her fastnessess, then round the cone Of Erebus a crown of tenfold light Appears; and shafts of marvellous splendour shoot Far out to east and west and south and north, Whereat a gorgeous dome of glory roofs Wild leagues of mountain and transfigured waves, And lends all things a beauty terrible.

Far-reaching lands, whereon the hand of Change Hath never rested since the world began, Lie here in fearful fellowship with cold And rain and tempest. Here colossal horns Of hill start up and take the polar fogs Shot through with flying stars of fire; and here, Above the dead-grey crescents topped with spires Of thunder-smoke, one half the heaven flames With that supremest light whose glittering life Is yet a marvel unto all but One-- The Entity Almighty, whom we feel Is nearest us when we are face to face With Nature's features aboriginal, And in the hearing of her primal speech And in the thraldom of her primal power.

While like the old Chaldean king who waxed Insane with pride, we human beings grow To think we are the mightiest of the world, And lords of all terrestrial things, behold The sea rolls in with a superb disdain Upon our peopled shores, omnipotent; And while we set up things of clay and call Our idols gods; and while we boast or fume About the petty honours, or the poor, Pale disappointments of our meagre lives, Lo, changeless as Eternity itself, The grand Antarctic mountain looms outside All breathing life; and, with its awful speech, Is as an emblem of the Power Supreme, Whose thunders shake the boundless Universe, Whose lightnings make a terror of all Space.

Our Jack

Twelve years ago our Jack was lost. All night, Twelve years ago, the Spirit of the Storm Sobbed round our camp. A wind of northern hills That hold a cold companionship with clouds Came down, and wrestled like a giant with The iron-featured woods; and fall and ford, The night our Jack was lost, sent forth a cry Of baffled waters, where the Murray sucked The rain-replenished torrents at his source, And gathered strength, and started for the sea.

We took our Jack from Melbourne just two weeks Before this day twelve years ago. He left A home where Love upon the threshold paused, And wept across the shoulder of the lad, And blest us when we said we'd take good care To keep the idol of the house from harm. We were a band of three. We started thence To look for watered lands and pastures new, With faces set towards the down beyond Where cool Monaro's topmost mountain breaks The wings of many a seaward-going storm, And shapes them into wreaths of subtle fire. We were, I say, a band of three in all, With brother Tom for leader. Bright-eyed Jack, Who thought himself as big a man as Tom, Was self-elected second in command, And I was cook and groom. A week slipt by, Brimful of life--of health, and happiness; For though our progress northward had been slow, Because the country on the track was rough, No one amongst us let his spirits flag; Moreover, being young, and at the stage When all things novel wear a fine romance, We found in ridge and glen, and wood and rock And waterfall, and everything that dwells Outside with nature, pleasure of that kind Which only lives for those whose hearts are tired Of noisy cities, and are fain to feel The peace and power of the mighty hills.

The second week we crossed the upper fork Where Murray meets a river from the east; And there one evening dark with coming storm, We camped a furlong from the bank. Our Jack, The little man that used to sing and shout And start the merry echoes of the cliffs, And gravely help me to put up the tent, And try a thousand tricks and offices, That made me scold and laugh by turns--the pet Of sisters, and the youngest hope of one Who grew years older in a single night-- Our Jack, I say, strayed off into the dusk, Lured by the noises of a waterfall; And though we hunted, shouting right and left, The whole night long, through wind and rain, and searched For five days afterwards, we never saw The lad again.

I turned to Tom and said, That wild fifth evening, "Which of us has heart Enough to put the saddle on our swiftest horse, And post away to Melbourne, there to meet And tell his mother we have lost her son? Or which of us can bear to stand and see The white affliction of a faded face, Made old by you and me? O, Tom, my boy, Her heart will break!" Tom moaned, but did not speak A word. He saddled horse, and galloped off. O, Jack! Jack! Jack! When bright-haired Benjamin Was sent to Egypt with his father's sons, Those rough half-brothers took more care of him Than we of you! But shall we never see Your happy face, my brave lad, any more? Nor hear you whistling in the fields at eve? Nor catch you up to mischief with your knife Amongst the apple trees? Nor find you out A truant playing on the road to school? Nor meet you, boy, in any other guise You used to take? Is this worn cap I hold The only thing you've left us of yourself? Are we to sit from night to night deceived Through rainy seasons by presentiments That make us start at shadows on the pane, And fancy that we hear you in the dark, And wonder that your step has grown so slow, And listen for your hand upon the door?

