"I will die cheering, if I needs must die; So shall my last breath write upon my lips _Viva Italia!_ when my spirit slips Down the great darkness from the mountain sky; And those who shall behold me where I lie Shall murmur: 'Look, you! how his spirit dips From glory into glory! the eclipse Of death is vanquished! Lo, his victor-cry!' "Live, thou, upon my lips, Italia mine, The sacred death-cry of my frozen clay! Let thy dear light from my dead body shine And to the passer-by thy message say: '_Ecco!_ though heaven has made my skies divine, My sons' love sanctifies my soil for aye!'" _George Edward Woodberry_ AUSTRALIA TO ENGLAND By all the deeds to Thy dear glory done, By all the life blood, spilt to serve Thy need, By all the fettered lives Thy touch hath freed, By all Thy dream in us anew begun; By all the guerdon English sire to son Hath given of highest vision, kingliest deed, By all Thine agony, of God decreed For trial and strength, our fate with Thine is one. Still dwells Thy spirit in our hearts and lips, Honour and life we hold from none but Thee, And if we live Thy pensioners no more But seek a nation's might of men and ships, 'T is but that when the world is black with war Thy sons may stand beside Thee strong and free. _Archibald T. Strong_ _August, 1914_ CANADA TO ENGLAND Great names of thy great captains gone before Beat with our blood, who have that blood of thee: Raleigh and Grenville, Wolfe, and all the free Fine souls who dared to front a world in war. Such only may outreach the envious years Where feebler crowns and fainter stars remove, Nurtured in one remembrance and one love Too high for passion and too stern for tears. O little isle our fathers held for home, Not, not alone thy standards and thy hosts Lead where thy sons shall follow, Mother Land: Quick as the north wind, ardent as the foam, Behold, behold the invulnerable ghosts Of all past greatnesses about thee stand. _Marjorie L.C. Pickthall_ LANGEMARCK AT YPRES This is the ballad of Langemarck, A story of glory and might; Of the vast Hun horde, and Canada's part In the great grim fight. It was April fair on the Flanders Fields, But the dreadest April then That ever the years, in their fateful flight, Had brought to this world of men. North and east, a monster wall, The mighty Hun ranks lay, With fort on fort, and iron-ringed trench, Menacing, grim and gray. And south and west, like a serpent of fire, Serried the British lines, And in between, the dying and dead, And the stench of blood, and the trampled mud, On the fair, sweet Belgian vines. And far to the eastward, harnessed and taut, Like a scimitar, shining and keen, Gleaming out of that ominous gloom, Old France's hosts were seen. When out of the grim Hun lines one night, There rolled a sinister smoke;-- A strange, weird cloud, like a pale, green shroud, And death lurked in its cloak.