Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War | Page 6

the day
By one grand surge along the line;

The spirit that urged them was divine.
The first works flooded,
naught could stay
The stormers: on! still on!
Bayonets for
Donelson!
Over the ground that morning lost
Rolled the blue billows,
tempest-tossed,
Following a hat on the point of a sword.
Spite shell
and round-shot, grape and canister,
Up they climbed without rail or
banister--
Up the steep hill-sides long and broad,
Driving the rebel
deep within his works.
'Tis nightfall; not an enemy lurks
In sight.
The chafing men
Fret for more fight:
"To-night, to-night let us take the Den"
But
night is treacherous, Grant is wary;
Of brave blood be a little chary.

Patience! the Fort is good as won;
To-morrow, and into Donelson._
LATER AND LAST.
THE FORT IS OURS.

_A flag came out at early morn
Bringing surrender. From their towers

Floats out the banner late their scorn.
In Dover, hut and house are
full
Of rebels dead or dying.
The national flag is flying
From the
crammed court-house pinnacle.
Great boat-loads of our wounded go

To-day to Nashville. The sleet-winds blow;
But all is right: the
fight is won,
The winter-fight for Donelson.
Hurrah!
The spell of old defeat is broke,
The Habit of victory begun;

Grant strikes the war's first sounding stroke
At Donelson.
For lists of killed and wounded, see
The morrow's dispatch: to-day
'tis victory._
The man who read this to the crowd
Shouted as the end he gained;

And though the unflagging tempest rained,
They answered him aloud.

And hand grasped hand, and glances met
In happy triumph; eyes
grew wet.
O, to the punches brewed that night
Went little water.
Windows bright
Beamed rosy on the sleet without,
And from the
deep street came the frequent shout;
While some in prayer, as these in
glee,
Blessed heaven for the winter-victory.
But others were who wakeful laid
In midnight beds, and early rose,

And, feverish in the foggy snows,
Snatched the damp paper--wife and
maid.
The death-list like a river flows
Down the pale sheet,
And
there the whelming waters meet.
Ah God! may Time with happy haste
Bring wail and triumph to a
waste,
And war be done;
The battle flag-staff fall athwart
The
curs'd ravine, and wither; naught
Be left of trench or gun;
The
bastion, let it ebb away,
Washed with the river bed; and Day
In vain
seek Donelson.
The Cumberland.

(March, 1862.)

Some names there are of telling sound,
Whose voweled syllables free

Are pledge that they shall ever live renowned;
Such seem to be
A Frigate's name (by present glory spanned)--
The Cumberland.
Sounding name as ere was sung,
Flowing, rolling on the tongue--
Cumberland! Cumberland!
She warred and sunk. There's no denying
That she was
ended--quelled;
And yet her flag above her fate is flying,
As when it swelled
Unswallowed by the swallowing sea: so grand--
The Cumberland.
Goodly name as ere was sung,
Roundly rolling on the tongue--
Cumberland! Cumberland!
What need to tell how she was fought--
The sinking flaming gun--

The gunner leaping out the port--
Washed back, undone!
Her dead unconquerably manned
The Cumberland.
Noble name as ere was sung,
Slowly roll it on the tongue--
Cumberland! Cumberland!
Long as hearts shall share the flame
Which burned in that brave crew,

Her fame shall live--outlive the victor's name;
For this is due.
Your flag and flag-staff shall in story stand--
Cumberland!
Sounding name as ere was sung,
Long they'll roll it on the tongue--

Cumberland! Cumberland!
In the Turret.
(March, 1862.)
Your honest heart of duty, Worden,
So helped you that in fame you
dwell;
You bore the first iron battle's burden
Sealed as in a
diving-bell.
Alcides, groping into haunted hell
To bring forth King
Admetus' bride,
Braved naught more vaguely direful and untried.

What poet shall uplift his charm,
Bold Sailor, to your height of daring,

And interblend therewith the calm,
And build a goodly style upon
your bearing.
Escaped the gale of outer ocean--
Cribbed in a craft which like a log

Was washed by every billow's motion--
By night you heard of Og

The huge; nor felt your courage clog
At tokens of his onset grim:

You marked the sunk ship's flag-staff slim,
Lit by her burning
sister's heart;
You marked, and mused: