Look! Look! What gentle form with cautious step Passes from couch to couch as silently As yon faint shadows flickering on the walls, And, bending o'er the gasping sufferer's head, Cools his flushed forehead with the icy bath, From her own tender hand, or pours the cup Whose cordial powers can quench the inward flame That burns his heart to ashes, or with voice As tender as a mother's to her babe, Pours pious consolation in his ear. She came to one long used in war's rude scenes-- A soldier from his youth, grown gray in arms, Now pierced with mortal wounds. Untutored, rough, Though brave and true, uncared for by the world. His life had passed without a friendly word, Which timely spoken to his willing ear, Had wakened God-like hopes, and filled his heart With the unfading bloom of sacred truth. Beside his couch she stood, and read the page Of heavenly wisdom and the law of love, And bade him follow the triumphant chief Who bears the unconquered banner of the cross. The veteran heard with tears and grateful smile, Like a long-frozen fount whose ice is touched By the restless sun, and melts away, And, fixing his last gaze on her and heaven, Went to the Judge in penitential prayer. She passed to one, in manhood's blooming prime, Lately the glory of the martial field, But now, sore-scathed by the fierce shock of arms, Like a tall pine shattered by the lightning's stroke, Prostrate he lay, and felt the pangs of death, And saw its thickening damps obscure the light Which make our world so beautiful. Yet those He heeded not. His anxious thoughts had flown O'er rivers and illimitable woods, To his fair cottage in the Western wilds, Where his young bride and prattling little ones-- Poor hapless little ones, chafed by the wolf of war-- Watched for the coming of the absent one In utter desolation's bitterness. O, agonizing thought! which smote his heart With sharper anguish than the sabre's point. The angel came with sympathetic voice, And whispered in his ear: "Our God will be A husband to the widow, and embrace The orphan tenderly within his arms; For human sorrow never cries in vain To His compassionate ear." The dying man Drank in her words with rapture; cheering hope Shone like a rainbow in his tearful eyes, And arched his cloud of sorrow, while he gave The dearest earthly treasures of his heart, In resignation to the care of God.