But once the ring of rapid hoofs
Came sudden in the night,
And on the Blue Ridge summits flashed
The camp-fire's baleful light.
Young Nick was in the saddle,
With half the valley men,
To find that old man's fighting sons
Who kept the ferry glen.
And like the golden ore that grew
To his divining rod,
The shining, armed soldiery
Swarmed o'er the clover sod;
O'er Crampton's gap the columns fought,
And by Antietam fords,
Till all the world, Nick Hammer thought,
At Funkstown had drawn swords.