THE CRYSTAL FOUNTAIN. "Perhaps Italian h'art attracts "Yet, good ma'am, I should explain, "She may see the silver things, "Or she may have gone Of a patent henvelope in hope To take home,—and if she's able, Or insist on one peep more, Where the Crystal Fountain flows!" "Well, policeman, certainly You're the man to have an eye Over such a place as this, And to find a straying Miss! Pray, good man, my daughter tell, Where the Crystal Fountain flows!" 405 LXX.-SONG OF STEAM. GEO. W. CUTTER. WHEN I saw an army upon the land, Or waiting a wayward breeze; As constant he turned at the tardy wheel, When I measured the panting courser's speed, As they bore a law a king decreed, Or the lines of impatient love ; I could not but think how the world would feel, When I should be bound to the rushing keel, And I rushed to my throne with a thunder-blast, Oh! then you saw a wondrous change On earth and the ocean wide, Whence now my fiery armies range, Hurrah! hurrah! the waters o'er, The Ocean pales where'er I sweep, THE STORMING OF MONTEREY. I carry the wealth and the lord of the earth,' In the darksome depth of the fathomless mine, Where the rocks ne'er saw the sun's decline, I blow the bellows, I forge the steel I hammer the ore, and turn the wheel Where my arms of strength are made; I manage the furnace, the mill, the mint, I curry, I spin, I weave; And all the doings I put in print, On every Saturday eve. I've no muscle to weary, no breast to decay, And soon I intend you may "go and play,"- But harness me down with your iron bands; For I scorn the strength of your puny hands, 407 LXXI-STORMING OF MONTEREY. CHARLES FENNO HOFFMAN. We were not many-we who stood Yet many a gallant spirit would 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 And on-still on our column kept Through walls of flame its withering way; The foe himself recoiled aghast, When, striking where the strongest lay, Our banners on those towers wave, We were not many-we who pressed LXXII-ANGELS OF BUENA VISTA. J. G. WHITTIER. SPEAK and tell us, our Ximena, looking northward far away, Look abroad, and tell us, sister, whither rolls the storm we hear. ANGELS OF BUENA VISTA. 409 "Down the hills of Angostura still the storm of battle rolls; Blood is flowing, men are dying; God have mercy on their souls!" Who is losing? who is winning?" Over hill and over plain, I see but smoke of cannon clouding through the mountain rain." Holy Mother! keep our brothers! Look, Ximena, look once more : "Still I see the fearful whirlwind rolling darkly as before, Bearing on, in strange confusion, friend and foeman, foot and horse, Like some wild and troubled torrent sweeping down its mountain course. Look forth once more, Ximena ! "Ah! the smoke has rolled away; And I see the Northern rifles gleaming down the ranks of gray. Hark! that sudden blast of bugles! there the troop of Minon wheels; There the Northern horses thunder, with the cannon at their heels." "Jesu, pity! how it thickens! now retreat and now advance! Right against the blazing cannon shivers Puebla's charging lance ! Down they go, the brave young riders; horse and foot together fall; Like a ploughshare in its fallow, through them ploughs the Northern ball." Nearer came the storm, and nearer, rolling fast and frightful on : "Speak, Ximena, speak and tell us, who has lost and who has won." "Alas! alas! I know not, friend and foe together fall, O'er the dying rush the living; pray, my sisters, for them all!" "Lo! the wind the smoke is lifting: Blessed Mother save my brain! I can see the wounded crawling slowly out from heaps of slain. |