Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War Part 6

Our rival Roses warred for Sway-- For Sway, but named the name of Right; And Pa.s.sion, scorning pain and death, Lent sacred fervor to the fight.

Each lifted up a broidered cross, While crossing blades profaned the sign; Monks blessed the fraticidal lance, And sisters scarfs could twine.

Do North and South the sin retain Of Yorkist and Lancastrian?

But Rosecrans in the cedarn glade, And, deep in denser cypress gloom, Dark Breckenridge, shall fade away Or thinly loom.

The pale throngs who in forest cowed Before the spell of battle's pause, Forefelt the stillness that shall dwell On them and on their wars.

North and South shall join the train Of Yorkist and Lancastrian.

But where the sword has plunged so deep, And then been turned within the wound By deadly Hate; where Climes contend On vasty ground-- No warning Alps or seas between, And small the curb of creed or law, And blood is quick, and quick the brain; Shall North and South their rage deplore, And reunited thrive amain Like Yorkist and Lancastrian?

Running the Batteries, As observed from the Anchorage above Vicksburgh.

(April, 1863.)

A moonless night--a friendly one; A haze dimmed the shadowy sh.o.r.e As the first lampless boat slid silent on; Hist! and we spake no more; We but pointed, and stilly, to what we saw.

We felt the dew, and seemed to feel The secret like a burden laid.

The first boat melts; and a second keel Is blent with the foliaged shade-- Their midnight rounds have the rebel officers made?

Unspied as yet. A third--a fourth-- Gun-boat and transport in Indian file Upon the war-path, smooth from the North; But the watch may they hope to beguile?

The manned river-batteries stretch for mile on mile.

A flame leaps out; they are seen; Another and another gun roars; We tell the course of the boats through the screen By each further fort that pours, And we guess how they jump from their beds on those shrouded sh.o.r.es.

Converging fires. We speak, though low: "That blastful furnace can they thread"

"Why, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego Came out all right, we read; The Lord, be sure, he helps his people, Ned."

How we strain our gaze. On bluffs they shun A golden growing flame appears-- Confirms to a silvery steadfast one: "The town is afire!" crows Hugh: "three cheers"

Lot stops his mouth: "Nay, lad, better three tears."

A purposed light; it shows our fleet; Yet a little late in its searching ray, So far and strong, that in phantom cheat Lank on the deck our shadows lay; The s.h.i.+ning flag-s.h.i.+p stings their guns to furious play.

How dread to mark her near the glare And glade of death the beacon throws Athwart the racing waters there; One by one each plainer grows, Then speeds a blazoned target to our gladdened foes.

The impartial cresset lights as well The fixed forts to the boats that run; And, plunged from the ports, their answers swell Back to each fortress dun: Ponderous words speaks every monster gun.

Fearless they flash through gates of flame, The salamanders hard to hit, Though vivid shows each bulky frame; And never the batteries intermit, Nor the boats huge guns; they fire and flit.

Anon a lull. The beacon dies: "Are they out of that strait accurst"

But other flames now dawning rise, Not mellowly brilliant like the first, But rolled in smoke, whose whitish volumes burst.

A baleful brand, a hurrying torch Whereby anew the boats are seen-- A burning transport all alurch!

Breathless we gaze; yet still we glean Glimpses of beauty as we eager lean.

The effulgence takes an amber glow Which bathes the hill-side villas far; Affrighted ladies mark the show Painting the pale magnolia-- The fair, false, Circe light of cruel War.

The barge drifts doomed, a plague-struck one.

Sh.o.r.eward in yawls the sailors fly.

But the gauntlet now is nearly run, The spleenful forts by fits reply, And the burning boat dies down in morning's sky.

All out of range. Adieu, Messieurs!

Jeers, as it speeds, our parting gun.

So burst we through their barriers And menaces every one: So Porter proves himself a brave man's son.[7]

Stonewall Jackson.

Mortally wounded at Chancellorsville.

(May, 1863.)

The Man who fiercest charged in fight, Whose sword and prayer were long-- Stonewall!

Even him who stoutly stood for Wrong, How can we praise? Yet coming days Shall not forget him with this song.

Dead is the Man whose Cause is dead, Vainly he died and set his seal-- Stonewall!

Earnest in error, as we feel; True to the thing he deemed was due, True as John Brown or steel.

Relentlessly he routed us; But _we_ relent, for he is low-- Stonewall!

Justly his fame we outlaw; so We drop a tear on the bold Virginian's bier, Because no wreath we owe.

Stonewall Jackson.

(Ascribed to a Virginian.)

One man we claim of wrought renown Which not the North shall care to slur; A Modern lived who sleeps in death, Calm as the marble Ancients are: 'Tis he whose life, though a vapor's wreath, Was charged with the lightning's burning breath-- Stonewall, stormer of the war.

But who shall hymn the roman heart?

A stoic he, but even more: The iron will and lion thew Were strong to inflict as to endure: Who like him could stand, or pursue?

His fate the fatalist followed through; In all his great soul found to do Stonewall followed his star.

He followed his star on the Romney march Through the sleet to the wintry war; And he followed it on when he bowed the grain-- The Wind of the Shenandoah; At Gaines's Mill in the giant's strain-- On the fierce forced stride to Mana.s.sas-plain, Where his sword with thunder was clothed again, Stonewall followed his star.

His star he followed athwart the flood To Potomac's Northern sh.o.r.e, When midway wading, his host of braves "_My Maryland!_" loud did roar-- To red Antietam's field of graves, Through mountain-pa.s.ses, woods and waves, They followed their paG.o.d with hymns and glaives, For Stonewall followed a star.

Back it led him to Marye's slope, Where the shock and the fame he bore; And to green Moss-Neck it guided him-- Brief respite from throes of war: To the laurel glade by the Wilderness grim, Through climaxed victory naught shall dim, Even unto death it piloted him-- Stonewall followed his star.

Its lead he followed in gentle ways Which never the valiant mar; A cap we sent him, bestarred, to replace The sun-scorched helm of war: A fillet he made of the s.h.i.+ning lace Childhood's laughing brow to grace-- Not his was a goldsmith's star.

O, much of doubt in after days Shall cling, as now, to the war; Of the right and the wrong they'll still debate, Puzzled by Stonewall's star: "Fortune went with the North elate"

"Ay, but the south had Stonewall's weight, And he fell in the South's vain war."

Gettysburg.

The Check.

(July, 1863.)