“ Flag of the South! aye, fling its folds
Upon the kindred breeze;
Emblem of dread to tyrant holds—
Of freedom on the seas.
[Pg 187] Forever may its stars and stripes
In cloudless glory wave;
Red, white, and blue—eternal types
Of nations free and brave!
States of the South! the patriot’s boast!
Here equal laws have sway;
Nor tyrant lord, nor despot host,
Upon the weak may prey.
Then let them rule from sea to sea,
And crown the queenly isle—
Union of love and liberty,
’Neath Heaven’s approving smile!
God of the South! protect this land
From false and open foes! ”

“ And let no feuds divide you;
On tyrants pour your hate,
And common vengeance guide you.
Our foes should feel proud freemen’s steel,
For freemen’s rights contending;
Where’er they die, there let them lie,
To dust in scorn descending.
Thus may each traitor fall
Who dare as foe invade us;
Eternal fame to all
Who shall in battle aid us!
Proud land! shall she invoke
Another’s hand to right her?
No! her own avenging stroke
Shall backward roll the smiter.
Ye tyrant band, with ropes of sand
Go bind the rushing river;
More weak and vain your cursèd chain,
While God is freedom’s giver. ”

“ How many a story of fame for us
They left: Would it not be a blame for us
If their memories part
From our land and heart,
And a wrong to them, and a shame for us?
No, no, no! they were brave for us,
[Pg 289] And bright were the lives they gave for us;
The land they struggled to save for us
Will not forget
Its warriors yet
Who sleep in so many a grave for us.
On many and many a plain for us
Their blood poured down all in vain for us,
Red, rich, and pure, like a rain for us;
They bleed—we weep,
We live—they sleep,
“All lost,” the only refrain for us. ”

“ Let them go, in God’s name, in defense of their fame,
Brave death at the cannon’s wide mouth;
Let them honor and save the land of the brave,
Plant Freedom’s bright flag in the South.
Let them go! While we weep, and lone vigils keep,
We will bless them, and fervently pray
To the God whom we trust, for our cause firm but just,
And our loved ones—the Ordered away.
When fierce battles storm, we will rise up each morn,
Teach our young sons the saber to wield:
Should their brave fathers die, we will arm them to fly
[Pg 36] And fill up the gap in the field. ”

“ March on! let every vale o’erflow with the invaders’ blood.
What! shall this groveling race, who cringe for gold,
Make laws for Southern men, on Southern soil?
Shall these degenerate hordes, to avarice sold,
Crush freedom’s sons, and Freedom’s altars spoil?
Great God! oh! by these iron-shackled hands,
Ne’er shall our necks beneath their yokes be led.
[Pg 218] Of despots such as these, shall Southern bands
Ne’er own the mastery, till every heart is dead.
To arms! sons of the South! Come like a mountain-flood;
March on! let every vale o’erflow with the invaders’ blood. ”

“ Can love be restored
To bosoms where only resentment may dwell;
Can peace upon earth be proclaimed by the sword,
[Pg 6] Or good-will among men be established by shell?
Shame! shame that the statesman and trickster, forsooth,
Should have for a crisis no other recourse,
Beneath the fair day-spring of Light and of Truth,
Than the old brutum fulmen of Tyranny,—Force.
From the holes where Fraud, Falsehood, and Hate slink away;
From the crypt in which Error lies buried in chains;
This foul apparition stalks forth to the day,
And would ravage the land which his presence profanes. ”

“ Single-handed in the fight,
Death-blows dealt the fierce marauder,
For his liberty and right;
Tho’ he fell beneath their thousands,
Who that covets not his fame?
Grand and glorious, brave and noble,
Henceforth shall be Jackson’s name.
Sons of freedom, can you linger
When you hear the battle’s roar,
Fondly dallying with your pleasures
When the foe is at your door?
Never! no! we fear no idlers,
“Death or freedom”’s now the cry,
’Till the stars and bars, triumphant,
Spread their folds to every eye.
Richmond Whig.
“CALL ALL! CALL ALL!”
BY “GEORGIA.”
Whoop! ”

