II
Twice had the sun gone down on the conflict as yet undetermined.
Two fierce days were done, and the marred earth cumbered with horror,
Horror of soulless pain of the beasts that perish unknowing,
Horror of human ruin, the shattered sheaths of the spirit,
Horror men pray to forget, and the tongue refuses to tell it.
Two proud days were done, that shall shine with the splendors of valor
Out of the night of the past, and live with the life of the nation:
Splendors that crowd like stars—how the names press faster and faster!
Splendors that melt like stars in the milkwhite highway of heaven,
Fame without name, and the deeds remembered of doers forgotten.
Two strange days were done; for Fate on the echoing anvil,
Clashing with blow upon blow, had fashioned a strength out of failure,
Craftily forging in fire and clangor the Line of the Union,
Battle-line hard to break. It was curved like the hook of the fisher,
Rough Culp’s Hill the barb, and the Hill of the Graves was the curving;
Straight as a shaft it stretched to the tawny stream at the southward,—
Running then red,—and the rocks of the rude-piled Den of the Devil,
Round-Top the Less, and the flank of the Greater, fledged with the forest,
Fortresses fit for the Left. So the Line had been forged out of failure,
Battle-line hard to break.
Yet sick were the souls of the leaders,
Burdened with pity and loss; the field with unspeakable anguish
Groaned to the large clear moon; might the army abide such a morrow?
Cautious courageous Meade, not playing with lives as with counters,
Held his commanders in council, retracing, unweaving the war-web,
Shifting the fiery threads. At the last, it was brought to the question.
Was it retreat that slept in the brazen throats of the bugles?
Each after each answered No; Newton and Gibbon and Birney,
Williams and Sedgwick and Sykes, Slocum and Howard and Hancock,
Soul-sick with pity and loss, yet steadily acting the soldier,
Man after man answered No. They were all one will; and their Captain
Gripped the huge host as a sword, that was utterly his for the wielding.
—So the warm bright night drew on to the Day of decision.