Their cannon swept o’er us and through us; Their rifles rained death on the field: We had sworn by the Mother of Jesus To conquer, but never to yield: Down, down, where he fought fell each hero, Horse and man, one by one, where he stood; And the sands of the rugged sierra Were crimson with Mexican blood. Like a lion at bay rode Najira: Not one of the troop that he led But was stretched on the side of the mountain— Thick strown with the dying and dead. His coat and his saddle were bloody; He reeled in his seat as he strove To strike once again for his country, Once again for the land of his love. All alone, all alone did he battle. Disdaining to yield, or to fly; He had failed, as he promised, to conquer, And nothing was left but to—die! “Surrender! surrender!” his foemen, Full of wonder, entreatingly cried, As, defying, he galloped his charger Along the sierra’s steep side. Down, down, at each stroke an invader Sank wounded, and gasping, and dead, As he galloped from foeman to foeman, His sword, waved in scorn, overhead. But the bullet at last rent his bosom, And down, from the cliff to the plain, Rolled the form of the dying Najira, The bravest and best of the slain. Weep, weep, for the gallant Najira! For never will Mexico own So heroic, so gallant a soldier, So fearless, so faultless a son! On his tomb lay your chaplets of laurel, And, Maidens of Mexico, pray For the soul of the knightly Najira— Pray, Maidens of Mexico, pray! NOTES. [1] The Sierra Madre. [2] Lieutenant-colonel Don Juan Najira, (pronounced Nah-_hee_-ra,) led the Guanjuato regiment in its attack on General Worth’s division, on the morning of the 21st September. He was as brave as the Chevalier Bayard, the knight “_sans peur, et sans reproche_.” RIPLEY, in his “War with Mexico,” says of him, that—“In spite of wounds he refused to surrender, and struggled on, until, at length, he fell from his horse, and rolled, dead, down the side of the mountain.” [3] “The traitorous Texan,” an epithet which is purely Mexican, as the ballad is supposed to be the product of a Mexican bard. The retreat of the Texan regiment, however, is a historical fact; but the Mexican lancers paid dearly for their short-lived triumph: not a man of them (I quote Ripley) survived. [Illustration] * * * * * LOITERINGS AND LIFE ON THE GREAT PRAIRIES OF THE WEST. BY J. M. LEGARE. A LOVE STORY OF THE PRAIRIES.