See, on the canon’s western ridge, There stands a girl! She beholds the bridge Smitten and broken; she sees the need For a warning swift, and a daring deed. See then the act of a simple girl; Learn from it, thinker, and priest, and churl. See her, the lantern between her teeth, Crossing the quivering trap of death. Hand over hand on a swaying rail, Sharp in her ears and her heart the wail Of a hundred lives; and she has no fear Save that her prayer be not granted her. Cold is the snow on the rail, and chill The wind that comes from the frozen hill. Her hair blows free and her eyes are full Of the look that makes Heaven merciful-- Merciful, ah! quick, shut your eyes, Lest you wish to see how a brave girl dies! Dies--not yet; for her firm hands clasped The solid bridge, as the breach out-gasped, And the rail that had held her downward swept, Where old Carew in his snow-grave slept.
Now up and over the steep incline, She speeds with the red light for a sign; She hears the cry of the coming train, it trembles like lanceheads through her brain; And round the curve, with a foot as fleet As a sinner’s that flees from the Judgment-seat, She flies; and the signal swings, and then She knows no more; but the enginemen Lifted her, bore her, where women brought The flush to her cheek, and with kisses caught The warm breath back to her pallid lips, The life from lives that were near eclipse; Blessed her, and praised her, and begged her name That all of their kindred should know her fame; Should tell how a girl from a cattle-ranche That night defeated an avalanche. Where is the wonder the engineer Of the train she saved, in half a year Had wooed her and won her? And here they are For their homeward trip in a parlour car! Which goes to show that Old Nature’s plans Were wrecked with the Bridge of the Hundred Spans.
Rebel? . . . I grant you,--my comrades then Were called Old Pascal Dubois’ Men Half-breeds all of us . . . I, a scamp, The best long-shot in the Touchwood Camp; Muscle and nerve like strings of steel, Sound in the game of bit and heel-- There’s your guide-book. . . . But, Jeanne Amray, Telegraph-clerk at Sturgeon Bay, French and thoroughbred, proud and sweet, Sunshine down to her glancing feet, Sang one song ‘neath the northern moon That changed God’s world to a tropic noon; And Love burned up on its golden floor Years of passion for Nell Latore-- Nell Latore with her tawny hair, Glowing eyes and her reckless air; Lithe as an alder, straight and tall-- Pride and sorrow of Rise-and-Fall! Indian blood in her veins ran wild, And a Saxon father called her child; Women feared her, and men soon found When they trod on forbidden ground. Ride! there’s never a cayuse knew Saddle slip of her; pistols, too, Seemed to learn in her hands a knack How to travel a dead-sure track. Something in both alike maybe, Something kindred in ancestry, Some warm touch of an ancient pride Drew my feet to her willing side. My comrade, she, in the Touchwood Camp, To ride, hunt, trail by the fire-fly lamp; To track the moose to his moose-yard; pass The bustard’s doom through the prairie grass; To hark at night to the crying loon Beat idle wings on the still lagoon; To hide from death in the drifting snow, To slay the last of the buffalo. . . . Ah, well, I speak of the days that were; And I swear to you, I was kind to her. I lost her. How are the best friends lost? The lightning lines of our souls got crossed-- Crossed, and could never again be free Till Death should call from his midnight sea.