MONTREAL CARNIVAL SPORTS.
1884.
The Frost-King sat on a throne of snow,
On a plain in the Royal Isle:
In his hand a sceptre of ice he bore,
On his brow a crown of ice he wore,
And his face was set in a holiday smile,
When he bade the carnival trumpet blow
For the famous Sports to begin.
The voluble hills returned the din
In echoes that travelled o’er many a mile;
O’er the broad St. Lawrence to St. Helen’s Isle,
To the sounding rapids of old Lachine,
To the Boucherville woods with their tufts of green,
And the peaceful hamlets that smiled between.
A multitude vast as the waves of the sea,
When Tritons rejoice that the winds are free,
People from far off Southern lands,
Where the eagle exults on outspread vans,—
People who came from the prairied West,
And pine-clad East, and numbers untold
Of natives who laughed at the teeth of the cold
Were there for a gala-day, threefold blest.
The trumpeter wight was an Arctic sprite,
Whose limbs were lank and whose locks were white,
And when he had blown with all his might,
The Frost-King raised his sceptre high,
When it flashed all the lights of a boreal sky,
And thus, in accents of festive tone,
He welcomed the guests who encircled his throne:—
“Friends! who have journeyed far to share
The verve of our Canadian air,
Greeting and love to all.
’Tis wise to lay aside each heavy care
And all the petty ills that do enthral,
To find in ampler scope this lusty joy,
This social amity, where no alloy
Of turbid passion mingles with the gold
Of kindly fellowship:
Where harmony betwixt the heart and lip
Its primal sanctity delights to hold.
Pleasure is native to the heart of man,
Here let it freely flow;
Here let an ocean tide of gladness roll,
Here where no tyrant’s interdict can ban
The sacred glow
That freedom kindles in the human soul.
Now let the Sports begin, and first
Let youths and maids who stand athirst
For Canada’s supreme sensation,
For motion’s wild intoxication,
Launch from yon hills their swift Toboggans.
Behold, upon the utmost crest,
How democratic Jones and Scroggins
With Lords and Ladies freely jest.
Blow, trumpet, blow!
The signal sound how well they know!
Down, down they plunge, what frantic speed!
No lightning-shod celestial steed
E’er swifter clove the azure air
Than headlong down the polished slide
Those young athletes and damsels ride,
Obedient to the trumpet’s blare;
Like foamy waves that seek the shore,
When red-mouthed storms behind them roar,—
Like avalanches loosed from high,—
Like meteors rushing down the sky,—
They spurn the steep, they leap, they fly,
Till on the flats in bubbling joy they pour.
A Sport of more elastic grace
Now claims from us its honoured place.
Again, my merry sprite,
The trumpet sound, and let the night
In starry azure veil the face
Of Earth, enrobed in purest white.
The signal blast the Skaters know,
And eagerly—with cheeks aglow,
Their costumes varied as the flowers
And blossoms that the Summer hours
On all the sunny lands bestow—
They skim in joy the crystal floor,
So full their bliss they ask no more.
In sooth it is a goodly show,
Twice twenty hundred twinkling feet
In fairy flight, advance, retreat,
Whilst others, more ambitious still,
In loops and scrolls assert their skill.
The Champion of a hundred rinks,
Behold him there! his bosom mailed
With trophies rich; what fancy jinks
Those lithe, light limbs that never failed!
What complicated, airy links
They weave, as weaves a spider’s feet!
Till tip-toe wonder, stares and winks,
And plauding hands his triumphs greet.
What ho! what means yon wild array,
In blanket-coats and sashes gay,
With red fire armed, that wind this way?
Stretching afar for many a mile,
Hither they haste in Indian file,
Ha! Ha! the rebel horde I know;
Blow, Trumpeter, the trumpet blow!—
To arms!—the Snowshoe host have sworn
To storm our castle walls,—this morn
A faithful courier warning gave;
Defiant let our war-flag wave!
And you, my guests, remain in sight,
Spectators of the weirdest fight
That ever shook the vault of night.
To arms our veterans! man the walls,
Receive them with a million balls
Of roaring flame, with dart and brand,
And serpents that no mortal hand
Can parry; let our trusty Pinch,
Who never has been known to flinch,
Protect the gates; our princely friend,
Great Zero, shall in wrath defend
The turrets and the loop-holed walls;
Let Blizzard—a tremendous power—
In fury guard the centre tower;
And Coldsnap, thine the task to shower
With fiery hail and blistering squalls,
And cannonade of burning snow
From every point the reeling foe!
The rebels advance with a shout and a cheer;
But they reck not the might of that spectral host,
Each warrior chieftain a blood-freezing ghost,
Who answered their mirth with a jeer.
Strange voices—such sounds as the winter winds make
When lattice and casement they wrench at and shake,
Were heard in those halls;
And such terrible calls
As made the most valiant assailant to quake.
The castle, a lucent volcano, emits
An ocean of flame on the heads of the foe,
They waver—they stagger—they lose their five wits,
And print their appalling defeat in the snow.
Short, sharp and decisive the battle—no breach—
In that marvellous structure the rebels could reach.
To the mountain, abashed, bearing torches, they fled,
Oppressed with the weight of their wounded and dead.
The Frost-King, no longer enveloped in wrath,
With pity surveyed their laborious path;
And then, to the multitude bending, he said:—
“What folly, what ingratitude!
To think with such rebellious war
This wonder of the world to mar!
This temple that in mist and flood
And cataract in embryo slept,
Till near this Royal Island crept
The fluent particles, on which
I breathed and wedded each to each,
And made the solid lustre rich
In dazzling beauty, fit to reach
And rival, in these gleaming spires,
The loveliness of astral fires,
The mellow radiance of the moon.
Ah! whether late or soon
We with our retinue depart,
Is there a single human heart
Will mourn our exit? Shall we not
Some few months hence be quite forgot?
If even so, another year,
With equal pleasure, equal cheer,
King Frost shall hold his court, we wot,
And meet your warmest welcome here.”