All the virtues of herbs and metals,
All the lore of the woods he knew,
And the arts of the Old World mingled
With the marvels of the New.
Well he knew the tricks of magic,
And the lapstone on his knee
Had the gift of the Mormon's goggles
Or the stone of Doctor Dee.
For the mighty master Agrippa
Wrought it with spell and rhyme
From a fragment of mystic moonstone
In the tower of Nettesheim.
To a cobbler Minnesinger
The marvellous stone gave he,—
And he gave it, in turn, to Keezar,
Who brought it over the sea.
He held up that mystic lapstone,
He held it up like a lens,
And he counted the long years coming
By twenties and by tens.
"One hundred years," quoth Keezar,
"And fifty have I told:
Now open the new before me,
And shut me out the old!"
Like a cloud of mist, the blackness
Rolled from the magic stone,
And a marvellous picture mingled
The unknown and the known.
Still ran the stream to the river,
And river and ocean joined;
And there were the bluffs and the blue sea-line,
And cold north hills behind.
But the mighty forest was broken
By many a steepled town,
By many a white-walled farm-house
And many a garner brown.
Turning a score of mill-wheels,
The stream no more ran free;
White sails on the winding river,
White sails on the far-off sea.