We hear the low hum of the volley, we see the fierce bomb-burst of red;
Still the rock in the forehead of Lookout through the rents of the windy
mist shows
The horrible flag of the Crossbar, the counterfeit rag of our foes:
Portentous it looks through the vapor, then melts to the eye, but it tells
That the rebels still cling to their stronghold, and hope for the moment
dispels.
But the roll of the thunder seems louder, flame angrier smites on the eye,
The scene from the fog is laid open--a battle field fought in the sky!
Eye to eye, hand to hand, all are struggling;--ha, traitors! ha, rebels,
ye know
Now the might in the arm of our heroes! dare ye bide their roused terrible
blow?
They drive them, our braves drive the rebels! they flee, and our heroes
pursue!
We scale rock and trunk--from their breastworks they run! oh, the joy of
the view!
Hurrah, how they drive them! hurrah, how they drive the fierce rebels
along!
One more cheer, still another! each lip seems as ready to burst into song.
On, on, ye bold blue-coated heroes! thrust, strike, pour your shots in
amain!
Banners fly, columns rush, seen and lost in the quick, fitful gauzes of
rain.
Oh, boys, how your young blood is streaming! but falter not, drive them
to rout!
From barricade, breastwork, and riflepit, how the scourged rebels pour out!
We see the swift plunge of the caisson within the dim background of haze,
With the shreds of platoons inward scudding, and fainter their batteries
blaze;
As the mist curtain falls all is blank; as it lifts, a wild picture out
glares,
A wild shifting picture of battle, and dread our warm hopefulness shares;
But never the braves of the 'White Star' have sullied their fame in defeat,
And they will not to-day see the triumph pass by them the foeman to greet!
No, no, for the battle is ending; the ranks on the slope of the crest
Are the true Union blue, and our banners alone catch the gleams of the
west,
Though the Crossbar still flies from the summit, we roll out our cheering
of pride!
Not in vain, O ye heroes of Lookout! O brave Union boys! have ye died!
One brief struggle more sees the banner, that blot on the sky, brushed
away,
When the broad moon now basking upon us shall yield her rich lustre to-day:
She brings out the black hulk of Lookout, its outlines traced sharp in
the skies,
All alive with the camps of our braves glancing down with their numberless
eyes.
See, the darkness below the red dottings is twinkling with many a spark!
Sergeant Teague thinks them souls of the rebels red fleeing from ours in
the dark;
But the light shocks of sound tell the tale, they are battle's fierce
fireworks at play!
It is slaughter's wild carnival revel bequeathed to the night by the day.
Dawn breaks, the sky clears--ha! the shape upon Lookout's tall crest that
we see,
Is the bright beaming flag of the 'White Star,' the beautiful Flag of the
Free!
How it waves its rich folds in the zenith, and looks in the dawn's open
eye,
With its starred breast of pearl and of crimson, as if with heaven's colors
to vie!
'Hurrah!' rolls from Moccasin Point, and 'Hurrah!' from bold Cameron's
Hill!
'Hurrah!' peals from glad Chattanooga! bliss seems every bosom to fill!
Thanks, thanks, O ye heroes of Lookout! O brave Union boys! during Time
Shall stand this, your column of glory, shall shine this, your triumph
sublime!
To the deep mountain den of the panther the hunter climbed, drove him to
bay,
Then fought the fierce foe till he turned and fled, bleeding and gnashing,
away!
Fled away from the scene where so late broke his growls and he shot down
his glare,
As he paced to and fro, for the hunter his wild craggy cavern to dare!
Thanks, thanks, O ye heroes of Lookout! ye girded your souls to the fight,
Drew the sword, dropped the scabbard, and went in the full conscious
strength of your might!
Now climbing o'er rock and o'er tree mound, up, up, by the hemlock ye
swung!
Now plunging through thicket and swamp, on the edge of the hollow ye hung!
