THE CALL OF THE BUGLES

Bugles! And the great nation thrills and leaps to arms! Prompt, unconstrained, immediate, Without misgiving and without debate, Too calm, too strong for fury or alarms, The people blossoms armies and puts forth The splendid summer of its noiseless might; For the old sap of fight Mounts up in South and North, The thrill That tingled in our veins at Bunker Hill And brought to bloom July of 'Seventy-Six! Pine and palmetto mix With the sequoia of the giant West Their ready banners, and the hosts of war, Near and far, Sudden as dawn, Innumerable as forests, hear the call Of the bugles, The battle-birds!

For not alone the brave, the fortunate, Who first of all Have put their knapsacks on — They are the valiant vanguard of the rest! Not they alone, but all our millions wait, Hand on sword, For the word That bids them bid the nations know us sons of Fate

Peace, when the world is free! Peace, when there is no thong, Fetter nor bar! No scourges for men's backs, No thumbscrews and no racks — For body or soul! No unjust Taw! No tyrannous control Of brawn or maw! But though the day be far, Till then, war!

Bugles! The imperious bugles! Still their call Soars like an exaltation to the sky — They call on men to fall, To die, — Remembered or forgotten, but a part Of the great beating of the Nation's heart. A call to sacrifice! A call to victory! Hark, in the Empyrean The battle-birds! The Bugles!