The Fiery Cross

Levin Daily Chronicle, 29 June 1918, Page 4

The Fiery Cross

(To Harry Lauder.') He stood behind the footlignts and he set -the crowds a-laughing With the same old crooning chuckle that we loved in other yeaTs, And only those who knew could guess the grief behind the doffing— But for those who knew the laughter had a secret salt of tears, Then at last he came out in his grassgreen coat and bonnet, With his gaudy tartans coloured like a garden in the sun, The same quaint little figure—but a different face was on it When he sang >113 of the laddies that fought and won. A face lined hard with furrows where the plough of pain had driven, Bine eyes that had grown shadow-set through many a sleepless night. The face of one who more than life ungrudgingly had given, Who called on ub to do as well—and, ah, we owned his right! We saw in him the Fiery Cross of Scotland, charred and gory, And the spirits burned within us to the challenge that he gave, For the player was a prophet as he spoke his people's glory— '' We 're a wee land ,and a puir land, but, by God, we're brave!" By Amelia J. Burr, in "The Outlook."