Camped by the Creek

"All day a strong sun has been drinking The ponds in the Wattletree Glen; And now as they're puddles, I'm thinking We were wise to head hitherwards, men! The country is heavy to nor'ard, But Lord, how you rattled along! Jack's chestnut's best leg was put for'ard, And the bay from the start galloped strong; But for bottom, I'd stake my existence, There's none of the lot like the mare; For look! she has come the whole distance With never the 'turn of a hair'.

"But now let us stop, for the 'super' Will want us to-morrow by noon; And as he can swear like a trooper, We can't be a minute too soon. Here, Dick, you can hobble the filly And chestnut, but don't take a week; And, Jack, hurry off with the billy And fill it. We'll camp by the creek."

So spoke the old stockman, and quickly We made ourselves snug for the night; The smoke-wreaths above us curled thickly, For our pipes were the first thing a-light! As we sat round a fire that only A well-seasoned bushman can make, Far forests grew silent and lonely, Though the paw was astir in the brake, But not till our supper was ended, And not till old Bill was asleep, Did wild things by wonder attended In shot of our camping-ground creep. Scared eyes from thick tuft and tree-hollow Gleamed out thro' the forest-boles stark; And ever a hurry would follow Of fugitive feet in the dark.

While Dick and I yarned and talked over Old times that had gone like the sun, The wail of the desolate plover Came up from the swamps in the run. And sniffing our supper, elated, From his den the red dingo crawled out; But skulked in the darkness, and waited, Like a cunning but cowardly scout. Thereafter came sleep that soon falls on A man who has ridden all day; And when midnight had deepened the palls on The hills, we were snoring away. But ere we dozed off, the wild noises Of forest, of fen, and of stream, Grew strange, and were one with the voices That died with a sweet semi-dream. And the tones of the waterfall, blended With the song of the wind on the shore, Became a soft psalm that ascended, Grew far, and we heard it no more.

Euterpe

-- * A cantata, set to music by C. E. Horsley, and sung at the opening of the Melbourne Town Hall, 1870. --

Argument.

Hail to thee, Sound!--The power of Euterpe in all the scenes of life-- in religion; in works of charity; in soothing troubles by means of music; in all humane and high purposes; in war; in grief; in the social circle; the children's lullaby; the dance; the ballad; in conviviality; when far from home; at evening--the whole ending with an allegorical chorus, rejoicing at the building of a mighty hall erected for the recreation of a nation destined to take no inconsiderable part in the future history of the world.

Overture

_No. 1 Chorus_

All hail to thee, Sound! Since the time Calliope's son took the lyre, And lulled in the heart of their clime The demons of darkness and fire; Since Eurydice's lover brought tears To the eyes of the Princes of Night, Thou hast been, through the world's weary years, A marvellous source of delight-- Yea, a marvellous source of delight!

In the wind, in the wave, in the fall Of the water, each note of thine dwells; But Euterpe hath gathered from all The sweetest to weave into spells. She makes a miraculous power Of thee with her magical skill; And gives us, for bounty or dower, The accents that soothe us or thrill! Yea, the accents that soothe us or thrill!

All hail to thee, Sound! Let us thank The great Giver of light and of life For the music divine that we've drank, In seasons of peace and of strife, Let us gratefully think of the balm That falls on humanity tired, At the tones of the song or the psalm From lips and from fingers inspired-- Yea, from lips and from fingers inspired.

_No. 2 Quartette and Chorus_

When, in her sacred fanes God's daughter, sweet Religion, prays, Euterpe's holier strains Her thoughts from earth to heaven raise. The organ notes sublime Put every worldly dream to flight; They sanctify the time, And fill the place with hallowed light.

_No. 3 Soprano Solo_

Yea, and when that meek-eyed maiden Men call Charity, comes fain To raise up spirits, laden With bleak poverty and pain: Often, in her cause enlis