One hand grasped the musket, the other clutched ladder of root and of
bough:
The trunk the tornado had shivered, the landmark pale glimmering now,
And now the mad torrent's white lightning;--no drum tapped, no bugle
was blown--
To the words that encouraged each other, and quick breaths, ye toiled up
alone!
Oh, long as the mountains shall rise o'er the waters of bright Tennessee,
Shall be told the proud deeds of the 'White Star,' the cloud-treading host
of the free!
The camp-fire shall blaze to the chorus, the picket-post peal it on high,
How was fought the fierce battle of Lookout--how won THE GRAND FIGHT OF
THE SKY!
ONE NIGHT.
I.
From the window at which I write, in these November days, I see a muddy,
swollen river, spread over the meadows into a dingy lake; it is not a
picturesque or a pretty stream, in spite of its Indian name. Beyond it
the land slopes away into a range of long, low hills, which the autumn
has browned; the long swaths of fog stretching between river and hill
are so like to them and to the dissolving gray sky that they all blend
in one general gloom. This picture filling my eye narrows and shapes
itself into the beginning of my story: I see a lazy, dirty river on the
outskirts of a manufacturing city; where the stream has broadened into a
sort of pond it is cut short by the dam, and there is a little cluster
of mills. They all belong to one work, however, and they look as if they
had been set down there for a few months only; 'contract' seems written
all over them, and very properly, for they are running on a Government
order for small arms. There is no noise but an underhum of revolving
shafts and the smothered thud of trip hammers. Ore dust blackens
everything, and is scattered everywhere, so that the whole ground is a
patchwork of black and gray; elsewhere there is snow, but here the snow
is turned to the dingy color of the place. It is very quiet outside,
being early morning yet; a cold mist hides the dawn, and the water falls
with a winter hiss; the paths are indistinct, for the sky is only just
enough lightening to show the east.
The coal dust around one door shows that the fires are there; a
cavernous place, suddenly letting a lurid glow out upon the night, and
then black again. It is only a narrow alley through the building, making
sure of a good draft; on one side are the piles of coal, and on the
other a row of furnace doors. The stoker is sitting on a heap of
cinder. He is only an old man, a little stooping, with a head that is
turning ashes color; his eye is faded, and his face nearly
expressionless, while he sits perfectly still on the heap, as if he were
a part of the engine which turns slowly in a shed adjoining and pants
through its vent in the roof. He has been sitting there so long that he
has a vague notion that his mind has somehow gone out of him into the
iron doors and the rough coal, and he only goes round and round like the
engine. Yet he never considered the matter at all, any more than the
engine wanted to use its own wheel, which it turned month after month in
the same place, to propel itself through the world; just so often he
opened and shut each door in its turn, fed the fires, and then sat down
and sat still.
He was looking at a boy of six, asleep at his feet on a pile of ashes
and cinder, which was not so bad a bed, for the gentle heat left in it
was as good as a lullaby, and Shakspeare long ago told us that sleep has
a preference for sitting by hard pillows. The child was an odd bit of
humanity. An accident at an early age had given it a hump, though
otherwise it was fair enough; and now perhaps society would have seen
there only an animal watching its sleeping cub. Presently the boy woke
and got on his feet, and began to walk toward the cold air with short,
uncertain steps, almost falling against a furnace door. The old man
jumped and caught him.
'Ta, ta, Nobby,' he said, 'what's thou doin'? Them's hotter nor cender.
Burnt child dreads fire--did knowst 'twas fire?'
He had a sort of language of his own, and his voice was singularly
harsh, as if breathing in that grimy place so long had roughened his
throat.
'There, go, Nobby, look thee out an' see howst black she is. Ta, but
it's hawt,' and he rubbed his forehead with his sleeve; 'it's a deal
pity this hot can nawt go out where's cold, an' people needin' it.
Here's hot, there's cold, but 'twill stay here, as it loved the place
'twas born--home, like. Why, Net, that thee?'
There was no door to the place to knock at or open, but the craunch of a
foot was heard on the coal outside, and a girl came in, moist and
shivering. The stoker set her down in a warm corner, and looked at her
now.
