# The Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier/Norembega

NOREMBEGA
Norembega, or Norimbegue, is the name given by early French fishermen and explorers to a fabulous country south of Cape Breton, first discovered by Verrazzani in 1524. It was supposed to have a magnificent city of the same name on a great river, probably the Penobscot. The site of this barbaric city is laid down on a map published at Antwerp in 1570. In 1604 Champlain sailed in search of the Northern Eldorado, twenty-two leagues up the Penobscot from the Isle Haute. He supposed the river to be that of Norembega, but wisely came to the conclusion that those travellers who told of the great city had never seen it. He saw no evidences of anything like civilization, but mentions the finding of a cross, very old and mossy, in the woods.
The winding way the serpent takes The mystic water took, From where, to count its beaded lakes, The forest sped its brook.
A narrow space ’twixt shore and shore, For sun or stars to fall, While evermore, behind, before, Closed in the forest wall.
The dim wood hiding underneath Wan flowers without a name; Life tangled with decay and death, League after league the same.
Unbroken over swamp and hill The rounding shadow lay, Save where the river cut at will A pathway to the day.
Beside that track of air and light, Weak as a child unweaned, At shut of day a Christian knight Upon his henchman leaned.
The embers of the sunset’s fires Along the clouds burned down; “I see,” he said, “the domes and spires Of Norembega town.”
“Alack! the domes, O master mine, Are golden clouds on high; Yon spire is but the branchless pine That cuts the evening sky.”
“Oh, hush and hark! What sounds are these But chants and holy hymns?” “Thou hear’st the breeze that stirs the trees Through all their leafy limbs.”
“Is it a chapel bell that fills The air with its low tone?” “Thou hear’st the tinkle of the rills, The insect’s vesper drone.”
“The Christ be praised!—He sets for me A blessed cross in sight!” “Now, nay, ’t is but yon blasted tree With two gaunt arms outright!”
“Be it wind so sad or tree so stark, It mattereth not, my knave; Methinks to funeral hymns I hark, The cross is for my grave!
“My life is sped; I shall not see My home-set sails again;
The sweetest eyes of Normandie Shall watch for me in vain.
“Yet onward still to ear and eye The baffling marvel calls; I fain would look before I die On Norembega’s walls.
“So, haply, it shall be thy part At Christian feet to lay The mystery of the desert’s heart My dead hand plucked away.
“Leave me an hour of rest; go thou And look from yonder heights; Perchance the valley even now Is starred with city lights.”
The henchman climbed the nearest hill, He saw nor tower nor town, But, through the drear woods, lone and still, The river rolling down.
He heard the stealthy feet of things Whose shapes he could not see, A flutter as of evil wings, The fall of a dead tree.
The pines stood black against the moon, A sword of fire beyond; He heard the wolf howl, and the loon Laugh from his reedy pond.
He turned him back: “O master dear, We are but men misled; And thou hast sought a city here To find a grave instead.”
“As God shall will! what matters where A true man’s cross may stand, So Heaven be o’er it here as there In pleasant Norman land?
“These woods, perchance, no secret hide Of lordly tower and hall; Yon river in its wanderings wide Has washed no city wall;
“Yet mirrored in the sullen stream The holy stars are given: Is Norembega, then, a dream Whose waking is in Heaven?
“No builded wonder of these lands My weary eyes shall see; A city never made with hands Alone awaiteth me—
“ ‘Urbs Syon mystica;’ I see Its mansions passing fair, ‘Condita cœlo;’ let me be, Dear Lord, a dweller there!”
Above the dying exile hung The vision of the bard, As faltered on his failing tongue The song of good Bernard.
The henchman dug at dawn a grave Beneath the hemlocks brown, And to the desert’s keeping gave The lord of fief and town.
Years after, when the Sieur Champlain Sailed up the unknown stream, And Norembega proved again A shadow and a dream,
He found the Norman’s nameless grave Within the hemlock’s shade, And, stretching wide its arms to save, The sign that God had made.
The cross-boughed tree that marked the spot And made it holy ground: He needs the earthly city not Who hath the heavenly found.