ed a trumpet's clang,
And when its silvery anger smote the air,
Men sprang to arms from every true man's home,
And followed to the field. He followed, too,--
All the mad blood of manhood in his veins,
All the fierce instincts of a warring race
Kindled like flame in every tingling limb,
And raging in his soul on fire with war.
He heard a thousand voices call him on:
Lips hot with anguish, shrieking their despair
From swamps and forests and the still bayous
That hide the wanderer, nor bewray his lair:
From fields and marshes where the tropic sun
Scorches a million laborers scourged to work;
From homes that are not homes; from mother-hearts
Torn from the infants lingering at their breasts;
From parted lovers, and from shuddering wives;
From men grown mad with whips and tyranny;
From all a country groaning in its chains.
Nor sleep, nor dream beguiled him any more;
He leaped to manhood in one torrid hour,
And armed, and sped to battle. Now no more
He cried or prayed,--"Show me the Sangreal, Lord!"

So in the front of deadly strife he stood;
The glorious thunder of the roaring guns,
The restless hurricane of screaming shells,
The quick, sharp singing of the rifle-balls,
The sudden clash of sabres, and the beat
Of rapid horse-hoofs galloping at charge,
Made a great chorus to his valorous soul,
The dreadful music of a grappling world,
That hurried him to fight. He turned the tide,
But fell upon its turning. Over him
Fluttered the starry flag, and fluttered on,
While he lay helpless on the trampled sward,
His hot life running scarlet from its source,
And all his soul in sudden quiet spent,
As still as on the silent mountain-top;
So still that from his quick-remembering heart
Burst that old cry,--"Show me the Sangreal, Lord!"

Then a bright mist descended over him,
And in its central glory stood a shape,
Wounded, yet smiling. With His bleeding hands
Stretched toward that bleeding side, His eyes divine
Like a new dawn, thus softly spake the Lord:--
"The blood poured out for brothers is my blood;
The flesh for brothers broken is my flesh;
No more in golden chalices I dwell,
No longer in a vision, angel-borne:
Here is the Sangreal, here the Holy Quest.
Thy prayer is heard, thy soul is satisfied:
Come, my beloved! I am come for thee.
As first I broke the bread and poured the wine,
So have I broken thee and poure