No More Learning

Then we cried, "The troops are routed! they are beat--it can't
be doubted!
God be thanked, the fight is over! "--Ah! the grim old soldier's
smile!
"Tell us, tell us why you look so? " (we could hardly speak,
we shook so),--
"Are they beaten? _Are_ they beaten? ARE they beaten? "--
"Wait a while. "

O the trembling and the terror! for too soon we saw our error:
They are baffled, not defeated; we have driven them back in vain;
And the columns that were scattered, round the colors that
were tattered,
Toward the sullen silent fortress turn their belted breasts again.

All at once, as we are gazing, lo the roofs of Charlestown blazing!
They have fired the harmless village; in an hour it will be down!
The Lord in heaven confound them, rain his fire and brimstone
round them,--
The robbing, murdering red-coats, that would burn a peaceful town!
They are marching, stern and solemn; we can see each massive column
As they near the naked earth-mound with the slanting walls
so steep.
Have our soldiers got faint-hearted, and in noiseless haste
departed?
Are they panic-struck and helpless? Are they palsied or asleep?

Now! the walls they're almost under! scarce a rod the foes asunder!
Not a firelock flashed against them! up the earthwork they
will swarm!
But the words have scarce been spoken, when the ominous
calm is broken,
And a bellowing crash has emptied all the vengeance of the storm!

So again, with murderous slaughter, pelted backward to the water,
Fly Pigot's running heroes and the frightened braves of Howe;
And we shout, "At last they're done for, it's their barges they
have run for:
They are beaten, beaten, beaten; and the battle's over now! "

And we looked, poor timid creatures, on the rough old soldier's
features,
Our lips afraid to question, but he knew what we would ask:
"Not sure," he said; "keep quiet,--once more, I guess, they'll
try it--
Here's damnation to the cut-throats! " then he handed me his flask,

Saying, "Gal, you're looking shaky; have a drop of old Jamaiky:
I'm afraid there'll be more trouble afore this job is done;"
So I took one scorching swallow; dreadful faint I felt and hollow,
Standing there from early morning when the firing was begun.

All through those hours of trial I had watched a calm clock dial,
As the hands kept creeping, creeping,--they were creeping
round to four,
When the old man said, "They're forming with their bayonets
fixed for storming:
It's the death grip that's a coming,--they will try the works
once more. "

With brazen trumpets blaring, the flames behind them glaring,
The deadly wall before them, in close array they come;
Still onward, upward toiling, like a dragon's fold uncoiling--
Like the rattlesnake's shrill warning the reverberating drum!

Over heaps all torn and gory--shall I tell the fearful story,
How they surged above the breastwork, as a sea breaks over a deck;
How, driven, yet scarce defeated, our worn-out men retreated,
With their powder-horns all emptied, like the swimmers from a wreck?