Martinsburg gazette. [volume] (Martinsburg, Va. [W. Va.]) 1833-1855, 1836-06-16
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r o e T. n x /.
From the LouisrilIe journal.
THE FAIL, OF ALAMO

THE FALL OF ALAMO.
Dim-dark-a and shadowy on the Alamo's walls,
The closing night had shed its raven pail
From guard 10 guard low murmurs pass'd along
Like the deep echo Of funeral song,
That falls so sad, so death. like on the ear,
We breathe more freely when we cease TO hear;
Or like sweet music's melancholy tone,
Heard in the chamber that death has marked his
own.
Where the night watches hear the gurglng
breath
misunderstanding with the child of death.
Within the dark and barricaded pile,
A itful, glimmering watch fire burned the while;
Now family dim, and now renew'd its fire.
Like the lamps flashing ere its beams expire.
No craven hearts with fear SIRE sinking there
No. theirs is valor maddened by despair;
There every hearts enthusiastic chord
Is manipulating as their trusty sword,
Whose firm graspcd hit is starting from its
sheath,
As if impatient for the work of death.
They gaze unmoved upon the entrenched lines,
Where dire expressions lurid watch fire shines,
From whence the shouts of revelling slaves arse
In fiend like mockery TO the echoing skies,
Nor blench TO see the howitzer's sulpbrous flash,
Nor start to hear the bombs tremendous crash:
But hail with JOY its blazing comet glare,
That half illumes the dreary midnight air,
And with its lurid unearthly light,
Unfolds Columbia's banner to the sight;
That starry banner, which in days OF yore,
O'er fields Of blood their patriot fathers bore.
lis dead of night, the exhausted watch fires wane
The jewellers sleep-the powers Of darkness
reign;
Deep boding silence sits amid the gloom
Sepulchral stillness-breathless as the tomb.
The glimmering morn has streaked the dappled
east,
The wreathing mist hangs on the mountains
breast,
The war horse neighs impatient for the strife,
4, l. uir h,ret tpar ,pfn
The changing arms-the hurried array
OF ranks preparing for the bloody fray;
The pealibg music of the martial drum
The shrilIy fife, half drowned amid the hum
OF mingling shouts, that load the morning air,
And tell Alamo's inmates TO prepare
They come! they come is shouted from the wall,
They come! they come is echo's answering call;
The starry standard of the free and brave
Waves back defiance to the mental slave.
Tho few the heroes around it stand,
Each willing heart has got faithful hand
That will not shrink in dangers trying hour,
To prove its prowess 'gaihst the tyranrs power.
That hour has come the red flag waving high
Moves swiftly forward, and the battle cry
OF Santa Anna rends the vaulted sky
Dark lengthening lines enclose the fortress round;
They shout-they rush-upon the walls they
bound.
A sheet of fl ame-a crash-a shriek-a groan
Bespeak how well the work Of death is done.
Flash follows Hash-and shouts on Shouts arise
Here falls the patriot-there the tyrant dies
Steel CLEANS On steel-and the battles cloud,
Now wraps the combatants in shIoud.
Brave Crockett grapples with the savage foe,
While fate and death are stamped in every blow,
As round his head his viewless weapon swings,
At every stroke despot's death knell rings
AT every turn he foils the savage pack,
And carnage glutted, revels at his back.
Brave Travis towers amid the battles fire,
Above the strugglers like a lofty spire,
Whose head has caught the liyid lightning's
power,
And pours 10 earth the devastating shower;
While desoation sweeps its bosom round,
And blackning ruin rolls along the ground
The living Chamber DER the heaps of dead,
At once bulwark and dying bed,
On--on they press-they gain-they mount the
wall,
And the Alamo totters TO its fall
Brave Crockett falls! s. helpless freedom weeps;
On heaps of slain the patriot hero sleeps.
Another shaft from deaths unerring bow
Has laid in death the gallant Travis low
Oh, Heaven was there no kind protecting
power,
To guard the brave at that eventual hour!
One desperate struggle-and the strife is Ger
A deafening shout-the Alamo is no more
The fallen fortress forms fun'ral pyre
Where freedoms spirit passed the ordeal fire,
The wreathing smoke in rolling columns rose
And pierced TO Heaven, where freedoms sons
repose. ). H. r.