HE muffled drum's sad roll has beat No more on life's parade shall meet On Fame's eternal camping-ground And glory guards, with solemn round, No rumor of the foe's advance Now swells upon the wind: No troubled thought at midnight haunts The warrior's dream alarms, No braying horn or screaming fife Their shivered swords are red with rust, Their pluméd heads are bowed, Their haughty banner, trailed in dust, Is now their martial shroud, - And plenteous funeral tears have washed The red stains from each brow, And the proud forms, by battle gashed, Are free from anguish now. The neighing troop, the flashing blade, The charge, the dreadful cannonade, Like the fierce Northern hurricane Who heard the thunder of the fray Knew well the watchword of that day Was victory or death. Full many a norther's breath has swept And long the pitying sky has wept Above its mouldered slain. The raven's scream or eagle's flight, Alone now wake each solemn height That frowned o'er that dread fray. Sons of the Dark and Bloody Ground, Where stranger steps and tongues resound Your own proud land's heroic soil Shall be your fitter grave : She claims from war its richest spoil, The ashes of her brave. Thus, 'neath their parent turf they rest, Far from the gory field, Borne to a Spartan mother's breast On many a bloody shield. The sunshine of their native sky Smiles sadly on them here, And kindred eyes and hearts watch by Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead! While Fame her record keeps, Yon marble minstrel's voiceless stone In deathless song shall tell, When many a vanished year The story how ye fell; hath flown, Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter's blight, Nor Time's remorseless doom, Can dim one ray of holy light That gilds your glorious tomb. HEEL me into the sunshine, Wheel me into the shadow; There must be leaves on the woodbine, Is the king-cup crowned in the meadow ? Wheel me down to the meadow, Down to the little river; In sun or in shadow I shall not dazzle or shiver, Stay wherever you will, By the mount or under the hill, |