Knoxville weekly chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1875, 1874-05-27

No -Jng of a soldier riding down
To the raging fight from Winchester town:
No song of u time that shook tho earth
With the nations throe at nation birth;
But the song of brave man. free from fear
As Sheridan's self or Paul Revere;
VINO riskcd what they riskcd free from strife
And IT. promise of glorious pay-his life.
The peaceful valley has walked and stirred,
And the answering echoes of life are heard
The dew still clngs to the trees and grass.
And the early toilers smiling pass,
A. they glance aside at the white walled homes,
Or up the valley, where merrily comes
Tho brook that sparkles in diamond rills
As the sun comes over the Hampshire hills
What was it. that passed like an ominous
breath
Like a SILVER of fear or touch of death?
What was it? The valley is peaceful still,
And the leaves are ahre on top of the hill;
|, was not a sound, nor thing of sense
Bat pain, like the psng of short suspense
That wraps the being of those who see
At their feet the gulf of eternity
The air of the valley has felt the chill
The workers pause at the door of the mill ;
Tho housewife, keen to the shivering air,
Arrests her foot on the cottage stair,
Instructive taught by the mother love,
And thinks Of the sleeping ones abovel
Why start the listeners Why does the course
Of the mill stream widen? l. it horse?
Hark to the sound Of his hoofs, they say,
That gallops so wildly Williamsburg way
God! what was that like human shrek
From the winding valley? Will nobody speak ?
Will nobody answer those women who cry
As the awful warnings thunder by
Whence come they? Listen And now they
hear
The sound of the gslloping households near;
They watch the trend of the vale, and see
The rider, who thunders SO menacngly,
With XUa vino q Y n warning
Tothe home filled banks of the valley stream,
he draws no rein, but he shakes the street
With = shout and the ring of gallopng feet,
And this the cry that he filings to the wind:
% To the hills jor your Lircsl The food is be-
hind"
He cries and is gone; but they know the worst
The treacherous Williamsburg dam has burst!
The basin that nourished their happy homes
Is changed 10 n demon-lt comes 1t comes
: monster in aspect, with shaggy front
Of shattered dwellings, to take the brunt
OF the dwellings they shatter-white-maned
and hoarse,
The merciless terror fills the course
OF the narrow valley, and rushing raves,
With Death on the first of its Kissing waves,
Til cottage and street and crowded mill
Are cruInbled and crushed.
But onward still,
In front of the roaring flood is heard
The galloping horse and the warning word,
Thank God that the brave mans life is spared
From Williamsburg town he nobly dared
To race with the food and to take the road
In front of the terrible swath it moved.
For miles it Numbered and crashed behind,
But he looked ahead with steadfast mind
ID Ihey must be tcdrned % was all he said
As away on his terrible ride he sped.
When heroes are called for, bring the crown
TO this Yankee rider; send him down
IN the stream of time with the Curtius old;
His deed as the Romans was brave and bold,
And the tale can as noble thrill awake,
FOR he offered his life for the peoples sake.
THE Boston Pilot.