Each knew, ere night should fall again,
They, or a stubborn foe, would yield
Life, honor, all that men hold dear,
Upon a blood-drenched battle-field.

The drums were beating the "tattoo,'
When through it, suddenly, there rang
A pealing Psalm in unison.

A thousand swelling voices sang,
Like those who wait in fearless faith,
"Eternal are thy mercies, Lord;"
The echoing valleys answered back,
"Eternal truth attends Thy Word."

"Thy praise shall sound from shore to shore,"
Their comrades heard with bated breath,
"Till suns shall rise and set no more:

'T was victory assured o'er death. They met the shock of fierce attack,

Of frenzied charge, we know how well, For graves and scars and empty homes, Of that day's fierce encounter tell.

Long years have come and gone since then:
Peace followed peril and distress,

And still the words they sang come back,
Like some dead voice that speaks to bless.
What they achieved, in purer laws

And freer power, is ours, to-day;
And Truth and Mercy still doth God
Affirm, in His appointed way.

MARY HANNAH KROUT.

33. TO THEE, O COUNTRY!

WRITTEN by the author, now Mrs. J. B. KING, in her 15th year, and set to music by Julius Eichberg, and used by permission of Messrs. O. Ditson & Co.

To thee, O country, great and free,
With trusting hearts we cling;
Our voices tuned by joyous love,
Thy power and praises sing.

Upon thy mighty, faithful heart
We lay our burdens down.
Thou art the only friend who feels
Their weight without a frown.

For thee we daily work and strive,
To thee we give our love,
For thee with fervor deep we pray
To Him who dwells above.

O God preserve our Fatherland!
Let peace its ruler be,

And let her happy kingdom stretch

From north to southmost sea.

ANNA PHILIPINE EICHBERG.

Still starlight sheds the same pale beam
For aye upon the plain,

And musing breasts might fondly dream
The Grecian free again;

For empires fall, and Freedom dies,
But dimless beauty robes the skies.

May He whose glory gems the sky,
God of the slave and free,
Hear every patriot's burning sigh
That's offered here for thee!
For thee, sad Greece, and every son
That braves a Turk on Marathon.

RICHARD MONTGOMERY.

17. JOAN OF ARC'S FAREWELL TO HOME.

THIS patriotic girl, at the age of eighteen, rescued her country, in the year 1429.

FAREWELL, ye mountains, ye beloved glades,
Ye lone and peaceful valleys, fare ye well!
Through you Joanna never more may stray!
For aye, Joanna bids you now farewell.
Ye meads which I have watered, and
Which I have planted, still in beauty bloom!
Farewell, ye grottos, and ye crystal springs!
Sweet echo, vocal spirit of the vale,

ye

trees

Who sang'st responsive to my simple strain,
Joanna goes, and ne'er returns again.

He who in glory did on Horeb's height
Descend to Moses in the bush of flame,
And bade him stand in Royal Pharaoh's sight;
Who once to Israel's pious shepherd came,
And sent him forth, his champion in the fight;
Who aye hath loved the lowly shepherd train, —
He, from these leafy boughs, thus spake to me:
"Go forth! Thou shalt on earth my witness be.

"Thou in rude armor must thy limbs invest,
A plate of steel upon thy bosom bear.
Vain earthly love may never stir thy breast,
Nor passion's sinful glow be kindled there,
But war's triumphant glory shall be thine.
Thy martial fame all women shall outshine!

"For when in fight the stoutest hearts despair,
When direful ruin threatens France, forlorn,
Then thou aloft my oriflamme shalt bear,
And swiftly as the reaper mows the corn,
Thou shalt lay low the haughty conqueror;
His fortune's wheel thou rapidly shalt turn,
To Gaul's heroic sons deliv'rance bring,.
Relieve beleaguered Rheims, and crown thy king!"

The Heavenly Spirit promised me a sign:
He sends the helmet, it hath come from Him.

Its iron filleth me with strength divine;

I feel the courage of the cherubim.

As with the rushing of a mighty wind
It drives me forth to join the battle's din;
The clanging trumpets sound, the chargers rear,
And the loud war-cry thunders in mine ear.

SCHILLER.

THE heroism of the Spartan patriot Leonidas, and the willing selfsacrifice of his little band of three hundred veterans at the Pass of Thermopylæ, along the northern shore of the Mediterranean Sea, B. C. 480, are among the most emphatic expressions of true patriotism to be found in human history. All the later struggles of Greece against Turkish oppression have equally aroused the sympathy of England and America.

SHOUT for the mighty dead

Who died along this shore,

Who died within this mountain glen!

For never nobler chieftain's head

Was laid on valor's crimson bed,

Nor ever prouder gore

Sprang forth, than theirs who won the day
Upon thy strand, Thermopyla!

Shout for the mighty men.

Who on the Persian tents,

Like lions from their midnight den,

Bounded on the slumbering deer;
Rush'd, a storm of sword and spear,
Like the roused elements

Let loose from an immortal hand,
To chasten or to crush a land!

But there are none to hear:

Greece is a hopeless slave.
Leonidas! no hand is near
To lift thy fiery falchion now;

No warrior makes the warrior's vow

Upon thy sea-washed grave.

The voice that should be raised by men
Must now be given by wave and glen.

GEORGE CROLY.