QUOTH Caspar: "We have found the Place. Why tread The
long road o'er again ? We who were dead, Need we return where roses bloom and fail, And all life's petals are in darkness shed ?
Here would I stay, a tireless worshipper, Here where I laid life's gift, the golden myrrh. Youth needs God most, and every path I dread That points me hence, the way of whip and spur."
Swart Balthazar replied : "Didst thou not note The setting of God's Star, nor watch it float Gladly on Nature's round, no cloud to blur. So man to duty must himself devote.
We must retake the road. Even now a cry Sounds from the East—' To tarry is to die '; Even now my incense with its mist and mote Darkens the gladness of the cradling sky."
But Melchior, ripe in wisdom and in years, Cried; Youth and manhood, vain alike your fears! Where the Gleam leads the golden goal must lie. 'Turn not, nor tarry at all. The path of tears, The Westward path that brings us East again, The Way of Christ, the thorny road of pain, This we must follow till at last appears Our Land of Roses and our sunlit plain."
So Westward they pursued, and still pursue, The painful quest, and ever seek to view, From height to height, the home they mean to gain ; But ever find the landscape sad and new.
• • • • • • • • Yet somewhere West the East is breaking through. J. E. G. DE MONTMORENCY.
Previous page