'Is thee, my little Net?' he repeated.
'Yes, and I've brought your breakfast, father; 'twas striking six before
I come in.'
'Too early, my girl, sleep her sleep out. Here's hot an' cosey like, an'
time goes, an' I could wait for breakfast, till I'm home. I'll nawt let
my little girl's sleep.'
'No, father, I couldn't sleep after five, anyway; and I thought I must
bring your breakfast to-day. You'll walk back through the cold easier
after something hot to eat.'
'That's my dear little girl. Shiverin' yet, she is. There, lay down on
this,' raking out a heap of fresh ashes, 'them warm an' soft like, an'
go ye to sleep till I go.'
'No, I must heat your coffee,' she answered, steadying the pot before
one of the furnaces with bits of coal.
''Ware that door doan' fly back an' hurt ye; them does so sometimes.'
'Yes, I'll be careful. Why, you've got Whitney here!'
'He come down to-night, Net. By himself, somehow, though I doan' knaw
how Lord kep' his short feet from the river bank an' the floom. An' he
couldn't go back, nor I couldn't go with him. He's slep' on the cender,
nice; all's a cradle to Nobby.'
'Yes, cinder's a good bed, when the eyes are shut,' said the girl,
bitterly. 'The coffee was smoking hot when I started, but it's cold out
this morning, so there's all this to be done over.'
'Yes, outdoors has cooled it. The world was hungry, like, an' wanted to
eat it. Small nubbin' for all the world, but it stole the hot an' the
smell o' the meat.'
The girl did not reply to this bit of pleasantry. She was about
eighteen, and her face would have been strikingly pretty except for the
eager, hungering look of the eye; but in every motion, every look, and
even the way in which she wore her neat and simple clothing, there was
the word 'unsatisfied.'
Finally, she brought coffee and meat to him.
'Here, Net, take ye a sip,' said he; ''twill warm ye nice. Shiverin' yet
she is; 'deed the mornin's clammy cold; there's naw love in thet. Drink!
I cawnt take ye home so, an' my time's most up; it's gettin' light.'
But she refused it, and sat and watched him as he ate, never taking her
eyes from his face.
'Father,' she presently said, 'what do you do here?'
The old stoker laughed: 'Do, my girl? Why, keep up the fires. It's like
I'm a spoke in a wheel or summut. I keeps the fires, an' the fires makes
the angeen go, an' thet turns the works thet makes the pistols, so't
folks may kill theirsel's. There's naw peace anywheres in the world.'
'I didn't mean that; but what do you do the rest of the time? Don't you
think? Aren't you tired of this place, father?'
'Sometimes it's like I think so; but how's the use, my Net? Here's
rough, an' here's rough too,' touching his chest. 'On smooth floors,
such as I couldn't work, if we could get there. How's the use o' bein'
tired? We've got to keep steady at summut. It's best to be content, like
Nobby there; cender's as good a bed as the king's got.'
'Well, if you _were_ tired, you're going to rest now, so I wish you
were.'
'What's that mean?'
'You've got through here, that's all,' cried the girl, with a smothered
sob.
He set down his pot of coffee and his pail: 'Who told ye so?' he
demanded.
'Margery Eames.'
Catching the girl's hand, the old man half dragged her through the
opening into a yard devoted to coal storage. Picking their way through
the spotted mire, they entered a shed where trip hammers were pounding
in showers of sparks, stepped over a great revolving shaft, and came to
a stairway; up, up, to the fifth floor, where the finishing rooms were.
Faint daylight was straggling through the narrow windows, and most of
the lamps were out, those that were burning being very sickly, as if
they did it under protest. A number of women were employed here, because
much of the work was merely automatic, and just now men were scarce and
women would work cheaper. The women were coarse and rough, rather the
scum of the city--perhaps some might have fallen; but the place was
noisome and grimy, with a sickening smell of oil everywhere, repulsive
enough to be fit for any workers.
The stoker and his daughter walked to the farther end, and came to where
a little group of women were sitting round a bench; one of the group
tipped a wink to the rest.
