Huzza! she spurns the Northern scum! She breathes! She burns! She'll come! She'll come ! Maryland, my Maryland! ABRAM JOSEPH RYAN (1839-1888) The Conquered Banner Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary; For there's not a man to wave it, Take that Banner down! 'tis tattered; Furl that Banner-furl it sadly! O'er their freedom or their grave! Furl it! for the hands that grasped it, For, though conquered, they adore it,Love the cold, dead hands that bore it, Weep for those who fell before it, Pardon those who trailed and tore it; Furl that Banner! True, 'tis gory, Though its folds are in the dust! Furl that Banner, softly, slowly! For it droops above the dead. FRANCIS BRET HARTE (1839-1902) Dickens in Camp (1812-1870) Above the pines the moon was slowly drifting, The dim Sierras, far beyond, uplifting The roaring camp-fire, with rude humor, painted On haggard face and form that drooped and fainted Till one arose, and from his pack's scant treasure And cards were dropped from hands of listless leisure, And then, while round them shadows gathered faster, He read aloud the book wherein the Master Perhaps 'twas boyish fancy,-for the reader But, as he read, from clustering pine and cedar The fir-trees, gathering closer in the shadows, While the whole camp, with "Nell," on English meadows Wandered and lost their way. And so in mountain solitudes-o'ertaken As by some spell divine Their cares dropped from them like the needles shaken Lost is that camp, and wasted all its fire: Ah! towering pine and stately Kentish spire, Lost is that camp, but let its fragrant story With hop-vines incense all the pensive glory And on that grave where English oak and holly Deem it not all a too presumptuous folly— Plain Language from Truthful James Which I wish to remark, And my language is plain, That for ways that are dark And for tricks that are vain, The heathen Chinee is peculiar: Which the same I would rise to explain. Ah Sin was his name; And I shall not deny, In regard to the same, What that name might imply; But his smile it was pensive and childlike. As I frequent remarked to Bill Nye. It was August the third, And quite soft was the skies; That Ah Sin was likewise; Yet he played it that day upon William Which we had a small game, But he smiled, as he sat by the table, With the smile that was childlike and bland. Yet the cards they were stocked In a way that I grieve, And my feelings were shocked At the state of Nye's sleeve, Which was stuffed full of aces and bowers, And the same with intent to deceive. But the hands that were played By that heathen Chinee, And the points that he made, Were quite frightful to see, Till at last he put down a right bower, Which the same Nye had dealt unto me. Then I looked up at Nye, And he gazed upon me; And he rose with a sigh, And said, "Can this be? We are ruined by Chinese cheap labor,"- In the scene that ensued I did not take a hand, But the floor it was strewed, Like the leaves on the strand, With the cards that Ah Sin had been hiding, In the game "he did not understand." In his sleeves, which were long, He had twenty-four packs, Which was coming it strong, Yet I state but the facts; And we found on his nails, which were taper, What is frequent in tapers,-that's wax. Which is why I remark, And my language is plain, That for ways that are dark, And for tricks that are vain, The heathen Chinee is peculiar, Which the same I am free to maintain. The Society upon the Stanislaus I reside at Table Mountain, and my name is Truthful James; I am not up to small deceit, or any sinful games; And I'll tell in simple language what I know about the row But first I would remark, that it is not a proper plan Now nothing could be finer or more beautiful to see Then Brown he read a paper, and he reconstructed there, From those same bones, an animal that was extremely rare; And Jones then asked the Chair for a suspension of the rules, Till he could prove that those same bones was one of his lost mules. Then Brown he smiled a bitter smile, and said he was at fault, It seemed he had been trespassing on Jones's family vault: He was a most sarcastic man, this quiet Mr. Brown, And on several occasions he had cleaned out the town. Now I hold it is not decent for a scientific gent Then Abner Dean of Angel's raised a point of order-when And the subsequent proceedings interested him no more. For, in less time than I write it, every member did engage In a warfare with the remnants of a paleozoic age; And the way they heaved those fossils in their anger was a sin, Till the skull of an old mammoth caved the head of Thompson in. |