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Page 71
By all we hope, by all we love,
Close the ranks! Close up the ranks!
By home on earth, by Heaven above,
Close the ranks! Close up the ranks!
By all the tears, and heart's blood shed,
By all our hosts of martyred dead,
We'll conquer, or we'll share their bed.
Close the ranks! Close up the ranks!
The front may fall, the rear succeed,
Close the ranks! Close up the ranks!
We smile in triumph as we bleed,
Close the ranks! Close up the ranks!
Our Southern Cross above us waves,
Long shall it bless the sacred graves
Of those who died, but were not slaves.
Close the ranks! Close up the ranks!
The Sea-Kings of the South.
By Edward C. Bruce, of Winchester, Va.
Full many have sung of the victories our warriors have won,
From Bethel, by the eastern tide, to sunny Galveston,
On fair Potomac's classic shore, by sweeping Tennessee,
Hill, rock, and river shall tell forever the vengeance of the free.
The air still rings with the cannon-shot, with battle's breath is warm;
Still on the hills their swords have saved our legions wheel and form;
And Johnston, Beauregard, and Lee, with all their gallant train,
Wait yet at their head, in silence dread, the hour to charge again.
But a ruggeder field than the mountain-side--a broader field than the
plain,
Is spread for the fight in the stormy wave and the globe-embracing main,
'Tis there the keel of the goodly ship must trace the fate of the land,
For the name ye write in the sea-foam white shall first and longest stand.
For centuries on centuries, since first the hallowed tree
Was launched by the lone mariner on some primeval sea,
No stouter stuff than the heart of oak, or tough elastic pine,
Had floated beyond the shallow shoal to pass the burning Line.
The Naiad and the Dryad met in billow and in spar;
The forest fought at Salamis, the grove at Trafalgar.
Old Tubalcain had sweated amain to forge the brand and ball;
But failed to frame the mighty hull that held enfortressed all.
Six thousand years had waited for our gallant tars to show
That iron was to ride the wave and timber sink below.
The waters bland that welcomed first the white man to our shore,
Columbus, of an iron world, the brave Buchanan bore.
Not gun for gun, but thirty to one, the odds he had to meet!
One craft, untried of wind or tide, to beard a haughty fleet!
Above her shattered relics now the billows break and pour;
But the glory of that wondrous day shall be hers for evermore.
See yonder speck on the mist afar, as dim as in a dream!
Anear it speeds, there are masts like reeds and a tossing plume of steam!
Fleet, fierce, and gaunt, with bows aslant, she dashes proudly on,
Whence and whither, her prey to gather, the foe shall learn anon.
Oh, broad and green is her hunting-park, and plentiful the game!
From the restless bay of old Biscay to the Carib' sea she came.
The catchers of the whale she caught; swift _Ariel_ overhauled;
And made _Hatteras_ know the hardest _blow_ that ever a tar
appalled.
She bears the name of a noble State, and sooth she bears it well.
To us she hath made it a word of pride, to the Northern ear a knell.
To the Puritan in the busy mart, the Puritan on his deck,
With "Alabama" visions start of ruin, woe, and wreck.
In vain his lubberly squadrons round her magic pathway swoop--
Admiral, captain, commodore, in gunboat, frigate, sloop.
Save to snatch a prize, or a foe chastise, as their feeble art she foils,
She will scorn a point from her course to veer, to baffle all their toils.
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