A ARCHIBALD LAMPMAN. RCHIBALD LAMPMAN was born on the seventeenth of November, 1861, at the little village of Morpeth, on the shore of Lake Erie. Situated in the County of Kent, on what is known as the Talbot road, the poet's birth-place is in the very garden of Canada, surrounded on every side by productive farms and rich fruit lands. His parents were both of German families which came to New England in the middle of the last century. At the outbreak of the war of Independence his father's family removed to Canada. They were staunch U. E. Loyalists, and took an active part in the War of 1812. His mother was a Gesner, of the Gesner and Stewart families, well known in Nova Scotia. Mr. Lampman's father is a Church of England clergyman, and in the course of events he was removed from Morpeth in 1886, and was sent to the parish of Perry Town, in the County of Durham. This seemed like desolation after the richness and beauty of the County of Kent, and after a sojourn of about a year the place was found so uncongenial that the family, which now consisted of one boy and three girls, removed to Gore's Landing, on Rice Lake. Although this place may have been undesirable in some respects it had the advantage of beautiful scenery, and it is doubtless responsible for some of Mr. Lampman's finest work. Here schooling was commenced at a private institution. After attending this school for some time he afterwards attended a public school. The family could never be considered well off, and it is chiefly owing to his mother, a woman of high ideals and of rare energy and bravery, that young Lampman was enabled to enjoy the best educational advantages that the country afforded. In 1876 he was sent to Trinity College school, Port Hope, which is modelled after the English public schools, and which is a preparatory institution for Trinity College, Toronto. Here he was very successful taking many prizes, and in his last year was head-boy at the school. In 1879 he entered Trinity College, Toronto, and, aided by the scholarships he obtained, he remained there until 1882, when he took the degree of B. A. with honors. At Trinity he was always foremost in literary matters, editing the college paper, writing constantly in both prose and verse for that and another college journal. After graduating, Mr. Lampman accepted the assistant-mastership of the Orangeville high school, and although fitted for such a position by his learning, he found the trials of the post unbearable. In January of 1883 he received an appointment in the Post Office Department, and removed to Ottawa, where he continues to reside. In 1887 he married Maud, youngest daughter of Edward Piayter, M. D. From the time of his removal to Ottawa his literary activity commenced, and he has ever since continued composing, and from time to time contributes to the Canadian literary paper, The Week, and the American magazines. In December, 1888, his first collection of poems, entitled "Among the Millet," was published. D. C. S. AMONG THE MILLET. THE dew is gleaming in the grass, The morning hours are seven, And I am fain to watch you pass, Ye soft white clouds of heaven. Ye stray and gather, part and fold; I think of what in time of old They called you sheep, the sky your sward, They called the shining sun your lord, The shepherd wind your keeper. Your sweetest poets I will deem The men of old for moulding In simple beauty such a dream, And I could lie beholding, Where daisies in the meadow toss, The wind from morn till even, Forever shepherd you across The shining field of heaven. AN IMPRESSION. I HEARD the city time-bells call I felt the march, the silent press I saw the haggard dreadfulness IN OCTOBER. Like tall slim priests of storm, stand up and bar The low long strip of dolorous red that lines The under west, where wet winds moan afar. The cornfields all are brown, and brown the mead OWS With the blown leaves' wind-heaped traceries, And the brown thistle stems that cast no shadows, And bear no bloom for bees. To wander like the bee among the flowers THE POETS. HALF god, half brute, within the self-same shell, Changers with every hour from dawn till even, Who dream with angles in the gate of heaven, And skirt with curious eyes the brinks of hell, Children of Pan, whom some, the few, love well, But most draw back, and know not what to say, Poor shining angels, whom the hoofs betray, Whose pinions frighten with their goatish smell. Half brutish, half divine, but all of earth, Half-way 'twixt hell and heaven, near to man, The whole world's tangle gathered in one span, Full of this human torture and this mirth: Life with its hope and error, toil and bliss, AUTUMN MAPLES. THE thoughts of all the maples who shall name, When the sad landscape turns to cold and grey? Yet some for very ruth aud sheer dismay, Hearing the northwind pipe the winter's name, Have fired the hills with beaconing clouds of flame; And some with softer woe that day by day, So sweet and brief, should go the westward way, Have yearned upon the sunset with such shame, That all their cheeks have turned to tremulous rose; Others for wrath have turned a rusty red, And some that knew not either grief or dread, Ere the old year should find its iron close, Have gathered down the sun's last smiles acold, Deep, deep, into their luminous hearts of gold. APRIL. Pale season, watcher in unvexed suspense, |