Classic Poem

Strike, strike, brave drum, thy startling note,
Strain, bugle, strain thy brazen throat;
Up, warriors, up! your country calls,
Up, thickly man your castle walls!
Let floods of flame dark night illume,
Dread foemen lurk amid the gloom.

With stealthy tread and pent-up breath,
The close-wedged ranks stride o'er the heath,
The rock they climb, the walls they scale,
Shots rattle thick and fleet as hail:
To arms! To arms! hoarse voices call,
In vain;—the assailants man the wall.

A thousand heroes start from sleep,
They rush to arms 'mid darkness deep,
Each musket raised with deadly aim,
Now vomits sheets of death-gorged flame;
And lights with fiery red the night,
That shrinking shuns the bloody sight.

Anon, anon, steel pressed to steel,
Down, down, the stricken warriors reel;
Again, again, heart, hand, and eye,
Fierce struggle for the mastery,
And dying shrieks and war-shouts tell
The horrors of a battle-hell.

The sun now gleams o'er tower and height,
And silence comes with morning light,
Victor and vanquished, which are they?
Alas! in yonder castle grey,
But few survive of either host
To tell the keep was kept or lost.