Page:Songs, Legends, and Ballads.djvu/174

162 The butcher's or the baker's bill,—though not a thought has she Of aught beside her girlish toys; and next to her I see Myself, a sturdy lad of twelve,—neglectful of the book That open lies upon my knee,—my fixed admiring look At Uncle Ned, upon the left, whose upright, martial mien. Whose empty sleeve and gray moustache, proclaim what he has been. My mother I had always loved; my father then was dead; But 'twas more than love—'twas worship—I felt for Uncle Ned. Such tales he had of battle-fields,—the victory and the rout, The ringing cheer, the dying shriek, the loud exulting shout! And how, forgetting age and wounds, his eye would kindle bright,