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BY CHARLES WOLFE
Charles Wolfe (1791–1823): An Irish poet and clergyman. He was born at Dublin and took his degree of B.A. at Dublin University. The poem given below was so admired that even while its author’s name was unknown, and it was ascribed to Campbell, Byron, etc., it had won for itself a secure place in the heart of the nation.
Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his
corse
to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O’er the grave where our hero we buried.
We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning;
By the struggling moonbeam’s misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless coffin inclosed his breast,
Not in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest
With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought as we hollowed his narrow bed,
And smoothed down his lonely pillow,
That the foe and the stranger would tread o’er his head,
And we far away on the billow.
Lightly they’ll talk of the spirit that’s gone,
And o’er his cold ashes upbraid him,—
But little he’ll reck if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.
But half our weary task was done
When the clock struck the hour for retiring;
And we heard the distant and random gun
That the foe was sullenly firing.
Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
From the field of his fame fresh and gory;
We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone —
But we left him alone with his glory.