Pamela S. Vining (J. C. Yule)

        God will not let His bright gifts die
If I may not sing my songs just now
        I shall sing them by and by


A young man with a Poet's soul,
    And a Poet's kindling eye -
Dark, dreamy, full of unvoiced thought -
    And forehead calm and high,
Toiled wearily at his heavy task
    Till his soul grew sick with pain,
And the pent up fires that burned within
    Seemed withering heart and brain

"Work, work, work!" he murmured low,
    Glancing up at the golden west -
Work, with the sunset heavens aglow
    By the hands of angels dressed,
Work for this perishing, human clay,
    While the soul, like a prisoned bird,
Flutters its helpless wings always
    By passionate longings stirred

"I hear in the wandering...

Fair land of peace! - to Britain's rule and throne
Adherent still, yet happier than alone,
And free as happy, and as brave as free,
Proud are thy children - justly proud, of thee!

Thou hast no streams renowned in classic lore,
No vales where fabled heroes moved of yore,
No hills where Poesy enraptured stood,
No mythic fountains, no enchanted wood;
But unadorned, rough, cold, and often stern,
The careless eye to other lands might turn,
And seek, where Nature's bloom is more intense,
Softer delights to charm the eye of sense.

But we who know thee, proudly point the hand
Where thy broad rivers roll serenely grand -
Where, in still beauty 'neath our northern sky,
Thy lordly lakes in solemn grandeur lie, -
Where old Niagara's awful voice has given
...

We met one fresh June-morn, Chlodine,
    Where two roads came together;
I'd travelled far through storm and rain,
    And you, through pleasant weather.
I loved you for the light, Chlodine,
    Of summer all around you, -
I loved you foil the sweet June-flowers,
    Whose dewy garlands bound you!

You loved me not, Chlodine, because
    The storms had beat upon me;
Because there was no breath of flowers,
    No summer sunshine on me; -
You could not see, Chlodine, that deep
    Within my soul were growing
Fresh flowers that evermore would keep
    The fragrance of their blowing.

And so we parted - you and I -
    Your ways all fresh and flowering;
Mine, rocky steeps up mountains high,
    'Neath skies with tempests lowering;
And...

Come home! come home! O loved and lost, we sigh
Thus, ever, while the weary days go by,
And bring thee not. We miss thy bright, young face,
Thy bounding step, thy form of girlish grace,
            Thy pleasant, tuneful voice, -
We miss thee when the dewy evening hours
Come with their coolness to our garden, bowers, -
We miss thee when the warbler's tuneful lay
Welcomes the rising glories of the day
            And all glad things rejoice!

Come home! - the vine that climbs our cottage eaves,
Hath a low murmur 'mid its glossy leaves
When the south wind sweeps by, that seems to be
Too deeply laden with sad thoughts of thee -
            Of thee, our absent one! -
The roses blossom, and their beauties die,
And the sweet violet opes its pensive eye
By t...

Weary soul, by care oppressed,
Wouldst thou find a place of rest?
Listen, Jesus calls to thee,
Come, and find thy rest in me!

Hungry soul, why pine and die
With exhaustless stores so nigh?
Lo, the board is spread for thee,
Come, and feast to-day with me!

Thirsty soul, earth's sweetest rill
Mocks thee with its promise still;
Hark, the Saviour calls to thee,
Here is water, come to me!

Homeless soul, thy path is drear,
Angry tempests gather near,
Night is darkening over thee,
Here is shelter, come to me!

Heavenly bread and heavenly wine,
Living waters, all are mine! -
Mine they are, and thine may be,
Weary wand'rer, come to me!

Before them lay the heaving deep
    Behind, the foemen pressed;
And every face grew dark with fear,
    And anguish filled each breast
Save one, the Leader's, he, serene,
    Beheld, with dauntless mind,
The restless floods before them seen.
    The foe that pressed behind.
"Why hast thou brought us forth for this?"
    The people loudly cry; -
"Were there no graves in Egypt's land,
    That here we come to die?"
But calm and clear above the din
    Arose the prophet's word, -
"Stand still! stand still! - and ye shall see
    The salvation of the Lord!"

"Fear not! - the foes whom now you see,
    Your eyes no more shall view! -
Peace to your fears! - your fathers' God
    This day shall fight for you;
For Egypt, in her haughty pride<...

