  By S. TEACKLE WALLIS. A Awake! and to horse my brothers, For the dawn is glimmering gray, And hark! in the crackling brushwood, There are feet that tread this way.“Who cometh?” “A friend.” “What tidings?“ “O God! I sicken to tell, For the earth seems earth no longer, And its sights are the sights of hell. “There’s rapine and fire and slaughter, From the mountain down to the shore, There’s blood on the trampled harvest, And blood on the homestead floor. “From the far-off conquered cities, Comes the voice of a stifled wail, And the shrieks and moans of the homeless Ring like the dirge of a gale. “I have seen from the smoking village, Our mothers and daughters fly, I’ve seen where the little children, Sank down in the furrows to die. “On the banks of the battle-stained river, I stood as the moonlight shone, And it glared on the face of my brother, As the sad wave swept him on. “Where my home was glad, are ashes, And horror and shame had been there, For I found on the fallen lintel, This tress of my wife’s torn hair. “They are turning the slave upon us, And with more than the fiend’s worst art. Have uncovered the fires of the savage, That slept in his untaught heart. “The ties to our hearts that bound him, They have rent with curses away, And madden him in their madness To be almost as brutal as they. “With halter and torch and Bible, And hymns to the sound of the drum, They preach the gospel of murder, And pray for lust’s kingdom to come. “To saddle! my brothers! to saddle! Look up to the rising sun, And ask of the God who shines there, Whether deeds like these shall be done. “Whither the vandal cometh, Press home to his heart with your steel, And where’er at his bosom ye cannot, Like the serpent, go strike at his heel. “Through thicket and wood go hunt him, Creep up to his camp-fire side, And let ten of his corpses blacken, Where one of our brothers hath died. “In his fainting footsore marches, In his flight from the stricken fray, In the snare of the lonely ambush, The debts that we owe him, pay. “In God’s hands alone is vengeance, But he strikes with the hands of men, And his blight would wither our manhood, If we smote not the smiter again. “By the graves where our fathers slumber, By the shrines where our mothers prayed, By our homes and hopes of freedom, Let every man swear by his blade.— “That he will not sheathe nor stay it, Till from point to hilt it glow, With the flush of Almighty justice, In the blood of the cruel foe.” They swore; and the answering sunlight Leapt from their lifted swords, And the hate in their hearts made echo, To the wrath of their burning words. [Southern.] Banner Banner
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