LA SOURCE
To end the drama, Fate grew fain,
Uprose a rebel tide, and flowed
Close to the threshold where he strode.
"And now the Black must exit make,
A craven at the last," they say:
Not so,—Christophe his leave will take
The long unwonted Roman way.
"Ho! Ho!" cried he, "the day is done,
And I go down with the setting sun!"
A pistol-shot,—no sign of fear,—
So died Christophe without a peer.
LA SOURCE
(PORT-AU-PRINCE)
A haunt the mountain roadside near,
Wherefrom the cliff that rose behind
Kept back, through all the tropic year,
The sundrouth and the whirling wind;
These here could never entrance find;
Perpetual summer balm it knew;
And skyward, thick-set boughs entwined
Their coil, where birds made sweet ado,
And heaven through glossy leaves was deepest blue.
Twin relics of some forest grim,
The last of their primeval race
Left scatheless, knit them limb with limb
Above the reaches of that place;
Time's hand against their high embrace
For seeming centuries had striven,
But yet they grappled face to face,
Still from their olden guard undriven
Though at their feet the cliff itself was riven.
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