Her quaint reply.

O'er classic volumes she will pore
With joy; and true scholastic lore
Will often gain.
In sports she bears away the bell,
Nor, under music's siren spell,
To dance divinely, flirt as well,
Does she disdain.



A Song of Sydney

(1894)


High headlands all jealously hide thee,
O fairest of sea-girdled towns!
Thine Ocean-spouse smileth beside thee,
While each headland threatens and frowns.
Like Venice, upheld on sea-pinion,
And fated to reign o'er the free,
Thou wearest, in sign of dominion,
The zone of the sea.

No winter thy fertile slope hardens,
O new Florence, set in the South!
All lands give their flowers to thy gardens,
That glow to thy bright harbour's mouth;