Music — Poetry — Fiction 



When darkest midnight veiled the sky, 1834 



You'd hear his hasting step go by, Sigoumey 



To gain the bridge beside the deep, 

 That where its wildest torrents leap 



Hung' threadlike o'er the surge, 



Just there, upon its awful verge, 

 His vigil hour to keep. 



And when the moon descending low, 



Hung on the flood that gleaming bow, 



Which it would seem some angel's hand, 



With heaven's own pencil, tinged and spanned, 



Pure symbol of a Better Land, 



He, kneeling, poured in utterance free 



The eloquence of ecstasy ; 



Though to his words no answer came, 



Save that One, Everlasting Name, 



Which since Creation's morning broke, 



Niagara's lip alone hath spoke. 



When wintry tempests shook the sky, 



And the rent pine-tree hurtled by, 



Unblenching mid the storm he stood, 



And marked, sublime, the wrathful flood, 



While wrought the frost-king fierce and drear, 



His palace mid those cliffs to rear, 



And strike the massy buttress strong, 



And pile his sleet the rocks among, 



And wasteful deck the branches bare 



With icy diamonds, rich and rare. 



Nor lacked the hermit's humble shed 



Such comforts as our nature ask 



To fit them for their daily task, 

 The cheering fire, the peaceful bed, 

 The simple meal in season spread : — 

 709 



