This volume established Isabella Valancy Crawford as one of Canada's principal poets. Coupled with an introductory collage of viewpoints and reactions to her work by James Reaney its provides a vivid glimpse into the literary past of this country.

Although her poetry reflects the patterns of her time, Isabella Valancy Crawford was able to accept the raw and vigorous Canadian landscape on its own terms. She was the first of our poets for whom it became the setting for struggle, passion, love, and death. She celebrated the young land with an imagery enriched by allusions to North American Indian lore reflected in such lines as these:

From his far wigwam sprang the strong North Wind 
And rushed with war-cry down the steep ravine,
And wrestled with the giants of the woods;
And with his ice-club beat the swelling crests
Of the deep water courses into death.

'These verses bear the stamp of genius and show a true poetic instinct,' said a critic in The Canadian Magazine in 1895. The poetry of Isabella Valancy Crawford forms a vital part of the body of Canadian writing.