The air, from blistered tongue and throat,
As burning rash and ghastly rheum
Supplanted nature's ruddy bloom;
How moan and outcry, curse and prayer
Were mingled with each other there;
Some raved in dialects unknown,
Or terms provincial, while the groan,
The common tongue of suffering men,
Was echoed ever and again.
Some, with reluctant clutch and gasp,