'How's coal an' fires now, Adam?' she said.
'Did ye tell my girl anythin'?' he demanded.
'Of course I did.'
'What was't then?'
'Well,' said she, wiping her greasy hands on the bosom of her dress, 'I
watched on the road for her this morning, an' I told her.'
'_What?_'
'I told her she needn't try to put on airs, she was only a stoker's
daughter, an' he'll not have that place any more.'
'Did ye knaw she didn't knaw't?'
'Yes. What do you care, old dusty? She's got a good place.'
'Yes, she has, Lord's good for't.'
'Shall we fight it out, Adam? Hold on till I wipe my hands.'
'Nawt till one can fight by hersel', Margery. I forgive yer spite, an'
hope Lord woan' bring it back to ye ever. What's said can nawt be
helped. Come, Net.'
'You're a mean creature, Margery, to tell him that,' said one, after
they were gone. 'I expected to hear you tell him about the place his
girl's got. Lord! he's innocent as a baby about it, an' thinks she's on
the way up, while everybody else knows it, an' knows it's the way down.'
''Tis that,' said Margery, 'but I've that much decency that I didn't say
it. Let the old man take one thing at a time; he'll know it soon enough
when she fetches up at the bottom.'
'What did you want to trouble old Adam for?'
'Because I did!' cried the woman, with a sudden flash; 'because I like
to hurt people. _I've_ been struck, an' stabbed, an' bruised, an'
seared, an' people pointin' fingers at me, whose heart wasn't fouler'n
theirs, if my lips were. It's all cut an' slash in the world, an' the
only way to get on with pain when you're hit, is to hit somebody else.
I'd rather find a soft spot in somebody than have a dollar give me,
sure's my name's Margery. What business has he to have any feelin's,
workin' year after year down there in the coal? Why haven't people been
good to _me_? I never come up here into this grease; people sent me; an'
when hit's the game I'll do my part. I hope his girl's a comfort to him;
he'll be proud enough of her some time, you see.'
Adam seated his girl again, opened the doors one after another, and
raked and fed the fires; then he shut them, and stood his rake in the
corner, and seated himself.
'Well, it's come out,' he said; 'but I didn't mean ye should know, yet.
Margery's ill willed, but it's like she didn't think.'
'I oughtn't to have told you till after to-morrow, father.'
'There's how't seems hard, thet it must come to Christmas. An' when I've
been here so long, twenty year noo, Net.'
'Oh, don't call me that any more, father; I don't like it.'
'Why nawt, little girl? What should I call her? You used to love to hear
it.'
'Not now, not now,' said the girl, in a choking voice, 'not to-day, not
till Christmas is over. Call me Jane.'
'Yes, twenty year ago I come here, an' I've been settin' on them piles
o' cender ever sence. 'Deed I most love them doors an' the rake an'
poker. I've hed my frets about it sometimes, but I doan' want to go
though.'
'And I say it's a shame in them to use you so!' cried the girl. 'Making
their money hand over hand, and to go and grudge you this ash hole, for
the sake of saving! They'll get no good from such reckoning. I wish
their cruel old mill would burn down!'
'No, Jane, hold hersel'! Here's fire--should _I_ do it?'
'It's Cowles's work. I hate him.'
'The mill's their own, Jane; they gev me what they liked; I've no claim.
Mr. Cowles do as he think best for t'mill.'
'Then to do it just now! I hope _his_ dinner'll be sweet.'
'I nawt meant my girl to knaw't till Christmas wor done. But ye'll nawt
mind it, Jane, ye'll nawt! We'll nawt lose Christmas, too, for it come
for us. Mr. Cowles doan' own _thet_. We'll hev thet anyhow, an' keep it.
She'll nawt fret hersel', my little girl!'
Jane did not answer.
'We'll get on somehoo, Lord knaws hoo. We never starved yet, an' you've
got a good place. It'll all be right, an' Christmas day to-morrow!'
'I got a good place! Oh, father!'
