flashed across the wires; Speed, speed the news from State to State, Light up the signal fires! Let all the bells from all the towers A joyous peal ring out; We've gained a glorious victory, And put the foe to rout! A mother heard the chiming bells; Her joy was mixed with pain.      "Pray God," she said, "my gallant boy Be not among the slain!"      Alas for her! that very hour Outstretched in death he lay, The color from his fair, young face Had scarcely passed away. His nerveless hand still grasped the sword. He never more might wield, His eyes were sealed in dreamless sleep Upon that bloody field. The chestnut curls his mother oft Had stroked in fondest pride, Neglected hung in clotted locks, With deepest crimson dyed. Ah! many a mother's heart shall ache, And bleed with anguish sore, When tidings come of him who marched So blithely forth to war. Oh! sad for them, the stricken down In manhood's early dawn, And sadder yet for loving hearts. God comfort them that mourn! Yes, victory has a fearful price Our hearts may shrink to pay, And tears will mingle with the joy That greets a glorious day. But he who dies in freedom's cause, We cannot count him lost; A battle won for truth and right Is worth the blood it cost! O mothers! count it something gained That they, for whom you mourn, Bequeath fair Freedom's heritage To millions yet unborn;—      And better than a thousand years Of base, ignoble breath, A patriot's fragrant memory, A hero's early death! 

  

       HARVARD ODES.     

      (SUNG AT ANNUAL DINNERS OF THE HARVARD CLUB OF New York. NEW YORK.) 

      HARVARD ODES. I.       (Feb. 23, 1869.)       Fair Harvard, dear guide of our youth's golden days; At thy name all our hearts own a thrill, We turn from life's highways, its business, its cares, We are boys in thy tutelage still. And the warm blood of youth to our veins, as of yore, Returns with impetuous flow, Reviving the scenes and the hopes that were ours In the vanished, but sweet Long Ago. Once more through thy walks, Alma Mater, we tread, And we dream youth's fair dreams once again, We are heroes in fight for the Just and the Right, We are knights without fear, without stain; Its doors in fair prospect the world opens wide, Its prizes seem easy to 

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