Huzza! she spurns the Northern scum! She breathes! She burns! She'll come! She'll come !

Maryland, my Maryland!

ABRAM JOSEPH RYAN (1839-1888)

The Conquered Banner

Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary;
Round its staff 'tis drooping dreary:
Furl it, fold it,-it is best;

For there's not a man to wave it,
And there's not a sword to save it,
And there's not one left to lave it
In the blood which heroes gave it,
And its foes now scorn and brave it:
Furl it, hide it,-let it rest!

Take that Banner down! 'tis tattered;
Broken is its staff and shattered;
And the valiant hosts are scattered,
Over whom it floated high.
Oh, 'tis hard for us to fold it,
Hard to think there's none to hold it,
Hard that those who once unrolled it
Now must furl it with a sigh!

Furl that Banner-furl it sadly!
Once ten thousands hailed it gladly,
And ten thousands wildly, madly,
Swore it should forever wave;
Swore that foeman's sword should never
Hearts like theirs entwined dissever,
Till that flag should float forever

O'er their freedom or their grave!

Furl it! for the hands that grasped it,
And the hearts that fondly clasped it,
Cold and dead are lying low;
And that Banner-it is trailing,
While around it sounds the wailing
Of its people in their woe.

For, though conquered, they adore it,Love the cold, dead hands that bore it, Weep for those who fell before it,

Pardon those who trailed and tore it;
And oh, wildly they deplore it,
Now to furl and fold it so!

Furl that Banner! True, 'tis gory,
Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory,
And 'twill live in song and story

Though its folds are in the dust!
For its fame on brightest pages,
Penned by poets and by sages,
Shall go sounding down the ages-
Furl its folds though now we must.

Furl that Banner, softly, slowly!
Treat it gently-it is holy,

For it droops above the dead.
Touch it not-unfold it never;
Let it droop there, furled forever,-
For its people's hopes are fled!

FRANCIS BRET HARTE (1839-1902)

Dickens in Camp

(1812-1870)

Above the pines the moon was slowly drifting,
The river sang below;

The dim Sierras, far beyond, uplifting
Their minarets of snow.

The roaring camp-fire, with rude humor, painted
The ruddy tints of health

On haggard face and form that drooped and fainted
In the fierce race for wealth;

Till one arose, and from his pack's scant treasure
A hoarded volume drew,

And cards were dropped from hands of listless leisure,
To hear the tale anew.

And then, while round them shadows gathered faster,
And as the firelight fell,

He read aloud the book wherein the Master
Had writ of "Little Nell."

Perhaps 'twas boyish fancy,-for the reader
Was youngest of them all,—

But, as he read, from clustering pine and cedar
A silence seemed to fall;

The fir-trees, gathering closer in the shadows,
Listened in every spray,

While the whole camp, with "Nell," on English meadows Wandered and lost their way.

And so in mountain solitudes-o'ertaken

As by some spell divine

Their cares dropped from them like the needles shaken
From out the gusty pine.

Lost is that camp, and wasted all its fire:
And he who wrought that spell?—

Ah! towering pine and stately Kentish spire,
Ye have one tale to tell!

Lost is that camp, but let its fragrant story
Blend with the breath that thrills

With hop-vines incense all the pensive glory
That fills the Kentish hills.

And on that grave where English oak and holly
And laurel wreathes entwine,

Deem it not all a too presumptuous folly—
This spray of Western pine!

Plain Language from Truthful James
(Table Mountain, 1870)

Which I wish to remark,

And my language is plain,

That for ways that are dark

And for tricks that are vain,

The heathen Chinee is peculiar:

Which the same I would rise to explain.

Ah Sin was his name;

And I shall not deny,

In regard to the same,

What that name might imply;

But his smile it was pensive and childlike.

As I frequent remarked to Bill Nye.

It was August the third,

And quite soft was the skies;
Which it might be inferred

That Ah Sin was likewise;

Yet he played it that day upon William
And me in a way I despise.

Which we had a small game,
And Ah Sin took a hand:
It was Euchre. The same
He did not understand;

But he smiled, as he sat by the table,

With the smile that was childlike and bland.

Yet the cards they were stocked

In a way that I grieve,

And my feelings were shocked

At the state of Nye's sleeve,

Which was stuffed full of aces and bowers,

And the same with intent to deceive.

But the hands that were played

By that heathen Chinee,

And the points that he made,

Were quite frightful to see,

Till at last he put down a right bower,

Which the same Nye had dealt unto me.

Then I looked up at Nye,

And he gazed upon me; And he rose with a sigh,

And said, "Can this be?

We are ruined by Chinese cheap labor,"-
And he went for that heathen Chinee.

In the scene that ensued

I did not take a hand,

But the floor it was strewed,

Like the leaves on the strand,

With the cards that Ah Sin had been hiding,

In the game "he did not understand."

In his sleeves, which were long,

He had twenty-four packs,

Which was coming it strong,

Yet I state but the facts;

And we found on his nails, which were taper, What is frequent in tapers,-that's wax.

Which is why I remark,

And my language is plain, That for ways that are dark,

And for tricks that are vain,

The heathen Chinee is peculiar,

Which the same I am free to maintain.

The Society upon the Stanislaus

I reside at Table Mountain, and my name is Truthful James; I am not up to small deceit, or any sinful games;

And I'll tell in simple language what I know about the row
That broke up our Society upon the Stanislow.

But first I would remark, that it is not a proper plan
For any scientific gent to whale his fellow-man,
And, if a member don't agree with his peculiar whim,
To lay for that same member for to "put a head" on him.

Now nothing could be finer or more beautiful to see
Than the first six months' proceedings of that same Society,
Till Brown of Calaveras brought a lot of fossil bones
That he found within a tunnel near the tenement of Jones.

Then Brown he read a paper, and he reconstructed there, From those same bones, an animal that was extremely rare; And Jones then asked the Chair for a suspension of the rules, Till he could prove that those same bones was one of his lost mules.

Then Brown he smiled a bitter smile, and said he was at fault,

It seemed he had been trespassing on Jones's family vault: He was a most sarcastic man, this quiet Mr. Brown, And on several occasions he had cleaned out the town.

Now I hold it is not decent for a scientific gent
To say another is an ass,-at least, to all intent;
Nor should the individual who happens to be meant
Reply by heaving rocks at him, to any great extent.

Then Abner Dean of Angel's raised a point of order-when
A chunk of old red sandstone took him in the abdomen,
And he smiled a kind of sickly smile, and curled up on the
floor,

And the subsequent proceedings interested him no more.

For, in less time than I write it, every member did engage In a warfare with the remnants of a paleozoic age;

And the way they heaved those fossils in their anger was a sin,

Till the skull of an old mammoth caved the head of Thompson in.