Left in that dreadful hour alone: Perchance her reason stoops or reels;
Perchance a courage, not her own, Braces her mind to desperate tone. The scattered van of England wheels; She only said, as loud in air
The tumult roared, "Is Wilton there?" They fly! or maddened by despair Fight but to die-"Is Wilton there?" With that, straight up the hill there rode Two horsemen drenched with gore, And in their arms, a helpless load,
A wounded knight they bore.
His hand still strained the broken brand; His arms were smeared with blood and sand.
Dragged from among the horses' feet, With dinted shield, and helmet beat, The falcon crest and plumage gone, Can that be haughty Marmion! Young Blount his armor did unlace, And, gazing on his ghastly face,
Said "By St. George, he's gone! That spear-wound has our master sped- And see the deep cut on his head! Good-night to Marmion."
"Unnurtured Blount! thy brawling cease: He opes his eyes," said Eustace, "peace!"
When, doffed his casque, he felt free air, Around 'gan Marmion wildly stare: "Where's Harry Blount? Fitz-Eustace where? Linger ye here, ye hearts of hare! Redeem my pennon-charge again! Cry-'Marmion to the rescue!'-vain! Last of my race, on battle plain That shout shall ne'er be heard again! Yet my last thought is England's: Fly! To Dacre bear my signet-ring: Tell him his squadrons up to bring: Fitz-Eustace, to Lord Surrey hie; Tunstall lies dead upon the field, His life-blood stains the spotless shield: Edmund is down; my life is reft; The Admiral alone is left,
Let Stanley charge with spur of fire- With Chester charge, and Lancashire, Full upon Scotland's central host, Or victory and England's lost. Must I bid twice? hence, varlets! fly! Leave Marmion here alone-to die." They parted, and alone he lay:
Clare drew her from the sight away,
Till pain wrung forth a lowly moan, And half he murmured,-"Is there none Of all my halls have nurst,
Page, squire, or groom, one cup to bring, Of blessed water from the spring,
To slake my dying thirst?"
O woman! in our hours of ease, Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, And variable as the shade
By the light quivering aspen made; When pain and anguish wring the brow, A ministering angel thou!
Scarce were the pitying accents said, When, with the Baron's casque, the maid To the nigh streamlet ran; Forgot were hatred, wrongs, and fears: The plaintive voice alone she hears, Sees but the dying man.
She stooped her by the runnel's side, But in abhorrence backward drew; For, oozing from the mountain's side, Where waged the war, a dark-red tide Was curdling in the streamlet blue. Where shall she turn! behold her mark A little fountain cell,
Where water, clear as diamond spark, In a stone basin fell. Above, some half-worn letters say, "Drink, weary pilgrim, drink and pray For the kind soul of Sybil Grey, Who built this cross and well." She filled the helm, and back she hied, And with surprise and joy espied
A monk supporting Marmion's head; A pious man whom duty brought To dubious verge of battle fought, To shrive the dying, bless the dead.
Deep drank Lord Marmion of the wave, And, as she stooped his brow to lave- "Is it the hand of Clare," he said, "Or injured Constance, bathes my head?" Then, as remembrance rose- "Speak not to me of shrift or prayer!
I must redress her woes.
Short space, few words are mine to spare; Forgive and listen, gentle Clare!"
"Alas!" she said, "the whileO, think of your immortal weal! In vain for Constance is your zeal;
She died at Holy Isle."
Lord Marmion started from the ground,
As light as if he felt no wouud; Though in the action burst the tide In torrents from his wounded side. "Then it was truth!" he said "I knew That the dark presage must be true. I would the fiend, to whom belongs The vengeance due to all her wrongs, Would spare me but a day! For wasting fire, and dying groan, And priests slain on the altar stone, Might bribe him for delay
It may not be?---this dizzy trance- Curse on yon base marauder's lance, And doubly cursed my failing brand! A sinful heart makes feeble hand." Then, fainting, down on earth he sunk, Supported by the trembling monk.
With fruitless labor, Clare bound,
And strove to stanch the gushing wound: The monk, with unavailing cares, Exhausted all the Church's prayers. Ever, he said, that close and near, A lady's voice was in his ear,
And that the priest he could not hear,
"In the lost battle, borne down by the flying, Where mingles war's rattle with groans of the dying!"
"Avaunt thee, fiend!-with cruel hand, Shake not the dying sinner's sand!
O, look, my son, upon yon sign Of the Redeemer's grace divine:
O, think on faith and bliss: By many a death-bed I have been, And many a sinner's parting seen, But never aught like this."
