With ready piece I wait and watch, Until my eyes, familiar grown, Detect each harmless earthen notch, And turn guerrillas into stone; And then, amid the lonely gloom, Beneath the tall old chestnut trees, My silent marches I resume, And think of other times than these. Sweet visions through the silent night! The deep bay windows fringed with vine, The room within, in softened light, The tender, milk-white hand in mine; The timid pressure, and the pause That often overcame our speech-- The time when by mysterious laws We each felt all in all to each. And then that bitter, bitter day, When came the final hour to part; When, clad in soldier’s honest gray, I pressed her weeping to my heart; Too proud of me to bid me stay, Too fond of me to let me go, I had to tear myself away, And left her, stolid in my woe. So rose the dream, so passed the night-- When, distant in the darksome glen, Approaching up the sombre height I heard the solid march of men; Till over stubble, over sward, And fields where lay the golden sheaf, I saw the lantern of the guard Advancing with the night relief. “Halt! Who goes there?” my challenge cry, It rings along the watchful line; “Relief!” I hear a voice reply; “Advance, and give the countersign!” With bayonet at the charge I wait-- The corporal gives the mystic spell; With arms aport I charge my mate, Then onward pass, and all is well. But in the tent that night awake, I ask, if in the fray I fall, Can I the mystic answer make When the angelic sentries call? And pray that Heaven may so ordain, Whene’er I go, what fate be mine, Whether in pleasure or in pain, I still may have the countersign. [Southern.] [Illustration] [Illustration] JONATHAN TO JOHN. BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.