And Fair The Form Of Music Shines

"To thee I'll return, overburdened with care
The heart's dearest solace will smile on me there
No more from that cottage again will I roam,
Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home."
John Howard Payne

Two armies covered hill and plain,

Where Rappahannock's waters

Ran deeply crimsoned with the stain

Of battles recent slaughters.

The summer clouds lay pitched like tents

In meads of heavenly azure;

And each dread gun of the elements

Slept in its high embrasure.

The breeze so softly blew, it made

No forest leaf to quiver;

And the smoke of the random cannonade

Rolled slowly from the river.

And now where circling hills look down

With cannon grimly planted,

O'er listless camp and silent town

The golden sunset slanted.

When on the fervid air there came

A strain now rich now tender;

The music seemed itself aflame

With day's departing splendor.

A Federal band which eve and morn

Played measures brave and nimble,

Had just struck up with flute and horn

And lively clash of cymbal.

Down flocked the soldiers to the banks;

Till, margined by its pebbles,

One wooded shore was blue with "Yanks"

And one was gray with "Rebels".

Then all was still; and then the band,

With movement light and tricksy,

Made stream and forest, hill and strand

Reverberate with "Dixie".

The conscious stream, with burnished glow,

Went proudly o'er its pebbles,

But thrilled throughout its deepest flow

With yelling of the Rebels.

Again a pause; and then again

The trumpet pealed sonorous,

And "Yankee Doodle" was the strain

To which the shore gave chorus.

The laughing ripple shoreward flew

To kiss the shining pebbles;

Loud shrieked the swarming Boys in blue

Defiance to the Rebels.

And yet once more the bugle sang

Above the stormy riot;

No shout upon the evening rang-

There reigned a holy quiet.

The sad, slow stream its noiseless flood

Poured o'er the glistening pebbles;

All silent now the Yankees stood,

All silent stood the Rebels.

No unresponsive soul had heard

That plaintive note's appealing,

So deeply, "Home Sweet Home" had stirred

The hidden fonts of feeling.

Or Blue, or Gray, the soldier sees

As by the wand of fairy,

The cottage 'neath the live oak trees,

The cabin by the prairie.

Tho' cold or warm, his native skies

bend in their beauty o'er him;

Seen through the tear mist in his eyes,

His loved ones stand before him.

As fades the iris after rain

In April's tearful weather,

The vision vanished as the strain

And daylight died together.

But Memory, waked by Music's art,

Expressed in simple numbers,

Subdued the sternest Yankee's heart,

Made light the Rebel's slumbers.

And fair the form of Music shines-

The bright celestial creature-

Who still 'mid War's embattled lines

Gives this one touch of Nature.

"Music In Camp"

John R. Thompson

Rappahannock River

Virginia