Now that you’ve marshalled your whole command, Planned what you would, and changed what you planned, Practised with shot and practised with shell, Know to a hair where every one fell, Made signs by day and signals by night; Was it all done to keep out of a fight? Is the whole matter too heavy a charge? What are you waiting for, tardy George? Shall we have more speeches, more reviews? Or are you waiting to hear the news; To hold up your hands in mute surprise, When France and England shall “recognize”? Are you too grand to fight traitors small? Must you have a nation to cope withal? Well, hammer the anvil and blow the forge-- You’ll soon have a dozen, tardy George. Suppose for a moment, George, my friend-- Just for a moment--you condescend To use the means that are in your hands, The eager muskets and guns and brands; Take one bold step on the Southern sod, And leave the issue to watchful God! For now the nation raises its gorge, Waiting and watching you, tardy George. I should not much wonder, George, my boy, If Stanton get in his head a toy, And some fine morning, ere you are out, He send you all “to the right about”-- You and Jomini, and all the crew Who think that war is nothing to do But to drill and cipher, and hammer and forge-- What are you waiting for, tardy George? January, 1862. [Illustration] WANTED--A MAN. BY EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN. [This virile cry for a fit leader for the Army of the Potomac was inspired by an editorial article of Henry J. Raymond in the _New York Times_. It was written in 1862, when the popular feeling of chagrin and humiliation over McClellan’s failure and Pope’s disaster at Manassas was most intense. Mr. Lincoln was so strongly impressed by the poem that he read it to his Cabinet.--EDITOR.] Back from the trebly crimsoned field Terrible words are thunder-tost; Full of the wrath that will not yield, Full of revenge for battles lost! Hark to their echo, as it crost The Capital, making faces wan: “End this murderous holocaust; Abraham Lincoln, give us a MAN! “Give us a man of God’s own mould, Born to marshal his fellow-men; One whose fame is not bought and sold At the stroke of a politician’s pen; Give us the man of thousands ten, Fit to do as well as to plan; Give us a rallying-cry, and then, Abraham Lincoln, give us a MAN! “No leader to shirk the boasting foe, And to march and countermarch our brave, Till they fall like ghosts in the marshes low, And swamp-grass covers each nameless grave; Nor another, whose fatal banners wave Aye in disaster’s shameful van; Nor another, to bluster, and lie, and rave,-- Abraham Lincoln, give us a MAN!