Sudden I picked up baby, and ran to the pasture-bar.
"Kentuck!" I called—"Kentucky!" She knew me ever so far!
I led her down the gully that turns off there to the right,
And tied her to the bushes; her head was just out of sight.
As I ran back to the log house, at once there came a sound—
The ring of hoofs, galloping hoofs, trembling over the ground—
Coming into the turnpike, out from the White-Woman Glen—
Morgan, Morgan the raider, and Morgan's terrible men.
As near they drew and nearer, my heart beat fast in alarm;
But still I stood in the doorway with baby on my arm.
They came; they passed; with spur and whip in haste they sped along—
Morgan, Morgan the raider, and his band, six hundred strong.
Weary they looked and jaded, riding through night and through day;
Pushing on East to the river, many long miles away,
To the border-strip where Virginia runs up into the West,
And fording the Upper Ohio before they could stop to rest.
On like the wind they hurried, and Morgan rode in advance;
Bright were his eyes like live coals, as he gave me a sideways glance;
I was just breathing freely, after my choking pain,
When the last one of the troopers suddenly drew his rein.
Frightened I was to death, sir; I scarce dared look in his face,
As he asked for a drink of water, and glanced around the place.
I gave him a cup and he smiled—'twas only a boy, you see;
Faint and worn, with dim blue eyes; and he'd sailed on the Tennessee.
Only sixteen he was, sir—a fond mother's only son—
Off and away with Morgan before his life has begun!
The damp drops stood on his temples—drawn was the boyish mouth;
And I thought me of the mother waiting down in the South.
Oh! pluck was he to the backbone, and clear grit through and through;
Boasted and bragged like a trooper, but the big words wouldn't do;—
The boy was dying, sir, dying, as plain as plain could be,
Worn out by his ride with Morgan up from the Tennessee.
But when I told the laddie that I too was from the South,
Water came in his dim eyes, and quivers around his mouth.
"Do you know the Blue-Grass country?" he wistful began to say;
Then swayed like a willow-sapling, and fainted dead away.
I had him into the log house, and worked and brought him to;
I fed him and I coaxed him, as I thought his mother'd do;
And when the lad grew better, and the noise in his head was gone,
Morgan's men were miles away, galloping, galloping on.