{
 "id": "james-mcintyre/canadian-thames",
 "title": "Canadian Thames",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": "Old Version",
 "poet": "James McIntyre",
 "poet_slug": "james-mcintyre",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Musings on the Banks of Canadian Thames",
 "book_slug": "musings-on-the-banks-of-canadian-thames",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1884,
  "venue": "Musings on the Banks of Canadian Thames (1884)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_09542"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/james-mcintyre_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_09542",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/36068",
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_11791"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 40,
  "n_stanzas": 10,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 42,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "We love to sing of classic names⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Even if we choose a borrowed plume⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Our theme, the Valley of the Thames,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where man may yet find ample room.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "It is not of old England’s river,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Covered o’er with many a mast;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "But where Cabot did discover",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The land of lakes and forests vast.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Although we have historic claims,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet them we now do lay aside;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "We pass the battle of the Thames,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Where foreign foe did fiercely ride.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "We do not sing the graceful dames,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No more than the fierce battle’s shock;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "We merely trace old English names,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Beginning first with the Woodstock.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "England’s Woodstock had a palace",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "None was raised up grander, stronger;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Canadian Woodstock without malice,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "We may say your streets by far the longer.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Yet you are Oxford’s County Town,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And can boast a fine new college,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Which with old age may some day frown,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like Old England’s seat of knowledge",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The next in order we enroll",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is Westminster and Middlesex,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "With London for it capitol⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "These names a Cockney do perplex.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Each familiar name doth greet thee!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Its bridges, markets, and its halls;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "All things in the Forest City",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Bears English names, even to St. Pauls’.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "The next in order we do trace,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Is Chatham⁠—once a famed resort⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "For there the bloodhound dared not chase,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Nor tear good colored men from sport.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And now our verse draws to a close,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Because beyond the County Kent",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The Thames by name no longer flows,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But in the lake it finds a vent.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}