To arms! to arms! ye men of might;
Away from home, away!
The first and foremost in the fight
Are sure to win the day!
Park Benjamin.
By the last of August, Taylor had whipped his army into shape, and began to advance on Monterey, a town believed to be impregnable, and where General Arista had collected an army of ten thousand men. The American army reached the town September 19; and after two days' desperate fighting the town surrendered.
MONTEREY
[September 23, 1846]
We were not many, we who stood
Before the iron sleet that day:
Yet many a gallant spirit would
Give half his years if but he could
Have been with us at Monterey.
Now here, now there, the shot is hail'd
In deadly drifts of fiery spray,
Yet not a single soldier quail'd
When wounded comrades round them wail'd
Their dying shout at Monterey.
And on—still on our column kept
Through walls of flame its withering way;
Where fell the dead, the living stept,
Still charging on the guns which swept
The slippery streets of Monterey.
The foe himself recoil'd aghast,
When, striking where he strongest lay,
We swoop'd his flanking batteries past,
And braving full their murderous blast,
Storm'd home the towers of Monterey.
Our banners on those turrets wave,
And there our evening bugles play:
Where orange-boughs above their grave
Keep green the memory of the brave
Who fought and fell at Monterey.