The clarion thunders and the battle joins;
Thick flames in vollied flashes load the air.
And echoing mountains give the noise of war;
Sulphureous clouds rise reddening round the height,
And veil the skies, and wrap the sounding fight.
Soon from the skirts of smoke, where thousands toil,
Ranks roll away and into light recoil;
Starke pours upon them in a storm of lead;
His hosted swains bestrew the field with dead,
Pierce with strong bayonets the German reins,
Whelm two battalions in his captive chains,
Bid Baum with wounds enfeebled quit the field,
And Breyman next his gushing lifeblood yield.
This Frazer sees, and thither turns his course,
Bears down before them with Britannia’s force,
Wheels a broad column on the victor flank
And springs to vengeance through the foremost rank.
Lincoln, to meet the hero, sweeps the plain;
His ready bands the laboring Starke sustain;
Host matching host, the doubtful battle burns,
And now the Britons, now their foes by turns
Regain the ground; till Frazer feels the force
Of a rude grapeshot in his flouncing horse;
Nor knew the chief, till struggling from the fall,
That his gored thigh had first received the ball.
He sinks expiring on the slippery soil;
Shock’d at the sight, his baffled troops recoil;
Where Lincoln, pressing with redoubled might,
Broke through their squadrons and confirmed the flight;
When this brave leader met a stunning blow,
That stopt his progress and avenged the foe.
He left the field; but prodigal of life,
Unwearied Francis still prolong’d the strife;
Till a chance carabine attained his head,
And stretch’d the hero mid the vulgar dead.
His near companions rush with ardent gait,
Swift to revenge, but soon to share his fate;
Brown, Adams, Coburn, falling side by side,
Drench the chill sod with all their vital tide.
Firm on the west bold Herkimer sustains
The gather’d shock of all Canadia’s trains;
Colons and wildmen post their skulkers there,
Outflank his pickets and assail his rear,
Drive in his distant scouts with hideous blare
And press, on three sides close, the hovering war.
Johnson’s own shrieks commence the deafening din,
Rouse every ambush and the storm begin.
A thousand thickets, through each opening glen,
Pour forth their hunters to the chase of men;
Trunks of huge trees and rocks and ravines lend
Unnumber’d batteries and their files defend;
They fire, they squat, they rise, advance and fly,
And yells and groans alternate rend the sky.
The well aim’d hatchet cleaves the helmless head,
Mute showers of arrows and loud storms of lead
Rain thick from hands unseen and sudden fling
A deep confusion through the laboring wing.
But Herkimer undaunted quits the stand,
Breaks in loose files his disencumbered band,
Wheels on the howling glens each light arm’d troop,
And leads himself where Johnson tones his whoop,
Pours through his copse a well directed fire;
The semisavage sees his tribes retire,
Then follows through the brush in full horse speed,
And gains the hilltop where the Hurons lead;
Here turns his courser; when a grateful sight
Recalls his stragglers and restrains his flight.
For Herkimer no longer now sustains
The loss of blood that his faint vitals drains:
A ball had pierced him ere he changed his field;
The slow sure death his prudence had conceal’d,
Till dark derouted foes should yield to flight,
And his firm friends could finish well the fight.
Lopt from his horse the hero sinks at last;
The Hurons ken him, and with hallooing blast
Shake the vast wilderness; the tribes around
Drink with broad ears and swell the rending sound,
Rush back to vengeance with tempestuous might,
Sweep the long slopes from every neighboring height,
Full on their checkt pursuers; who regain,
From all their woods, the first contested plain.
Here open fight begins; and sure defeat
Had forced that column to a swift retreat,
But Arnold toiling through the distant smoke
Beheld their plight, a small detachment took,
Bore down behind them with his field-park loud
And hail’d his grapeshot through the savage crowd;
Strow’d every copse with dead, and chased afar
The affrighted relics from the skirts of war.
But on the centre swells the heaviest charge,
The squares develop and the lines enlarge.
Here Kosciusko’s mantling works conceal’d
His batteries mute, but soon to scour the field;
Morgan with all his marksmen flanks the foe,
Hull, Brooks and Courtland in the vanguard glow;
Here gallant Dearborn leads his light arm’d train,
Here Scammel towers, here Silly shakes the plain.
Gates guides the onset with his waving brand,
Assigns their task to each unfolding band,
Sustains, inspirits, prompts the warrior’s rage,
Now bids the flank and now the front engage,
Points the stern riflers where their slugs to pour
And tells the unmasking batteries when to roar.
For here impetuous Powell wheels and veers
His royal guards, his British grenadiers;
His Highland broadswords cut their wasting course,
His horse-artillery whirls its furious force.
Here Specht and Reidesel to battle bring
Their scattering yagers from each folding wing;
And here, concentred in tremendous might,
Britain’s whole park, descending to the fight
Roars through the ranks; ’tis Phillips leads the train
And toils and thunders o’er the shuddering plain.
Burgoyne, secure of victory, from his height
Eyes the whole field and orders all the fight,
Marks where his veterans plunge their fiercest fire
And where his foes seem halting to retire,
Already sees the starry staff give way,
And British ensigns gaining on the day;
When from the western wing, in steely glare,
All conquering Arnold surged the tide of war.
Columbia kindles as her hero comes;
Her trump’s shrill clangor and her deafening drums
Redoubling sound the charge; they rage, they burn,
And hosted Europe trembles in her turn.
So when Pelides’ absence checkt her fate,
All Ilion issued from her guardian gate;
Her huddling squadrons like a tempest pour’d,
Each man a hero and each dart a sword,
Full on retiring Greece tumultuous fall,
And Greece reluctant seeks her sheltering wall;
But Peleus’ son rebounding o’er the plain,
Troy backward starts and seeks her towers again.
Arnold’s dread falchion with terrific sway
Rolls on the ranks and rules the doubtful day,
Confounds with one wide sweep the astonisht foes,
And bids at last the scene of slaughter close.
Pale rout begins, Britannia’s broken train
Tread back their steps and scatter from the plain,
To their strong camp precipitate retire,
And wide behind them streams the roaring fire.
Meantime, the skirts of war as Johnson gored,
His kindred cannibals desert their lord;
They scour the waste for undistinguisht prey,
Howl through the night the horrors of the day,
Scalp every straggler from all parties stray’d,
Each wounded wanderer through the moonlight glade;
And while the absent armies give them place,
Each camp they plunder and each world disgrace.
One deed shall tell what fame great Albion draws
From
