Panther and hart together Fled to the wilds afar, From the flash and the crash of the cannon And the rush of the southward war. But at last by the lordly river The trampling giant swayed, And his massive arm swung eastward Like a blindly-plunging blade. New England felt her bosom Menaced with deadly blow, And her minute-men sprang up again And flew to bar the foe. But Stark in his Hampshire valley Watched like a glowering bear, That hears the cry go sweeping by Yet stirs not from his lair; For on his daring spirit A wrath lay like a spell,-- The wrath of one rewarded ill For a great work wrought right well. Neighbor and friend and brother Flocked to his side in vain,-- "What, can it be that they long for me To ruin their cause again? "Surely the northern lights are bright. Surely the South lies still. Would they have more?--Lo, I left my sword On the crest of Bunker Hill." But at last from his own New Hampshire An urgent summons came, That stirred his heart like the voice of God From Sinai's walls of flame. He bowed his head, and he rose aloft; Again he grasped the brand,-- "For the cause of man and my native State, Not for an ingrate land!" Through the mist-veil faintly struggling, The rays of the setting sun Reddened the leafy village Of white-walled Bennington. Then out of the dismal weather Came many a sound of war,-- The straggling shots and the volleys And the cries, now near now far. For forms half seen were chasing The phantom forms that fled; And ghostly figures grappled And spectres fought and bled; Till the mist on a sudden settled And they saw before them fair, Over a hill to the westward, An island in the air. There were tree-trunks and waving branches, And greensward and flowers below; It rose in a dome of verdure From the mist-waves' watery flow. A flag from its summit floated And a circling earthwork grew, As the arms of the swarming soldiers At their toil unwonted flew. "Aha!" cried the Yankee leader, "So the panther has turned at bay With his claws of steel and his breath of fire Behind that wall of clay! "_Our_ steel is in muscle and sinew. But I know,"--and his voice rang free,-- "Right well I know we shall strike a blow That the world will leap to see." I stood by a blazing city Till the fires had died away, Save a flickering gleam in the ruins And a fitful gleam on the bay. But a swarthy cove by the water Blue-bristled from point to base, With the breath of demons, bursting Through the crust of their prison-place; And another beside it flaunted A thousand rags of red, Like the Plague King's dancing banners On a mound of the swollen dead.