You bade--I know not what;
With one last gnash, with one last wrench,
I sped my last, sure shot.

"The thing that lies on the sodden ground
Like a wrack of the whirlwind's track,
Your men have made of the body of me,
But they could not call you back!

"In that black game I won, I won!
But had you worked your will,
Speak now the shame that you would have done
In the blockhouse under the hill!"

"God judge my men!" said the fair young soul,
"He knows you tried them sore.
Had He given me power to bide an hour
I had wrought that they forebore.

"I bade them, ere your bullet brought
This swift, this sweet release,
To bear your body out of the fire
That you might rest in peace."

Said the grim dark soul, "Farewell, farewell,
Farewell 'twixt you and me
Till they set red Judas free from Hell
To kneel at the Lord Christ's knee!"

"Not so, not so," said the fair young soul,