Of jarring voices stirs the startled city,

Like oil and acid, sounds that will not mingle,

By natural hatred sundered. Thou may’st hear

Shouts of the victor, with the dying groan,

Battling, and captives’ cry; upon the dead—

Fathers and mothers, brothers, sisters, wives—

The living fall—the young upon the old;

And from enthralléd necks wail out their woe.

Fresh from the fight, through the dark night the spoilers

Tumultuous rush where hunger spurs them on,