The war that for a space did fail, Now trebly thundering swelled the gale, And STANLEY! was the cry:
A light on Marmion's visage spread, And fired his glazing eye: With dying hand above his head He took the fragment of his blade,
And shouted "Victory!
Charge, Chester, charge! On, Stanley, on!" Were the last words of Marmion.
Far away the Russian eagles
Soar o'er smoking hill and dell, And their hordes, like howling beagles, Dense and countless, round them yell! Thundering cannon, deadly mortar, Sweep the field in every quarter ! Never, since the days of Jesus, Trembled so the Chersonesus !
Here behold the Gallic Lilies- Stout St. Louis' golden Lilies- Float as erst at old Ramillies! And beside them, lo! the Lion! With her trophied cross, is flying! Glorious standards! shall they waver On the field of Balaklava?
No, by heavens at that command- Sudden, rash, but stern command- Charges Lucan's little band!
Brave six hundred! lo! they charge, On the battle's bloody marge !
Down yon deep and skirted valley,
Where the crowded cannon playWhere the Czar's fierce cohorts rally, Cossack, Calmuck, savage Kalli
Down that gorge they swept away! Down that new Thermopyla, Flashing swords and helmets see! Underneath the iron shower,
To the brazen cannon's jaws, Heedless of their deadly power,
Press they without fear or pauseTo the very cannon's jaws ! Gallant Noland, brave as Roland
At the field of Roncesvalles, Dashes down the fatal valley, Dashes on the bolt of death, Shouting with his latest breath, "Charge, then, gallants! do not waver, Charge the pass at Balaklava!"
O that rash and fatal charge, On the battle's bloody marge!
Now the bolts of volleyed thunder Rend that little band asunder, Steed and rider wildly screaming,
Screaming wildly, sink away; Late so proudly, proudly gleaming, Now but lifeless clods of clay- Now but bleeding clods of clay! Never, since the days of Jesus, Saw such sight the Chersonesus ! Yet your remnant, brave six hundred, Presses onward, onward, onward,
Till they storm the bloody pass
Till, like brave Leonidas,
They storm the deadly pass, Sabering Cossack, Calmuck, Kalli, In that wild, shot-rended valley- Drenched with fire and blood, like lava, Awful pass at Balaklava !
O that rash and fatal charge, On the battle's bloody marge!
For now Russia's rallied forces, Swarming hordes of Cossack horses, Trampling o'er the reeking corses,
Drive the thinned assailants back, Drive the feeble remnant back, O'er their late heroic track! Vain, alas! now rent and sundered, Vain your struggles, brave two hundred ! Thrice your number lie asleep, In that valley dark and deep. Weak and wounded, you retire From that hurricane of fire- That tempestuous storm of fire- But no soldiers, firmer, braver, Ever trod the field of fame, Than the Knights of Balaklava—
Honor to each hero's name! Yet their country long shall mourn For her ranks so rashly shorn- So gallantly, but madly shorn In that fierce and fatal charge, On that battle's bloody marge.
-Alexander Beaufort Meek.
APTAIN GRAHAM, the men were
66 CAPT sayin'
Ye would want a drummer lad,
So I've brought my boy Sandie, Tho' my heart is woful sad; But nae bread is left to feed us, And no siller to buy more, For the gudeman sleeps forever, Where the heather blossoms o'er. "Sandie, make your manners quickly, Play your blithest measure true- Give us Flowers of Edinboro'; While yon fifer plays it too. Captain, heard ye e'er a player
Strike in truer time than he?" "Nay, in truth, brave Sandie Murray Drummer of our corps shall be."
"I give ye thanks-but Captain, maybe Ye will hae a kindly care For the friendless, lonely laddie,
When the battle wark is sair:
For Sandie's aye been good and gentle, And I've nothing else to love, Nothing-but the grave off yonder, And the Father up above."
Then her rough hand gently laying, On the curl-encircled head,
She blessed her boy. The tent was silent, And not another word was said; For Captain Graham was sadly dreamiag Of a benison, long ago,
Breathed above his head, then golden, Bending now, and touched with snow.
"Good bye, Sandie." "Good-bye, mother, I'll come back some summer day; Don't you fear-they don't shoot drummers Ever. Do they, Captain Gra—? One more kiss-watch for me, mother, You will know 'tis surely me Coming home-for you will hear me Playing soft the reveille."
After battle. Moonbeams ghastly Seemed to link in strange affright, As the scudding clouds before them Shadowed faces dead and white; And the night wind softly whispered,
When low moans its light wing boreMoans that ferried spirit over
Death's dark wave to yonder shore.
Wandering where a footstep careless Might go splashing down in blood, Or a helpless hand lie grasping Death and daisies from the sod
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