William Hodgson Ellis

“ To-day, a thousand blossoms fair,
From sunny slope and sheltered glade,
With grateful incense fill the air—
To-morrow they shall fade.
[20]
But thou shalt live when sinks in night
Yon glorious sun, and shall not He
Who hath the flowers so richly dight,
Much rather care for thee?
O, faithless murmurer, thou may’st read
A lesson in the lowly sod,
Heaven will supply thine utmost need,
Fear not, but trust in God.
1865.
[5] Awarded the prize for English verse in the University of Toronto in 1865. ”

“ A badly decayed, rather large, double tooth!
“In your estimation, I very much fear,”
Thus gravely the Father began,
“Devoid of all value my gift will appear;
But when you have heard me its worth will be clear:
’Tis a relic of Holy Saint Anne!
[7] To tell half its virtues all night would require:
’Tis an excellent cure for the vapours;
’Twill heal any dropsy, no matter how dire,
Put out the last spark of Saint Anthony’s fire,
And stop all Saint Vitus’s capers!
The twinges of toothache, so hard to endure,
The quinsy, the gout and the spleen,
The scurvy, the jaundice, all these it will cure ”

“ Deep rooted; and with boughs to heaven that soar.
We see the better issue from the strife,
And hope the best. In loathsome crawling things
We feel the fluttering of jewelled wings.
In Nature’s score, with seeming discords rife,
We seek to read, with you, the note that brings
To harmony the jarring chords of life.
[15] Read at the Dinner given in honour of Professor R. Ramsay Wright, Professor of Biology and Dean of the Faculty of Arts in the University of Toronto, on his retirement, May, 1912. ”

“ At seeing a tooth to his nose sticking fast.
“Away,” they cried, smitten with panic, “away!
Let us fly to the distant hills!
The Devil is fighting against us to-day,
Our foemen are shedding their teeth as they say
That the porcupine sheds its quills!” ”

“ While astride on his nose sat the tooth of Saint Anne!
Part III.
In the Iroquois towns very deep was the grief,
When they heard of the pitiful plight of their chief;
There wasn’t a woman in all the Five Nations,
Who didn’t indulge in prolonged lamentations.
They tried to relieve him, but tried all in vain,
The tenderest touch produced exquisite pain:
[15] The med’cine men tried incantations and sorceries,
And yet, though their magic as strong as a hawser is,
The tooth wouldn’t budge for the best of the lot;
The more they incanted the tighter it got. ”

“ On the day he received the back tooth of Saint Anne;
And for all his successes he piously thanked it. He
Died full of years in the odour of sanctity.
1878.
[18] Consider the Lilies of the Field [5]
O weary child of toil and care,
Trembling at every cloud that lowers,
Come and behold how passing fair
Thy God hath made the flowers.
From every hillside’s sunny slope,
From every forest’s leafy shade
The flowers, sweet messengers of hope,
Bid thee “Be not afraid.” ”

“ We be seventy Lyric Poets,
All in the Fatherland,
Our verse is delightful, although its
Not easy to understand.
We’re the flower and crown of the nation,
The crown and flower of the earth,
But we find our remuneration
Inadequate to our worth.
We sing of “Sehnsucht” and “Trauer,”
“Die Liebe,” “Das Herz” and “Die Welt,”
But leider, we haven’t the power,
To sing from the public “Das Geld.” ”

“ When his hand in his med’cine bag chancing to thrust,
As Fortune would have it his fingers he ran
Against the back tooth of the blessed Saint Anne!
Little White Crow gave a terrible shout,
The tooth in a trice from the bag he whipped out,
Dropped it into his musket, and yelling still louder,
He rammed it well home on the top of the powder.
But here come the foe! From rocks, bushes and trees
They start like a swarm of exasperate bees ”

“ He’d a stoop in the shoulder, was yellow of skin,
With closely cut hair, and a smooth shaven chin,
He had very black eyes, and a rather red nose;
Wore shoes with steel buckles and very square toes,
A big shovel hat, a black cassock and bands,
And a rosary seldom was out of his hands.
But Loyola never, and nowhere than he
Had a loyaller or a more staunch devotee;
[3] And none carried further the Jesuit virtue,
Viz.:—“Do as you’re bid, and don’t cry if it hurt you!”
Though gentle by nature and fond of his ease,
He would work like a slave his Superior to please ”

“ If then at any distant day
Your thoughts should chance to turn to me
Draw me not as I am, I pray,
But as you think I ought to be.
[60] Horace, Odes I. i. [12]
Colonel, Most worthy President,
Our Club’s chief stay and ornament,
One man who drives with dust and jar
A 40 h.p. motor car,
All other mortals counts but clods,
Himself a rival of the Gods.
The fickle crowd another woos
Him for a threefold term to choose.
A third will lie awake all night
If Manitoba wheat be light. ”

“ Put the tooth in his med’cine bag safely away,
And then with a gesture more free than polite,
Clapped the priest on the shoulder and wished him, “good night.”
Part II.
A year and a day! A year and a day!
How the days and the weeks and the months roll away!
How little we know what of joy or of sorrow lies
Before us next year—but I’ve no time to moralize. ”

“ Ellis is laurea donandus Apollinari, worthy of the laurel (crown) of Apollo. (Horace, Carminum, iv. 2, 9.) 4. Why should “the gown and hood” be required “for angels’ wings”? To clothe them withal, of course. The draping of angels with wings and the attachment of wings to the structure of the back of the human figure have presented problems to artists in all ages. The best solution is undoubtedly to cover up the wings, and the gown with its hood is the only appropriate garment. ”

“ ELLIS
TORONTO: PUBLISHED BY
J. M. DENT & SONS LTD.
MCMXIV
NOTE The verses in this volume have been collected by a few of Dr. Ellis’s friends, and in this form are presented to him by them as a New Year’s gift
1 January, 1914
[vii] INTRODUCTION BY
MAURICE HUTTON, LL.D.,
Principal of University College, Toronto
W. H. E.
There is a Heav’n: at least on earth below:
It is where scholars read and thinkers brood:
For crowns and halos volumes in a row
For angels’ wings it has its gown and hood.
In that seraphic choir see Ellis sit! ”

“ His “dandy lines” become our “harmless gold.” [4]
[1] Plato (sixth letter—323 c.) speaks of Elysian or Ellis-i-an scholars “Swearing with scholarly seriousness and with that playfulness which is seriousness’ twin sister.” Thompson’s Gorgias, 41.
[2] See “Weed,” p. 37.
[3] See “Weed,” p. 43.
[4] See Lowell on “Dandelions”:—
“Fringing the dusty road with harmless gold.”
[ix] SOME ELUCIDATIONS OF THE INTRODUCTION BY THE EDITORS Lines 1. So also,
“. . . amidst the fairest flowers
Of the blest isles, Elysium’s blooming bowers.” ”

“ Under 50 pfennig a line. [10]
[9] “Seventy lyric poets in Germany have formed a trade’s union, and agreed not to sell their verses for less than half a mark a line.”—Daily paper.
[10] The author encloses his name and address, not for publication, but in order that the editor may know where to send the three dollars and thirty-six cents—twenty-eight lines at twelve cents.
[53] Psychology Dr. Jaeger has propounded the theory that the Soul is an emanation emitted by animals, and is the cause of the odour characteristic of each species. Cf. in Lives of the Saints, “the odour of sanctity” ”