“So within the prison cell,
We are waiting for the day
That shall come to open wide the iron door,
And the hollow eye grows bright,
And the poor heart almost gay,
As we think of seeing home and friends once more.”
To appreciate the pathos of that song one needs to hear a company of Grand Army Veterans tell about singing it in Andersonville or Libby Prisons.
FORTRESS MONROE
Just Before the Battle, Mother appealed to the tender side of those who remained at home, and made it a very popular song not only for public gatherings, but in drawing-rooms, and camps in the twilight of the evening. The sequel to it, Just After the Battle, was equally as popular and retains its popularity though a generation has passed away since it was written. It, too, has the vein of optimism in it which runs through all of Doctor Root’s work. Perhaps that is one of the secrets of his great power over the human heart. While he makes us weep with the tenderness of the sentiment, there is always a rainbow on his cloud, a rainbow with promises of a brighter to-morrow. Just After the Battle has that rainbow in it, in the hope expressed by the singer that he shall still see his mother again in the old home:—
“Still upon the field of battle
I am lying, mother dear,
With my wounded comrades waiting
For the morning to appear.
Many sleep to waken never,
In this world of strife and death,
And many more are faintly calling,
With their feeble dying breath.
Mother dear, your boy is wounded,
And the night is drear with pain,
But still I feel that I shall see you,
And the dear old home again.
“Oh, the first great charge was fearful,
And a thousand brave men fell,
Still, amid the dreadful carnage,
I was safe from shot and shell.
So, amid the fatal shower,
I had nearly pass’d the day,
When here the dreaded Minie struck me,
And I sunk amid the fray.
“Oh, the glorious cheer of triumph,
When the foeman turn’d and fled,
Leaving us the field of battle,
Strewn with dying and with dead.
Oh, the torture and the anguish,
That I could not follow on,
But here amid my fallen comrades,
I must wait till morning’s dawn.”