POEMS
A Legend of Dead Man’s Lake.
“Dead Man’s Lake is a lonely sheet of water lying in a desolate region of the Indian Peninsula, between Lake Huron and Georgian Bay. It is situated in a forest of dead pines and hemlocks, blighted by bush fires long before the memory of any living man, and this adds materially to the desolation of an already dreary region of swamp and rock. The following legend is based on tradition, and the Indians to this day believe that the body of the murdered chief lies with upturned face at the bottom of the lake.”—Anon.
I.
Sad vale of death that moaneth dreary,
As if weighed ’neath a burden of care,
Even the sun shines cold, and his beams wax weary
In thy vacant shadowless air;
And the winds o’er the breast of thy lone lake sweeping,
Bear echoes from the tomb,
And thy desolate pines their death-watch keeping,
Ever whisper this tale of gloom:
II.
Long years ago, (so long that in telling,
A weary tale ’twould make)
An aged chief with his tribe was dwelling
On the shore of this desolate lake.
But life then bloomed here, and in beauty tender
The wild-flowers lifted their eyes,
Till it gleamed like a vale of magic splendor
Just fallen from the sunset skies.