Legends and Memories of St John's Chapel -
Addressed to R. A. Riddick
by Major John W. Moore 

Part XIV - published in the Windsor Ledger Sept 21, 1899

I am sure my good neighbor,
That you, very long ago,
Came unto the conclusion
That I draw so long a bow
As to worry you my good friend
And the many readers kind.
Who perchance have been so luckless
Their attention to confine
To these tales an old man tells you
Whose only merit is, they're true.

And though much of them were best
Left unwritten and unsung,
Still you and other readers
Who by chance have clung
To the thread of my discoursing
Will excuse their emptiness,
Just because they are unto me
Like some darling's sweet caress,
In that past that's gone forever
With dear friends across the river.

I am very sure that you
Would in no wise e'er detract
From such high and noble things
That restrain and counteract
Men and women, all who wander
On life's lonely pilgrimage,
And await the coming season
That shall be the Golden Age,
When a larger humanity
Shall then in truth make us all free.

Freed from bonds of prescription,
Loosing chains of custom old,
Rising out of narrow ruts
To a new and ample fold,
Where the people yet ascending
To a nobler, brighter sphere
With new hopes and expectations
Dawning on us then every year,
And with an increase of stature
Grow more Godlike in their nature.

He that kindles but a spark
Of low hatred in a heart,
Sows a seed that afterwards
Never from it may depart;
But expanding and infecting
Grow and widen with the years,
Till it poisons a whole nation
And results in blood and tears,
Which only cease when wiser men
Show all its folly and its sin.

Like him who on Carmel stood,
And looked out across the sea,
Doing what the prophet bade him,
And who ere long suddenly
Saw across the vast blue waters
Washing many a coast and land;
In the west a little cloudlet
Of the bigness of his hand;
But then that cloud so very small
Was soon to come and kings appall.

So with a truth once spoken
Feeble though may be its morn,
Ten thousand Herods watch it,
And as soon as it is born
They and a rabble brutalized
Build them crosses high and strong
To crucify another saint
While the mad and guilty throng;
To Barrababas sing hosannas
And find in hell their chosen banners.

Alas for poor humanity,
If it should be e'er the same
As it was in past ages
To thus wallow in the shame,
Despising every holy thing
And cleaving to the evil;
With eyes too blind the Lord to know,
Yet not even the Devil
Was more eager for the thing
That would to all swift ruin bring.

But take courage, oh my friend,
This conflict though enduring,
Is sure in the lapse of time
New and better ways to bring,
"Truth crushed to Earth will rise again
The eternal years of God are hers
While error wounded writhes in pain
And dies amid her worshippers."
And so we calmly wait on God
And find him best beneath the rod.

The ages in one grand trend,
Lift themselves toward the stars,
In mercy ever and anon,
God helps us break down the bars
Which shut us from the higher plain,
And we lift poor, blinded eyes
And through the rifts behold the King,
He still hears our feeble cries;
To all who give him heart and hand
He leads straight on to Beulah Land.

I was led, my good neighbor,
To indite the thoughts above,
Touching the new relations
Of our race to peace and love;
And the slow but ever widening
Growth of true humanity,
Which is to my apprehension
The surest, noblest test can be
Of how we stand with God on high
And love for him thus testify.

Our Lord has plainly told us 
That our duty first and last
Is shown forth in simple words,
That the men of every caste
Should love God with all their power,
And their neighbors as their selves
And that these two great commandments
All the books upon our shelves
Could not amplify or alter,
If in these we do not falter.

But we grow with the ages
And of late a mighty stride
Has been made toward the goal
Promised us by Him who died
To lead on that great Jubilee
When the lion and the lamb
Shall consort by silent waters
And discord no longer damn
A race that God would only bless
And crown with perfect happiness.

A hundred years ago sir
Even our good fathers thought
That they and all their children
At that time certainly ought
To serve and obey forever
Him by grace of God their king
And all their rights and liberties
Could from him only spring, 
That he was source of every right
Their royal master, hope and light.

We've slightly changed that Robert,
We say now, that all the law,
All rights and regulations,
From the people ever flow:
And that kings, at best are phantoms
Of the childish ages gone,
They never knew their power and rights
Til there had dawned forth better lights:

A hundred years ago sir,
And our jails were never free
Of good honest men, there pining,
Barred from hope and liberty;
For no other cause or reason,
Than their debts had some excess
Over available assetts
They then happened to possess;
So often then the wisest, best,
For weary years in jail were cast.

If some sudden disaster
Fell on greatest prince in trade,
His life and views the noblest
No difference ever made,
If a creditor malignant
Closed the doors of mercy fast,
Then he looked on home and children
And that look was oft his last,
The murderer might his pardon get
But mercy never to a man in debt.

And thus it was friend Robert,
In too many other things,
But a man had best defer
When too long a lay he sings:
So we'll wait a wee, mon ami
And will take some better time
To discuss a recent blessing;
So in homely, halting rhyme
For a week I'll bid adieu
To other readers and to you.