Champlain's First Winter And Spring In Quebec.
By W. M. MacKeracher
(From the prose of Parkman.)
I. THE WINTER.
September bade the sail of Pontgrav
Godspeed, and smil'd upon the infant nation;
October deckt the shores and hills with "gay
Prognostics of approaching desolation."
Ere long the forest, steep'd in golden gloom,
Dropt rustling down its shrivel'd festal dress,
And chill November, sombre as the tomb,
Sank on the vast primeval wilderness.
Inexorable winter's iron vice
Gript hard the land, funereal with snow;
The stream was fill'd with grinding drifts of ice;
A fell disease laid twenty Frenchmen low
In death, and left the dauntless leader eight
With whom to hold the New World's fortress gate.
II. THE SPRING.
The purgatory pass'd - the stalactites
That fring'd the cliffs fell crashing to the earth;
With clamor shrill the wild geese skimm'd the heights,
In airy navies sailing to the north;
The bluebirds chirrup'd in the naked woods,
The water-willows donn'd their downy blooms,
The trim swamp-maple blush'd with ruddy buds,
The forest-ash hung out its sable plumes.
The shad-bush gleam'd a wreath of purest snow,
The white stars of the bloodroot peep'd from folds
Of rotting leaves, and in the meadows low
Shone saffron spots, the gay marsh-marigolds.
May made all green, and on the fifth of June
A sail appeared, with succor none too soon.