| |
| MOUNT ROYAL rises proudly up the blue, | |
| A royal mount indeed, with verdure crowned, | |
| Adorned with regal dwellings not a few, | |
| Sparkling like gems set in the mighty mound. | |
| St. Helen’s, too, that seems enchanted ground; | 5 |
| A stately isle in gleaming guise bedight; | |
| In the fond river’s saintly arms enwound, | |
| Blushing, and graceful as some witching sprite; | |
| Fair contrast to the gloom of Hochelaga’s height. * * * * * | |
| With what an undissembled pride of mien | 10 |
| Jacques Cartier stood upon yon mountain’s brow! | |
| Beneath him, the deep wilderness of green, | |
| Where the vast city gleams and sparkles now; | |
| Around him lordly tree and gnarly bough | |
| Rose in primeval grandeur; leagues away, | 15 |
| The rolling hills untouched by axe or plough; | |
| The glowing river; lakes and islands gay: | |
| Another Mirza’s dream of some remoter day. | |
| |
| The Huron then was master of the soil; | |
| The broad champaign was his, both near and far; | 20 |
| But scanty need had he to slave and toil, | |
| The chase sufficed him as a rest from war. | |
| He little knew that his eventful star | |
| Of empire flickered like a dying flame, | |
| Too soon, alas! to set amid the jar | 25 |
| Of rival nations,—one at least in aim: | |
| But Cartier’s dream was France, her glory and her fame. | |
| |
| The smoke that o’er the misty tree-tops curled | |
| Showed where the Hochelagan wigwams, rude, | |
| And few in number, made the Hurons’ world, | 30 |
| Surrounded by the awful solitude. | |
| Rapt in deep thought, with folded arms he stood, | |
| The daring navigator! Did he see | |
| Aught of the future mirrored in his mood? | |
| The tricolor, his cherished fleur-de-lys, | 35 |
| Replaced by Britain’s flag? No! this could never be! | |
| |
| His only dream was France. The new world seemed | |
| Created for her glory. Long years thence, | |
| Could he have known how humanly he dreamed, | |
| How little of the seer’s prophetic sense | 40 |
| Was his, how much of human impotence! | |
| O Britain! should thine island reign be o’er, | |
| Shouldst thou be hurled from thy proud eminence, | |
| Be this in mercy the predestined shore | |
| To keep thy name and fame alive forevermore. | 45 |
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