"There was where the gunboats opened on the dark rebellious host;

And where Webster semicircled his last guns upon the

coast;

There were still the two log-houses, just the same, or else their ghost,

And the same old transport came and took me over, -or its ghost!

And the old field lay before me all deserted far and

wide;

There was where they fell on Prentiss, there McClernand met the tide;

There was where stern Sherman rallied, and where Hurlbut's heroes died,

Lower down, where Wallace charged them, and kept charging till he died.

"There was where Lew Wallace showed them he was of the canny kin,

There was where old Nelson thundered, and where Rousseau waded in;

There McCook sent 'em to breakfast, and we all began to win,

-

There was where the grape-shot took me, just as we began to win.

"Now, a shroud of snow and silence over everything was spread;

And but for this old blue mantle and the old hat on my head,

I should not have even doubted, to this moment, I

For my footsteps were as silent as the snow upon the dead!

"Death and silence! - Death and silence! all around me as I sped!

And behold, a mighty tower, as if builded to the dead, To the heaven of the heavens lifted up its mighty head, Till the Stars and Stripes of heaven all seemed waving from its head!

"Round and mighty-based it towered, — up into the

And I knew no mortal mason could have built a shaft

so bright;

For it shone like solid sunshine; and a winding-stair

of light

Wound around it and around it till it wound clear out

of sight!

“And, behold, as I approached it, with a rapt and dazzled stare,

Thinking that I saw old comrades just ascending the great stair,

Suddenly the solemn challenge broke of Halt, and who goes there!'

'I'm a friend,' I said, 'if you are.'

sir, to the stair!'

'Then advance,

"I advanced! That sentry, Doctor, was Elijah Ballantyne!

First of all to fall on Monday, after we had formed the

line!

'Welcome, my old Sergeant, welcome! Welcome by that countersign!'

And he pointed to the scar there, under this old cloak of mine!

"As he grasped my hand, I shuddered, thinking only of the grave;

But he smiled and pointed upward with a bright and bloodless glaive;

'That's the way, sir, to head-quarters.' 'What headquarters?' 'Of the brave.'

'But the great tower?'

That,' he answered, 'is

the way, sir, of the brave!'

"Then a sudden shame came o'er me, at his uniform of light;

At my own so old and tattered, and at his so new and

bright:

'Ah!' said he, 'you have forgotten the new uniform to-night,

Hurry back, for you must be here at just twelve o'clock to-night!'

"And the next thing I remember, you were sitting there, and I

Doctor, did you hear a footstep? Hark! - God bless you all! Good by!

Doctor, please to give my musket and my knapsack,

when I die,

To my son - my son that 's coming,

here till I die!

he won't get

'Tell him his old father blessed him as he never did

And to carry that old musket Hark! a knock is

at the door!

Till the Union"-See! it opens! "Father! Father! speak once more!”

"Bless you!" gasped the old, gray Sergeant, and he lay and said no more!

Forceythe Willson.

Sierra Madre, New Mexico Ter.

ON THE SUMMIT OF THE SIERRA MADRE.

ERCHED like an eagle on this kingly height,

PERCHE

That towers toward heaven above all neighboring heights,

Owning no mightier but the King of kings,

I look abroad on what seems boundless space,
And feel in every nerve and pulsing vein
A deep thrill of my immortality.

How desolate is all around! No tree,

Or shrub, or blade, or blossom ever springs
Amid these bald and blackened rocks; no wing
Save the fell vulture's ever fans the thin

And solemn atmosphere; no rain e'er falls
From passing clouds, for this stupendous peak
Is lifted far above the summer storm,

Its thunders and its lightnings. As I hold

Strange converse with the genius of the place,
I feel as if I were a demigod,

And waves of thought seem beating on my soul
As ocean billows on a rocky shore

O'erstrown with mouldering wrecks.

I look abroad,

And to my eyes the whole world seems unrolled
As 't were an open scroll. The beautiful,
Grand, and majestic, near and far, are blent
Like colors in the bow upon the cloud.
Illimitable plains, with myriad flowers,

White, blue, and crimson, like our country's flag;
The green of ancient forests, like the green
Of the old ocean wrinkled by the winds;
Cities and towns, dim and mysterious,

Like something pictured in the dreams of sleep;
A hundred streams, with all their wealth of isles,
Some bright and clear, and some with gauze-like mists
Half veiled like beauty's cheek; tall mountain-chains,
Stretching afar to the horizon's verge,

With an intenser blue than that of heaven,
Forever beckoning to the human soul
To fly from pinnacle to pinnacle

Like an exulting storm-bird: these, all these,
Sink deep into my spirit like a spell

From God's own spirit, and I can but bow
To Nature's awful majesty, and weep

As if my head were waters.

Fare thee well,

Old peak, bold monarch of the subject clouds,
That crouch in reverence at thy feet; I go