HAVE you heard the story that gossips tell Of Burns of Gettysburg? No? Ah, well! Brief is the glory that hero earns, Briefer the story of poor John Burns: He was the fellow who won renown,— The only man who didn't back down
When the rebels rode through his native town,
But held his own in the fight next day,
When all his townsfolk ran away.
That was in July, sixty-three, The very day that General Lee, Flower of Southern chivalry,
Baffled and beaten, backward reeled From a stubborn Meade, and a barren field. I might tell how, but the day before, John Burns stood at his cottage door, Looking down the village street, Where, in the shade of his peaceful vine, He heard the low of his gathered kine, And felt their breath with incense sweet; Or I might say, when the sunset burned The old farm gable, he thought it turned The milk, that fell in a babbling flood Into the milk-pail, red as blood! Or how he fancied the hum of bees Were bullets buzzing among the trees. But all such fanciful thoughts as these Were strange to a practical man like Burns, Who minded only his own concerns, Troubled no more by fancies fine Than one of his calm-eyed, long-tailed kine,- Quite old-fashioned and matter-of-fact, Slow to argue, but quick to act. That was the reason, as some folk say, He fought so well on that terrible day.
And it was terrible. On the right Raged for hours the heady fight, Thundered the battery's double bass,- Difficult music for men to face; While on the left-where now the graves Undulate like the living waves That all that day unceasing swept Up to the pits the rebels kept- Round shot ploughed the upland glades, Sown with bullets, reaped with blades; Shattered fences here and there Tossed their splinters in the air; The very trees were stripped and bare: The barns that once held yellow grain Were heaped with harvests of the slain; The cattle bellowed on the plain,
The turkeys screamed with might and main, And brooding barn-fowl left their rest With strange shells bursting in each nest. Just where the tide of battle turns, Erect and lonely stood old John Burns.
How do you think the man was dressed? He wore an ancient long buff vest, Yellow as saffron,-but his best; And buttoned over his manly breast Was a bright blue coat, with a rolling collar, And large gilt buttons,-size of a dollar,- With tails that the country-folk called 'swaller.' He wore a broad-brimmed, bell-crowned hat, White as the locks on which it sat. Never had such a sight been seen For forty years on the village green, Since old John Burns was a country beau, And went to the 'quiltings' long ago.
Close at his elbows all that day, Veterans of the Peninsula,
Sunburnt and bearded, charged away; And striplings, downy of lip and chin,- Clerks that the Home Guard mustered in,- Glanced, as they passed, at the hat he wore, Then at the rifle his right hand bore; And hailed him, from out their youthful lore, With scraps of a slangy repertoire: 'How are you, White Hat!' 'Put her through!' 'Your head's level,' and 'Bully for you!' Called him 'Daddy.'-begged he'd disclose The name of the tailor who made his clothes, And what was the value he set on those; While Burns, unmindful of jeer and scoff, Stood there picking the rebels off,- With his long brown rifle, and bell-crown hat, And the swallow-tails they were laughing at.
'Twas but a moment, for that respect Which clothes all courage their voices checked; And something the wildest could understand Spake in the old man's strong right hand; And his corded throat, and the lurking frown Of his eyebrows under his old bell-crown; Until, as they gazed, there crept an awe Through the ranks in whispers, and some
In the antique vestments and long white hair, The Past of the Nation in battle there; And some of the soldiers since declare That the gleam of his old white hat afar, Like the crested plume of the brave Navarre, That day was their oriflamme of war.
So raged the battle. You know the rest: How the rebels, beaten, and backward pressed, Broke at the final charge, and ran. At which John Burns-a practical man— Shouldered his rifle, unbent his brows, And then went back to his bees and cows.
That is the story of old John Burns; This the moral the reader learns:
In fighting the battle, the question's whether 110 You'll show a hat that's white, or a feather!
PASSAGE OF THE RED SEA FROM 'PALESTINE.'
Lo, these are they whom, lords of Afric's fates, Old Thebes hath poured through all her hundred gates,
Mother of armies! How the emeralds glowed, Where, flushed with power and vengeance, Pharaoh rode!
And stoled in white, those brazen wheels before, Osiris' ark his swarthy wizards bore; And still responsive to the trumpet's cry, The priestly sistrum murmured-Victory! Why swell these shouts that rend the desert's gloom?
