1931
Listen to Ted Yates read Thorold Lock
Old walls of stone and gates of wood
That through a century have stood
Upon yon scarp, where, water borne
Tall ships locked through your ancient form
Before the grime and soot of smoke
From blackened funnels o’er you broke.
No booming blasts of sirens loud
Rang o’er your temperamental flood.
Nor hissing steam proclaimed the glide
Of steel clad freighter on your tide.
In other days, above the trees,
A snow white sail set to the breeze
Heralds a gallant ship’s approach
To mount through you to higher reach
Of rippling waters flowing from
The mighty Erie’s blue bosom.
Beneath her forefoot wavelets purl
As comes a warship, sails a-furl
Moved on by plodding horses draft
Along the bordering tow path
To rest at last within your walls
And lower as your level falls.
Her glistening decks come into view
From off your sides. Her blue clad crew,
When opes’ your lower gate, make sail
To waft her further down the vale.
Above your moss grown gates I see,
In years agone, steal quietly
A fleet of painted bark canoes
Propelled by stalwart Indian crews.
Enroute from upper forests tall
To sell their furs in Montreal.
Once through your gates they paddle on
Through gathering dusk their way along
So through past generations you
Have borne your burdens, old and new
Till stern necessity decrees
You lie at rest amongst the trees.
First Published in Poems by Captain F. S. Drummond, 1931, 20-21. Also published in: Kevin McCabe [ed.], The Poetry of Old Niagara. St. Catharines, Ont.: Blarney Stone Books, 1999, 56-57.
Published in Spirit of the Big Ditch: The Story of the Welland Canals in Pictures, Poems and Songs. Compiled, edited and annotated by Robert Ratcliffe Taylor. St. Catharines: The Historical Society of St. Catharines, 2024
The Historical Society of St. Catharines 