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While the grown-up women labor
For the soldiers night and day;
Would you have us children idle,
Minding nothing but our play?

Little hands we have, but willing;
Little hearts, but loving well
Those who languish sorely wounded,
Those who fill the prisoner's cell;
And we know the names of heroes

Who have fallen on the field
Gleam with never-dying brightness,
Blazoned on our country's shield.

We have toiled with busy fingers

Many days, to gather here
Little treasures that may tempt you
With full purses to draw near.
For they tell us that with money
Many great things may be done;
Never found it nobler uses

Since this big world was begun!

Let the great and glorious impulse Now astir throughout the land, Make us welcome as we greet you, Coming with this new demand. Give us then, O generous people! Ready purchase of our wares, And we'll give you children's blessings Won from heaven by children's prayers! Metropolitan Fair, New-York, April, 1864.

"ONLY A PRIVATE KILLED."

BY H. L. GORDON.

"We've had a fight," a captain said, "Much rebel blood we've spilled; We've put the saucy foe to flight,

Our loss-but a private killed!" "Ah! yes," said a sergeant on the spot, As he drew a long, deep breath, "Poor fellow, he was badly shot,

Then bayoneted to death!"

When again was hushed the martial din,
And back the foe had fled,

They brought the private's body in ;
I went to see the dead.

For I could not think the rebel foe,
Though under curse and ban,
So vaunting of their chivalry,
Could kill a wounded man.

A Minie ball had broke his thigh,
A frightful, crushing wound,

And then with savage bayonets

They pinned him to the ground. One stab was through the abdomen, Another through the head;

The last was through his pulseless breast, Done after he was dead.

His hair was matted with his gore,

His hands were clenched with might, As though he still his musket bore

So firmly in the fight:

He had grasped the foeman's bayonet,
His bosom to defend.

They raised the coat-cape from his face-
My God! it was my friend!

Think what a shudder thrilled my heart!
'Twas but the day before
We laughed together merrily,

As we talked of days of yore.
"How happy we shall be," he said,
"When the war is o'er, and when,
The rebels all subdued or fled,
We all go home again."

Ah! little he thought, that soldier brave,
So near his journey's goal,

That God had sent a messenger

To claim his Christian soul.

But he fell like a hero, fighting,

And hearts with grief are filled,

And honor is his, though our chief shall say: "Only a private killed!"

I knew him well, he was my friend;
He loved our land and laws;
And he fell a blessed martyr

To our country's holy cause.

And, soldiers, the time will come, perhaps,
When our blood will thus be spilled,
And then of us our chief will say:
"Only a private killed!"

But we fight our country's battles,
And our hopes are not forlorn,
And our death shall be a blessing
To millions yet unborn.

To our children and their children!
Then as each grave is filled,
What care we if our chief shall say:
Only a private killed!"

BATTLE-WORN BANNERS.

(January 26, 1864.)

BY PARK BENJAMIN.

I saw the soldiers come to-day
From battle fields afar;

No conqueror rode before their way
On his triumphal car;

But captains, like themselves, on foot,
And banners sadly torn,

All grandly eloquent though mute,
In pride and glory borne.

Those banners soiled with dust and smoke,

And rent by shot and shell,

That through the serried phalanx broke, What terrors could they tell!

What tales of sudden pain and death

In every cannon's boom,

When even the bravest held his breath
And waited for his doom.

By hands of steel those flags were waved
Above the carnage dire,

Almost destroyed yet always saved,
'Mid battle-clouds and fire.

Though down at times, still up they rose
And kissed the breeze again,
Dread tokens to the rebel foes
Of true and loyal men.

And here the true and loval still
Those famous banners bear;
The bugles wind, the fifes blow shrill,
And clash the cymbals where,

POETRY AND INCIDENTS.

With decimated ranks, they come,

And through the crowded street
March to the beating of the drum
With firm though weary feet.

God bless the soldiers! cry the folk,
Whose cheers of welcome swell;

God bless the banners, black with smoke,
And torn by shot and shell!
They should be hung on sacred shrines,
Baptized with grateful tears,
And live embalmed in poets' lines
Through all succeeding years.

No grander trophies could be brought
By patriot sire to son,

Of glorious battles nobly fought,
Brave deeds sublimely done.

And so, to-day, I chanced with pride
And solemn joy to see

Those remnants from the bloody tide
Of victory!

OUR HERO-DEAD.

BY CHARLES BOYNTON HOWELL.
From their labors nobly done,
From their battles bravely won,
'Neath the earth's cold sod they lie
Resting calmly, silently.
Sleep their sacred patriot forms,
Where war's tempests and alarms
Cannot reach them-cannot smite
Them to earth in camp or fight..

Some passed from the realms of life
In the battle's sanguine strife,
Smitten down, in carnage, low
By the hand of dastard foe;
Who would pluck the beaming stars
From our flag, invoking Mars
To look on their deeds of blood
With the mien of gratitude.

