S. C. Mercer

“ Where the strains of the flute and the plaintive guitar
Are echoed each night ’neath the glow of the star,
Where the days glide as smooth as the waves of the river,
And swift as the shaft from an Indian quiver?
Oh, Heaven has showered with a bountiful hand
All, all that is lovely and gorgeous and grand
On the Rhine’s noble valley, that beautiful land,
Yet alas!—for the tale I am going to tell
Is as sad as the chime of a funeral bell,
And oft as they pause at their leisure to listen,
The tear on the pale cheek of beauty will glisten. ”

“ A heart so true and innocent, a form so young and fair!
I saw thy lily hands crossed on thy snowy winding sheet,
But thy soul was by the shining throne, upon the golden street.
But oh, thy gentle voice on earth can make no music now,
And in the tomb the funeral dust is gathered on thy brow.
What now is left to me? To muse upon the past with pain
While the quivering pulse is throbbing like a death knell on my brain.
I am like one shipwrecked upon some bleak and lonely shore,
With not a voice to greet his ear except the billows’ roar ”

“ We studied our tasks together till our aims and sympathies seemed to be one. The horrid war-bugle sounded; the dismal drum beat; the beardless boy then rushed from my arms to throw himself into the tumult of battle. Suddenly, while waiting on the wounded in the house of torture, I came upon the lost one, mangled and bleeding. He gasps and dies in my arms without recognition! Mother of Sorrows, whose loving heart was pierced with woe as with a sword under the cross of thy Son, give thy divine sympathy to this heart so bereaved, crushed, and desolate! ”

“ I soar aloft among the stars, inhaling the aroma
Of the silver songs of Florence and Madrid’s “La Paloma,”
And “Love Me and the World is Mine” in melody divine
Breathes from Gerardi’s harp-strings like bouquet of Roman wine.
And Weber’s “Invitation”—he pours it like old wine—
“Come right on in, oh stranger! the water’s very fine!”
And oh! my willing soul would stay ’mid girls and song like this
And dream and sigh itself away in everlasting bliss. ”

“ Who sits on the throne with white radiance burning—
In whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning.
Fallen, fallen, is the storm-shattered oak of the South;
Fallen, fallen, is the strong, stately pine of the North;
One combatant loses, another one wins—
God have mercy on both and forgive them their sins.
And if a man conquer, or if he should lose,
’Tis naught if the Great Judge His mercy refuse.
And now, all unheeding earth’s praises or blame,
Thy two sons, Kentucky, repose in their fame. ”

“ Of old Kentucky Home.
The New South wakes! the New South shakes
The dew-drops from her mane,
For idle grief brings no relief,
The past comes not again;
To manly hearts and patient souls
Heaven sanctifies each loss;
Two angels, Toil and Patience, bear
To Heaven the Southern Cross.
New South! New South! unseal thy mouth,
Thy golden age is come—
Invention’s soaring harmony
And labor’s busy hum.
The Old South dies; with beaming eyes
The New South hastens in;
So boyhood’s toys are cast aside
When manhood’s deeds begin. ”

“ The widow’s tears shall quench her cottage fire,
The soldier’s orphan moan his second sire.
There need no glittering trappings of the tomb,
No martial dirge, nor hearse with nodding plume,
To tell their grief; but words devoid of art
Show how this stroke has pierced the Nation’s heart.
Precious the tears shall be the Nation weeps,
And sacred be the sod where Lincoln sleeps.
His fame shall be the jewel of the West,
Like a rich pearl on Beauty’s throbbing breast. ”

“ The nightshade pours the blistering dews of death
What bloody phantom with a brow of wrath
Stalks in the van of our triumphal path,
And o’er our banners flings a funeral veil,
Till Heaven grows black and mortal cheeks grow pale?
’Twas in the halls of mirth, a gala night,
Bright lamps o’er joyful thousands shed their light,
The nation’s Father sat amid the throng,
Relaxed his brow and heard the festal song;
He dreams not of conspiracy, nor sees
Above his head the sword of Damocles;
Wide opes the sepulchre its marble jaws,
All nature seems to make a breathless pause ”

“ The ravished Genii of the waves
Repeat the story through the caves;
And far along the tuneful flood,
A never-ending multitude
Of echoing Ariels take their flight
Far down the dark aisles of the night.
If, when our throbbing hearts are still,
And pulseless lies the icy hand,
Reality should then fulfill
Our dreamings of a brighter land,
Then may the unfettered spirit’s ear,
In some supernal, sinless sphere,
Hear some immortal song like this
Float through the bowers of Paradise,
That bloom serene forever.
While wafted home to rest, we dream. ”

