Classic Poem

We saw their watch-fires through the night
Light up the far horizon's verge;
We heard at dawn the gathering fight
Swell like the distant ocean surge —
The thunder-tramp of mountain hordes
From distance sweeps a boding sound,
As Aztec's twenty thousand swords
And clanking chargers shake the ground.

A gun! — now all is hushed again —
How strange that lull before the storm,
That fearful silence o'er the plain! —
Halt they their battle line to form?
It booms — it booms — it booms again,
And through each thick and thunderous shock
The war-scream seems to pierce the brain,
As charging squadrons interlock.
Columbia's sons — of different race —
Proud Aztec and bold Alleghan,
Are grappled there in death embrace,
To rend each other, man to man!

The storm-clouds lift, and through the haze,
Dissolving in the noontide light,
I see the sun of Aztec blaze
Upon her banner broad and bright!
And on — still on, her ensigns wave,
Flinging abroad each glorious fold;
While drooping round each sullen stave
Cling Alleghan's but half unrolled.

But stay! that shout has stirred the air;
I see the stripes — I see the stars —
O God! who leads the phalanx there
Beneath those fearful meteor bars?
" Old Z ACK " — " Old Z ACK " — the war-cry rattles
Amid those men of iron tread,
As rung " Old Fritz, " in Europe's battles,
When thus his host great Frederick led!
Like Cordillera's snow-fed flood
Its torrent-track through forests rending,
Like Santiago's crashing wood
Through which it whirls, in foam descending,
So Taylor's power in that wild hour
Upon our central might is thrown,
So round his dread resistless tread
Our bleeding ranks are rent and strewn.

Oh! hardly from that carnage dire
We drag our patriot chief away —
Who, crushed by famine, steel and fire,
Yet claims as his the desperate day!
That day whose sinking light is shed
O'er Buena Vista's field, to tell
Where round the sleeping and the dead
Stalks conquering T AYLOR'S sentinel.