'Tis but to fold the arms in peace,
    To close the tear-dimmed, aching eye,
From sin and suffering to cease,
    And wake to sinless life on high.

'Tis but to leave the dusty way
    Our pilgrim feet so long have pressed,
And passon angel-wings away,
    Forever with the Lord to rest.

'Tis but with noiseless step to glide
    Behind the curtain's mystic screen
That from our mortal gaze doth hide
    The glories of the world unseen.

Tis but to sleep a passing hour,
    Serene as cradled infants sleep;
Then wake in glory and in power,
    An endless Sabbath day to keep.

[Footnote: In the Grand River, at Brantford, July 30th, 1875, Miss Jessie Hamilton, adopted daughter of C.H. Waterous, Esq., Brantford, aged 14 years and 3 months, and Miss Ella E. Murton, only daughter of John W. Murton, Esq., Hamilton, aged 14 years.]


    The morning dawned without a cloud,
But evening came with pall and shroud, -
With muffled step, and bated breath,
And mournful whisperings of - death!

            *            *            *

    Young lips, that in the morning sung
The summer's opening flowers among,
Were hushed and cold; - young, laughing eyes,
That met the dawn with sweet surprise,
Were darkly sealed; - young feet, that pressed
The dewy turf with glad unrest,
Were cold and stirless, never more
To tread the paths they trod ...

                        Eloise! Eloise!
        It is morn on the seas,
And the waters are curling and flashing;
        And our rock-sheltered seat,
        Where the waves ever beat
With a cadenced and rhythmical dashing,
                Is here - just here,
                But I miss thee, dear!
And the sun-beams around me are flashing
        O seat, by the lonely sea,
        O seat, that she shared with me,
                Thou art all unfilled to day!
                And the plaintive, grieving main
                Hath a moan of hopeless pain
                That it had not yesterday.

                        Eloise! Eloise!
        It is noon; and the breeze
Through the shadowy woodland is straying;
        And our green, mossy seat,

To pray as Jesus prayed,
    When faithless brethren sleep, -
To weep the ruin sin has made -
    The only ones that weep, -
To bear the heavy cross, -
    To toil, yet murmur not, -
To suffer pain, reproach, and loss, -
    Be such our earthly lot.

Yet oh, how richly blest
    The Master's cup to share, -
The aching grief that wrung His breast, -
    His broken-hearted prayer, -
If thus we may but gain
    One sheaf of golden wheat
Gleaned from Earth's sultry harvest-plain,
    To lay at His dear feet! -

If thus we may but win
    One precious earthly gem
Snatched from the mire of vice and sin,
    For His rich diadem! -
Here, sorrow, patience, prayer;
    In Heaven, the rich reward!
Here, the sharp thorns, the cross,...

Alien blossoms! tell me why
    Seek ye such a lonely place,
Thus to bloom, and droop, and die
    Far away from all your race?

Wherefore, from the sunny bowers
    Where your beauteous kindred bloom,
Have ye come, O banished flowers!
    Thus to decorate a tomb?

"Mortal, dost thou question why
    Thus beside the grave we bloom?
Why we hither come to die,
    Aliens from our garden-home?

"'Twas Affection's gentle hand
    Placed us thus her dead so near; -
Tis at weeping Love's command
    That we breathe our fragrance here.

"Ask not why we wither here,
    Thou who ne'er hast tasted woe,
Who hast never felt the tear
    Of bereaved affection flow, -

"Ask not, till thy household band
    By death's cruel ...

"Yea I have loved thee with an everlasting love."


Love of God! - amazing love!
Height, above all other height,
Depth no creature thought can prove,
Boundless, endless, infinite!
Howsoe'er I sink or rise,
Stretch my powers beyond, abroad,
Pierce the depths or climb the skies,
Find I still the love of God -
Fount of bliss, exhaustless, free,
Evermore unsealed for me!

Love of Christ! - amazing love!
Vast as His eternity;
Theme of angel-tongues above,
Theme of souls redeemed like me!
Outward to creation's bound,
Up to Heaven's serenest height,
Universal space around,
Swells the chorus day and night -
Fount of bliss, exhaustless, free,
Evermore unsealed for me!

Oh, these tongues that falter so
When...

