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| ALL day long the storm of battle through the startled valley swept; | |
| All night long the stars in heaven o’er the slain sad vigils kept. | |
| |
| O, the ghastly upturned faces gleaming whitely through the night! | |
| O, the heaps of mangled corses in that dim sepulchral light! | |
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| One by one the pale stars faded, and at length the morning broke; | 5 |
| But not one of all the sleepers on that field of death awoke. | |
| |
| Slowly passed the golden hours of that long bright summer day, | |
| And upon that field of carnage still the dead unburied lay. | |
| |
| Lay there stark and cold, but pleading with a dumb, unceasing prayer, | |
| For a little dust to hide them from the staring sun and air. | 10 |
| |
| But the foeman held possession of that hard-won battle-plain, | |
| In unholy wrath denying even burial to our slain. | |
| |
| Once again the night dropped round them,—night so holy and so calm | |
| That the moonbeams hushed the spirit, like the sound of prayer or psalm. | |
| |
| On a couch of trampled grasses, just apart from all the rest, | 15 |
| Lay a fair young boy, with small hands meekly folded on his breast. | |
| |
| Death had touched him very gently, and he lay as if in sleep; | |
| Even his mother scarce had shuddered at that slumber calm and deep. | |
| |
| For a smile of wondrous sweetness lent a radiance to the face, | |
| And the hand of cunning sculptor could have added naught of grace | 20 |
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| To the marble limbs so perfect in their passionless repose, | |
| Robbed of all save matchless purity by hard, unpitying foes. | |
| |
| And the broken drum beside him all his life’s short story told: | |
| How he did his duty bravely till the death-tide o’er him rolled. | |
| |
| Midnight came with ebon garments and a diadem of stars, | 25 |
| While right upward in the zenith hung the fiery planet Mars. | |
| |
| Hark! a sound of stealthy footsteps and of voices whispering low, | |
| Was it nothing but the young leaves, or the brooklet’s murmuring flow? | |
| |
| Clinging closely to each other, striving never to look round | |
| As they passed with silent shudder the pale corses on the ground, | 30 |
| |
| Came two little maidens,—sisters, with a light and hasty tread, | |
| And a look upon their faces, half of sorrow, half of dread. | |
| |
| And they did not pause nor falter till, with throbbing hearts, they stood | |
| Where the drummer-boy was lying in that partial solitude. | |
| |
| They had brought some simple garments from their wardrobe’s scanty store, | 35 |
| And two heavy iron shovels in their slender hands they bore. | |
| |
| Then they quickly knelt beside him, crushing back the pitying tears, | |
| For they had no time for weeping, nor for any girlish fears. | |
| |
| And they robed the icy body, while no glow of maiden shame | |
| Changed the pallor of their foreheads to a flush of lambent flame. | 40 |
| |
| For their saintly hearts yearned o’er it in that hour of sorest need, | |
| And they felt that Death was holy, and it sanctified the deed. | |
| |
| But they smiled and kissed each other when their new strange task was o’er, | |
| And the form that lay before them its unwonted garments wore. | |
| |
| Then with slow and weary labor a small grave they hollowed out, | 45 |
| And they lined it with the withered grass and leaves that lay about. | |
| |
| But the day was slowly breaking ere their holy work was done, | |
| And in crimson pomp the morning heralded again the sun. | |
| |
| Gently then those little maidens—they were children of our foes— | |
| Laid the body of our drummer-boy to undisturbed repose. | 50 |
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