Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

The Cremation of Sam McGee
Robert Service | 2008-02-27 | Robert Service

Posted on 02/27/2008 12:21:19 PM PST by Clive

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.

Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam ‘round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he’d often say in his homely way that “he’d sooner live in hell.”

On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka’s fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we’d close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn’t see;
It wasn’t much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee.

And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o’erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and “Cap,” says he, “I’ll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I’m asking that you won’t refuse my last request.”

Well, he seemed so low that I couldn’t say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
“It’s the cursed cold, and it’s got right hold till I’m chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet ‘taint being dead—it’s my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you’ll cremate my last remains.”

A pal’s last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee.

There wasn’t a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn’t get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: “You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it’s up to you to cremate those last remains.”

Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows — O God! how I loathed the thing.

And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I’d often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.

Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the “Alice May.”
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then “Here,” said I, with a sudden cry, “is my cre-ma-tor-eum.”

Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared and the furnace roared—such a blaze you seldom see;
Then I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.

Then I made a hike, for I didn’t like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don’t know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky.

I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: “I’ll just take a peep inside.
I guess he’s cooked, and it’s time I looked;” . . . then the door I opened wide.

And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and he said: “Please close that door.
It’s fine in here, but I greatly fear you’ll let in the cold and storm—
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it’s the first time I’ve been warm.”

There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold; The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.


TOPICS: Canada; Culture/Society
KEYWORDS:
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-6061-71 next last

1 posted on 02/27/2008 12:21:20 PM PST by Clive
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | View Replies]

To: Alberta's Child; albertabound; AntiKev; backhoe; Byron_the_Aussie; Cannoneer No. 4; ...

-


2 posted on 02/27/2008 12:22:45 PM PST by Clive
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

yikes....H.S. lit flash backs....


3 posted on 02/27/2008 12:23:11 PM PST by stylin19a
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

Living in New England most of my life. I’ve always liked this poem. Makes me smile. “There’s nothing like finally being warm, huh Sam?”


4 posted on 02/27/2008 12:23:49 PM PST by shineon
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

Oh crap!

Another global warming screed.


5 posted on 02/27/2008 12:24:09 PM PST by oldbill
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

Oh, I LOOOOOVE that poem! I used to have it memorized. Service spoke so eloquently on the hold the north has on us who live here. Thanks, Clive!


6 posted on 02/27/2008 12:26:09 PM PST by redhead (Stop Gorebal Warning!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

My Dad, deceased for many years, used to recite that to us.

On Friday nights, before he’d give us money to go to the skating rink, he’d tease us and say we had to recite it word for word to earn our “skatin” money.

Thanks for bringing back those wonderful memories.


7 posted on 02/27/2008 12:26:15 PM PST by girlangler (Fish Fear Me)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

Perfect.

I just got diagnosed with hypertension and the medications they’re giving me make me feel chilled to the bone, just like this guy. I can not get warm.

I’ll be so glad when Global Warming makes it to Oklahoma!


8 posted on 02/27/2008 12:27:12 PM PST by 2Jedismom (Expect me when you see me!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 2 | View Replies]

To: Clive

http://www.mochinet.com/poets/service/index.cgi

Searchable database of Robert Service.

The work that has gone into compiling these poems into electronic format started with Project Gutenberg.
The first of Service’s books they compiled was
“The Spell of the Yukon” followed by one or two others.
Some of the books here have been shamelessly copied from
their archives and reformatted into HTML.
However, most of the works here have been typed up by
individuals devoted to preserving the memory and work
of Robert Service.
Two such people that I have immediate knowledge of, on
this regard, is Art Ude and Myself.


9 posted on 02/27/2008 12:30:22 PM PST by HuntsvilleTxVeteran (McCain, Huckabee will send a self-abused stomped elephant to the DRNC.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

This one was one of my favorites. The “Shooting of Dan McGrew” was too.


10 posted on 02/27/2008 12:39:22 PM PST by Mogollon (Vote straight GOP for congress....our only protection against Obama-Clinton, or McCain.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

Huddled here in the warmth of my little office against a cold and snowy New England day, I can still imagine Jean Shepherd reciting that poem over the transistor radio I kept under my pillow as a kid.


11 posted on 02/27/2008 12:44:42 PM PST by andy58-in-nh (Kill the terrorists, secure the borders, and give me back my freedom.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: girlangler

> My Dad, deceased for many years, used to recite that to us.

Mine, too. I had totally forgotten about it.

Perhaps, I should read it to my baby grand-daughter some day.


12 posted on 02/27/2008 12:47:06 PM PST by dinasour
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: Clive
Ah ... "The Cremation of Sam McGee." One of my favorites. I love Service's galloping rhythm and clever rhyme.

My favorite of his ... "The Law of the Yukon." It was an inspiration to one of my heroes, Jim Elliot (the young missionary pioneer in Ecuador) ... who took the words out of their earthy context and applied them to bold conquests for Christ.

This is the law of the Yukon, and ever she makes it plain:
"Send not your foolish and feeble; send me your strong and your sane--
Strong for the red rage of battle; sane, for I harry them sore;
Send me men girt for the combat, men who are grit to the core;
Swift as the panther in triumph, fierce as the bear in defeat,
Sired of a bulldog parent, steeled in the furnace heat.
Send me the best of your breeding, lend me your chosen ones;
Them will I take to my bosom, them will I call my sons;
Them will I gild with my treasure, them will I glut with my meat;"

************

"And I will not be won by weaklings, subtle, suave and mild,
But by men with the hearts of vikings, and simple faith of a child;
Desperate, strong and resistless, unthrottled by fear or defeat,
Them will I gild with my treasure, them will I glut with my meat."

13 posted on 02/27/2008 12:47:10 PM PST by Oliver Optic
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

And then what happened?


14 posted on 02/27/2008 12:48:42 PM PST by AppyPappy (If you aren't part of the solution, there is good money to be made prolonging the problem.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: AppyPappy

Heh. :-)


15 posted on 02/27/2008 12:51:58 PM PST by Oliver Optic
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: andy58-in-nh
There was a DJ on WMEX, Boston era, who did a lot of poetry on the Midnight hour he did this one, and many others, it was pretty good.

I first hear this poem and many, many others from my Mother who used to recite poetry to us at nap time when I was a kid.

16 posted on 02/27/2008 12:57:48 PM PST by Little Bill (Welcome to the Newly Socialist State of New Hampshire)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: Clive

My husband loves this poem.


17 posted on 02/27/2008 1:01:56 PM PST by murron (Proud Marine Mom)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive

Love it....AFAIK, I’m the only FReeper with a R.W. Service poem on my profile page :-D


18 posted on 02/27/2008 1:04:11 PM PST by Joe 6-pack (Que me amat, amet et canem meum)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Clive
I remember as a 16 year old on a month long vacation with my parents getting to see his cabin. We toured the town and close by was Jack London’s home as well. A few hundred miles IIRC away was Lake LaBarge. Service was a very talented writer. One of my favorites.
19 posted on 02/27/2008 1:05:57 PM PST by cva66snipe (Proud Partisan Constitution Supporting Conservative to which I make no apologies for nor back down)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Mogollon

I also recommend “The Ballad of the Iceworm Cocktail”


20 posted on 02/27/2008 1:08:34 PM PST by poindexters brother
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 10 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first 1-2021-4041-6061-71 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson