In 'Victorian Poets' I am moving on to the letter 'C' - and the first in my list is Ada Cambridge.
"Ada WHO?" you ask. Yes, I know - I hadn't heard of her either.
Ask any Australian though and he will probably claim that she is one of their national treasures
This is because, although she was born in England, she emigrated 'down under' at the age of 26 and spent the remaining 56 years of her life there. She is buried in Melbourne.
Here is a brief biography:
Ada Cambridge (1844 - 1926), later known as Ada Cross, was an English writer.
Overall she wrote more than twenty-five works of fiction, three volumes of poetry and two autobiographical works. Many of her novels were serialised in Australian newspapers, and were never published in book form.
While she was known to friends and family by her married name, Ada Cross, she was known to her newspaper readers as A.C..
Later in her career she reverted to her maiden name, Ada Cambridge, and it is thus by this name that she is known.
Ada was born at St Germans, Norfolk, the second child of Thomasine and Henry Cambridge, a gentleman farmer.
She was educated by governesses, an experience she abhorred. She wrote in a book of reminiscences: "I can truthfully affirm that I never learned anything which would now be considered worth learning until I had done with them all and started foraging for myself. I did have a few months of boarding-school at the end, and a very good school for its day it was, but it left no lasting impression on my mind."
On 25 April 1870 she was married to the Rev. George Frederick Cross and a few weeks later sailed for Australia. She arrived in Melbourne in August and was surprised to find it a well established city.
While she began writing in the 1870s to make money to help support her children, her formal published career spans from 1865 with Hymns on the Litany and The Two Surplices, to 1922 with an article 'Nightfall' in Atlantic Monthly.
(Wikipedia)
Moving on to her poetry, I like to think that the following is a description of Ada Cambridge's voyage to Australia by ship. No QANTAS in those days!
AT SEA
When the investing darkness growls,
And deep reverberates to deep;
When keyhole whines and chimney howls,
And all the roofs and windows weep;
Then, through the doorless walls of sleep,
The still-sealed ear and shuttered sight,
Phantoms of memory steal and creep,
The very ghosts of sound and light--
Dream-visions and dream-voices of a bygone night.
I see again, I hear again,
Where lightnings flash and house-eaves drip,
A flying swirl of waves and rain--
That storm-path between Sound and Rip.
I feel the swaying of the ship
In every gust that rocks the trees,
And taste that brine upon my lip
And smell the freshness of the breeze
That sped us through the welter of those racing seas.
I hear the menace of the call
To rope and rivet, wheel and mast,
In the swift onrush of the squall,
The challenge of the thundering blast
To daring men as it sweeps past;
And in my dream I have no dread.
Rivet and rope are firm and fast,
The clear lights shining, green and red,
The quiet eyes of sentry watching overhead.
What epic battles pass unsung!
It was a war of gods befell
On that wild night when we were young.
They rode, like cavalry of hell,
The mighty winds, the monstrous swell,
On their white horses, fierce and fleet;
They stood at bay, invincible,
Where pulsed beneath our sliding feet
The faithful iron heart that never lost a beat.
How the sharp sea-spume lashed and stung!
How the salt sea-wind tugged and tare
And clawed and mauled us where we clung,
With panting breasts and streaming hair,
To our frail eyrie in mid-air!
How we exulted in the fight--
With neither haste nor halt to dare
Those Titans furies in their might,
Undaunted and unswerving in our insect flight!
No lap of exquisite repose!
A mortar wherein souls are brayed;
An anvil ringing to the blows
Whereby true men are shaped, and made
Divinely strong and unafraid.
Such gallant sailor-men there be--
Never unready or dismayed,
Though 't's the face of death they see
In cyclone, fire and fog, and white surf on the lee.
Not only in the sylvan bower,
On dreaming hill, by sleeping mere,
The holy place--the sacred hour.
Beset by every form of fear,
Darkness ahead and danger near,
Sorely hard-driven and hard-prest,
But still unspent and of good cheer--
He finds them who can pass the test,
Who never winks an eye and never stays to rest
Ada Cambridge
One who values happiness for himself but creates anxiety for others is confused.
neil xx
http://www.neilemacview.blog.ca/main
15/06/08 @ 18:48