’Twas at Fredericksburg Heights, where we charged like such fools,
And learned by experience—that saddest of schools—
An experience that brought us a fire-rain beneath—
Not to crack a hard nut, nor to try, with our teeth,
That I got this old sabre, and with it a scar,
From a small pistol bullet, my beauty to mar;
And a narrow escape, for an inch t’other way,
And a narrow earth-jacket I’d worn the next day.
I hated the enemy, then—no offence,
If you held ’tother side, each man acts on his sense—