Dawson's Falls.
(Juvenilia.)

The waters from the snowy hills Are clear and chill
The mountain tarn below the rills Is deep and still
And where with sheer abandonment The Fall comes tumbling down
An outcrop makes a gaping rent
Whereat the severed stream is bent
To show, through mists all heavenward sent
The cliff so bare and brown.
But down upon the plains afar The river flows
Creeping o'er pebbled reach and bar Until it goes
To where the rippling wavelet laves
The margin of the bay
And then by currents, tides and waves Convoyed to where the sunlight paves
Vast watery plains o'er jewelled caves Of ocean far away.
And such our life, from start to end An ever-flowing stream
Which ‘gainst the rocks may break or bend
As best to Heaven may seem;
Which must, though oft with wonderment
Come tumbling down the fall, Until our youthful discontent
Is lost in depths that hide the rent
And barms the lessons Heaven has meant
And finds the end of all.

—Clyde Carr.

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