The Union. [volume] (Georgetown, Del.) 1863-1866, 1863-10-16
Tite 9oet's Corner.
Written for The Union.l
LAST NIGHT OF SEPTEMBER, 1858.
By DELAWARE.


fhs gray, cold gloom of night falls solemn Ger
Ihs silent earth, from shore to shore,
From wondrous depths, wide blazing from afar,
Translucent fair shines star succeeding star,
Rolls orb round orb in many winding maze,
Screnely on in their appointed ways.
Chill blows the night wind Ger the dew damp ground
Rustles the thickets and the forests round,
Curs the dark stream, and whitens oceans wave,
Means sad above the ever lonely grave.
Lo, where the clouds yellow tnge betray
In the far east, where first beams golden day,
The Harvest moon, the regal queen Of night,
On amber wheels slow rises on the sight;
Impetuous to the stars her broad beams fly,
Shoot through all space and CLEAN along the sky,
Der rocks, aud hills and floods and fields they fall
Forests, lone castles, moat, and iyied wall.
Thou art the moon that on Antietam shone,
When from the plain went mingled moan ON moan,
And curse, and sigh, and prayer, to Heavens ear,
Where angels bending dropped the plying tear,
Where heroes died and won immortal name,
Their country saving from dishonor's fame.
The streams ran blood where thy pale splendor fell;
Where varying horrors seemed second hell
Retreating traitors wound the hills among,
Through the deep night in bafled rage along,
On troop and weapon thy full radiant shone
following splendor where the gloom had gone.
And too of late, oh mournful truth thy beam
Shone saddcned down DER the far Georgian stream,
Where our great army felt disastrous fate,
On her broad banners breathe baleful hate;
But ere the night spread low her leaden PAIL
Black traitors fell in thousands, weltering all.
In far age to come, when by fixed doom,
All who now live, shall molder in the tomb,
Some warrior brave shall note thy rising ray,
And to himself rejecting, thus shall says
"There shines the moon that on two battles shone,
Whose equal thunders shook the solid zone,
Where Freedoms armies fastening to the fray,
From black Rebellion plucked the laureled day;
Where thckenng thousands trod the bloody plain
When sulphrous clouds gave forth iron rain;
And gained Ger hell the whole worlds liberty,
That deepening, broadening STILL grasps all eternity"
Now where the boundless regions of the west
extend,
The Evening Star with steady blaze doth tend,
Beaming mild love on all; the court of night
She sadly leaves deprived of all her light.
As hours roll on, the lesser planets slow;
With all their light into the darkness go.
hear re-echoing thronge each woodland aisle,
In mellow notes, the hunters horn the while,
And still more distant comes the hounds deep bay,
In quick pursuit through tangled wilds away;
On quivering branches sits the game on high;
Straight to the tree the hounds unerring fly,
The hunter climbs, it falls upon the earth,
A savory prize to greet the blazing hearth.
And now again through shadowy arches dim,
Pass tainted ground with straining eye and limb.
Here rolls river to the restless main,
Whose solemn flood divides fruitful plain,
On either side the full orbed moon looks down,
Where in fierce arms two mighty armies frown.
Now locked in sleep the mingling columns lie,
Their bed the turf their roof the star gemmed sky;
Chilled to the BONE on anxious round the guard,
With sense acute, DER all keeps watch and ward;
His thoughts meanwhile, in every region roam,
But settle down sfst in his own homej
He lives again where war Is far away,
And quiet night succeeds the peaceful day;
There heaves the ocean on the hollow shore,
Through the still night with unabating roar;
Stars set, winds cease, all nature sleeps but he
Forevermore rolls on his angry sea.
Light DER the waves the broad winged vessels fly,
Sailing straight on where mingles sea and sky;
Winds fill their Pnions waters give them room,
That reused in storms would hurl them to the tomb.
In shiny caves, on beetling crags below,
Thousands lie still, where high the billows 1ow.
The midnight hour is nearj ghostly and dread,
A thousand spectres screen the stars Ger head.
The world lies dark below, the moon on high
Sheds not4. beam across the sullen sky;
Strange voices call along the trembling gale,
Where phantom hunters seek the long lost trail;
The lonely chnrehyard ghastly visions tread,
While marble tombs emit the rising dead
The hour hath come! and 10, in hurried fight,
September bids the world long, long good night.
Milton, Del, Sept. 80, 1868