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In a Belgian Garden and Other Poems

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<h3> The Chambly Rapid </h3> There's a spirit in the rapid, calling, calling through the night, There's a gleam upon the water, burning pale and burning bright. Woe to him who hears the calling! Woe to him who sees the light! My son and I had left St. Jean, Our paddles dipping in the blue, And many miles to north had gone Along the silent Richelieu; The night came down, we thought of rest; A threatening cloud hung in the west. No warning sound the river made Save for the rapid's muffled roar, As 'neath the pine-trees' deepening shade We camped upon that luckless shore; No sound the night-wind bore to me Save one weird echo from Chambly. The night grew dark and darker still, The pale-faced moon was hid from sight, When o'er the waters black and chill We saw a ghastly, gleaming light,—- A fitful fire, pale and blue, That burned my inmost spirit through. And like some baleful gleaming eye It shone beneath night's heavy pall; Then high above the loon's lone cry Afar we heard the spirit call; It called us from the other shore. Ah, Jean will never hear it more! I could not seize or hold him back, For while the light burned pale and blue, A heavy hand from out the black Held me beside my own canoe, And ere I stirred, the other barque Had silent sped into the dark. Adown the river's drifting tide To where the wild, mad rapids run, Past pine-trees towering on each side His frail canoe had drifted on; He did not look to left or right But gazed upon that hell-born light. And ever swifter with the flow He drifted where the rapids play, His eyes still on that awful glow; Ah, God! my life seemed snatched away! I saw a gleam far up the sky And heard the echo of a cry. There's a spirit in the rapid, calling, calling through the night, There's a gleam upon the water, burning pale and burning bright. Woe to him who hears the calling! Woe to him who sees the light! <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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