Yet how could we mourn, when each drum's muffled strain
Told of foemen hurled back in disorder,
When we knew the North reaped her rich harvest
Unharmed by a foe on her border!
JOHN BURNS OF GETTYSBURG.
[A Union officer who was with the Eleventh Corps in the battle of Gettysburg says: "During the first day's fight an old man in a swallow-tailed coat and battered cylinder hat came stalking across the fields from the town, and made his appearance at Colonel Stone's position. With a musket in his hand and ammunition in his pocket, this venerable citizen asked Colonel Wister's permission to fight. Wister directed him to go over to the Iron Brigade, where he would be sheltered by the woods; but the old man insisted on going forward to the skirmish-line. He was allowed to do so, and continued firing until the skirmishers retired, when he was the last man to leave. He afterward fought with the Iron Brigade, where he was three times wounded. This patriotic and heroic citizen was Constable John Burns of Gettysburg."]
HAVE you heard the story that gossips tell
Of Burns of Gettysburg ?— No? Ah, well:
Brief is the glory that hero earns,
Briefer the story of poor John Burns;
He was the fellow who won renown-
The only man who didn't back down
When the rebels rode through his native town; But held his own in the fight next day,
When all his townsfolk ran away.
That was in July, sixty-three,—
The very day that General Lee,
Flower of Southern chivalry,
Baffled and beaten, backward reeled
From a stubborn Meade and a barren field.
I might tell how, but the day before,
John Burns stood at his cottage-door,
Looking down the village street,
Where, in the shade of his peaceful vine,
He heard the low of his gathered kine,
And felt their breath with incense sweet;
Or, I might say, when the sunset burned
The old farm gable, he thought it turned
The milk that fell like a babbling flood
Into the milk-pail, red as blood;
Or, how he fancied the hum of bees
Were bullets buzzing among the trees.
But all such fanciful thoughts as these
Were strange to a practical man like Burns,
Who minded only his own concerns,
Troubled no more by fancies fine
Than one of his calm-eyed, long-tailed kine,-
Quite old-fashioned and matter-of-fact,
Slow to argue, but quick to act.
That was the reason, as some folk say,
He fought so well on that terrible day.
And it was terrible. On the right
Raged for hours the heady fight,
Thundered the battery's double bass-
Difficult music for men to face;
While on the left-where now the graves
Undulate like the living waves
That all the day unceasing swept
Up to the pits the rebels kept-
Round-shot ploughed the upland glades,
Sown with bullets, reaped with blades;
Shattered fences here and there,
Tossed their splinters in the air;
The very trees were stripped and bare;
The barns that once held yellow grain
Were heaped with harvests of the slain;
The cattle bellowed on the plain,
The turkeys screamed with might and main,
And brooding barn-fowl left their rest
With strange shells bursting in each nest.
Just where the tide of battle turns,
Erect and lonely, stood old John Burns.
How do you think the man was dressed?
He wore an ancient, long buff vest,
Yellow as saffron-but his best;
And buttoned over his manly breast
Was a bright blue coat with a rolling collar,
And large gilt buttons-size of a dollar,-
With tails that the country-folk called "swaller.”
He wore a broad-brimmed, bell-crowned hat,
White as the locks on which it sat.
Never had such a sight been seen
For forty years on the village green,
Since old John Burns was a country beau,
And went to the "quiltings" long ago.
Close at his elbows all that day
Veterans of the Peninsula,
Sunburnt and bearded, charged away;
And striplings, downy of lip and chin,-
Clerks that the Home-Guard mustered in,—
Glanced, as they passed, at the hat he wore,
Then at the rifle his right hand bore;
And hailed him, from out their youthful lore,
With scraps of a slangy répertoire:
"How are you, White Hat?" "Put her through !"
"Your head's level!" and "Bully for you!"
Called him, 'Daddy,"-begged he'd disclose
The name of the tailor who made his clothes,
And what was the value he set on those;
While Burns, unmindful of jeer and scoff,
Stood there picking the rebels off—
With his long brown rifle and bell-crown hat,
And the swallow-tails they were laughing at.
'Twas but a moment, for that respect
Which clothes all courage their voices checked;
And something the wildest could understand
Spake in the old man's strong right hand,
And his corded throat, and the lurking frown
Of his eyebrows under his old bell-crown ;
Until, as they gazed, there crept an awe
Through the ranks in whispers, and some men saw,
In the antique vestments and long white hair,
The Past of the Nation in battle there;
And some of the soldiers since declare
That the gleam of his old white hat afar,
Like the crested plume of the brave Navarre,
That day was their oriflamme of war.
Thus raged the battle. You know the rest;
How the rebels, beaten, and backward pressed,
Broke at the final charge and ran.
At which John Burns-a practical man-
Shouldered his rifle, unbent his brows,
And then went back to his bees and cows.
That is the story of old John Burns ;
This is the moral the reader learns:
In fighting the battle, the question's whether
You'll show a hat that's white, or a feather.
READING THE LIST.
Is there any news of the war?" she said.
"Only a list of the wounded and dead,"
Was the man's reply,
Without lifting his eye
To the face of the woman standing by.
""Tis the very thing I want," she said;
"Read me a list of the wounded and dead."
He read the list-'twas a sad array
Of the wounded and killed in the fatal fray.
In the very midst, was a pause to tell
Of a gallant youth who fought so well
That his comrades asked: "Who is he, pray?"
"The only son of the Widow Gray,"
Was the proud reply
Of his Captain nigh..
What ails the woman standing near?
Her face has the ashen hue of fear!
"Well, well, read on; is he wounded? Quick! O God! but my heart is sorrow-sick!
Is he wounded ?" 'No; he fell, they say,
Killed outright on that fatal day!”
But see, the woman has swooned away!
Sadly she opened her eyes to the light;
Slowly recalled the events of the fight;
Faintly she murmured: “Killed outright!
It has cost me the life of my only son;
But the battle is fought, and the victory won;
The will of the Lord, let it be done!"
God pity the cheerless Widow Gray,
And send from the halls of eternal day
The light of His peace to illumine her way.
ANONYMOUS (Southern).
“CORPORAL GREEN!" the Orderly cried ;
Here!" was the answer, loud and clear,
From the lips of the soldier who stood near,-
And "Here!" was the word the next replied.
'Cyrus Drew!"-then a silence fell;
This time no answer followed the call; Only his rear-man had seen him fall: Killed or wounded-he could not tell.
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