The breeze so softly blew, it made
    No forest leaf to quiver,
  And the smoke of the random cannonade
    Rolled slowly from the river.

  And now, where circling hills looked down,
    With cannon grimly planted,
  O’er listless camp and silent town
    The golden sunset slanted.

  When on the fervid air there came
    A strain—­now rich and tender;
  The music seemed itself aflame
    With day’s departing splendor.

  And yet once more the bugles sang
    Above the stormy riot;
  No shout upon the evening rang—­
    There reigned a holy quiet,

  The sad, slow stream, its noiseless flood
    Poured o’er the glistening pebbles;
  All silent now the Yankees stood,
    And silent stood the Rebels.

  No unresponsive soul had heard
    That plaintive note’s appealing,
  So deeply “Home, Sweet Home” had stirred
    The hidden founts of feeling.

  Or Blue, or Gray, the soldier sees,
    As by the wand of fairy,
  The cottage ’neath the live-oak trees,
    The cabin by the prairie.

  Or cold or warm, his native skies
    Bend in their beauty o’er him;
  Seen through the tear-mist in his eyes,
    His loved ones stand before him.

  As fades the iris after rain
    In April’s tearful weather,
  The vision vanished, as the strain
    And daylight died together.

  But memory, waked by music’s art,
    Expressed in simplest numbers,
  Subdued the sternest Yankee’s heart,
    Made light the Rebel’s slumbers.

  And fair the form of music shines,
    That bright, celestial creature,
  Who still ’mid war’s embattled lines,
    Gave this one touch of Nature.

[Footnote 90:  Received a liberal education and relinquishing his profession—­the law—­for literature, was for some years editor of the Southern Literary Messenger.  Has written chiefly for the magazines and for the newspapers.  A native of Virginia.]

* * * * *

=_George Henry Boker, 1824-._= (Manual, p. 520.)

From the “Ode to a Mountain Oak.”

=_411._= THE OAK AN EMBLEM.

    Type of unbending Will! 
  Type of majestic self-sustaining Power! 
  Elate in sunshine, firm when tempests lower,
  May thy calm strength my wavering spirit fill! 
      Oh! let me learn from thee,
      Thou proud and steadfast tree,
  To bear unmurmuring what stern Time may send;
    Nor ’neath life’s ruthless tempests bend: 
      But calmly stand like thee,
      Though wrath and storm shake me,
  Though vernal hopes in yellow Autumn end,
  And, strong in truth, work out my destiny. 
      Type of long-suffering Power! 
        Type of unbending Will! 
      Strong in the tempest’s hour,
        Bright when the storm is still;
  Rising from every contest with an unbroken heart,
  Strengthen’d by every struggle, emblem of might thou art! 
  Sign of what man can compass, spite of an adverse state,
  Still from thy rocky summit, teach us to war with Fate!