You shudder as you think upon
The carnage of the grim report,
The desolation when we won
The inner trenches of the fort.
But there are deeds you may not know,
That scourge the pulses into strife;
Dark memories of deathless woe
Pointing the bayonet and knife.
The house is ashes where I dwelt,
Beyond the mighty inland sea;
The tombstones shattered where I knelt,
By that old church at Point Coupee.
The Yankee fiends that came with fire,
Camped on the consecrated sod,
And trampled in the dust and mire
The Holy Eucharist of God!
The spot where darling mother sleeps, Beneath the glimpse of yon sad moon, Is crushed, with splintered marble heaps, To stall the horse of some dragoon.
God! when I ponder that black day
It makes my frantic spirit wince;
I marched--with Longstreet-far away,
But have beheld the ravage since.
The tears are hot upon my face,
When thinking what black fate befell
The only sister of our race-
A thing too horrible to tell.
They say, that ere her senses fled,
She rescue of her brothers cried;
Then feebly bowed her stricken head,
Too pure to live thus-so she died!
Two of those brothers heard no plea;
With their proud hearts forever still-
John, shrouded by the Tennessee,
And Arthur there at Malvern Hill.
But I have heard it everywhere,
Vibrating like a passing knell;
'Tis as perpetual as the air,
And solemn as a funeral bell.
By scorched lagoon and murky swamp
My wrath was never in the lurch;
I've killed the picket in the camp,
And many a pilot on his perch.
With steady rifle, sharpened brand,
A week ago upon my steed,
With Forrest and his warrior band,
I made the hell-hounds writhe and bleed.
You should have seen our leader go
Upon the battle's burning marge,
Swooping like falcon on the foe,
Heading the gray-lines iron charge.
All outcasts, from our ruined marts,
We heard th' undying serpent hiss,
And in the desert of our hearts
The fatal spell of Nemesis.
The Southern yell rang loud and high
The moment that we thundered in,
Smiting the demons hip and thigh,
Cleaving them to the very chin.
My right arm bared for fiercer play,
The left one held the rein in slack;
In all the fury of the fray
I sought the white man, not the black.
The dabbled clots of brain and gore
Across the swirling sabres ran;
To me each brutal vision bore
The front of one accursed man.
Throbbing along the frenzied vein
My blood seemed kindling into song-
The death dirge of the sacred slain,
The slogan of immortal wrong.
It glared athwart the dripping glaves,
It blazed in each avenging eye-
The thought of desecrated graves,
And some lone sister's desperate cry!
BY W. WINSTON FONTAINE, VIRGINIA.
WHEN golden lines of evening light
Along the tops of mountains rest;
When summer winds in gentle flight
With pinions touch the river's breast;
When curling smoke in fleecy wreaths
Winds upward through the lucid air;
When westward some white cloud-sail heaves,
There often walks a lady fair.
A lady fair, with pensive eyes--
With trace of pain upon her brow.
The lilies hear grief-laden sighs;
The waters listen in their flow.
The lady walks the river shore,
Her vision in the distance dwells.
Why lonely mourns the maiden pure?
Her chamber wall the secret tells!
A portrait hangs upon the wall:
A soldier in Confederate gray-
A youthful figure, graceful, tall—
A face the foeman shuns in fray;
A face the infant fondly loves;-
An eye, wherein the eagle's glance
Melts in the softness of the dove's,
And all the warmer feelings dance.
There hangs above the warrior's head
A knightly sword with many a dent,
A colonel's sash, a banner red,
By sabre-stroke and bullet rent.
Upon the banner's silken fold
Gleams, first Manassas' field of fame-
And many another battle bold,
With Petersburg's illustrious name.
When on the April's breeze there rang
The cheering note of bugle wild,
A score of sabres fiercely sang-
And proud Virginia lost a child!
They bore him to his plighted bride
Upon the flag her fingers wrought!
No braver son for freedom died!
In holier cause no warrior fought!
RICHMOND ENQUIRER.
Butler's Proclamation.
"It is ordered that hereafter when any female shall, by word, ges ture, or movement, insult or show contempt for any officer or soldier of the United States, she shall be regarded and held liable to be treated as a woman of the town, plying her vocation."-BUTLER'S ORDER AT NEW ORLEANS.
AYE! drop the treacherous mask! throw by
The cloak which veiled thine instincts fell,
Stand forth thou base incarnate lie,
Stamped with the signet brand of hell.
At last we view thee as thou art—
A trickster with a demon's heart,
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