"Yet mirrored in the sullen stream The holy stars are given: Is Norembega, then, a dream Whose waking is in Heaven? "No builded wonder of these lands My weary eyes shall see; A city never made with hands Alone awaiteth me-- "'_Urbs Syon mystica_;' I see Its mansions passing fair, '_Condita coelo_;' let me be, Dear Lord, a dweller there!" Above the dying exile hung The vision of the bard, As faltered on his failing tongue The song of good Bernard. The henchman dug at dawn a grave Beneath the hemlocks brown, And to the desert's keeping gave The lord of fief and town. Years after, when the Sieur Champlain Sailed up the unknown stream, And Norembega proved again A shadow and a dream, He found the Norman's nameless grave Within the hemlock's shade, And, stretching wide its arms to save, The sign that God had made, The cross-boughed tree that marked the spot And made it holy ground: He needs the earthly city not Who hath the heavenly found. JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. Until the middle of the sixteenth century, Spain was the only nation which had succeeded in establishing colonies in the New World. In 1583 Sir Humphrey Gilbert secured permission from Queen Elizabeth to set out on a voyage of discovery and colonization, for the glory of England. He landed at St. John's, Newfoundland, August 5, and established there the first English colony in North America. Then he sailed away to explore further, and met the fate described in the poem. The colony proved a failure. SIR HUMPHREY GILBERT [1583] Southward with fleet of ice Sailed the corsair Death; Wild and fast blew the blast, And the east-wind was his breath. His lordly ships of ice Glisten in the sun; On each side, like pennons wide, Flashing crystal streamlets run. His sails of white sea-mist Dripped with silver rain; But where he passed there were cast Leaden shadows o'er the main. Eastward from Campobello Sir Humphrey Gilbert sailed; Three days or more seaward he bore, Then, alas! the land-wind failed. Alas! the land-wind failed, And ice-cold grew the night; And nevermore, on sea or shore, Should Sir Humphrey see the light. He sat upon the deck, The Book was in his hand; "Do not fear! Heaven is as near," He said, "by water as by land!" In the first watch of the night, Without a signal's sound, Out of the sea, mysteriously, The fleet of Death rose all around. The moon and the evening star Were hanging in the shrouds; Every mast, as it passed, Seemed to rake the passing clouds. They grappled with their prize, At midnight black and cold! As of a rock was the shock; Heavily the ground-swell rolled.