There are eyes of watchful reapers
Beneath the summer leaves,
With a glitter as of sickles
Impatient for the sheaves.
They are men who guard the passes,
They are men who bar the ford;
Stands our David at Manassas,
The champion of the Lord.
They are men who guard our altars,
And beware, ye sons of Gath,
The deep and dreadful silence
Of the lion in your path.
Lo! the foe was mad for slaughter,
And the whirlwind hurtled on;
But our boys had grown to heroes,
They were lions, every one.
And they stood a wall of iron,
And they shone a wall of flame,
And they beat the baffled tempest
To the caverns whence it came.
And Manassas' sun descended
On their armies crushed and torn,
On a battle bravely ended,
On a nation grandly born.
The laurel and the cypress,
The glory and the grave,
We pledge to thee, O Liberty!
The life-blood of the brave.
Francis Orrery Ticknor.
Retreat soon turned to flight and flight to panic. A great crowd of officials and civilians, male and female, had driven out from Washington to the battlefield to witness a victory which they considered certain. They were furnished with passes, and picnicked and wined and jested and watched the distant conflict. Suddenly the Union army gave way, the Confederates dashed forward in pursuit, and soldiers and civilians were mixed together in one panic-stricken mob.