{
 "id": "henry-van-dyke-jr/the-camp-fires-of-my-friend",
 "title": "The Camp-Fires of My Friend",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Henry van Dyke Jr.",
 "poet_slug": "henry-van-dyke-jr",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Poems of Henry Van Dyke: Now First Collected and Revised, with Many Hitherto Unpublished",
 "book_slug": "poems-now-first-collected",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 11,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1911,
  "venue": "The Poems of Henry Van Dyke: Now First Collected and Revised, with Many Hitherto Unpublished (1911)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1911 first collected edition. That is the printing this text comes from and the first to give the poem a title, not necessarily the poem's first appearance: the volume's own title page describes it as now first collected and revised, and eleven of these twelve poems had already been printed untitled in Out-of-Doors in the Holy Land (1908).",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsnowfirstcol00vanduoft"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/henry-van-dyke-jr_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
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   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16134",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10679",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3525",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9372",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29314",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43094",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsofhenryvand00vandrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/buildersotherpoe00vandrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/toilingoffelixan00vandiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/musicotherpoems0000henr_c7v6",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsnowfirstcol00vanduoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/songsoutofdoors0000vand",
   "https://archive.org/details/thyseaisgreatour00vandiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/chosenpoems0000vand"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 28,
  "n_stanzas": 9,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 61,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "Thou hast taken me into thy tent of the world, O God,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beneath thy blue canopy I have found shelter,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Therefore thou wilt not deny me the right of a guest.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Naked and poor I arrived at thy door before sunset:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou hast refreshed me with beautiful bowls of milk,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "As a great chief thou hast set forth food in abundance.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I have loved the daily delights of thy dwelling,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thy moon and thy stars have lighted me to my bed,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In the morning I have made merry with thy servants.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Surely thou wilt not send me away in the darkness?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There the enemy Death is lying in wait for my soul:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Thou art the host of my life and I claim thy protection.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then the Lord of the tent of the world made answer:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The right of a guest endureth for a certain time,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "After three days and nights cometh the day of departure.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Yet hearken to me since thou fearest to go in the dark:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I will make with thee a new covenant of hospitality,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Behold I will come unto thee as a stranger and be thy guest.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Poor and needy will I come that thou mayest entertain me,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Meek and lowly will I come that thou mayest find a friend,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With mercy and with truth will I come to give thee comfort.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Therefore open thy heart to me and bid me welcome,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "In this tent of the world I will be thy brother of the bread,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And when thou farest forth I will be thy companion forever.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Then my soul rested in the word of the Lord;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And I saw that the curtains of the world were shaken,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But I looked beyond them to the stars,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The camp-fires of my eternal friend.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}