'Why, Jane, I thought so. Doan' they use her well?'
'Yes, they do,' quickly answered the girl; 'I don't know why I spoke
so. I'm a bit discontented, perhaps, but don't you fear for me, father;
and we mustn't fret--anyway, till after to-morrow.'
'She's nawt content, is she?' said the stoker, settling his head into
his hands. 'I've hed my frets, too, alone here, thinkin' summut like I
should liked to knaw books, an' been defferent, but it's like I'd nawt
been content. Lord knows. 'Deed I loves them doors an' the old place
here, but seems as if summut was sayin' there's better things; it's like
there is, but nawt for such as me. I doan' care for mysel', but I'd like
to hev more to gev my little girl.'
'You give me all you've got, father, and I ought to be satisfied. But
I'm not--it's not your blame, father, but I know I'm not,' she said,
with sudden energy. 'I don't know what I want; it's something--it seems
as if I was hungry.'
'Nawt hungry, Jane! She's nawt starvin'!'
'No, I don't want any more to eat, nor better clothes,' she said,
getting out the words painfully. 'It's something else; I can't tell what
it is, unless I'm hungry.'
'Well, I knaw I doan' understan' her,' said the man sadly. 'I doan' knaw
my little girl. Is it _him_ she's thinkin' of?'
The fire-glow on the girl's face hid any change that may have come
there, and she only drew a little farther away, without answering.
'I've nawt seen many people, Jane, but sometimes I likes an' dislikes,
as Nobby does, an' I doan' like _him_. An' I doan' like him to be nigh
my girl; there's naw truth in him. I wish she'd say she'll hev naw more
speech with him.'
'No, no, father, don't ask me that. I don't care for him, but I can't
promise not to speak to him--I do! I do! Oh, father!' sobbed the girl,
'everything comes at once!'
The old man drew her head on his knee, and even his rough voice grew
softer, talking to his 'little girl.' He bent and kissed her.
'I wish 'twere nawt so,' he said; 'but mebbe I'm wrong. Lord keep my
little girl, an' we'll nawt fret, but be happy to-morrow.'
Another man came in with a big tread. It was the engineer, a hale, burly
fellow, with a genuine, rollicking kindness. He tossed the boy into the
air, pinched Jane's cheek, and gave his morning salutation in several
lusty thumps on the stoker's back.
'Rippin' day this'll be, Adam,' said he; 'say t'won't, an' I'll shake
your ribs loose. Just such a day's I like to breathe in; an' when I've
set all night in my chair there, not sleepin' of course, but seein' that
everlastin' old crosshead go in an' out, an' that wheel turnin' away
just so fast an' no faster, I swear I do go to sleep with my eyes open;
an' when it gets light such a day's this, I get up an' shake
myself--this fashion,' giving him an extra jerk. 'Keep up heart, Adam; I
know it, an' I don't know what Cowles is thinkin' of. I don't want to
crowd you out, an' you ought to be the last one to go. I'd quit 'em for
it myself, afford it or not, only 'twon't do you no good.'
'Merry Christmas, Mr. Grump!' cried Nobby, rubbing his eyes.
'You've slept over, my young 'un,' laughed the engineer; 'you're one day
ahead. Of course the palty mill must run to-morrow. Mine don't, I
warrant. My machinery runs on a fat turkey, twenty pound if he's an
ounce. That's me.'
'Yes, and we've got a turkey too,' chimed Nobby.
'I warrant you have. An' he had as good an appetite when he was alive as
anybody else's turkey; them fellows do gobble their grub quite
conscientiously, fattin' 'emselves without knowin' or carin' whether
rich or poor'll eat 'em. _I'll_ bet yours's as fat an' good's Mr.
Prescott's, or old Cowles's--damn him! No, I don't mean quite that, so
near Christmas, but he ought to be choked with his own dinner, I'll say
that. Keep up good heart, Adam; an' now clear out, every one! cut home
to yer breakfasts! My watch now, and' I won't have one of ye
round--scud! or wait a minute an' I'll pitch ye out.'
