Dunedin
Men say that seven hills encircle Rome.
I can but dream of them, or learn in song
Of that still blue Campania, where there throng
The wraiths of many lovers. The dark loam
The Mantuan oxen turned ere Peter's dome
Upsoared in testimony, still is strong
To nourish grain when all the land along
Spreads the white wonder of the blossom's foam.
But this I think. The hills that dreaming stand
About this town are seven, this far place
This godchild of Dunedin. Hence a band
Of stalwart pilgrims came from bracken brown
And the cold burn, where peeweets hard at hand
Whistled their dirge the martyrs’ graves adown.

—C. R. Allen.

* * *

The Broken Column
Young they were then, with their heads held high:
Sun shone on steel as the troops swung by.
Little they recked of the darkening sky,
Or the holocaust yet to come.
The rhythmical tramp of marching feet (A stirring sound in a crowded street)
Was echoing through the town.
Out of the battle the remnant came, Smoke-grimed and weary. The searing flame
Of war had left them immortal fame.
But had taken their youth and hope.
The rumble of guns and marching feet (A sinister sound in an empty street)
Were stilled in a foreign town.
Old they are now, but a bugle's note
Summons the past from its brazen throat.
Weather-worn medal on faded coat
Is all that is left of fame.
And to-day we hear in the crowded street
But a ghostly echo of tramping feet
Of the column that marched to war.

—C. W. Vennell.

* * *

Sentinel

There is a window watching where the sun, Rests on its leap each morning as it wakes

Egmont's proud peak from blue to burnished gold, And speeds the dark chariots of the night

O'er grass where gleams the dew, as spears coldly bright.

Barring his march black cloud against the light, Then brown leaves in the hazel copse ashake, Sighing to Death the down wind eddies take; The mist comes whirling from the stream in spate, And its dull roar the jarring note of Fate

Paints to fancy a fresh and piquant face

With golden curls agleam o'er snowy lace.

' ' The House is ruined and its years are old, Yet still one pane tight shut against the cold

Catches the sun and coffers its dull mold

A moment: the dream as those days ended

Fades sun, glass, gleam, her bright spirit tended.

—Shirley S. Morrison.

The Wanderer
I've ridden out the droving roads that skirt the dim blue bays, The long white roads unfurling slow into the seaward haze.
I've heard the picks ring bells on rock, down in the cold dark mine, And sifted out the gravel dregs where the bright gold nuggets shine.
I've ridden mountain tracks at dawn, where the wild hill horses roam, And the turf flies high from spurning hoofs, and the wind is wet with foam.
I've blazed a trail in the timber bush, by the bell-bird's anvil slow, And rafted logs on the riverways where the brown flood-torrents flow.
And then one night, up on the hills, on a wild white Arab mare, I saw you ride out of the sun, out of the golden flare.
I saw you once, and though I rode into the darkening day'
The memory of that upland road still follows all the way!

—Joyce T. West.

* * *

The Forest Passes
Trees grew in the valley—
Old, gracious trees, and the slimly youthful sapling; Joyous with bird-song, murmurous with soft breezes, And flecked with the sun's dappling.
Man came to the valley, With whine of saw, and the savage axe-blade's ringing, And ravening fire to aid the bright steel's slaughter— To still the birds’ sweet singing.
Charred stumps in the valley
Stand jaggedly, their fallen trunks still lying
Like men unburied in the ghastly wake of battle— Their dirge—a lost wind crying.

—Anne Croft.