“ For the Judgment trump shall blow,
Its blast of joy or woe.
The nations of the dead shall rise
And the Lion of the Vatican shall waken.
Once in earth’s Gethsemane by all but God forsaken!
With glory crested on his head and splendor in his eyes,
The kingdoms gather round the great white throne
To hear the final sentence
Of all who seek or scorn repentance.
Long ere the dreadful conflagration
Which shall consume each nation,
Along each height or hollow shore,
Loud shall reverberate the roar
Which made the iron Bismarck bow
Before the Lion’s calm, majestic brow ”

“ For Freedom and Union and Southland they strike.
Grant, Meade, Lee and Thomas like Titans engage,
And the Lost Cause departs like a ghost from the stage.
’Tis past, like a dream of the dawning in air,
For thee, the world’s pageant of Vanity Fair.
All faded—those phantoms and dreams of the past,
And crepe ties the flag as it falls to the mast.{3}
The dirge wails its sorrow to dead ears in vain;
The pallbearers’ flag is the flag of the train,
The traveler’s baggage lies all in one chest,
Whose check is a coffin plate lettered “At Rest.” ”

“ When justice comes to claim her due;
Strange somethings of more frightful mien
Than mortal eye has ever seen.
O! sacred sleep, once more descend,
And seal these throbbing, aching eyes,
Thou art the sufferer’s truest friend,
And bringest balm from Paradise,
Distilled from groves which never cast
Their leaves from worm, or winter’s blast.
Hush!—’Twas as if some murmured strain,
Well known in childhood’s happy hours,
Came wafted o’er a desolate plain,
On winds impregnated with flowers,
And then they vanish—like the lambent light
That flashes through a tempest cloud at night
Lo! ”

“ At Hopkinsville.
Take courage, ye people of order and law,
Nor longer let Night Riders hold you in awe;
Though your crops be destroyed, your barns burnt in ashes,
Your women outraged, your backs scourged with lashes,
Take courage! Remember that God reigns on high
Who foredooms your tyrants ’neath His vengeance to die.
When bad men conspire, let all good men unite;
All crime must be conquered by organized Right. ”

“ And the pennons streamed gay o’er their Castles in Spain.
O Lulu, dear Lulu! magnificent belle—
Whose name is a charm and whose presence a spell,
Bright star ever shining in Memory’s stream,
You were gowned on that night in the very extreme
Of fashion, indeed quite a crinoline belle,
You spread yourself so, and you made such a swell,
Your dress circle being made after the pattern
Of the rings that the telescope shows around Saturn,
Not whalebone or cordage, but Carnegie’s best steel,
As when you dance with her next time you can feel. ”

“ Another milestone meets me, on Time’s weary road of woe,
And onward to the sea of Death, o’er rugged steeps I go;
Far in the West the setting sun in clouds is sinking fast,
And night o’ertakes me with its storms and madly howling blast.
Ah, there were days whose lapse was like the flow of summer waves
When June’s fresh roses stoop to kiss the murmuring stream that laves,
When gentle tones and loving eyes my boyish pastimes blest
And childhood’s every care was soothed upon a mother’s breast. ”

“ Till the judgment’s last trump sounds the ending of time.
The Christmas Eve bells were all ringing aloud,
When I dreamed that I saw on God’s bow in the cloud—
Its red like the rose dawn of Easter’s bright day;
Its blue like the love that abideth for aye;
Its gold the reflection of Paradise street;
Its white the effulgence of God’s mercy seat—
An Angel, calm, radiant, of presence august,
The great, golden balance of mercy adjust;
And millions of martyrs on battlefields slain,
Like the voice of the ocean, repeated the strain:
“O, States of the Union, all warfare shall cease ”

“ Like a beacon-fire burns in the temple of fame.
Weep, daughters of Mexico, for lover and spouse,
Hang crepe on the door of each desolate house,
Long, long shall the maidens of Anahuac mourn
For their fallen defenders who shall never return.
Once, in Senate encounter, in battle’s fierce brunt,
Thy plume, like Navarre’s, streamed full high in the front.
Thou wast once, like Scotch Bruce, of inflexible will,
Unyielding, though conquered, and resolute still.
In field or in council, with sword, tongue or pen,
The molder of ideas, the leader of men. ”

“ The amphitheatre’s thronged for a spectacle rare.
Ten sons of one mother contend for the prize
And a whirlwind of cheering ascends to the skies
’Tis surely a pity that horses and sheep,
Mules, poultry and swine the blue ribbon should keep,
O’er a highly bred strain of true women and men—
If degenerate men rule the State, pray what then?
On ten iron-gray horses they enter the ring,
Ten brothers as graceful as swallows on wing.
The crowd shouts and claps, for county and town
Loved their silver-haired mother, Rebecca Brown. ”

