Sons of the Dark and Bloody Ground,
Ye must not slumber there,
Where stranger steps and tongues resound
Along the heedless air;
Your own proud land's heroic soil
Shall be your fitter grave;
She claims from war its richest spoil,
The ashes of her brave.
So 'neath their parent turf they rest,
Far from the gory field,
Borne to a Spartan mother's breast
On many a bloody shield;
The sunshine of their native sky
Smiles sadly on them here,
And kindred eyes and hearts watch by
The hero's sepulcher.
Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead!
Dear as the blood ye gave,
No impious footsteps here shall tread
The herbage of your grave.
Nor shall your glory be forgot
While fame her record keeps
Or honor points the hallowed spot
Where valor proudly sleeps.
Yon marble minstrel's voiceless stone
In deathless songs shall tell,
When many a vanished age hath flown,
The story how ye fell;
Nor wreck nor change nor winter's flight
Nor Time's remorseless doom
Can dim one ray of holy light
That gilds your glorious tomb.
Little Glimpses of the 19th Century.
The Great Events in the History of the Last One Hundred Years, Assembled
so as to Present a Nutshell Record.
[Continued from page 163.]