Here’s to the living absent, comrades they
So gay in camp, so dauntless in the fray,
The lingering remnant of the mighty host
That swept from far Atlanta to the coast.
Since then their prows through every sea have foamed,
And o’er five continents their feet have roamed,
And plucked the brightest bays in fields afar,
Who glittered brightest in the van of war.
But fast and faster from our sight they fail,
A few belated stragglers feebly hail