Page:Wessex poems and other verses (IA wessexpoemsother00hard).pdf/97

 "Nay, Captain, hold! We skirt, not trace the course Of Grouchy," said I then: "As we go, yonder went he, with his force Of thirty thousand men."

—At length noon nighed, when west, from Saint-John's-Mound, A hoarse artillery boomed, And from Saint-Lambert's upland, chapel-crowned, The Prussian squadrons loomed.

Then to the wayless wet gray ground he leapt; "My mission fails!" he cried; "Too late for Grouchy now to intercept, For, peasant, you have lied!"

He turned to pistol me. I sprang, and drew The sabre from his flank, And 'twixt his nape and shoulder, ere he knew, I struck, and dead he sank.