University of Virginia Library

Let them sleep,
And I will look on them. All the home-joys
Come fluttering their warm welcome to my soul,
Joys all too long estranged, which, in the heat
And hurry of war, draining the heart-blood dry,
Seemed sad and distant as the pitying moon
To him who sees her as the ship goes down
Amid the boiling surf, lashed white with rage,
And recollects the dewy tender time
Of tears and kisses underneath her beams
With the sole maid he loves. Ah! I have stood,
Falchion in hand, and stayed the deadly stroke,
Thinking of wives far off, and helpless babes,
Dreading to put the hated name of death
Into their innocent prattle;—turned away,
Lest haply some small childish voice should say,
In aftertimes, with wonder in its eyes,
“My father's dead, slain by the great Purmar,
Who made so many orphans long ago!”

Down the red path of slaughter, littered with death,
Thou and thy little ones came hand in hand
With most melodious steps, and healed the wounds
Of ghastliest anarchy, and sounds of woe.
In the war-fever, when the blood was high,
And all the shadowy halls of sleep ran red
With gore and carnage—rang with fighting men,
And the strong horror of the tug and strife,
Ye came upon me like the breath of spring,
Murmuring along the grass and early leaves,
And flowers sprang up with deep ambrosial cups,
Full of cool nectar and delicious dew.

While I was wounded, lying in my tent,
The noise of battle clanging in my ears,
A feverish sleep came o'er me; and I stood
Hard by a mountain, black and thunderous,
Which, as I gazed upon it, cracked i' the midst,
Broke into hollow caverns, jagged and dark,
Whence came a noise as of a gathering host
Of trampling millions from the nether world,
That boomed and thundered through the black abyss,
Until at last the hideous van appeared:—
They were the dead of countless centuries
Who had been slain in battle. On they came
With all their gaping wounds shedding new blood,
And the white woe of deadliest agony
Dashed on their upturned faces, on the which
The moon, hanging between two thunder-clouds,
Shed pallid lustres, weird, and sharp, and wan.
Eagerly upward welled the wondrous waves
Of this great human sea; and all that came
Were as the waters in a sandy creek
To the on-coming ocean still behind,
Its mighty volume rolling thunderous,
And wide, and dark, with slow and sullen swell.
Thousands on thousands wound from out the gloom,
Crowding on tumbling thousands. Heads came up
Livid and ghastly through the welling wounds
Of the tormented mountain, gleaming white,
Followed by countless myriads, till the plain
Ran o'er and weltered with the thickening throng,
And all the little hills grew black with forms
That huddled and hasted from the crushing crowds
That choked the hidden hollows lying between.
Long dreary hours, all through that horrible night,
The endless millions rolled from out the mouths
Of the black caverns, waves still following waves
Exhaustless, dark, and dreadful, till the dawn
Of a drear day, that day was none, broke white
And sad as a last death-smile on the hills;
And still the hurrying crowds came hastening on,
Millions on millions, hour by hour they came:
And dim and far as the extremest verge
Of the horizon, where the faint blue hills
Melted into the pallor of the heavens,
Wended the fearful throng, and then went down
Into some nether world beyond my ken.
Night came again with torrents of woeful rain,
And winds that whistled through the ghastly gloom;
And still the unending millions came up
Through the black ragged fissures, till the day
Once more came tossing-troubled on the hills,
Dashing white billows of glory in his path,
That turned to pallors of death upon their brows;
And through that day the millions wended on
O'er plain and mountain, out into the east,
Till night dropped down with thunder in her hand,
And forked lightnings played round her zone,
That shot upon the dazeless eyes of all
That ever-gathering multitude, that turned
Their scatheless sockets up to the blue blaze
With melancholy meaning:—On, and on,
For ever and for ever came the crowds,
Till the soul sickened:—On and on,
Millions on millions, crowds on crushing crowds,
For ever and for ever.

Till at last,
Just as the day broke with an angry blaze
Over the edges of the mountain peaks,
Out of that black and weltering abyss,
Out of that ghastly death-throng glode, you four—
Thou and thy children—meekly, silently,
With balm and healing, and with calm love-looks;
And straightway all the scene was changed. I lay
Beneath the quiet boom of summer boughs,
Dallying softly with the teasing winds,
That rippled up among the shadowy leaves—
Still cool with night dews in the early dawn—
And shook down honey and odour. By my side
Sparkled a tiny river, where I slaked
The feverous thirst that burned within my blood;
And, looking on you all, ye seemed so near,
And yet so strangely far, so true and real,
And yet so evanescent, sweet, and dim—
Wrapped in dream-azures and in mists of sleep—
That, as I stretched my arms to clasp you all,
To fold you to my soothed and softened heart,
Four cloudy shapes passed by me, and I woke,
And heard the sword-blades ringing sharp and near,
And shouts and clamours of victory and defeat,
And all the fury of battle by my tent.

And now I see you all, so like my dreams,
But with no glances in your deep dark eyes
Looking afar; I touch you, and behold!
No cloudy phantom passes through my arms;
I press you to my heart, and do not wake
To wounds and agony, and sounds of war
Jangling dread arms for ever!

There they lie,
My innocent babes! all folded up in sleep
Silent and sweet as flowers; all their day-smiles
Hanging in rosy hues upon their cheeks,
All their day-laughter lying deep and warm
In silken dimples; all their daily tasks,
Their garland-gatherings in the empurpled woods,
Forgotten, or enacted o'er in dreams.
How sweet they look!—the two meek infant girls,
Each in her little nest, and the bright boy,
With merry thoughts shut up within the lids
Of his dark dreaming eyes, and laughing out
Of the rich reel of his ambrosial curls.

Oh! if we could but draw aside the veil
Which hangs between them and futurity,—
Could see the bright and dew-sprent path of youth
All through its many windings, and behold
The poisonous reptiles coiled amid its flowers,
And the grim company of beasts of prey
Lurking amid the thickets by the way,—
Could we behold the far-off ghostly shapes
Poising their poisoned barbs even as we speak,
And waiting in the mists of distant years
For the set time to flame before the eyes
Of their now slumbering victims,—could we see
The man and woman in the sleeping child,
Catch the wan woe-look on the budding cheek,
Hear the thick sighs of sorrow in the dark,
And read the history from this dawning time
When the young steps stumble through clumps of flowers,
And the young heart dances its fill of glee,
And the young soul wears all its gala-robes,
On through the distance, till the lone-path winds
Over the craggy heights that cut the feet,
And where, weary and wan, with garments soiled,
And hair dishevelled, through the wind and rain,
With red eyes blinded by the storms o' the world,
They go grief-laden past the hollow caves
Strewn o'er with bones, and stretch their woe-worn hands
Out towards the distant arches, lying low
And dim and dark, beyond the mountain-slopes,
Through which the weary walk to endless rest—
With what an agony of love we'd press
The little brows now lying milky white!
We should hear sorrow surging in each tone,
And hollow wails sounding through every laugh,
And every look would catch the haggard hue
Of passing suffering, every word would be
Symbolic of some agony to come,
And every childish antic seem to wave
Some grim old woe out of its cavern-hold;
And every innocent wile would be the dress
Wherein gaunt wretchedness was quaintly dight,
And every look a window where the face
Of some pale spectre came to sun itself.

But now they live, sweet in the present hour
As untouched roses cool with evening dew,
Reposing on the present, with no fear
Shooting athwart the heaven of their dreams,
And lying beautiful and hushed in sleep
As though each morrow were a festal morn,
And they its chosen actors.