Sitting in silence on the edge of the earth crater, I mused sadly. How wonderful, I thought, if the great safety valve would but open and bear my love and me away in its flaming arms. But the conflagration was to be of a more human and dangerous character.
"See," whispered the maiden. "I have brought my present for you." How like her it was, to steal away from the others for this sacred presentation. I peered at the object in her hand. It was a small sack of translucent fish membrane filled with a viscous liquid.
ODE TO THE AURORA
No more poignant moment in the history of American literature has ever been recorded by the camera than that shown with this text which portrays Whinney, the poet-scientist, in the very act of creating his immortal poem "Ode to Aurora," which John Farrar, the veteran critic, pronounces "the best classic ode ever written north of the arctic circle."
As a poet Whinney resembles Milton, in that he is blind. Though this was only a temporary affliction,—snow-blindness,—its immediate effects were heartrendingly pathetic. Not only did the unfortunate traveller miss seeing the Pole and the polar fireworks but he was also forced to master the most difficult of all literary exercises, that of operating a typewriter with mittens on. The ancient pastime of catching a flea while wearing boxing-gloves is child's-play compared with this achievement. Hour after hour, day after day, the persistent poet practised his sightless-touch system.
"What does it look like?" he would ask, submitting a page to Sausalito who had good-naturedly assumed the duties of nursing-secretary.
"Nothing," would be the invariable reply.
But with dogged perseverance Whinney struggled on, gaining a comma here, and a colon there, until he had mastered his instrument. The result all the world knows,—those deathless lines beginning:
"O Aurora!
Not only East, but North as well,
And West! and South!
Th' extraordinary tidings tell!
Flash thy bright beams
And wave thy lambent paws,
Clap thou thy rays
In luminous applause."For sheer glory of color the description of the aurora which forms the main part of the ode has never been equalled. And then the solemn close, touching in its modesty.
"Tell thou the world,
That it remember shall
The names of Traprock!
Whinney! Swank! et al."Since returning to this country Mr. Whinney has taken out a regular poet's licence and is now turning out verse of the very highest standard.
Ode to the Aurora
"What is it?" I asked tenderly.
I could feel her flush against my cheek.
"Walrus tears."