Condon globe. (Condon, Gilliam Co., Or.) 189?-1919, 1903-05-28
Old
FAVORITES
Iohn Rnrn. of 0ettyaburE.

Iohn Burns of GettysburE.
Have you heard the story that gossips
tell
OF Baras of GettysburgG NOf All,
well;
Brief is the glory that hero earns,
Rriefer Is the story Of poor John Burnsi
He was the fellow who won renown---
The only man who didn't back down
When the rebels rode through his native
town;
But held his own IN the fight next day,
When all his townsfolk ran away.
That was in July, sixty-three,
The very day that General Lee,
Flower Of Southern chivalry.
Baffled and beaten, backward reeled
From stubborn Meade and barren
field.
| might tell you how, but the day before,
John Burns stood at his cottage door,
Looking down the village street,
Where, in the shade of his peaceful vine,
He heard the low of his gathered kline,
And felt their breath with Incense sweet;
Or might say, when the sunset burned
The old farm gable, be thought II turned
The milk, that fell In babbling Hood
Into the milk pail, red as blood.
OR how he fancied the hum OF bees
Were bullets buxKing among the trees,
But all such fanciful thoughts as these
Were strange to u practical man like
Burns,
Who minded only his own concerns,
Troubled no more by faneies hne
Than one of his calm-eyed, long-tailed
kline
Quite old-fashioned and matter-of-faet,
Slow to argue. but quick to act.
That was the reason, as some folks say,
He fought so well on that terrible day,
, Aud il was terrible. On the right
Ragged for hours the heady fight,
Thundered the battery's double bass
Difficult music for men to face;
While on the left-where now the graves
Undulate Ike the living waves
That all that day unceasng swept
Up to the pits the rebels kept
Round-shot plowed the upland glades,
Sown with bullets, reaped with blades
( Shattered fences here and there
/ Tossed their splinters in the air;
/ The very trees were stripped and bare
/ The barns that once held yellow grain
\ Were heaped with harvest of the slain
| The cattle beloved on the plain,
/ The turkeys screamed with might anc
main,
And brooding barn-fowl left their rest
/ With strange shells bursting In each nest
Just where the tide of battle turns,
Erect and lonely stood old John Burns
/ How do you think the man was dressed
He wore an ancient long buff vest,
! Yellow as saffron-but his best;
/ And, buttoned over his manly breast,
1 Was a bright-blue coat, with a rolling
collar,
And large gilt buttons-size Of dollar
With tails that the country-folk called
"swaller."
He wore broad brimmed. bell-crowneC
hat,
White as the locks on which it sat.
Never had such a sight been seen
| For forty years on the village green,
Since old John Burns was a cou2try
beau,
And went to the "Quiltings" long ago.
/ Close at his elbows all that day
\ Veterans of the Penins ula,
Sunburnt and bearded. charged away:
And striplings, downy of lip and chin
! Clerks that the Home Guard mustered
/ Glanced, as they passed, at the hat h'
/ wore,
| Then at the rife his right hand bore;
And hailed him, from out their youthful
lore,
With scraps Of a slangy repertoire:
How are you, White HatE" Put he
through"
Your heads level" and Bully fo
your
Called him Daddy; begged he'd dis
close
The name of the tailor who made hi
clothes,
And what was the value he set on those
| While Burns, unmindful of jeer and scoff
Stood there picking the rebels off
With his long brown rifle. and bell crow
hat,
And the swallow tails they were laugh
ing at.
Twas but for a moment, for that re
spect
Which clothes all courage their voice
checked,
And something the widest could under
stand
Spake in the old mans strong right hand
And bis corded throat. and the lurking
frown
of his eyebrows under his old bell-crown
Until, as they gazed, there crept an aw
Through the ranks in whispers, and som
men saw
In the antique yestments and long whit
hair
The Past of the Nation in battle there;
And some Of the soldiers since declare
That the CLEAN of his old white hat afal
Like the crested plume of the brave Ma
yarre,
That day was the oriflamme Of war.
So ragged the battle. You know tn
reEt:
How the rebels, beaten and backwar
pressed,
Broke at the final charge and ran.
At which John Burns-a practical man
Shouldered his rife, unbent his brows,
And then went back to his bees and cow
This Is the story of old John Burns.
This is the moral the reader learns:
In fighting the battle, the question
whether
You'll show hat that's white, or
feather!
Bret Harte.
--=-=-=@---
HAS LEFT HIS HIGH POST.