Whom come ye forth to combat?-warriors, whom?
These flocks and herds-this faint and weary train
Red from the scourge, and recent from the chain?
God of the poor, the poor and friendless save! Giver and Lord of freedom, help the slave! North, south, and west, the sandy whirlwinds fly,
The circling horns of Egypt's chivalry. On earth's last margin throng the weeping train; Their cloudy guide moves on:-' And must we swim the main?'
He comes their leader comes!-the man of God
O'er the wide waters lifts his mighty rod, And onward treads. The circling waves retreat, In hoarse deep murmurs, from his holy feet; And the chased surges, inly roaring, show The hard wet sand and coral hills below.
With limbs that falter, and with hearts that swell,
Down, down they pass-a steep and slippery dell;
Around them rise, in pristine chaos hurled, The ancient rocks, the secrets of the world; And flowers that blush beneath the ocean green, And caves, the sea-calves' low-roofed haunt,
Down, safely down the narrow pass they tread; The beetling waters storm above their head; While far behind retires the sinking day, And fades on Edom's hills its latest ray.
Yet not from Israel fled the friendly light, Or dark to them or cheerless came the night. Still in their van, along that dreadful road, Blazed broad and fierce the brandished torch of God.
[Casabianca, a boy of thirteen, son of the Admiral of the Orient, died at his post, in the battle of the Nile, 1798, after the ship had taken fire.]
THE boy stood on the burning deck Whence all but he had fled; The flame that lit the battle's wreck Shone round him o'er the dead.
The flames rolled on. He would not go Without his father's word: That father, faint in death below, His voice no longer heard.
He called aloud: 'Say, father, say, If yet my task is done!' He knew not that the chieftain lay Unconscious of his son.
'Speak, father!' once again he cried,
If I may yet be gone!
And'-but the booming shots replied, And fast the flames rolled on.
Upon his brow he felt their breath, And in his waving hair,
And looked from that lone post of death In still, yet brave despair;
And shouted but once more aloud,
'My father, must I stay?'
While o'er him fast, through sail and shroud, The wreathing fires made way.
They wrapt the ship in splendour wild, They caught the flag on high, And streamed above the gallant child Like banners in the sky.
Then came a burst of thunder-sound- The boy-oh, where was he? Ask of the winds that far around With fragments strewed the sea !— With mast and helm, and pennon fair That well had borne their part: But the noblest thing that perished there Was that young faithful heart!
THE DEACON'S MASTERPIECE; or THE WONDERFUL ONE HOSS SHAY
HAVE you heard of the wonderful one-hoss
That was built in such a logical way It ran a hundred years to a day,
And then, of a sudden, it-ah! but stay; I'll tell you what happened without delay, Scaring the parson into fits,
Frightening people out of their wits,- Have you ever heard of that, I say?
Seventeen hundred and fifty-five! Georgius Secundus was then alive,- Snuffy old drone from the German hive. That was the year when Lisbon-town Saw the earth open and gulp her down, And Braddock's army was done so brown, Left without a scalp to its crown. It was on the terrible Earthquake-day That the Deacon finished the one-hoss shay.
Now in building of chaises, I tell you what, There is always somewhere a weakest spot, In hub, tire, felloe, in spring, or thill, In panel, or crossbar, or floor, or sill, In screw, bolt, thoroughbrace,-lurking still: Find it somewhere you must and will,- Above or below, or within or without,- And that's the reason, beyond a doubt, A chaise breaks down, but doesn't wear out.
[But the Deacon swore (as deacons do, With an 'I dew vum,' or an 'I tell yeou'), He would build one shay to beat the taown 'n' the keounty 'n' all the kentry raoun'; It should be so built that it couldn' break daown:
-Fur-said the Deacon-"t's mighty plain Thut the weakes' place mus' stan' the strain; 'n' the way t' fix it, uz I maintain,
T' make that place uz strong uz the rest.'] So the Deacon inquired of the village folk Where he could find the strongest oak, That couldn't be split nor bent nor broke,- That was for spokes and floor and sills; He sent for lancewood to make the thills; The crossbars were ash, from the straightest trees;
The panels of white-wood, that cuts like cheese,
But lasts like iron for things like these; The hubs of logs from the Settlers' ellum'— Last of its timber, they couldn't sell 'em,-
Never an axe had seen their chips,
And the wedges flew from between their lips, Their blunt ends frizzled like celery-tips;
Step and prop-iron, bolt and screw, Spring, tire, axle, and linchpin too, Steel of the finest, bright and blue;
Thoroughbrace bison-skin, thick and wide; Boot, top, dasher, from tough old hide Found in the pit when the tanner died. That was the way he put her through.
