THE OTONABEE

  Dark, rushing, foaming river! 
    I love the solemn sound
    That shakes thy shores around,
  And hoarsely murmurs, ever,
    As thy waters onward bound,
      Like a rash, unbridled steed
  Flying madly on its course;
  That shakes with thundering force
      The vale and trembling mead. 
  So thy billows downward sweep,
    Nor rock nor tree can stay
    Their fierce, impetuous way;
  Now in eddies whirling deep,
     Now in rapids white with spray.

  I love thee, lonely river! 
    Thy hollow restless roar,
    Thy cedar-girded shore;
  The rocky isles that sever,
    The waves that round them pour. 
      Katchawanook[1] basks in light,
  But thy currents woo the shade
  By the lofty pine-trees made,
      That cast a gloom like night,
  Ere day’s last glories fade. 
    Thy solitary voice
  The same bold anthem sung
  When Nature’s frame was young. 
     No longer shall rejoice
  The woods where erst it rung!

  Lament, lament, wild river! 
    A hand is on thy mane[2]
    That will bind thee in a chain
  No force of thine can sever. 
    Thy furious headlong tide,
  In murmurs soft and low,
    Is destined yet to glide
  To meet the lake below;
    And many a bark shall ride
  Securely on thy breast,
    To waft across the main
    Rich stores of golden grain
  From the valleys of the West.

[1] The Indian name for one of the many expansions of this beautiful river.

[2] Alluding to the projected improvements on the Trent, of which the Otonabee is a continuation.  Fifteen years have passed away since this little poem was written; but the Otonabee still rushes on in its own wild strength.  Some idea of the rapidity of this river may be formed from the fact that heavy rafts of timber are floated down from Herriot’s Falls, a distance of nine miles from Peterborough, in less than an hour.  The shores are bold and rocky, and abound in beautiful and picturesque views.

CHAPTER XV

THE WILDERNESS, AND OUR INDIAN FRIENDS

  Man of strange race! stern dweller of the wild! 
  Nature’s free-born, untamed, and daring child!

The clouds of the preceding night, instead of dissolving in snow, brought on a rapid thaw.  A thaw in the middle of winter is the most disagreeable change that can be imagined.  After several weeks of clear, bright, bracing, frosty weather, with a serene atmosphere and cloudless sky, you awake one morning surprised at the change in the temperature; and, upon looking out of the window, behold the woods obscured by a murky haze—­not so dense as an English November fog, but more black and lowering—­and the heavens shrouded in a uniform covering of leaden-coloured