Years after, when the Sieur Champlain
Sailed up the unknown stream,
And Norembega proved again
A shadow and a dream,
He found the Norman's nameless grave
Within the hemlock's shade,
And, stretching wide its arms to save,
The sign that God had made,
The cross-boughed tree that marked the spot
And made it holy ground:
He needs the earthly city not
Who hath the heavenly found.
John Greenleaf Whittier.
Until the middle of the sixteenth century, Spain was the only nation which had succeeded in establishing colonies in the New World. In 1583 Sir Humphrey Gilbert secured permission from Queen Elizabeth to set out on a voyage of discovery and colonization, for the glory of England. He landed at St. John's, Newfoundland, August 5, and established there the first English colony in North America. Then he sailed away to explore further, and met the fate described in the poem. The colony proved a failure.
SIR HUMPHREY GILBERT
[1583]
Southward with fleet of ice
Sailed the corsair Death;
Wild and fast blew the blast,
And the east-wind was his breath.
His lordly ships of ice
Glisten in the sun;
On each side, like pennons wide,
Flashing crystal streamlets run.
His sails of white sea-mist
Dripped with silver rain;
But where he passed there were cast
Leaden shadows o'er the main.