And Irish Nora's eyes are dim Sleep, soldiers! still in honored rest The bravest are the tenderest,— 1. War 2. 47 MARCO BOZZARIS 1 FITZ-GREENE HALLECK At midnight, in his guarded tent, The Turk was dreaming of the hour In dreams, through camp and court, he bore In dreams his song of triumph heard; At midnight, in the forest shades, Heroes in heart and hand. Marco Bozzaris. A Greek patriot (1790-1823), killed in the of Independence against Turkey. Suliote. Grecian troops from Souli. 3. There had the Persian's thousands stood, And now there breathed that haunted air An hour passed on—the Turk awoke; "To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek!" And death shots falling thick and fast Bozzaris cheer his band: "Strike-till the last armed foe expires; They fought-like brave men, long and well; Bleeding at every vein. His few surviving comrades saw His smile when rang their proud hurrah, And the red field was won; Then saw in death his eyelids close Like flowers at set of sun. Plataea. At the battle of Plataea the Greeks won a great victory over the Persians, 479 B. C. Come to the bridal-chamber, Death! Come to the mother's, when she feels, For the first time, her first-born's breath; Come when the blessed seals That close the pestilence are broke, The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier, But to the hero, when his sword Has won the battle for the free, The thanks of millions yet to be. Of sky and stars to prisoned men; Thy grasp is welcome as the hand Of brother in a foreign land; Thy summons welcome as the cry That told the Indian isles were nigh To the world-seeking Genoese, When the land wind, from woods of palm, And orange groves, and fields of balm, Blew o'er the Haytian seas. Genoese. Columbus. Bozzaris! with the storied brave Greece nurtured in her glory's time, Rest thee-there is no prouder grave, Even in her own proud clime. She wore no funeral weeds for thee, Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume Like torn branch from death's leafless tree In sorrow's pomp and pageantry, The heartless luxury of the tomb; But she remembers thee as one Long loved and for a season gone; For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed, Her marble wrought, her music breathed; For thee she rings the birthday bells; Of thee her babe's first lisping tells; For thine her evening prayer is said At palace couch and cottage bed; Her soldier, closing with the foe, Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow; His plighted maiden, when she fears For him the joy of her young years, Thinks of thy fate, and checks her tears; And she, the mother of thy boys, Though in her eye and faded cheek Is read the grief she will not speak, The memory of her buried joys, And even she who gave thee birth, Will, by their pilgrim-circled hearth, Talk of thy doom without a sigh; For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's: One of the few, the immortal names, That were not born to die. 48 LITTLE GIFFEN 1 FRANCIS ORRAY TICKNOR Out of the focal 2 and foremost fire, "Take him and welcome!" the surgeons said; So we took him; and brought him where And we laid him down on a wholesome bed,- And we watched the war with abated breath,—— And didn't. Nay, more! in death's despite Giffen and I are left alive." 1. This story of a young private in the Confederate army is taken from real life. 2. Focal fire. The point upon which the firing was concentrated. Lazarus. A man covered with sores. |