Mourners, in whose every heart
There has entered sorrow's dart,
Sorrow for the loved ones gone
To the confines of the tomb-
Seek the graves of warriors slain
On the battle's gory plain,
Or sent to the realms of death
By disease's fatal breath.

Sacrificing self they fought
That the land, with treason fraught,
Might rise, phoenix-like, again
From her agonizing pain;

That the traitorous hordes that aim
At their country's name and fame,
Might be conquered in the fray,
And insure us triumph's day.

Alexander, brave and bold,
In the chivalrous days of old,
Did not nobler deeds perform
In the stirring battle-storm,
On Europa's bloody soil,
Than our hardy sons of toil,
Have, when so intrepidly
Battling for our liberty.

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'Twas a Minie ball that struck him; it entered at the side,

And they did not think it fatal till the morning that he died.

So when he found that he must go, he called me to his bed,

And said: "You'll not forget to write when you hear that I am dead?

And you'll tell them how I loved them and bid them all good-by?

Say I tried to do the best I could, and did not fear to die;

And underneath my pillow there's a curl of golden

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I send you back his hymn-book, and the cap he used

to wear,

And a lock, I cut the night before, of his bright, curling hair.

I send you back his Bible. The night before he died, We turned its leaves together, as I read it by his side. I've kept the belt he always wore; he told me so to do: It has a hole upon the side-'tis where the ball went through.

So now I've done his bidding; there's nothing more to tell;

But I shall always mourn with you the boy we loved so well. -Evangelist.

STRIKE!

BY EDWARD S. ELLIS.

From New-England's granite mountains,
From the North's resounding woods,
From the far West's flashing fountains,
Pour the living human floods.

Onward sweeps the arouséd nation,
From the lakes and streams and sea;
Onward for their home's salvation,
And the fight for liberty.

Deeds, not words, make men immortal
In this grand, heroic age;
He who wills can ope the portal
To a name on history's page.

Know ye not that revolutions

Are the throes of struggling Right? In these national ablutions

It must triumph over Might.

What though but a child in learning,

When the war-note onward rolls, While our country's fate is turning,

'Tis not heads we need-but souls.

Some must make their names historic,
Who, the future soon will tell ;
Some must perform deeds heroic
And the roll of glory swell.

Strike then for the truth eternal;

Strike then, for the cause is just; Strike then at the wrong infernal, Till it bites again the dust.

THE BATTLE.

Give them a shell boys! give them a shell!

They are coming over the hill; You can see their widening columns swell; You can hear their bugles trill. Give them a shell, boys! Aim her straight! Ready! Pull lanyard! Off she goes! Hear her skurry and scream in hate.

Pouff! She's done for a dozen foes!

Give them grape, boys! give them grape!
They are coming a little too near.
Each dusky bulk is gaining a shape,

And their tramp is loud and clear.

Give them grape, boys! Steady! Fire!
Now, boys, go to work with a will!
Sight that gun a little bit higher.
Right!-a gap that twenty can fill !

Give them lead, boys! give them lead!

Up with the infantry! Load, boys, load!
Where's Joe Lane? Poor fellow ! he's dead;
Many of us must travel his road!
Give them lead, boys! On they come,

With columns massed in a fierce attack.
Think of your dear ones safe at home!

Stand by your guns, boys! Drive them back!

Give them steel, boys! give them steel!

They fight like devils! At them again! Their charge is broken! they pause, they reel! After them, boys, with might and main ! Give them steel, boys! See how they run! I'm hit-just here--but never mind me. Lay me down by the side of that gun,

And after the rest with a three times three!

Give them a cheer, boys! give them a cheer!
Let them know we have won the fight!
I'm dying now; you can bury me here.

Dig deep, boys, and do it to-night.
There's one at home-you can give her my sword,
(You know whom I mean,) and say that I
Have always been true to my plighted word-
For my country and her I am glad to die.

"FORWARD, MARCH."

BY MRS. C. J. MOORE.

A. A. A.

On Newbern's bloody battle-ground,
Bold as a crusade knight,
Our young Lieutenant led us on,
All eager for the fight.

"Forward, my men, my comrades brave !"
His voice rang loud and clear;
And charging with our bayonets,
We followed in the rear.

And, ever foremost, on he pressed;
Our ranks held firm and true,
Though volley after volley poured

And thinned us through and through.

Well done, my boys, the day is ours! Like veterans you've fought!" Another crash of musketry;

The day was dearly bought:

For there, upon the accursed soil,
Our young Lieutenant lay;
Too brave for even one low moan,
His life-blood ebbed away.

Loud rang his voice, as clarion clear As when he onward led; "Forward, my boys, the day is ours!" Then fell back with the dead.

And "forward!" is our battle-cry, Which through the land shall ring, Until the Union is restored,

And Liberty is king!

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