And when the cannon-mouthings loud Heave in wild wreaths the battle-shroud, And gory sabres rise and fall,

Like shoots of flame on midnight's pall! There shall thy victor-glances glow,

And cowering foes shall shrink beneath,
Each gallant arm that strikes below,
The lovely messenger of death.

Flag of the seas! on ocean's wave
Thy star shall glitter o'er the brave;
When Death, careering on the gale,
Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail,
And frighted waves rush wildly back
Before the broad-side's reeling rack,
The dying wanderer of the sea

Shall look, at once, to heaven and thee,
And smile, to see thy splendors fly,

In triumph, o'er his closing eye.

Flag of the free heart's hope and home,

By angel hands to valor given!

Thy stars have lit the welkin dome,

And all thy hues were born in heaven! [And fixed as yonder orb divine,

That saw thy bannered blaze unfurled, Shall thy proud stars resplendent shine, The guard and glory of the world.] Forever float that standard sheet!

Where breathes the foe but falls before us?

With Freedom's soil beneath our feet,

And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us!

JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE.

Sept. 16, 1830.

OLD IRONSIDES.

The frigate Constitution was launched in 1797, and took part in the war with Tripoli in 1804. In 1812 she captured the British Guerrière on August 19th, and the British Java on December 29th. After the war she served as a training ship. In 1830 it was proposed to break her up, which called forth this indignant poem. In 1876 she was refitted, and in 1878 she took over the American exhibits to the Paris Exhibition. She now lies out of commission in Rotten Row, at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

Y, tear her tattered ensign down!

Long has it waved on high,

And many an eye has danced to see
That banner in the sky;

Beneath it rung the battle shout,

And burst the cannon's roar;

The meteor of the ocean air

Shall sweep the clouds no more!

Her deck, once red with heroes' blood,
Where knelt the vanquished foe,

When winds were hurrying o'er the flood

And waves were white below,

No more shall feel the victor's tread,

Or know the conquered knee;

The harpies of the shore shall pluck
The eagle of the sea!

Oh, better that her shattered hulk
Should sink beneath the wave;
Her thunders shook the mighty deep,
And there should be her grave;
Nail to the mast her holy flag,

Set every threadbare sail,

And give her to the God of storms,

The lightning and the gale!

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

Sept. 19-24, 1846.

WE

MONTEREY.

The assaulting American army at the attack on Monterey
numbered six thousand six hundred and twenty-five;
the defeated Mexicans were about ten thousand.

E were not many- we who stood
Before the iron sleet that day;

Yet many a gallant spirit would
Give half his years if but he could

Have with us been at Monterey.

Now here, now there, the shot it hailed
In deadly drifts of fiery spray,

Yet not a single soldier quailed

When wounded comrades round them wailed

Their dying shout at Monterey.

And on still on our column kept,

Through walls of flame, its withering way;

Where fell the dead, the living stept,

Still charging on the guns which swept
The slippery streets of Monterey.