Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1871-03-08

JOH y ,tUtkNS- AOE~ GET TESBBlkGss I
The name Of no poet is now SO fire.
quentfy mentioned by the people Of the
United States as that of Bret Hsrte. His
saaf has, within a bic. period, risen
from below the horizon and shot to the
zenith. His genuine buf unaffected hu.
NOR, his deep pathps, his excellent versi=
sfication, his bsppy facultyih SEEING and
seizing the prominent points ia individual
character and The, peculiar charact eristics
Of society, have enabled him TO produce
series ct poems which have been read
and admired in the richly furnished par
lors Of the Atlantic States, by the camp
fires. of the rowing pioneer of the West,
and in the shanties of the reckless and
hardy miners of the Pacific coast. (. ls 2, I
John Burns of Gettysburg is the title
of the best as we think, Of these poems,
and one of the best of the many poems
which are bssed upon events Of the late
war. We give portion of it,, 500 T1-
HAYe you heard the story that poets tel 2,
OF Burns OF Gettysburg-Eo? All, well:
Brief is the glory that here earns,
Briefer The t,tosy Of poor John Burns; A
He was the fellow who won reDown,-s e
The only intn who didn't back down NJ 1.
When the Rebels rode through his native town:
But held his own in the fight N xt cay,
When al his townsfolk ran away.
That was in JAY, sixty three, 81 NJ ii
The very day that General Lee,
Flower Of Southern chivslry,
Bsffied and beaten backward reeled
From 5 stubborn Meade and a barren field,
1 might tell how, but the day before,
John Burns stood ct his cottage door,
Looking down the village street -.- A. "a
Where, in the shade OF his peaceful wire,
He heard the Low Of bis gathered kline,
And felt their breath with incense sweet; loot
Or, might say, when the sunset burned
The old iaI gable, he though it turned
The milk that Il, in q babblng food -'
Into the milk-paii, red as blOOd
Or how he fancied the hum of bees
Were bullets buzzing among the trees
But all such faucitul thoughts as these
We're strange to practical man like Burns,
Who minded only his own concerns,
Troubled no more by fancies fine
Than one of his calm eyed, long-taile kine,- -.
Quite oId-fashioned and nstter-oi.fact, -f.f
6iJw to argue, but quick 10 act
That was the reason, as some folks Fay,
He fought so weil on that teri ible dNy.
And it was terrible oaihe right
Ragged for hours the heady fight,
Tbundered the battery e double bass
Difficult mu-io or men to face;
While on the left where now the graves
Undulate Ike the living waves
That ell that day uncea ing swept
Up to the pits the Rerels kept r1
Round shot plowed the upland gladeS; ..'
SoEed With bnllets, reaped VITA blades; ...
Shattered ferces here and there
Tossed their splnters in the cir; -8a
The very trees were stripped and bare; r .|
The barns that once held yellow grain ID
We're heaped with harvests of the sldn;
The cattle beloved on the plain,
the turkeys screamed with might and main.
And brooding barn-lowl left their rest
WI h strange shells bursting In each nest
The poem proceeds with description
of the dress John Burns wore, his '1ong
buff vest, ''bnght blue coat"
with rolling conlr
and large gilt buttons-size OF a dollar
WITH ta'ls that the couutry-folk ca led "swsller.
BE wore a broad imIned, bell-cIowned INST,
White as the locks on which it sat. .
The cle.ks that the Home Guard had
mustered in hailed him:
show are you, White HAITI, "Put her through"
''Youf heads level" aud "BdIy for youi" -.
Called him Daddy, begged he'd disclose .-|
The name of the ta''or who made his clothes,
and whas was the yslue ne set on those.
The battle ragged and Lee was defeated.
At which John Burns-a practical ma1-
Shouldered bis life, Unbent his brows,
AID then went back to his bees and cows
The author concludes:
That is the story Of old John Barns;
rCis is tie moral the reader learn:
In ng1ting the battle, the question e whether
You'll show hat that's white, or q featherl
We thiuk there is another m raj which
the reader may Learn from this story of
old John Burns, quite as Geducible IS that
given by the author aud certainly far
more applicable to the times, and that is:
When the war is over, when you have
whipped your enemy, as "a practicsl
ran"
Shoulder your rife, unbend your brows
Then 60 back to your bees and cows !
There are many Of our Radical fellow
citizens who, We know, will admire the |
story Of John Buns, of Getty sburg, far
more for his patriotic "Ioyalty" than for
the beauty and intrinsic merit of the |
poem. To all such we would commend |
the further study of this beautiful |
triumph of American genius, and ask
that they devote more of their time to |
proper appreciation of the true moral
taught by it and less to the cUntrivsnce |
of laws TO hsrrsss and Cypress ''the IT b.
els" who were "beaten and backward |
pressed at Gettysburg.