The dauntless three! For twenty days and nights <br />These heroes battled with the haughty heights; <br />For twenty spaces of the star and sun <br />These Romans kept their harness buckled on; <br />By gaping gorges, and by cliffs austere, <br />These fathers struggled in the great old year. <br />Their feet they set on strange hills scarred by fire, <br />Their strong arms forced a path through brake and briar; <br />They fought with Nature till they reached the throne <br />Where morning glittered on the great UNKNOWN! <br />There, in a time with praise and prayer supreme, <br />Paused Blaxland, Lawson, Wentworth, in a dream; <br />There, where the silver arrows of the day <br />Smote slope and spire, they halted on their way. <br />Behind them were the conquered hills — they faced <br />The vast green West, with glad, strange beauty graced; <br />And every tone of every cave and tree <br />Was as a voice of splendid prophecy.<br /><br />Henry Kendall<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/blue-mountain-pioneers/
