(Anser Bernicla.)

Fast on the northern breeze,
Beyond the rosy cloud-lands of the morn,
I see yon wedge-line columns o'er the seas
In swift procession borne.

Now o'er some headland gray,
Now o'er the sloping beach with sands of gold,
Now o'er thick forests that engird the bay,
Your passage I behold.

Far up the savage shore
Of Baffin's Bay, deep hid in darksome swamps,
Or fast by shores of rugged Labrador,
Where smoke the Indian camps,

Your spring-time home hath been,
And there your callow fledgelings you have fed
Where rank weeds grow, and wave the grasses green,
Afar from human tread.

To a soft Southern clime,
To Florida's low, marshy coast,
Or isles of Mexic Gulf, in flight sublime
Speeds on your sable host.

And there in bays afar,
Or by some sluggish river, dark and deep,
Where red flamingoes line the sandy bar
And the tall herons sweep,

Your winter home shall be,
Where groves of palm shall shade their plumy crest,
And odorous gales distil from shrub and tree, —
A paradise of rest!