Where the short-legged Eskimo
Waddle in the ice and snow,
And the playful polar bear
Nips the hunter unaware;
Where by day they track the ermine,
And by night another vermin--
Segment of the frigid zone,
Where the temperature alone
Warms on St. Elias' cone;
Polar dock, where Nature slips
From the ways her icy ships;
Land of fox and deer and sable,
Shore end of her western cable--
Let the news that flying goes
Thrill through all your Arctic floes,
And reverberate the boast
From the cliffs of Beechey's coast,
Till the tidings, circling round
Every bay of Norton Sound,
Throw the vocal tide-wave back
To the isle of Kodiak. Let the stately polar bears
Waltz around the pole in pairs,
And the walrus, in his glee,
Bare his tusk of ivory;
While the bold sea unicorn
Calmly takes an extra horn;
All ye polar skies, reveal your
Very rarest of Parhelia;
Trip it, all ye merry dancers,
In the airiest of lancers;
Slide, ye solemn glaciers, slide,
One inch farther to the tide,
Nor in rach precipitation
Upset Tyndall's calculation.
Know you not what fate awaits you,
Or to whom the future mates you?
All ye icebergs make salaam--
You belong to Uncle Sam! On the spot where Eugene Sue
Led his wretched Wandering Jew,
Stands a form whose features strike
Russ and Eskimo alike.
He it is whom Skalds of old
In their Runic rhymes foretold;
Lean of flank and lank of jaw,
See the real Northern Thor!
See the awful Yankee leering
Just across the Straits of Bering;
On the drifted snow, too plain,
Sinks his fresh tobacco stain
Just beside the deep inden-
Tation of his Number Ten. Leaning on his icy hammer
Stands the hero of this drama,
And above the wild-duck's clamor,
In his own peculiar grammar,
With its linguistic disguises,
Lo, the Arctic prologue rises:
"Wall, I reckon 't ain't so bad,
Seein' ez 't was all they had;
True, the Springs are rather late
And early Falls predominate;
But the ice crop's pretty sure,
And the air is kind o' pure;
'T ain't so very mean a trade,
When the land is all surveyed.
There's a right smart chance for fur-chase
All along this recent purchase,
And, unless the stories fail,
Every fish from cod to whale;
Rocks, too; mebbe quartz; let's see--
'T would be strange if there should be--
Seems I've heard such stories told;
Eh!--why, bless us--yes, it's gold!" While the blows are falling thick
From his California pick,
You may recognize the Thor
Of the vision that I saw--
Freed from legendary glamour,
See the real magician's hammer.