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| NATURE is ever varied. Calm and still | |
| The lake receives us on its tranquil breast | |
| With sweetest smiles of welcome. As a rill | |
| Enters a valley with a lightsome zest, | |
| After it leaves some mountain tarn, oppressed | 5 |
| With its wild journey ere it finds the plain, | |
| So hail we Lake St. Francis. Love might rest | |
| Among these isles where many a savage train | |
| Trampled the flowers of peace, and strewed them on the main. | |
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| Embowered homesteads greet us as we pass | 10 |
| These nooks of quiet beauty. Here and there | |
| An isle of shade upon a sea of glass | |
| Floats lightly as a breath of summer air; | |
| Verdurous points and openings so fair | |
| ’T were vain to search the misty Dreamland o’er | 15 |
| For such a vision as could well compare | |
| With the broad landscape strewn from shore to shore, | |
| That like a dear face grows in beauty more and more. | |
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| No aged forests lift their tangled arms, | |
| No threatening rapid rolls its vengeful way, | 20 |
| The ever-shifting panorama charms | |
| And soothes the soul like an entrancing lay. | |
| Along the shores the restless poplars stray, | |
| Like woodland outposts watching through the night; | |
| Yon grove of pine englooms each starry ray | 25 |
| And sleeps in darkest shadow; and the white | |
| And spectral tombstones mark the graveyard’s hallowed site. | |
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| Faint, far-off islands, dim and shadowy, seem | |
| To loom like purple clouds, and a stray sail, | |
| Like a white condor, flits across our beam, | 30 |
| Inviting truant breeze and loitering gale | |
| From odorous wood and flower-besprinkled vale; | |
| The murmurs of the isles past which we glide | |
| Are soothing as an Oriental tale | |
| Flung by some tuneful Hafiz far and wide, | 35 |
| As through the dreamy maze we dash with native pride. | |
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| An Indian, like a memory, glides by; | |
| One frail canoe where once the tribes in all | |
| Their savage greatness sent their startling cry | |
| Along their countless fleets. Thus at the call | 40 |
| Of Destiny whole races rise and fall; | |
| Whole states and empires like those tribes have passed | |
| To swell the grim historic carnival. | |
| We, too, the puppets of to-day, that vast | |
| And solemn masquerade must gravely join at last. | 45 |
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| A dreamy quiet haunts the wide expanse | |
| O’er all the flashing lake,—a world of calm, | |
| Fair as the fairest picture of romance. | |
| Night’s awful splendor thrills us like a psalm. | |
| High and erect, and heavenward as a palm, | 50 |
| Our thoughts and hopes ascend. Is it not well | |
| That we should feel at times the heavenly balm | |
| Of contemplation soothe us like a spell? | |
| As these too-witching scenes our grosser yearnings quell. | |
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| The welcome lighthouse like an angel stands | 55 |
| Arrayed as with a glory, pointing to | |
| Vast heights of promise, where the summer lands | |
| Rise like great hopes upon man’s spirit-view. | |
| It warns life’s toiling pilgrim to eschew | |
| The rocks and shoals on which too many wrecks | 60 |
| Of noble hearts, all searching for the true, | |
| Have sunk in utter ruin. Man may vex | |
| His thoughts to find out God; his searchings but perplex | |
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| His poor contracted reason,—poor at best, | |
| One grain of faith is worth a sheaf of search. | 65 |
| On, love! to-night we cannot think of rest, | |
| Past the dim islands where the silvery birch | |
| Gleams like a shepherd’s crook. Yonder, the church | |
| Lights us to Lancaster. And now the wide, | |
| Wide lake, we wander over, soon to lurch | 70 |
| And roll and toss, as down the stream we glide, | |
| Light as a feather on the stormy ocean-tide. | |
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