Слике страница
PDF
ePub
[blocks in formation]

Attend at the call of the fifer and drummer, The French and the rebels are coming next

summer,

And the forts we must build

Though the Tories are killed. Take courage, my jockies, and work for your King,

For if you are taken, no doubt you will swing. If York we can hold,

I'll have you enroll'd;

And after you're dead, your names shall be read,

As who for their monarch both labor'd and bled,

And ventur'd their necks for their beef and their bread.

"T is an hour to serve the bravest of nations,
And be left to be hanged in their capitulations.
Then scour up your mortars,
And stand to your quarters,
'Tis nonsense for Tories in battle to run,
They never need fear sword, halberd, or gun;
Their hearts should not fail 'em,
No balls will assail 'em,
Forget your disgraces, and shorten your faces,
For 't is true as the gospel, believe it or not,
Who are born to be hang'd, will never be shot.
PHILIP FRENEAU.

On the last day of May, Clinton had succeeded in capturing the fortress at Stony Point, on the Hudson, had thrown a garrison of six hundred men into it, and added two lines of fortifications, rendering it almost impregnable. Washington, nevertheless, determined to recapture it, and intrusted the task to General Anthony Wayne, giving him twelve hundred men for the purpose. At midnight of July 15, the Americans crossed the swamp which divided the fort from the mainland, reached the outworks before they were discovered, and carried the fort by storm.

THE STORMING OF STONY POINT

[July 16, 1779]

HIGHLANDS of Hudson! ye saw them pass, Night on the stars of their battle-flag, Threading the maze of the dark morass

Under the frown of the Thunder Crag;

Flower and pride of the Light Armed Corps,
Trim in their trappings of buff and blue,
Silent, they skirted the rugged shore,
Grim in the promise of work to do.

"Cross ye the ford to the moated rock! Let not a whisper your march betray! Out with the flint from the musket lock! Now! let the bayonet find the way!"

"Halt!" rang the sentinel's challenge clear. Swift came the shot of the waking foe. Bright flashed the axe of the Pioneer Smashing the abatis, blow on blow.

Little they tarried for British might!

Lightly they recked of the Tory jeers! Laughing, they swarmed to the craggy height, Steel to the steel of the Grenadiers!

Storm King and Dunderberg! wake once

more

Sentinel giants of Freedom's throne, Massive and proud! to the Eastern shore Bellow the watchword: "The fort's our own!"

Echo our cheers for the Men of old!

Shout for the Hero who led his band Braving the death that his heart foretold Over the parapet, “spear in hand!" ARTHUR GUITERMAN.

WAYNE AT STONY POINT

[July 16, 1779]

"T WAS the heart of the murky night, and the lowest ebb of the tide,

Silence lay on the land, and sleep on the waters wide,

Save for the sentry's tramp, or the note of a lone night bird,

Or the sough of the haunted pines as the south wind softly stirred.

Gloom above and around, and the brooding spirit of rest;

Only a single star over Dunderberg's lofty

crest.

Through the drench of ooze and slime at the marge of the river fen

File upon file slips by. See! are they ghosts or men?

Fast do they forward press, on by a track unbarred;

Now is the causeway won, now have they throttled the guard;

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

THE COW-CHACE

Nothing more, did I say? Stay one moment; you've heard

Of Caldwell, the parson, who once preached the Word

Down at Springfield? What, No? Come that's bad; why he had

All the Jerseys aflame. And they gave him the name

Of the "rebel high-priest." He stuck in their gorge,

For he loved the Lord God, and he hated King George!

[blocks in formation]

Keep the ghost of that wife, foully slain, in your view,

And what could you, what should you, what would you do?

Why, just what he did! They were left in the lurch

For the want of more wadding. He ran to the church,

Broke the door, stripped the pews, and dashed out in the road

With his arms full of hymn-books and threw down his load

At their feet! Then above all the shouting and shots,

Rang his voice, - "Put Watts into 'em,
Boys, give 'em Watts!"

And they did. That is all. Grasses spring, flowers blow

Pretty much as they did ninety-three years ago.

233

[blocks in formation]

Among the posts occupied by the British on the Hudson was a blockhouse just above Bergen Neck. Pastured on the neck was a large number of cattle and horses, and on July 21, 1780, General Wayne was sent, with some Pennsylvania and Maryland troops, to storm this blockhouse and drive the stock within the American lines. The attack on the blockhouse was repulsed by the British, the Americans losing heavily. It was this affair which was celebrated by Major John André in the verses called "The Cow-Chace."

THE COW-CHACE

[July 21, 1780]
CANTO I

To drive the kine one summer's morn,
The Tanner took his way;

The calf shall rue that is unborn
The jumbling of that day.

And Wayne descending steers shall know, And tauntingly deride;

And call to mind in every low,

The tanning of his hide.

Yet Bergen cows still ruminate,
Unconscious in the stall,

What mighty means were used to get,
And loose them after all.

For many heroes bold and brave, From Newbridge and Tappan, And those that drink Passaic's wave, And those who eat supawn;

And sons of distant Delaware,

And still remoter Shannon, And Major Lee with horses rare,

And Proctor with his cannon.

All wond'rous proud in arms they came,
What hero could refuse

To tread the rugged path to fame,
Who had a pair of shoes!

At six, the host with sweating buff,
Arrived at Freedom's pole;

When Wayne, who thought he'd time enough,
Thus speechified the whole:

« ПретходнаНастави »