Oh, how our pulses leaped and thrilled, when, at the dead of night,
We saw our legions mustering, and marching forth to fight!
Line after line comes surging on with martial pomp and pride,
And all the pageantries that gild the battle's crimson tide.
A forest of bright bayonets, like stars at midnight, gleam;
A hundred glittering standards flash above the silver stream.
We plunged into the Wilderness, and morning's early dawn
Disclosed our gallant army in line of battle drawn.
An early zephyr fresh and sweet breathed through the forest shade;
A thousand happy warblers, too, a pleasant music made;
And modest blossoms bathed in dew the morning light revealed:
Oh, who could deem those pleasant shades a savage foe concealed?
With lagging pace the morning hours dragged heavily away,
And yet we wait the coming strife, in battle's stern array.
A solemn stillness reigns around--but hark! a savage yell,
As if ten thousand angry fiends had burst the gates of hell,
Now thrills upon our startled ears. By heaven! the traitors come!
We see their gleaming banners, we hear the throbbing drum.
In solid ranks, their countless hordes from the dense woods emerge,
And roll upon our serried lines like ocean's angry surge.
Our ranks are silent--on each face the light of battle glows:
'Ready!' At once our polished tubes are levelled on our foes.
Now leaps a livid lightning up--from rank to rank it flies--
A fearful diapason rends the arches of the skies.
The wooded hills seem reeling before that fierce recoil;
With fire and smoke the valleys like Etna's craters boil:
From red volcanoes bursting, hissing, hurtling in the sky,
A thousand death-winged messengers like fiery meteors fly:
Within that seething vortex their shattered cohorts reel.
'Fix bayonets!' At once our lines bristle with burnished steel.
'Charge!' And our gallant regiments burst through the _feu d'enfer_.
Before their furious onset the rebel hosts give way;
And, surging backward, hide again within the forest's shade,
Whose mazes dark and intricate our charging columns stayed.
Now sinks the fiery orb of day, half hidden from our sight
Amid the sulphurous clouds of war dyed red in lurid light;
And soon the smoking Wilderness with gloom and darkness fills;
The dense, damp foliage on the sod a bloody dew distils.
Sleepless we rest upon our arms. Dim lights flit through the shade:
We hear the groans of dying men, the rattle of the spade.
And when the morning dawns at last, resounding from afar
We hear the crash of musketry, the rising din of war.
O comrades, comrades, rally round, close up your ranks again;
Weep not our brethren fallen upon the crimson plain;
For unborn ages shall their tombs with freshest laurels twine;
Their names in characters of light on history's page shall shine:
We all must die; but few may win a deathless prize of life--
Close up your ranks--again the foe renews the bloody strife.
Two days we struggled fiercely against our stubborn foes--
Two days from out the Wilderness the din of conflict rose.
But when the third aurora bathed the eastern sky in gold,
And to our soldiers' anxious gaze the field of death unrolled,
Lo! all was silent in our front. The rebel hosts had fled,
Abandoning in hasty flight their wounded and their dead.
Come, friends of freedom, gather round, loud shouts of triumph give:
The field of blood is won at last--let the republic live!
Our country, O our country, our hearts throb wild and high;
Your cause has triumphed. God be praised! Freedom shall never die.
Our eagle proudly soars to-day, his talons bathed in gore,
For treason's hydra head is crushed--its reign of terror o'er.
Wake, wake your shouts of triumph all through our mighty land,
From California's golden hills to proud Potomac's strand.
Atlantic's waves exulting Pacific's billows call,
And great Niagara's cataracts in louder thunders fall.
We've stayed the tempest black as night that on our country lowers,
And backward dashed its waves of blood. The victory is ours!
A light shines from the Wilderness--far up time's pathway streams--
Through death, and blood, and agony, on Calvary's cross it gleams;
It lights with radiance divine Mount Vernon's humble tomb,
And sparkles on Harmodius' sword bright flashing through the gloom.
Ho! slaves of yesterday, arise, now will your chains be riven.
Ho! tyrants, tremble, for behold a day of vengeance given.
Gaze on our banners stained with blood--think of your brethren slain;
Say, has not freedom, crushed to earth, sprung forth to life again?
Freedom, high freedom, friend of man, sheath not thy crimson steel;
Still let thy cannon thunder loud, still let thy trumpet peal;
Stay not the justice of thy wrath, stay not thy vengeful hand,
Till slavery and treason have been blotted from our land.