POETRY AND INCIDENTS. Den away, den away, for I can't stay any longer; Massa got scared, and so did his lady! Open de gates out! here's ole Shady, Comin', comin'! Hail, mighty day! Good-by, Massa Jeff! good-by, Misses Stevens! 'Spec, pretty soon, you'll see Uncle Abram's Den away, den away, etc. Good-by, hard work, and never any pay-- Comin', comin'! Hail, mighty day! I've got a wife, and she's got a baby, SUSPIRIA ENSIS. Mourn no more for our dead, Laid in their rest serene- Ever their fair, true glory Fondly shall fame rehearse-- (Wilt thou forget, O mother! How thy darlings, day by day, For the giver they gave their breath, But a long lament for others, Dying for darker powers! That a people, haughty and brave, And never a dirge be sung! We may look with woe on the dead, And the mother's milk we drew. But alas! how vainly bleeds The breast that is bared for crime! Were it alien steel that clashed, They had guarded each inch of sod But the angry valor dashed On the awful shield of God! (Ah! if for some great good On some giant evil hurled- 'Gainst the might of a banded world!) But now, to the long, long night A stranger and sadder sight Than ever the sun hath seen. 64 For his waning beams illume A vast and a sullen train Going down to the gloom One wretched and drear refrain The only line on their tomb 66 'They died—and they died in vain !" A WAR STUDY. "Sun and rain regardless falling On the just and the unjust." Methinks, all idly and too well We love this Nature-little care (Whate'er her children brave and bear) Were hers, though any grief befell. With gayer sunshine still she seeks To gild our trouble, so 'twould seem; Through all this long, tremendous dream, A tear hath never wet her cheeks. And such a scene I call to mind: The third day's thunder (fort and fleet, And I their beauty praised: but he, POETRY AND INCIDENTS. No despot ever saw such forces, Enough to strike the Old World dumb! Their gathering cry a thunder hum. To foreign tyrants fearful warning, This strife 'twixt Freedom's children stands, Once more united, meet we'd scorning The leagued wrath of king-ruled lands; With Freedom's flag our hosts adorning, Upheld and fenced by Freemen's hands. Urge on the fight! True to ourselves, a brighter morning, Then, brothers, fearful though the toil be, To arms and fight! They despise our Republic, John Bull, And curse the whole "Yankeedom race;" THE VIRGINIA MOTHER. BY EDNA DEAN PROCTOR, My home is drear and still to-night, But my fire burns dim, while athwart the wall Is the sleeping hound on the moonlit floor. Roll back, O weary years! and bring Though fierce and strong the war-whirl's boil be, When every bird was on the wing, True to the end there can no foil be: Written while the fever ran high on recognition by England and France, during the first year of the unnatural war, and inscribed to the English secessionists of to-day. Don't meddle with the Yankees, John Bull, They'll teach you a thing, now, or two;" As you treated the captured Sepoy. The Yankees don't boast, Johnny Bull, They but speak out their mind as it is; Then I pray you don't meddle, John Bull, For "the Yankees are awful when riz!' They had hoped to be friendly, John Bull, At least to have lived that profession; But if meddled with, mark it, John Bull, They'll serve you, as of old, with the "Hessian." We've "a 'ost hov your 'eroes," John Bull, When, in fact, they're a treacherous band: And my blithe summer boys were born! With his laughing eyes and his locks of gold! Our laurels blush when May winds call, Our pines shoot high through mellow showers; My boys grew up from childhood's hours. They climbed the heights or they roamed the plain; O Storm! look up; you ne'er may hear, Their whistle stealing o'er the hill; What drew our hunters from the hills? When Shenandoah roars below. My tears their fond arms round me thrown- But oh! to feel my boys were foes Was more than loss or battle's steel! In every shifting cloud that rose I saw their hostile squadrons wheel; 66 My home is drear and still to-night, Where Shenandoah murmuring flows; But my fire burns dim, while athwart the wall Yet still in dreams my boys I own: They chase the deer o'er dewy hills, And I hear them sing by the evening blaze I cannot part their lives and say, "This was the traitor, this the true;" God only knows why one should stray, And one go pure death's portals through. They have passed from their mother's clasp and care; LOOKOUT MOUNTAIN. BY ALFRED B. STREET. For months that followed the triumph the rebels had boasted they wrought, But which lost to them Chattanooga, thus bringing their triumph to naught; The mountain-walled citadel city, with its outposts in billowy crowds, Grand soarers among the lightnings, stern conquerors of the clouds! For months, I say, had the rebels, with the eyes of their cannon, looked down The rebel to sweep from old Lookout, that cloud-post dizzily high, Whence the taunt of his cannon and banner had affronted so long the sky. Brave Thomas the foeman had brushed from his summit the nearest, and now The balm of the midnight's quiet soothed Nature's agonized brow; A midnight of murkiest darkness, and Lookout's undefined mass Heaved grandly a frown on the welkin, a barricade nothing might pass. Its breast was sprinkled with sparkles, its crest was dotted with gold, Telling the camps of the rebels secure as they deemed in their hold. Where glimmered the creek of the Lookout, it seemed the black dome of the night Had dropped all its stars in the valley, it glittered so over with light: and There were voices and clashings of weapons, There were figures dark edging the watchfires, and And a tone like the murmur of waters all round from the valley upsent. "D'ye see, lad, that black-looking peak?" said a sergeant, scarred over and gray, To a boy, both in glow of a camp-fire, whence wavered their shadows away; Strap tightly your drum, or you'll lose it when climb- Is to take that pricked ear of old Lookout, where Our noble commander has said it, and we all should By dawn we must plant the old flag where the rebels now shame us with theirs ; Hurrah for bold General Hooker, the leader that never knew fear, He's to lead us! now, comrades, be ready and give at the rolls a good cheer! I look for the time at each moment!"