“ Send forth a base and hireling band,
To desolate our happy land,
And make our Southern freemen cower.
To arms, to arms! each one,
The sword unsheathe, raise the gun,
Then on, rush on, ye brave and free,
To death or victory.
Now clouds of war begin to gather,
And black and murky is our sky—
Shall we submit—no, never, never!
Let death or freedom be our cry—
In Heaven’s justice firm relying,
We’ll nobly struggle to be free,
[Pg 171] And bravely gain our liberty,
Or die, our Northern foes defying. ”

“ Missouri is the pride of the nation,
The hope of the brave and the free;
The Confederacy will furnish the rations,
But the fighting is trusted to thee;
For, brave boys, your soil has been noted,
And your flag has been trusted to you;
For freedom you have not yet voted,
But you fight for the Red, White, and Blue.
Chorus—Three cheers, etc.
The Stars shall shine bright in the heaven,
But the Stripes should be trailed in the dust,
For they are no longer the sign of the haven
Of the brave, of the free, or the just ”

“ There’s many a grave in all the land,
And many a crucifix,
Which tells how that heroic band
[Pg 260] Stood firm in seventy-six—
Ye heroes of the deathless past,
Your glorious race is run,
But from your dust springs freemen’s trust,
And blows for sixty-one.
We build our altars where you lie,
On many a verdant sod,
With sabers pointing to the sky,
And sanctified of God;
The smoke shall rise from every pile,
Till Freedom’s cause is won,
And every mouth throughout the South
Shall shout for sixty-one! ”

“ And we strip from our flag every recusant star.
They have forced us to stand by our own Constitution,
To defend our lov’d homesteads, our altars and fires,
While they tamely submit to a tyrant’s pollution,
Beneath whose foul tread their own freedom expires.
Then up with the banner, its broad stripes wide flowing—
’Tis the emblem of Liberty—flag of the free;
Let it wave us to triumph, and every heart glowing,
Nerve each arm’s bravest blow for its lov’d Tennessee. ”

“ Their bosoms burn with fierce desires,
They thirst for victory.
’Tis not the love of bloody strife,
The horrid sacrifice of life,
But thoughts of mother, sister, wife,
That stir their manly hearts.
A sense of honor bids them go,
To meet a hireling, ruthless foe,
And deal in wrath the deadly blow
Which vengeance loud demands.
In freedom’s sacred cause they fight,
For Independence, Justice, Right,
And to resist a desperate might.
And by Manassas’ glorious name,
And by Missouri’s fields of fame,
We hear them swear, with one acclaim,
We’ll triumph or we’ll die! ”

“ We loved our banner while it waved
An emblem of our Union,
The fiercest danger we had braved
To guard that sweet communion.
But when it proved that “stripes” alone
Were for our sunny South,
And all the “stars” in triumph shone
Above the chilly North—
Then, not till then, our voices rose
In one tumultuous wave—
[Pg 178] We WILL the tyranny oppose,
Or find a bloody grave!
Another flag shall lead our hosts
To battle on the plain,
The “rebels” will defy your boasts,
And prove your sneering vain! ”

“ What! sons of the South! submit to be ruled
By the minions of Abraham Lincoln, the fool?
Our fair ones insulted—our wealth all controlled
By Yankees, free negroes, and every such tool!
Heaven forbid it! and arm us with might,
To drive back our foes, and grind them to dust!
In every conflict may we put them to flight,
Aided by thee, thou God of the just!
Our bosoms we’ll bare to the glorious strife,
And our oath is recorded on high,
To prevail in the cause is dearer than life,
Or crushed in its ruins to die! ”

