Pioneers

Long have we sung our noble pioneers,
Vanguard of progress, heralds of the time,
Guardians of industry and art sublime,
Leaders of man down all the brightening years!
To them the danger, to their wives the tears,
While we sit safely in the city’s grime,
In old-world trammels of distress and crime,
Playing with words and thoughts, with doubts and fears.

Children of axe and gun! Ye take to-day
The baby steps of man’s first, feeblest age,
While we, thought-seekers of the printed page,
We lead the world down its untrodden way!
Ours the drear wastes and leagues of empty waves,
The lonely deaths, the undiscovered graves.