The battle roar is ended and the twilight falls

again,

The bugles have blown, the hosts have flown save

they in the dusky grain.

And lo! the shaking barley tells where the wounded

writhe and roll;

With a panting breath at the pass of death the body

fights for the soul.

Some rise to retreat and they die on their feet in

this terrible fight for the soul.

And horses urged by the spur of Death are galloping

over the grain;

Their hoofs are red, their riders are dead, and

loose are the stirrup and rein.

A ghost in the saddle is riding them down, the

spurs of Pain at his heels;

They are cut to the bone, they rush and they groan,

as a wake in the barley reels:

And faces rise with haggard eyes where the wake

in the barley reels.

The blue and the gray lie face to face and their

fingers harrow the loam,

There's a sob and a prayer in the smoky air as

their winged thoughts fly home.

The Devil of war has dimmed the sky with the

breath of his iron lungs,

And he gluts his ear on the note of fear in the cry

of the fevered tongues;

Like the toll of a bell at the gate of hell is the wail

of the fevered tongues.

One rising, walked from the bullet shock, seems to

reel 'neath the weight of his head,

He feels for his gun and starts to run and falls in a

hollow—dead.

The wagons are coming and over each the light of

a lantern swings,

And a holy thought to the soul is brought, as the

voice of a driver sings;

And the cry of pain in the trampled grain is hushed

as the driver sings:

My country, 'tis of thee,

Sweet land of liberty,

Of thee I sing.