There was a pause. A guardsman said, “We storm the forts to-morrow; Sing while we may, another day Will bring enough of sorrow.”
They lay along the battery’s side, Below the smoking cannon, Brave hearts from Severn and from Clyde, And from the banks of Shannon.
They sang of love, and not of fame; Forgot was Britain’s glory: Each heart recalled a different name, But all sang “Annie Lawrie.”
Voice after voice caught up the song, Until its tender passion Rose like an anthem, rich and strong,-- Their battle-eve confession.
Beyond the darkening ocean burned The bloody sunset’s embers, While the Crimean valleys learned How English love remembers.
And once again a fire of hell Rained on the Russian quarters, With scream of shot and burst of shell And bellowing of the mortars!
And Irish Nora’s eyes are dim For a singer dumb and gory; And English Mary mourns for him Who sang of “Annie Lawrie.”
Sleep, soldiers! still in honored rest Your truth and valor wearing. The bravest are the tenderest, The loving are the daring.
Far ’neath the glorious light of the noontide, In a damp dungeon a prisoner lay, Aged and feeble, his failing years numbered, Waiting the fate to be brought him that day.
Silence, oppressive with darkness, held durance; Death in the living, or living in death; Crouched on the granite, and burdened with fetters, Inhaling slow poison with each labored breath.
O’er the damp floor of his dungeon there glistened Faintly the rays of a swift-nearing light; Then the sweet jingle of keys, that soon opened The door, and revealed a strange scene to his sight.
In the red glare of the flickering torches, Held by the gray-gowned soldiers of God, Gathered a group that the world will remember Long ages after we sleep ’neath the sod.
Draped in their robes of bright scarlet and purple, Bearing aloft the gold emblems of Rome, Stood the chief priests of the papal dominion, Under the shadow of Peter’s proud dome,
By the infallible pontiff commanded, From his own lips their directions received; Sent to demand of the wise Galileo Denial of all the great truths he believed,--
Before the whole world to give up his convictions, Because the great church said the world had not moved; Then to swear, before God, that his science was idle, And truth was unknown to the facts he had proved.
