Page:The poems of Edmund Clarence Stedman, 1908.djvu/75

ALICE OF MONMOUTH Tramp, tramp, out again,

Sheer across the ragged plain,

Where the moonbeams glaze our steel

And the fresher air we feel.

Thus a triple league, and more,

Till behind us spreads the gray,

Pallid light of breaking day,

And on cloudy hills, before,

Rebel camp-fires smoke away.

Hard by yonder clump of pines,

We should touch the rebel lines:

Gain yon hillock's westward brow.

5

In battle-order, we let the horses breathe;

The Colonel raised his glass and scanned the bridge,

The tents on the bank beyond, the stream beneath.

Just then the sun first broke from the redder east,

And their pickets saw five hundred of us, at least,

Stretched like a dark stockade against the sky;

We heard their long-roll clamor loud and nigh:

In half a minute a rumbling battery whirled

To a mound in front, unlimbering with a will,

And a twelve-pound solid shot came right along,

Singing a devilish morning-song,

And touched my comrade's leg, and the poor boy curled

And dropt to the turf, holding his bridle still.

Well, we moved out of range,—were wheeling round,

I think, for the Colonel had taken his look at their ground,

(Thus he was ordered, it seems, and nothing more:

Hardly worth coming at midnight for!)

When, over the bridge, a troop of the enemy's horse

Dashed out upon our course,

Giving us hope of a tussle to warm our blood.

Then we cheered, to a man, that our early call 45