II.
There's the cowslip, narcissus, and sweet mignonette,
The asters, verbenas, the fuschias; and yet,
As much as I love them in Summer array,
It's the white and the pink I dream of to-day,
And I walk 'neath the branches that just interlace
And shower their blossoms right down in my face
When the breeze that is laden with rarest perfume
Is wafted along where the apple trees bloom!
III.
With glad voices the birds as they flit to and fro
Are singing their songs where the pink and the snow
Of the orchard, bedecked in its garments so rare,
Is diffusing and sending its breath on the air;
And the rays of the sun sift through on the grass,
And the dew-drops that sparkle no jewels surpass!
In Springtime at evening, at morning, at noon,
How sweet is the scent of the apple trees' bloom!
IV.
And when Summer is gone, and Autumn has shed
It's soft, dreamy haze through the trees overhead,
On each spreading branch where blossoms now cling
The red and the gold to the fruit it will bring,
And stripe with a skill and give it that blush
Only Nature can paint with her delicate brush!
O when life ebbs away, then make me a tomb
Right out in the orchard, where the apple trees bloom!
CHICKAMAUGA.
To Chattanooga's vale, where flows the winding Tennessee,
And rugged Lookout sentinels heroic dust of sixty-three—
Where Chickamauga's gory field re-echoed to the cannon's roar,
And shot and shell through serried ranks a bloody pathway tore,
And mountain slope and wood and field were lumined with the blaze
Of musketry from Blue and Gray in those September days—
They come again, the gallant few, survivors of the fray,
Their breasts with hallowed memories filled, but passion passed away!