"That rose with morning's crimson rays
And grew to noonday's gloried dome,
Melting to even's purple haze
When all the hopes of earth went home?
* * * * * *
"Yea, thou mayst quench the latest spark
Of life's weird day's expectancy,
Roll down the thunders of the dark
And close the light of life for me.
"Melt all the splendid blue above
And let these magic wonders die,
If thou wilt only leave me, Love,
And Love's heart-brother, Memory."
His Canadian Folk Song has become a popular favourite. The last stanza runs:
"The firelight dances upon the wall,
Footsteps are heard in the outer hall,
And a kiss and a welcome that fill the room,
And the kettle sings in the glimmer and gloom—
Margery, Margery, make the tea,
Singeth the kettle merrily."
It is in the setting of Canada's wonderland to music that much of the best work of Mr. Campbell lies; in his Manitou, The Legend of Restless River, Dawn in the Island Camp, and the musical Vapour and Blue. He has made himself the interpreter of Nature in all her moods, as has also Archibald Lampman, of whom William Dean Howells said that his pure spirit was electrical in every line; and that "the stir of wing, of leaf, of foot; the drifting odours of wood and field," thrilled his readers in his verse.
Canoeing on the Fraser River