I snatched their toil to serve my needs-- Too slow their fleetest flew for me-- I tired twenty smoking steeds, And bade them bait a new for me. I sent the lightnings forth to see Where hour by hour she waited me. Among ten million one was she, And surely all men hated me! Dawn ran to meet us at my goal-- Ah, day no tongue shall tell again!-- And little folk of little soul Rose up to buy and sell again! V OUR LADY OF THE SNOWS 1897 (_Canadian Preferential Tariff, 1897_) A Nation spoke to a Nation. A Queen sent word to a Throne: "Daughter am I in my mother's house But mistress in my own. The gates are mine to open, As the gates are mine to close, And I set my house in order," Said our Lady of the Snows. "Neither with laughter nor weeping, Fear or the child's amaze-- Soberly under the White Man's law My white men go their ways. Not for the Gentiles' clamour-- Insult or threat of blows-- Bow we the knee to Baal," Said our Lady of the Snows. "My speech is clean and single, I talk of common things-- Words of the wharf and the market-place And the ware the merchant brings: Favour to those I favour, But a stumbling-block to my foes. Many there be that hate us," Said our Lady of the Snows. "I called my chiefs to council In the din of a troubled year; For the sake of a sign ye would not see, And a word ye would not hear. This is our message and answer; This is the path we chose: For we be also a people," Said our Lady of the Snows. "Carry the word to my sisters-- To the Queens of the East and the South I have proven faith in the Heritage By more than the word of the mouth. They that are wise may follow Ere the world's war-trumpet blows, But I--I am first in the battle," Said our Lady of the Snows. _A Nation spoke to a Nation, A Throne sent word to a Throne: "Daughter am I in my mother's house, But mistress in my own. The gates are mine to open, As the gates are mine to close, And I abide by my Mother's House," Said our Lady of the Snows._ VI THE SONG OF THE WOMEN (_Lady Dufferin's Fund for medical Aid to the Women of India_). How shall she know the worship we would do her? The walls are high, and she is very far. How shall the women's message reach unto her Above the tumult of the packed bazaar? Free wind of March, against the lattice blowing, Bear thou our thanks, lest she depart unknowing.