NEBULA TO MAN 
O Powers that be, why thus the life-cup fill 
Of helpless brutes, that never wrought ye ill ! 20 
Snow, snow and snow ; frosts keener ; thicker ice ; 
And more broad acres heaped with sacrifice. 
Blind on its way, and silent, marches Fate, 
Deaf to all sounds, unmoved by love or hate. 
Yet why should we on pain and misery dwell ? 25 
The sun shines forth, and all is seeming well. 
Fitful and faint fall cries of last distress ; 
And conies not Peace to grace the wilderness ? 
Thick is the snow high gathering centres bear, 
Alike in east and western hemisphere. 30 
Vast glistening fields for miles and miles extend, 
Stretching to north as if they knew no end : 
And rivalling in beauty and in pride 
The whilom glories of the scenes they hide. 
See how they glitter in the sunny noon, 35 
As they were thick with diamonds bestrewn ; 
Will ever king to come, or fair princess 
Put on a mantle, glorious as this ! 
And life these snowfields have, life of their own, 
Though strange compared with true life overthrown. 40 
A font they are, as is a mountain lake, 
Whose flooded site adventurous rills forsake. 
Far from these parent fields of hardening snow 
Are ice-streams creeping to the vales below. 
'74 