“ For Jackson fought on red Chalmette, and won the glorious fight,
And then the Wrong went down, hurrah! and triumph crowned the Right!
The day has come again, when men who love the beauteous South,
To speak, if needs be, for the Right, though by the cannon’s mouth;
For foes accursed of God and man, with lying speech and song,
Would bind, imprison, hang the Right, and deify the Wrong.
But canting knave of pen and sword, nor sanctimonious fool,
Shall ever win this Southern land, to cripple, bind, and rule ”

“ No! let the despot’s hireling band,
Who feel not honor—know not faith,
Who war not for their native land,
Fly trembling from a dreaded death.
Our lives are to our country pledged,
Until her last red field is won;
For “liberty or death” is waged
The war where fights her faithful son.
Then plant that flag-staff in the earth,
And round it rally, every son
[Pg 201] Who loves the State that gave him birth,
Till her proud sovereignty be won.
What though our limbs be weak with toil,
What though we bear full many a scar;
Huzza! here’s to our native soil,
We re-enlist, and for the war! ”

“ LAND OF THE SOUTH.
BY A. F. LEONARD.
Air—“Friend of my Soul.”
Land of the South! the fairest land
Beneath Columbia’s sky!
Proudly her hills of freedom stand,
Her plains in beauty lie.
[Pg 186] Her dotted fields, her traversed streams
Their annual wealth renew.
Land of the South! in brightest dreams
No dearer spot we view.
Men of the South! a free-born race,
They vouch a patriot line;
Ready the foemen’s van to face,
And guard their country’s shrine.
By sire and son a haloing light
Through time is borne along—
They “nothing ask but what is right,
And yield to nothing wrong.” ”

“ Your flag’s unfurled
’Mid clashing steel, and death-shot hurled,
And war’s dark storm-cloud, swiftly whirled,
Your country calls. On! Southron, on!
[Pg 270]
Strike! Southron, strike!
The foeman’s trail
Is marked with blood and flame alike;
And woman’s shriek, and infant’s wail,
Show that he wars upon the frail
A war of hate. Strike! Southron, strike!
Can manhood fly,
And, recreant, brave
The silent scorn, the averted eye—
Decked in its chains—a cringing slave?
No! rather seek a soldier’s grave,
And show the tyrant how to die. ”

“ He would dare Columbia, till she swore herself his foe—
Forged the chains for freemen—when he buckled on his sword.
And God be with the freeman, when he buckled on his sword!
He lives or dies for duty, and he yields no inch of sward.
The foes they come with thunder, and with blood and fire arrayed,
And they swear that we shall own them—they the masters, we the slaves;
But there’s many a gallant laddie, who wears a blue cockade,
Will show them what it is to dare the blood of Southern braves!
[Pg 85] And God be with the banner of those gallant Southern braves! ”

“ Ye sons of the sunny South, strike to be free!
Fear not the Northern despot, or his feeble frown,
[Pg 255] Who seeks, through his minions, the South to put down;
Look to your God, from whence comes all power,
And seek His aid and protection in each darkened hour.
Strike again and again, O ye sons of the free!
Carolina’s sons to this platform have come—
Protection to Liberty, to fireside, and home—
Their watch-word to-day, as their Fathers’ of old,
Truth, Justice, and Freedom, before Northern gold.
Ye are the sons of the Fathers who bled to be free! ”

“ We move, we know not how nor why,
For life and hope but phantoms seem,
And it would be relief—to die.
THE INVOCATION.
BY B. W. W.
God bless the land of flowers,
And turn its winter hours
To bright summer time!
Be the brave soldier’s friend,
And from dangers defend,
When Northern balls descend
On the Southern line!
Father, we implore Thee,
Let Thy people go free
From their foes once more!
And they will bend the knee,
[Pg 307] And Thine the praise shall be,
On sunny land and sea,
As in days of yore!
Lord, bid the carnage cease,
Let the banner of peace
Again be unfurled! ”

