1 SEPTEMBER 1917, Page 17

POETRY.

MORITIIRI TE SALUTANT.

Ix this last hour, before the bugles blare The summons of the dawn, we turn again To you, dear country, you whom unaware, Through summer years of idle selfishness, We still have loved—who loved no none the less, Knowing the destined hour would find us men.

O thrill and laughter of the busy town!

0 flower-valleys, trees against the skies, Wild moor and woodland, glade and sweeping down, 0 land of our desire! like men asleep We have let pass the years, nor felt you creep So close into ore• heart's dear sanctities.

So, we are dreamers; but our dreams ere cast Henceforward in a more heroic mould; We have kept faith with our immortal past. Knights—we have found the lady of our love; Minstrels have heard great harmonies, above The lyrics that enraptured us of old.

The dawn's aglow with lustre of the son . 0 love, 0 burning passion, that has made Our day illustrious till its hours are done— Fire our dull hearts, that, in our eon's eclipse, When Death stoops low to kiss no on the lips, He still may find us singing, unafraid.

One thing we know, that love so greatly spent Dies not when lovers die From hand to hand We pass the torch and perish—well content, If in dark years to come our countrymen Feel the divine flame leap in them again, And so remember us and understand. P. H. 13. L.