-just then the long-rolls swelled about, There were tramplings of steeds and of men, there was jingle and rattle and shout; Dark columns would glimmer and vanish, a rider flit by like a ghost There was movement all over the valley, the movement and din of a host. 'Twas the legion so famed of the White Star, and They crossed the dim creek of the Lookout, and toiled From the high-crested forehead of Lookout, the Mis-Till sion's long sinuous crown; Till Grant, our invincible hero, the winner of every fight! Who joys in the strife, like the eagle that drinks from Marshalled his war-worn legions, and, pointing to them the atoms black crawling and struggling in dense upper darkness were blent. Mists, fitful in rain, came at daydawn, they spread in one mantle the skies, And we that were posted below stood and watched with our hearts in our eyes; We watched as the mists broke and joined, the quick flits and the blanks of the fray; There was thunder, but not of the clouds; there was lightning, but redder in ray; Oh! warm rose our hopes to the White Star, oh! wild went our pleadings to heaven; We knew, and we shuddered to know it, how fierce oft the rebels had striven; We saw, and we shuddered to see it, the rebel flag still in the air; She brings out the black hulk of Lookout, its outlines traced sharp in the skies, All alive with the cans of our braves glancing down with their numberless eyes. Ha! the darkness is roofed like an arbor with streakings of shrapnel and shell Shall our boys be hurled back? God of battles! oh! Till it bring not such bitter despair! But the battle is rolling still up, it has plunged in the mantle o'erhead, We hear the low hum of the volley, we see the fierce bomb-burst of red; Still the rock in the forehead of Lookout through the rents of the windy mist shows The horrible flag of the Cross-bar, the counterfeit rag of our foes: Portentous it looks through the vapor, then melts to the eye, but it tells That the rebels still cling to their stronghold, and hope for the moment dispels. But the roll of the thunder seems louder, flame angrier smites on the eye, The scene from the fog is laid open-a battle-field fought in the sky! Eye to eye, hand to hand, all are struggling-ha! traitors, ha! rebels, ye know Now the might in the arm of our heroes! dare ye bide their roused terrible blow? They drive them, our braves drive the rebels! they flee, and our heroes pursue! We scale rock and trunk-from their breastworks they run! oh! the joy of the view! Hurrah! how they drive them! hurrah! how they drive the fierce rebels along! One more cheer-still another! each lip seems as ready to burst into song. On, on, ye bold blue-coated heroes! thrust, strike, pour your shots in amain! Banners fly, columns rush, seen and lost in the quick, fitful gauzes of rain. O boys! how your young blood is streaming! but falter not, drive them to rout! From barricade, breastwork, and rifle-pit, how the scourged rebels pour out! It is seems like the vestibule lurid that leads to the chambers of hell; cleft with the fierce shooting cannon-flame, sprinkled with red dots of spray; It is havoc's wild carnival revel bequeathed to the night by the day. Dawn breaks, the sky clears-ha! the shape upon Lookout's tall crest that we see, Is the bright beaming flag of the White Star, the beautiful flag of the Free! How it waves its rich folds in the zenith, and looks in the dawn's open eye, With its starred breast of pearl and of crimson, as if with heaven's colors to vie ! Hurrah! rolls from Moccasin Point, and Hurrah! from bold Cameron's Hill! Hurrah! peals from glad Chattanooga! bliss seems every bosom to fill ! Thanks, thanks, O ye heroes of Lookout! O brave Union boys! during time Shall stand this your column of glory, shall shine this your triumph sublime! To the deep mountain den of the panther the hunter climbed, drove him to bay, Then fought the fierce foe till he turned and fled, bleeding and gnashing away! And they will not to-day see the triumph pass by them Shall be told the proud deeds of the White Star, the the foeman to greet! No, no, for the battle is ending; the ranks on the slope of the crest Are the true Union blue, and our banners alone catch the gleams of the west; Though the Cross-bar still flies from the summit, we roll out our cheering of pride! Not in vain, O ye heroes of Lookout! O brave Union boys! have ye died! One brief struggle more sees the banner, that blot on the sky, brushed away, When the broad moon now basking upon us shall yield her rich lustre to-day: cloup-treading host of the free! The camp-fire shall blaze to the chorus, the picket post peal it on high, How was fought the fierce battle of Lookout-how won THE GRAND FIGHT OF THE SKY! THE CHILDREN'S TABLE. M. J. M. SWEAT. While the wise men are all seeking How to save our native land; And the brave men are all fighting, Heart to heart and hand to hand: |