“ Yield not! our soil shall rather be
One waste of flame, one sea of blood!
Fear not their steel, but fear their gold—
Not Yankee force, but Yankee fraud;
Trust not the race—as false as cold—
Whose very prayers are lies to God.
Up! old and young, etc.
[Pg 299]
Armed, or unarmed, stand fearless forth,
Sons of the South! stand, wife and maid!
Against the foul insidious North,
Our babes shall wield the battle-blade!
On! though perennial be the strife,
For honor dear, for hearth-stone fire;
Give blow for blow! take life for life!
“Strike! till the last armed foe expire!” ”

“ Tell’s freedom-beacon lights the Swiss;
Vainly the invader ever strives;
He finds “Sic Semper Tyrannis”
In San Jacinto’s bowie-knives!
Than these—than all—a holier fire
Now burns thy soul, Virginia’s son!
Strike then for wife, babe, gray-haired sire;
Strike for the grave of Washington!
The Northern rabble aims for greed;
The hireling parson goads the train—
In that foul crop from bigot seed,
Old “Praise God Barebones” howls again!
We welcome them to “Southern lands”—
We welcome them to “Southern slaves”—
We welcome them “with bloody hands
To hospitable Southern graves!” ”

“ Acknowledging no “right divine”
In kings and princes from the rest;
In their creed he is the noblest
Who has worked and striven best.
Decorations do not tempt them—
Diamond stars they laugh to scorn—
Each will wear a “Cross of Honor”
On the Resurrection morn.
Warriors they in fields of wisdom—
Like the noble Hebrew youth,
Striking down Goliath’s error
With the God-blessed stone of truth.
Marshaled ’neath the Right’s broad banner,
Forward rush these volunteers,
Beating olden wrong away
From the fast advancing years. ”

“ Their blood in our veins, with their honor we vie,
Theirs, too, was the watchword, “We conquer or die!”
We strike for the South—mountain, valley and plain—
For the South we will conquer again and again;
Her day of salvation and triumph is nigh,
Ours, then, be the watchword, “We conquer or die!”
SONS OF FREEDOM.
BY NANNY GRAY.
Sons of freedom, on to glory
Go, where brave men do or die,
Let your names in future story
Gladden every patriot’s eye;
’Tis your country calls you, hasten!
Backward hurl the invading foe;
Freemen never think of danger,—
To the glorious battle go! ”

“ BY J. A. WAGENER.
Arise! arise! with main and might,
Sons of the sunny clime!
Gird on the sword; the sacred fight
The holy hour doth chime.
Arise! the craven host draws nigh,
In thundering array;
Arise, ye brave! let cowards fly—
The hero bides the fray.
Strike hard, strike hard, thou noble band;
Strike hard, with arm of fire!
Strike hard, for God and fatherland,
For mother, wife, and sire!
Let thunders roar, the lightning flash;
Bold Southron, never fear!
The bayonet’s point, the saber’s clash,
True Southrons do and dare!
Bright flow’rs spring from the hero’s grave ”

“ On the doomsday-book of heaven.
Rebels! ’tis our fighting name!
For peace rules o’er the land,
Until they speak of craven woe—
Until our rights receive a blow,
From foe’s or brother’s hand.
Rebels! ’tis our dying name!
For, although life is dear,
Yet, freemen born and freemen bred,
We’d rather live as freemen dead,
Than live in slavish fear.
Then call us rebels, if you will—
We glory in the name;
For bending under unjust laws,
And swearing faith to an unjust cause,
We count a greater shame.
Atlanta Confederacy.
[Pg 63]
THE HEART OF LOUISIANA.
BY HARRIET STANTON.
Oh! ”

“ Rally round our country’s flag!
Rally, boys, haste! do not lag;
Come from every vale and crag,
Sons of liberty!
[Pg 110]
Northern Vandals tread our soil,
Forth they come for blood and spoil,
To the homes we’ve gained with toil,
Shouting, “Slavery!”
Traitorous Lincoln’s bloody band
Now invades the freeman’s land,
Armed with sword and firebrand,
’Gainst the brave and free.
Arm ye then for fray and fight,
March ye forth both day and night,
Stop not till the foe’s in sight,
Sons of chivalry. ”