Project Gutenberg's The Last West and Paolo's Virginia, by G. B. Warren

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net

Title: The Last West and Paolo's Virginia

Author: G. B. Warren

Release Date: November 8, 2004 [EBook #13974]

Language: English

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE LAST WEST AND PAOLO'S VIRGINIA ***

Produced by Al Haines

THE LAST WEST

——AND——

Paolo's Virginia

G. B. WARREN

Copyright Canada, 1919

By G. B. Warren

CONTENTS

  October Daybreak on Boundary Bay
  The Last Arete
  The Great Divide
  Above the Clouds
  Winter Sunset in the Cascade Range
  Beside the Ocstall
  Jansen's Curse
  The Survey Cook
  A Raid on the Seal Rookeries
  The Coast of British Columbia
  Vancouver
  Victoria, B. C.

Paolo's Virginia (A Spring Phantasy)

Author's Introduction

  To you who have lifted the veil of mists o'er-blown
  And gazed in the eyes of dawn when night had flown—
  Have felt in your hearts a thrill of sheer delight
  As you scanned the scene below from some alpine height—
  I extend this fleeting glimpse across a world
  Of forest and meadow land—at last unfurled—
  Through vistas of soaring peaks with frosted crest
  In the fiorded wonderland of this—last—west.

October Daybreak on Boundary Bay

  A skyline bold and clear
    Of cold sharp corniced snow,
  Where, bulking huge, the mass of Baker's cone
    Shadows the world below.

  'Tis bright with promise now!
    That flood and field
  Still shrouded in the mystery of night,
    Will shortly be revealed.

  The wildfowl on the bay
    Call to the distant flight
  Of ducks, that swoop from out the realms of space,
    Seeking a place to light.

  Sounds through the waking hours
    The beating of countless wings,
  Faint voices floating through the upper air
    In softest whisperings.

  A blush of coming day
    Flooding the eastern sky,
  Fresh rosy Dawn climbing the rampart hills,
    Forces the night to fly:

  Then from his lair the sun
    Leaps forth. The fading gleam
  Of silver moon and silent stars is quenched.
    Day reigns once more supreme.

The Last Arete

  Alpinist—
    Excelsior, there's nought we may not dare!
    Why, now, confess defeat, when plain in sight
    Looms the stern peak—to which we've toiled and fought
    Up many a mountain gorge and soaring height?
    It were a shame if we should now go back
    And, leaving all we've won, retrace our track.

    Undaunted by the circling mists we camped,
    Laid siege; while hail and snow went storming by,
    Assaulted through the brilliant mists; that wrapped
    A veil, impenetrable to the eye,
    Around the wastes of ice, the snowfields bare
    And craggy peaks that pierce the upper air.

    We scorned to own defeat, when lost to sight,
    'Mid cloud and snowstorm, was that summit cold;
    But started out the morn e're yet the sun
    The highest cornices had edged with gold.
    See now! the noonday glare reveals our fate
    Above a rampart white and sharp arete.

  Guide—
    Crevasses open-mouthed have reft the face
    Of brightly gleaming ice, that upward led.
    Their clear green depths a gap impassable present
    Across the glacier slope ahead;
    Save on yon steep and scintillating slope
    Which promises success to axe and rope.

  Alpinist—
    Roped man to man we'll scale the giddy height:
    Step after step cut up those slopes of snow
    That, gleaming spotless in the noonday light,
    Curve out of sight above and far below.
    What rumbled? (G.) From yon distant cliff was hurled
    An avalanche which shakes this snowy world.

  Guide—
    The rocks I've gained through chimneys rough and steep
    That crumble at a careless touch, and send
    A rattling train of rubble bounding down
    The icy slopes, which great crevasses rend.
    Re-entrant over here the mountain dips
    Into a gulf, which eddying mists eclipse.

    Perched on this tottering and steep arete,
    One hardly dares to even whisper low;
    Lest, crashing from their crumbling pedestals,
    The rotten crags through empty space will go
    Two thousand feet down, where the hard neve
    Is packed by ice that avalanched that way.

    I'll anchor fast, and hold the rope, that you
    By hand and foot and alpenstock may scale.
    A traverse of the skyline rocks we'll make
    And yon last gleaming slope of snow assail.
    It leads up to a virgin mountain's head,
    On which our feet will be the first to tread.

* * * *

  The highest of a glacier covered range,
  Its proud and lofty crest at length hath bowed
  Before the bold attack of alpinists
  Undaunted by the steeps or storm or cloud;
  and all the dangers than in grim array
  The spirit of the mountain brought to play.

[*]The Great Divide

  What strange emotions fill my breast!
  What flitting shadows of unrest
  Sweep o'er me as I stand beside
  The Rocky Mountains' "Great Divide."

  That rustic arch, with letters bold
  Against the summit snowfields cold,
  Has power to wing my fancy far
  To this split streamlet's furthest bar.

  The icy flood is cleft in twain,
  Its waters never meet again;
  Far east and to the furthest west
  Those wavelets hurry without rest.

  The mind can hardly grasp such vast
  Extent of territory passed
  E're these two streams shall reach the sea,
  At different oceans to be free.

  Through valleys wide and fertile plain,
  Where yellow fields of waving grain
  Are garnered for the wide world's store,
  One stream flows to a distant shore.

  May be that harnessed it will drive
  The wheels which in some human hive
  Of industry are waiting for
  The power that it holds in store