34 THE FLAG. My wine is not of the choicest, yet it bears an honest brand; And the bread that I bid you lighten, I break with no sparing hand: But pause, ere ye pass to taste it; one act must accomplished be, Salute the flag in its virtue, before ye sit down with me. The flag of our stately battles, not struggles of wealth and greed, Its stripes were a holy lesson, its spangles a deathless creed: 'Twas red with the blood of freemen, and white with the fear of the foe; And the stars that fight in their courses 'gainst tyrants its symbols know. Come hither, thou son of my mother; we were reared in the self-same arms; Thou hast many a pleasant gesture, thy mind hath its gifts and charms; But my heart is as stern to question as mine eyes are of sorrows full; Salute the flag in its virtue, or pass on where others rule. Thou lord of a thousand acres, with heaps of uncounted gold, steeds of thy stall are haughty, thy lackeys cunning and bold; THE FLAG. 35 I envy no jot of thy splendor, I rail at thy follies none, Salute the flag in its virtue, or leave my poor house alone! Fair lady with silken flouncings, high waving thy stainless plume, We welcome thee to our banquet, a flower of costliest bloom. Let a hundred maids live widowed to furnish thy bridal bed, But pause where the flag doth question, and bend thy triumphant head. T is the Rhine! Our mountain vineyards laving, I see the bright floodine! Sing on the march, with every banner waving, Sing, brothers! 'tis the Rhine! The Rhine! the Rhine! Our own imperial river! Be glory on thy track! We left thy shores, to die or to deliverWe bear thee Freedom back! Hail! hail! My childhood knew thy rush of water, Even as my mother's song; That sound went past me on the field of slaughter, And heart and arm grew strong. RETURN OF THE RHINE SOLDIER. 37 Roll proudly on! sweeping, Brave blood is with thee Poured out by sons of thine, Where sword and spirit forth in joy were leaping, Like thee, victorious Rhine! Home! home! Thy glad wave hath a tone of greeting, Thy path is by my home, Even now my children count the hours till meeting: O, ransomed ones! I come. Go tell the seas, that chain shall bind thee never! Sound on by hearth and shrine! Sing through the hills that thou art free forever Lift up thy voice, O Rhine! Felicia Hemans. BARBARA FRIETCHIE. P from the meadows, rich with corn, The clustered fires of Frederick stand, Round about them orchards sweep, Fair as the garden of the Lord To the eyes of the famished rebel horde, On that pleasant morn of the early fall, When Lee marched over the mountain wall, Over the mountains winding down, |