Our topmen, a dauntless crowd, Swarmed in rigging and shroud: There, (’twas a wonder!) The burning ratlines and strands They quenched with their bare, hard hands; But the great guns below Never silenced their thunder. At last, by backing and sounding, When we were clear of grounding, And under headway once more, The whole rebel fleet came rounding The point. If we had it hot before, ’Twas now from shore to shore, One long, loud, thundering roar,-- Such crashing, splintering, and pounding, And smashing as you never heard before! But that we fought foul wrong to wreck, And to save the land we loved so well, You might have deemed our long gun-deck Two hundred feet of hell! For above all was battle, Broadside, and blaze, and rattle, Smoke and thunder alone; (But, down in the sick-bay, Where our wounded and dying lay, There was scarce a sob or a moan). And at last, when the dim day broke, And the sullen sun awoke, Drearily blinking O’er the haze and the cannon smoke, That ever such morning dulls,-- There were thirteen traitor hulls On fire and sinking! Now, up the river!--through mad Chalmette Sputters a vain resistance yet, Small helm we gave her our course to steer,-- ’Twas nicer work then you well would dream, With cant and sheer to keep her clear Of the burning wrecks that cumbered the stream, The _Louisiana_, hurled on high, Mounts in thunder to meet the sky! Then down to the depths of the turbid flood,-- Fifty fathom of rebel mud! The _Mississippi_ comes floating down, A mighty bonfire from off the town; And along the river, on stocks and ways, A half-hatched devil’s brood is ablaze,-- The great _Anglo-Norman_ is all in flames, (Hark to the roar of her trembling frames!) And the smaller fry that Treason would spawn Are lighting Algiers like an angry dawn! From stem to stern, how the pirates burn, Fired by the furious hands that built! So to ashes forever turn The suicide wrecks of wrong and guilt! But as we neared the city, By field and vast plantation, (Ah! millstone of our nation!) With wonder and with pity, What crowds we there espied Of dark and wistful faces, Mute in their toiling places, Strangely and sadly eyed, Haply ’mid doubt and fear, Deeming deliverance near, (One gave the ghost of a cheer!) And on that dolorous strand, To greet the victor brave, One flag did welcome wave-- Raised, ah me! by a wretched hand, All outworn on our cruel land,-- The withered hand of a slave!