Till the purple and gold of the sunset are gone;
For the battle draws near her:--few leagues intervene
Her home and that Valley of slaughter, between.

The tidings and rumors come thick and come fast,
As riders fly hotly and breathlessly past;
They tell of the onslaught,--the headlong attack
Of the foe with a quadruple force at his back:
They boast how they hurl themselves,--shiver and fall
Before their stout rampart, the valiant "Stonewall."

At length, with the gradual fading of day,--
The tokens of battle are floated away:
The booming no longer makes sullen the air,
And the silence of night seems as holy as prayer.

Gray shadows still linger the beeches among,
And scarce has the earliest matin been sung,
Ere Alice with Beverly pale at her side,
Yet firm as his mother, is ready to ride.

With sympathy, womanly, tender, divine,--
With lint and with bandage, with bread and with wine,--
She hastes to the battle-field, eager to bear
Relief to the wounded and perishing there:
To breathe, like an angel of mercy, the breath
Of peace over brows that are fainting in death.

She dares not to stir with a question, _her_ woe,
One word,--and the bitter-brimm'd heart would o'erflow: