I.—THE SOLDIER AND HIS BURDEN.
A PAUSE in the din of battle!
The denizens of Mount Airy and Chesnut Hill came crowding to their
doors and windows; the hilly street was occupied by anxious groups of
people, who conversed in low and whispered tones, with hurried gestures
and looks of surprise and fear. Yonder group who stand clustered in the
roadside!
A grey haired man with his ear inclined intently toward Germantown,
his hands outspread, and his trembling form bent with age. The maiden,
fair cheeked, red lipped, and blooming, clad in the peasant costume, the
tight boddice, the linsey skirt, the light 'kerchief thrown over the bosom.
Her ear is also inclined toward Germantown, and her small hands are involuntarily
crossed over her bosom, that heaves and throbs into view.
The matron, calm, self possessed, and placid, little children clinging to
the skirt of her dress, her wifely cap flung carelessly on her head, with
hair slightly touched with grey, while the sleeping babe nestles in her
bosom.
The boy, with the light flaxen hair, the ruddy cheeks, the merry blue
eye! He stands silent and motionless—he also listens!
You stand upon the height of Mount Airy, it is wearing towards noon,
yet gaze around you.
Above the mist is rising. Here and there an occasional sun gleam lights
the rolling clouds of mist, but the atmosphere wears a dull leaden hue, and
the vast horizon a look of solemnity and gloom.
Beneath and around sweep field and plain, buckwheat field, and sombre
woods, luxuriant orchards and fertile vallies, all seen in the intervals of the
white columns of the uprising mist.
The group clustered along the roadside of Mount Airy are still and silent.
Each heart is full, every ear absorbed in the effort of catching the slightest
sound from Germantown.
There is a strange silence upon the air. A moment ago, and far off
shouts broke on the ear, mingled with the thunder of cannon and the
shrieks of musquetry, the earth seemed to tremble, and far around the wide
horizon was agitated by a thousand echoes.
Now the scene is still as midnight. Not a sound, not a shout, not a distant
hurrah. The anxiety of the group upon the hill becomes absorbing
and painful. Looks of wonder at the sudden pause in the battle, flit from
face to face, and then low whispers are heard, and then comes another moment
of fearful suspense.
It is followed by a wild rushing sound to the south, like the shrieks of
the ocean waves, as they fill the hold of the foundering ship, while it sinks
far in the loneliness of the seas.
Then a pause, and again that unknown sound, and then the tramp of ten
thousand footsteps, mingled with a wild and indistinct murmur.—Tramp,
tramp, tramp, the air is filled with the sound, and then distinct voices break
upon the air, and the clatter of arms is borne on the breeze.
The boy turns to his mother, and asks her who has gained the day?
Every heart feels vividly that the battle is now over, that the account of
blood is near its close, that the appeal to the God of battles has been made.
The mother turns her tearful eyes to the south—she cannot answer the
question. The old man, awaking from a reverie, turns suddenly to the
maiden, and clasps her arm with his trembling hands. His lips move, but
his tongue is unable to syllable a sound. His suspense is fearful. He
flings a trembling hand southward, and speaks his question with the gesture
of age.
The battle, the battle, how goes the battle?
And as he makes the gesture, the figure of a soldier is seen rushing from
the mist in the valley below, he comes speeding round the bend of the road,
he ascends the hill, but his steps totter, and he staggers to and fro like a
drunken man.
He bears a burden on his shoulders—is it the plunder of the fight, is it
spoil gathered from the ranks of the dead?
No—no. He bears an aged man on his shoulders, he grasps the aged
form with his trembling arms, and with an unsteady step nears the group
on the hill top.
The old man's grey hairs are waving in the breeze, and his extended
hand grasps a broken bayonet, which he raises on high with a maniac
gesture.
The soldier and the veteran he bears upon his shoulders, are clad in the
blue hunting shirt, torn and tattered and stained with blood, it is true, but
still you can recognize the uniform of the Revolution.
The tottering soldier nears the group, he lays the aged veteran down by
the roadside, and then looks around with a ghastly face and a rolling eye.
There is blood dripping from his attire, his face is begrimed with powder,
and spotted with crimson drops. He glances wildly around, and then
kneeling on the sod he takes the hands of the aged man in his own, and
raises his head upon his knee.
The battle, the battle, how goes the battle?
The group cluster round as they shriek the question.
The young Continental makes no reply, but gazing upon the face of the
dying veteran, wipes the beaded drops of blood from his forehead.
“Comrade,” shrieks the veteran, “raise me on my feet, and wipe the
blood from my eyes. I would see him once again!”
He is raised upon his feet, the blood is wiped from his eyes.
“I see—I see—it is he—it is Washington! Yonder—yonder—I see
his sword—and Antony Wayne,—raise me higher, comrade,—all is getting
dark—I would see—Mad Antony!”
Did you ever see a picture that made your heart throb, and your eyes
grow blind with tears?
Here is one.
The roadside, the group clustered in front of Allen's house, which rises
massive and solemn in the background. The young soldier, all weak and
trembling from loss of blood, raising the grey haired veteran in his arms,
placing his face toward Germantown, while the wrinkled features light up
with a sudden gleam, and waving his broken bayonet before his eyes, he
looks toward the scene of the late fight.
The bystanders, spectators of this scene. The matron gazing anxiously
upon the old man's face, her eyes swimming in tears, the ruddy cheeked
boy holding one hand of the dying veteran, the youthful maiden, all blossom
and innocence, standing slightly apart, with the ancient man in peasant's
attire, gazing vacantly around as he grasps her arm.
“Lift me, comrade—higher, higher— I see him—I see Mad Antony!
Wipe the blood from my eyes, comrade, for it darkens my sight—it is dark,
it is dark!”
And the young soldier held in his arms a lifeless corse. The old veteran
was dead. He had fought his last fight, fired his last shot, shouted the
name of Mad Antony for the last time, and yet his withered hand clenched,
with the tightness of death, the broken bayonet.
The battle, the battle, how goes the battle?
As the thrilling question again rung in his ears, the young Continental
turned to the group, smiled ghastily and then flung his wounded arm to the
south.
“Lost!” he shrieked, and rushed on his way like one bereft of his
senses. He had not gone ten steps, when he bit the dust of the roadside,
and lay extended in the face of day a lifeless corse.
The eyes of the group were now fixed upon the valley below.