“ Face to face and sword to sword—
See the slave confront his lord;
Through the tumult the foam-covered charger is spurred,
And the shrieks of the wounded and dying are heard;
And the muskets and carbines are doubled and battered
And sabres and bayonets to atoms are scattered—
The command and the curse, and the groan and the yell,
Thunder up like the mad-bubbling cauldron of Hell. [B]
Eagles of victory, say, on which flag will you alight—
Confederate or Federal? Both deem their cause is right;
Never more fearless rivals grappled in mortal fight. ”

“ Unwarped by wrong, unspotted by a crime!
Oh, may the blooming vigor of thy youth
Ripen in wisdom, purity and truth.
Spare in thy flight the innocent and gay
And scatter pleasure’s garlands in their way;
Repress the insolence of lawless might,
And make the wrong submissive to the right;
Uphold the patriot and strike down the hand
That waves the traitor’s sword or treason’s brand
And with the hand of charity redress
Each form of human woe and wretchedness,
So that the annals of all coming time
Shall write thee as the Golden Age sublime. ”

“ The manes of the chargers like meteors streamed,
Like rainbows far-flashing the gay pennons gleamed;{2}
Like lightning from Heaven Davis brandished his sword
And fierce was the volley his riflemen poured;
They reel in their saddles, they topple and fall,
The flag of the cavalcade turns to a pall,
Its ghostly Commander is the skeleton Death—
The fair rose of Mexico shrinks in his breath.
They halt—they retreat—in wild tumult they run,
The eagle soars victor—Buena Vista is won. ”

“ Around the cross are clinging
With wooing and sweet singing
Of nightingale and turtle.
The frozen Arctic splinter
Shot from the bow of winter
Will lose its power to harm us,
While dreams of childhood’s Christmas,
’Twixt heaven and earth an isthmus,
In nightly visions charm us.
The angry gale may shatter
Sweet Cashmere’s rose and scatter
Its leaves o’er vale and river;
The Christmas flower shall thrive
As long as Love shall live,
Forever and forever!
{99}
TO THE SOLDIERS OF GENERAL DUMONT’S COMMAND. [E] Nashville, Tenn., 1862. ”

“ To mourn the dead made perfect with his God.
Yet mourn we not the statesman’s death alone,
His hearthstone’s glory far exceeds a throne.
Though crowned with civic honors is his name,
Husband and Father have a dearer fame;
Glory attends the leader to his rest,
But most she mourns the man who knew him best.
Nor swiftest wind, nor farthest ocean’s foam,
Visits a spot so dear to man as home ”

“ As the prism-banded bow of the sky stanched the flood
Its earth-child, the flag, ends the deluge of blood.
War’s death-dealing cloud has forever rolled by,
And Peace, with her olive branch, smiles from the sky
Forever is silenced dissension’s wild roar;
The demon of hate rends the Union no more. ”

“ Two children, Kentucky, who nursed at thy breast.{5}
Oh, Hardin and Christian, the homes of the great,
Forgetfulness veils, through the satire of fate,
While fame blazons far to the ends of the earth
The log huts which gave to your progeny birth.
The leaders of millions lie helpless and lone
As the soldiers who perished unnoticed, unknown.
Take them tenderly, dear Mother Earth, to thy breast,
To sleep in their “windowless palace of rest.”
I hear, as I stand, pressed with grief, by your graves,
A murmur, soft, strong, as of waves upon waves ”

“ When the Evening Star shines and the meteors glide
She counselled them thus as they knelt by her side:—
“Let no plausible white lie, for gain, soil your lips;
Let the dear sun of Truth be undimmed by eclipse.
God’s commandments be yours, for their number is Ten,
Obey them and be honored of God and of Men,
For ’tis better by far to be honest than rich,
And the King who is false finds his grave in a ditch;
His manhood’s secure in the armour of Truth
Who remembers his Creator in the days of his youth.”
Swift round the ring rode the Ten Brothers Brown,
Till the bugle sounds “Halt!” ”

“ Like all the rainbows since the flood, crushed in one grand confusion.
Gerardi’s high on Seelbach’s Roof, with harp and flute and fiddle;
Women divine crowd thickly round, and the devil’s in the middle.
Did you ever hear a harpist like the Florentine, pray tell me?
Like some sweet mocking-bird he soars, and his notes with rapture swell me.
The moon and stars shine bright aloft ”