II.
After his breakfast, Adam walked back to the factory. He was wondering,
as he went along, why they should begin with him if they wanted to save
expense. Eighteen dollars a month was a good deal to him, but what was
it to the mill? Every turn of the water wheel, he thought, made more
money than his day's wages. But possibly Mr. Prescott had found out that
his son fancied Jane, and meant to drive them out of town. The very day
that Mr. Prescott saw him first, Mr. Cowles, the manager, told him he
wasn't needed any longer, that the under engineer would see to the
fires. That was punishing him for another's fault--just the way with
rich men; and for a while he almost hated Mr. Prescott.
Adam Craig had had a peculiar life, as he thought. He wanted education,
money, and such other things, besides something to eat and wear; but
they never came to him, and he drifted into a place at the machine
shops, and got the stamp put on him, and then went his round year after
year with less and less thought of stepping out of it. Yet he always
believed he once had some uncommon stuff in him, and he claimed his own
respect for having had it, even if he had lost it now; he had his own
way of proving it too. His wife was the mirror by which he judged
himself. She was a German woman, whom he found in the city hospital; or
rather she found him, shot through the throat by the accidental
discharge of a rifle. She was just from the fatherland, and could not
speak a word of English; with his swollen head he could not speak at
all; but she watched him through it, and by the signs of that language
which is common to all nations, they managed to understand each other,
and signalized the day of his recovery by marrying. This was the pride
of Adam's whole life, and convinced him he was made capable of being
somebody; he held his wife to be a superior woman, and her appreciation
was a consolation that never left him. 'She knawed me,' he used to say,
'she saw into me better nor I did.' And though he would talk stoutly
sometimes for democracy, he had an odd notion that marrying a
Continental European gave him some sort of distinction; and all his
troubled talks with himself ended in his saying: 'Ah, well, if I'd been
born in Germany, I might been somebody.'
Adam watched for Mr. Cowles most of the forenoon, determined to ask
about his dismissal; at last the manager strolled through the shops, and
Adam made a desperate effort, and went to him. He turned short about, as
the stoker spoke.
'Mr. Cowles, was ye told to send me away?'
'Told! Who should tell me?'
'But I thought--I thought Mr. Prescott might said summut--'
'Do you suppose he concerns himself about you? I'm master here, and I
don't ask what I shall do.'
Adam took hope: 'Hev ye said sure I must go, Mr. Cowles? I've been here
so long, an' noo I'm old. I've got gray at t'mill,' touching his head as
he spoke.
'You've had your wages regular, haven't you?' said Cowles, roughly. 'I
don't inquire how long you've been here. Would I keep an old lathe that
was worn or that I had no use for, because I'd had it a good while? Stay
round to-day, if you like, and then go.'
'But eighteen dollars is nawt much to t'mill,' said Adam, humbly; 'doan'
be hard, an' gev me a chance, a chance to help mysel'! T'winter's hard,
an' I've a family!'
'Did I make your family? You should have thought of that long ago. Stand
out of the way, if you're done.'
The stoker clung to the doorpost.
'Summut else I could do--there must be summut--ye knaw summut else, Mr.
Cowles?'
'Something else to do, you fool! What could you do--run the engine? tend
the planers? If I wanted you at all, I should keep you where you were.'
He moved off at this. Adam seated himself on the familiar cinder heaps
and grieved in his simple way, for a time feeling almost bitter.
Little Nobby's deformity was one of the strange things that made Adam
think. Several years before, he had the child with him at the factory
one night, just old enough to walk a little. In Adam's momentary absence
the boy managed to get upon a box near one of the furnace doors, and,
rolling against the blistering iron, was horribly burned; yet
unaccountably he did not die, but grew bent into a scarred, shapeless
body, though his face was a sweet, childish one, innocent of fire.
Nobby, as Adam called him after that, was a silent preacher to the
stoker. When a clergyman asked him once if he was a Christian, he
pointed to Nobby's back: