POETRY.

ALIEN.

IN Afric's fabled fountains I have panned the golden sand— Caught crocodile with baviaan for bait—

I've fished, with blasting gelatine for hook and gaff and wand, And lured the bearded barbel to his fate :

But take your Southern rivers that meander to the sea, And set me where the Leochel joins the Don,

With eighteen feet of greenheart and the tackle running

free—

I want to have a clean fish on.

The eland and the tsessebe I've tracked from early dawn, I've beard the roar of lions shake the night, I've fed the lonely bush-veld camp on dik-kop and korbaan, And watched the soaring vulture in his flight; For horn and head I've hunted, yet the spoil of gun and spear, My trophies, I would freely give them all,

To creep through mist and heather on the great red deer--I want to hear the black cock call.

In hot December weather when the grass is caddie high, I've driven clean and lost the ball and game, When winter veld is burned and bare I've cursed the cuppy

lie—

The language is the one thing still the same ;

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For dongas, rocks, and scuffled greens give me the links up North, The whine, the broom, the thunder of the surf, The three old fellows waiting where I used to make a fourth- ./ want to play a round on turf.

I've faced the fremt, its strain and toil, in market and in mine,

And fortune's ebb and flow between the " Chains," Been guest at starlit banquets where the danger spiced the wine, But bitter are the lees the alien drains ; For all the time the heather blooms on distant Benachie, And wrapt in peace the sheltered valley lies, I want to wade through bracken in a glen across the sea- /. want to see the peat reek rise.

CHARLES MURRAY.