There’s a rhythm still and toneless with the wind amid the green, Of the drum, muffled drum, And there’s arms reversed, and something ’neath a flag that goes between As they come, as they come. “Just a soldier, nothing more, such as all the ages bore “And as time and tide shall bear them till the sun be sere and hoar,” Says the rhythm, muffled rhythm, of the drum. “No more am I requiring of the keen brazen lyring “Than ‘taps’ from the bugle--some shots for the firing. “Hats off; stand aside; it is all I’m desiring,” Says the rhythm, muffled rhythm, of the drum. “I am rhythm, muffled rhythm; long and deep farewell go with him, “Hands that bore their portion through tasks our nature needs must do, “Feet that stepped the ancient rhyme of the battle-march of Time. “Blood or tribute, steel or gold, still _Vae Victis_ as of old, “Stern and curt the message runs taught to sons and sons of sons. “_Chair à canon_, would you call? What else are we, one and all? “Write it thus to close his span: ‘_Here there lies a fighting man_,’” Says the rhythm, muffled rhythm, of the drum. “O ye farms upon the hillside and ye cities by the sea, “With the laughter of young mothers and the babes about the knee, “’Tis a heart that once beat for you that is passing, still and dumb, “To the rhythm, muffled rhythm, “To the rhythm, solemn rhythm, “To the slow and muffled rhythm “Of the drum!” _Scribner’s Magazine_ _E. Sutton_ IF! Suppose ’twere done! The lanyard pulled on every shotted gun; Into the wheeling death-clutch sent Each millioned armament, To grapple there On land, on sea and under, and in air! Suppose at last ’twere come-- Now, while each bourse and shop and mill is dumb And arsenals and dockyards hum,-- Now all complete, supreme, That vast, Satanic dream!-- Each field were trampled, soaked, Each stream dyed, choked, Each leaguered city and blockaded port Made famine’s sport; The empty wave Made reeling dreadnought’s grave; Cathedral, castle, gallery, smoking fell ’Neath bomb and shell; In deathlike trance Lay industry, finance; Two thousand years’ Bequest, achievement, saving disappears, In blood and tears, In widowed woe That slum and palace equal know, In civilization’s suicide,-- What served thereby, what satisfied? For justice, freedom, right, what wrought? NAUGHT!-- Save, after the great cataclysm, perhap On the world’s shaken map New lines, more near or far, Binding to King or Czar In fostering hate Some newly vassaled state; And passion, lust and pride made satiate; And just a trace Of lingering smile on Satan’s face! _Boston New Bureau_ _Bartholomew F. Griffin_ PRELUDE