New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1874-08-16

l o"cSPhiS Wy lAto Cuc West.
Four little walls of cOquina stone
Rude thatch OF palmetto leaves
There have they n. stled, like birds in tree,
| From winter, and labor and hunger free,
Taking from earth their small need but no more
| No thought OF the morrow, no laying in store,
NO gathering patient leaves.
Alone in their southern island home.
Through the year of summer days,
The Two love on: and the bvuntiful beach
| Clusters its food within his reach;
The two love on. and the tropical land
Drops IFS wild fluit in her incident hand,
And lie is sunshiny haze.
Luiz, Dolores, and baby brown
With dreamy passionate eyes
Far in the past, lurei by Saxon wiles,
simple folk calle from the Spanish sea isles,
Now, tinged with the blood of the creole quOdroon
Their children live idly along the lagoon,
Under the florida skies.
Luz, Dolores and baby brown,
All, their blOssonlng life of love-
But fever falls with its whitening blight:
Dolores keeps watch through the sultry night,
In vain her poor herbs in vain her poor prayers-
Her LUZ is mounting tho spirit winged stairs
That lead TO ner heaven above.
So her old boat loaded with oranges,
Her baby tied on her breast,
Dolores rows Off TO the ancient town,
Where the blue eyed soldiers come marchiug down
Thus Dolores thnks-hOw to cure all woe;
Nay, their very touch Is blest.
"Orauges! ges =! hear her cry,
Through the AIDED plaza path;
But the Northern soldiers come marching in
Through the old spanish city, with stir and din
And the silent people stand sullen by,
To SEE the old flag mount again 10 the sky
The flag they had trampled IN wrath.
All, brown Dolores will no one hear,
And by thy poor little store?
Now north, now SOUTH on the old sea wall
But her pitiful tones unheeded fall;
Now east, now west through the angry town.
Patient she journeys up ana down,
Nor misses one suriy door.
Then desperate, up to the dreaded ranks
She carries her passionate suit;
have no money, for none would buy;
But come, for Gods sake, or he will die!
Rave hiin-my Luz-he is so youngw
She pleads in her liquid MnOrcan tongue,
And prOtfers her store OF fruit.
But the Northern go diers move steadily on .
They hear not nor understand
The last blue rank has passed down the street,
She sees but the dust oftheir marching feet;
They have crossed a whole country by night and
And marked with their blood every step of the
To conquer this Southern land.
They are. gone-o despaiil She turns to the
church.
Halffanting her fruit wet with tears;
perhaps the old saint, who is alw avs there,
May wake up and take them to pay for prayer;
They are very sweet as the saint will see,
IT he would but wake up, and listen to me;
But he sleeps So he never hears"
She enters; the church is filled with men,
The palld men of the North:
Each dingy old pew is a sick mans bed,
Each battered old bench holds a weary head
The altar candles are swept away
For Via S and knives in SHINING array,
And a new saint is stepping fortbl
he must be saint for he comes from the shrine
A saint of a Northern creed
Glad in a unifOrm-army blue,
But surely the saints may wear any hue
Dolores thinks, as he takes her hands
And hears all Ter story, and understands
The cry Of her desperate need
An orange he gives to each weary man.
To freshen the feveret mouth,
Then forth they go down the old sea wall
The rowboat is moored on the he shadow a .hore,
The Northern saint can manage oar,
And the boat gides fast to the SOUTH
healing touch and holy drink,
A bright little heavenly knife
And this strange Northern saint, who prays no
Brings back The soul from the spirit-winged stairs
And once more MnOrcan LUIS dark eyes,
In whose depths the warmth of the tropics lies,
Rest calm on the awestricken wife.
"Oh, dear Northern saint shrine will build,
Wild roses I'll bring from afar.
The jessamine, orange flower, woed-t tulips bright,
And those will worship each morning and night"
"Na y, nay, poor Dolores. I am but man,
surgeon. who binds with what skill heScan
The wounds Of this heart breaking war.
"See, build me no 'shrines, but take this small
book,
And teach the brown baby to read"
He is gone; and Dolores is left on the shore
! he watches the boat till she sees it no more
She hears the quick musketry all through the
night,
She holds the book in her pine knots red
light,
The book Of the Northerner's creed.
The sad war is over, the dear peace has come.
The blue -cOated soldiers depart;
The brown baby reads the small book and the
three
Live on in their isle in the Florida sea;
The brown baby learns many things wise and
strange,
But all his new English words never can change
The faith of Dolores fond heart.
A boat with load of oranges
In a flower decked shrine doth stand
Carved in coquna, and thither she goes,
To pray to the only real saint she knows.
The Northern surgeon in army blue;
And there SHE was found in this mornings dew
Dead, with the book in her hand