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THE SOLDIER'S DEATH. |
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By A. B. Cunningham.
The night-cloud had lowered o'er Shiloh's red plain. And the blast howled sadly o'er wounded and slain; The lightning- flashed vividly, fiercely and proud, And glared thro' the mist of the smoke and the cloud; The thunder pealed loudly from heaven's black sky, Where litely the cannon had pealed the war-cry; The last gun had been fired, and its moaning sound Had died 'way in the distance, and echoed around.
Where the fight had raged fiercest, near a deep ravine,
At the foot of a crag (a wild, thrilling scene),
A soldier lay there all ghastly and gory,
Who'd fall'n in the strife for freedom and glory!
His life-blood was pouring from out a deep gash
He'd received 'mid the battle's loud roar and fierce crash;
" O mother ! O mother ! I never thought this,
When but a mere child I received thy sweet kiss—
"That I'd die on a field all gory and red
With the blood of the wounded, the dying and dead,
With no friend or relation to cheer my dark way,
But the forms of dear comrades all lifeless as clay,
None to watch o'er me but the ghosts of the dead,
None to smooth down the death-pillow 'neath my poor head ;
And sadly I think of my home in the South,
Where I roam'd a mere boy in the pride of my youth. |
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