The White Pine news. [volume] (Treasure City, Nev.) 1868-1906, 1882-05-13
PINE NEWS
A NEVADA UNSET.

BY R. N. DAGGETT
The day Is spent; behold the setting sun,
With golden pencil tipped with silver light,
In farewell greeting reach among the stars
And touch the palette Of eternal haes
That glorify the walks of other worlds
And paint the vaults and tapestries of heaven;
Then with a single stroke Of skill divine
So guild the cloudy canvass of the skies
That art stands aned. and seeks, but seeks in
vain.
To match its splendors.
Not it Arctic seas;
Not by the Adriatic or the Alps;
Not where the Himalayan minarets
Rend into shreds the clouds of Kumaon,
Or where the sun. as drops the plummetdoWn
Dyes red the yapors with its eyes of fire:
Not where, o'erlooking bright Sicilian seas.
The Syracusans watch the amber skies,
Or where the clouds, on balmy breezes borne,
Their shadows troop across 4Egaean isles,
Are looped such pictures from the evening
stars.
Ye who would view these gJories. with me
To some brown hill in Autumn, sloping down
From Tahoe eastward. where the rocky waves
Lower and gentler in recession thence,
Die out in ripples on the desert plains
The sere and ~sentless heritage at our feet,
The glard'd nut pine and fragrant juniper.
Scarce feel the breath. cool from the frosty
heights,
OF tr uants zephyrs from the western sea.
Before US, far as human e~yesean grasp,
Stretch the Sierras, with their hammered peaks
Above tho clouds. and in the storm-king's
path
Exchanging signals Of his airy march.
Along the heights the idly drifting clouds,
In strange accord of color and Of form,
Arc blending with and lifting hoavenward
With art sublime the mighty granite pile,
All cannon-smeamsd and capped with endless
SHOWS,
As if the fragments of a world had dropped.
Behind this wild illusion sinks the sun,
And with the glory OF It's quenehless beams
Lights up the moving landscape of the skies
With hues celestial; then the misty peaks
Their summit lurid with volcanic fires,
Are rent in n~oiseless tumalt gentle winds
As with the strength Of Titans. sap the base,
And from their broad foundations topping
DER,
41tlI Aud@11Nt JUN nv AZ
Ssaying and e~linging IN their awful light,
Are hurled in fragments to the plains belo~
There taking form as islands ol a lake
Fast shaping round them-8aYes Of silken
thread
Prayed from the fringes Of an ebon cloud
Skirtiog the distance in low sloning hills
That binds the waters of the silver sea.
Along its margins stately mansions rise,
With spacious lawns and shaded avenues,
And on thu peaceful islets, grit with green,
Between which giided barge. come and 20,
Sleep marble domes and pillared porticos-
The whole so rich in splendor and in hue.
So fair in form, so like reality,
That we would still the pulses Of the heart
To catch tome whisper from that silent shore.
As comes the thought, how bent in holy awe.
That angel hands have drawn the curtain
back,
That mortal eyes may for a moment gaze
Upon the glory Of that realm of souls
Beyond the sunset and the gates Of earth.
Now sinks the sun; the silver Of the lake
Has turned to lead, to bronze the FURNISHED
gold.
The c~ircling hills are massing into peaks.
llclI cIt-to Apldko Win IEuN anu plAlucu
with smoke.
Now from their tops and down their heaying
sides
Pour streams of liquid lava, drinking up
The waters Of the lake, submerging isles
In awful deluge, and with breath Of fire
And kissing tufs burning black the wales.
Turn to hide the ruin from my sight,
And close my ears, perehanee against such
shrieks
As rose amidst the storm of heated hail
That sepulchred doomed Herculanaum.
Again | look, and 10! The fires are qaenehed;
The sun has dropped behind the granite hills
And twilight ashes cover all the scene.
NJ that KHn1 ~ a UHaIlrAncA