And Other Poems.
9
GOD’S OWN COUNTRY.
A recent arrival from New Zealand, walking along Collins Street, Melbourne, a short time since, encountered another Maorilander, who holds a good position in the Victorian capital. “Well, how do you like Australia?” enquired the recent arrival. “Oh! it is a wonderful place,” replied the other, “and I am doing very well here, but I would much sooner live on a far smaller salary in ‘God’s Own Country.’”
GIVE me, give me God’s own country! there to live and there to die,
God’s own country! fairest region resting ’neath the southern sky,
God’s own country! framed by nature in her grandest, noblest mould;
Land of peace and land of plenty, land of wool and corn and gold!
Where the forests are the greenest and the rugged mountains rear
Noble turrets, towers, and spires, piercing through the ambient air;
Rising to the gates supernal, pointing Godwards through the blue,
When the summer’s sunny splendours tip them with a nameless hue,
And the gusts of winter gather snow and sleet and mist and cloud,
Weaving many a curious mantle, many a quaint fantastic shroud.
Oh! the mountains of New Zealand! wild and rugged though they be,
They are types of highest manhood, landmarks of a nation free.
God’s own country! fairest region resting ’neath the southern sky,
God’s own country! framed by nature in her grandest, noblest mould;
Land of peace and land of plenty, land of wool and corn and gold!
Where the forests are the greenest and the rugged mountains rear
Noble turrets, towers, and spires, piercing through the ambient air;
Rising to the gates supernal, pointing Godwards through the blue,
When the summer’s sunny splendours tip them with a nameless hue,
And the gusts of winter gather snow and sleet and mist and cloud,
Weaving many a curious mantle, many a quaint fantastic shroud.
Oh! the mountains of New Zealand! wild and rugged though they be,
They are types of highest manhood, landmarks of a nation free.
