preface to this collection of poems must be my excuse for obtruding
myself upon the reader.  Having frequently had the pleasure as
editor of _The Canadian Monthly_, of introducing many of Mrs.
MacLean's poems to lovers of verse in the Dominion it was thought
not unfitting that I should act as foster father to the collection
of them here made and to bespeak for the volume at the hands at
least of all Canadians the appreciative and kindly reception due to a 

Child of the first winds and suns of a nation. 

Accepting the task assigned to me the more readily as I discern the
high and sustained excellence of the collection as a whole let me
ask that the volume be received with interest as a further and most
meritorious contribution to the poetical literature of our young
country (the least that can be said of the work), and with sympathy
for the intellectual and moral aspirations that have called it into
being. 

There is truth, doubtless, in the remark, that we are enriched less
by what we have than by what we hope to have.  As the poetic art in