'There!' said the Deacon-naow she'll dew!'
Do! I tell you, I rather guess
She was a wonder, and nothing less! Colts grew horses, beasts turned grey, Deacon and deaconess dropped away, Children and grandchildren-where were they? But there stood the stout old one-hoss shay As fresh as on Lisbon-earthquake-day!
EIGHTEEN HUNDRED,-it came and found The Deacon's masterpiece strong and sound; Eighteen hundred increased by ten,- 'Hahnsum kerridge' they called it then; Eighteen hundred and twenty came,— Running as usual, much the same; Thirty and forty at last arrive; And then come fifty, and FIFTY-FIVE.
[Little of all we value here Wakes on the morn of its hundredth year Without both feeling and looking queer. In fact, there's nothing that keeps its youth, So far as I know, but a tree and truth. (This is a moral that runs at large; Take it! You're welcome. No extra charge.)]
FIRST OF NOVEMBER, the Earthquake-day,- There are traces of age in the one-hoss shay, A general flavour of mild decay. But nothing local, as one may say. There couldn't be,-for the Deacon's art Had made it so like in every part
That there wasn't a chance for one to start. For the wheels were just as strong as the thills,
And the floor was just as strong as the sills, And the panels just as strong as the floor, And the whippletree neither less nor more, And the back-crossbar as strong as the fore, And spring and axle and hub encore. And yet, as a whole, it is past a doubt In another hour it will be worn out!
And the parson was sitting upon a rock, At half-past nine by the meet'n'-house clock,- Just the hour of the Earthquake shock! -What do you think the parson found, When he got up and stared around? The poor old chaise in a heap or mound, As if it had been to the mill and ground! You see, of course, if you're not a dunce, How it went to pieces all at once,- All at once, and nothing first,- Just as bubbles do when they burst.
End of the wonderful one-hoss shay. Logic is logic. That's all I say.
See also ROBERT HERRICK (1591-1674)
WITH fingers weary and worn, With eyelids heavy and red, A woman sat, in unwomanly rags, Plying her needle and thread- Stitch! stitch! stitch!
In poverty, hunger, and dirt,
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch She sang the 'Song of the Shirt.'
While the cock is crowing aloof!
And work-work-work,
Till the stars shine through the roof! It's O, to be a slave
Along with the barbarous Turk, Where woman has never a soul to save, If this is Christian work!
'Work-work-work,
Till the brain begins to swim; Work-work-work, Till the eyes are heavy and dim! Seam, and gusset, and band,
Band, and gusset, and seam, Till over the buttons I fall asleep, And sew them on in a dream!
'O, Men, with Sisters dear!
O, Men, with Mothers and Wives! It is not linen you're wearing out, But human creatures' lives! Stitch-stitch-stitch,
In poverty, hunger, and dirt, Sewing at once, with a double thread, A Shroud as well as a Shirt.
'But why do I talk of Death? That Phantom of grisly bone,
I hardly fear his terrible shape, It seems so like my own— It seems so like my own, Because of the fasts I keep;
O God! that bread should be so dear, And flesh and blood so cheap!
'Work-work-work!
My labour never flags;
And what are its wages? A bed of straw, A crust of bread-and rags.
That shattered roof, and this naked floor--- A table-a broken chair-
And a wall so blank, my shadow I thank For sometimes falling there!
'Work-work-work! From weary chime to chime. Work-work-work-
As prisoners work for crime!
Band, and gusset, and seam, Seam, and gusset, and band,
Till the heart is sick, and the brain benumbed, As well as the weary hand.
'Work-work-work,
In the dull December light,
And work-work-work,
When the weather is warm and bright-While underneath the eaves
The brooding swallows cling
As if to show me their sunny backs And twit me with the spring.
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