        I hear the beat of the unresting tide
    On either shore as swiftly on I glide
    With eager haste the narrow channel o'er,
    Which links the floods behind with those before.
    I hear behind me as I onward glide,
    Faint, farewell voices blending with the tide,
    While from beyond, now near, now far away,
    Come stronger voices chiding each delay;
    And drowning, oft, with wild, discordant burst,
    The melancholy minor of the first

"Farewell! farewell! - ye leave us far behind you!" -
    Tis thus the bright-winged Hours sigh from the Past -
"Ye leave us, and the coming ones will find you
    Still vainly dreaming they will ever last, -
Still trifling with the gifts all fresh and glowing,
    Each in its turn will scatter in your way, ...

    Over my window in pencillings white,
Stealthily traced in the silence of night -
Traced with a pencil as viewless as air,
By an artist unseen, when the star-beams were fair,
Came wonderful pictures, so life-like and true
That I'm filled with amaze as the marvel I view.

    Like, and yet unlike the things I have seen, -
Feathery ferns in the forest-depths green,
Delicate mosses that hide from the light,
Snow-drops, and lilies, and hyacinths white,
Fringes, and feathers, and half-opened flowers,
Closely-twined branches of dim, cedar bowers -
Strange, that one hand should so deftly combine
Such numberless charms in so quaint a design!

    O wondrous creations of silence and night!
I watch as ye fade in the clear morning light, -
As ye melt into te...

    Go, dream no more of a sun-bright sky
        With never a cloud to dim! -
Thou hast seen the storm in its robes of night,
Them hast felt the rush of the whirlwind's might,
Thou hast shrunk from the lightning's arrowy flight,
        When the Spirit of Storms went by!

    Go, dream no more of a crystal sea
        Where never a tempest sweeps! -
For thy riven bark on a surf-beat shore,
Where the wild winds shriek, and the billows roar,
A shattered wreck to be launched no more,
        Will mock at thy dream and thee!

    Go, dream no more of a fadeless flower
        With never a cankering blight' -
For the queenliest rose in thy garden bed,
The pride of the morn, ere the noon is fled,
With the worm at its heart, withers cold and dead
    ...

"For thou, Lord, wilt bless the righteous; with favour wilt thou compass him as with a shield."


Like the dew-drops that fall
    Through the chill, midnight hours,
Unheeded by all,
    On the close-folded flowers, -
E'en so, on thy chosen,
    Grief stricken that bend,
Thy tenderest blessings
    In silence descend.

Like the showers that moisten
    The tree's shrivelled root,
And quicken its branches
    To flower and fruit,
E'en thus, on thy people
    Descend from above,
In richest abundance
    The showers of thy love

Like the glad light that never
    Our sad Earth forsakes,
But, as day fadeth, ever
    In the star beam awakes,
So certain and constant,
    So rich and unspent,
Thy blessings unstin...

Upon the plain of Dura stood an image great and high,
With golden forehead broad and bright beneath the morning sky;
All regal in its majesty and kingly in its mien,
The grandest and most glorious thing the world had ever seen!

Full sixty cubits high in air the lordly head was reared,
And robed in gold from head to foot the stately form appeared;
Adown the breast six cubits broad, a flood of yellow gold,
All deftly wrought with matchless skill, its shining tresses rolled.

And, fronting thus the rising sun, it sent back ray for ray -
A golden flood of arrowy light - into-the face of day;
While round its feet, in awe and dread, all Shinar stood amazed,
And up into that radiant face with reverent wonder gazed.

Woke sackbut, psaltery, and harp, woke dulcimer and flu...

(IN MEMORY OF A PUPIL)


            Thou art but gone before -
            Gone to that unknown shore
Toward which my feet are journeying swiftly on
            Thou hast but laid thy head
            First with the dreamless dead,
I, too, shall come, and share thy rest anon.

            Methinks 'twas sweet to die,
            Ere childhood's purity
Had been polluted by sin's withering breath;
            Ere Care's pale, haggard mien
            Thy laughing eye had seen,
Or thou hadst wept beside the bed of death!

            We weep - yet thou art blest!
            We mourn - but thou'rt at rest!
Well may we weep, yet, lost one, not for thee!
            Not that thy race is run,
            Thy brief life-journey...