Grey bent. A something trembled o'er the well,
Bright, spherical--a tear? Ah no! a button fell!

XXVII

"Material minds might think that gravitation,"
Quoth Grey, "drew yon metallic spheroid down.
The soul poetic views the situation
Fraught with more meaning. When thy girlish crown
Was mirrored there, there was disintegration
Of me, and all my spirit moved to you,
Taking the form of slow precipitation!"
But here came "Taps," a start, a smile, adieu!
A blush, a sigh, and end of Canto II.

BUGLE SONG

Fades the light,
And afar
Goeth day, cometh night;
And a star
Leadeth all,
Speedeth all
To their rest!

Love, good-night!
Must thou go
When the day
And the light
Need thee so,--
Needeth all,
Heedeth all,
That is best?

CANTO III

I

Where the sun sinks through leagues of arid sky,
Where the sun dies o'er leagues of arid plain,
Where the dead bones of wasted rivers lie,
Trailed from their channels in yon mountain chain;
Where day by day naught takes the wearied eye
But the low-rimming mountains, sharply based
On the dead levels, moving far or nigh,
As the sick vision wanders o'er the waste,
But ever day by day against the sunset traced:

II

There moving through a poisonous cloud that stings
With dust of alkali the trampling band
Of Indian ponies, ride on dusky wings
The red marauders of the Western land;
Heavy with spoil, they seek the trail that brings
Their flaunting lances to that sheltered bank
Where lie their lodges; and the river sings
Forgetful of the plain beyond, that drank
Its life blood, where the wasted caravan sank.

III

They brought with them the thief's ignoble spoil,
The beggar's dole, the greed of chiffonnier,
The scum of camps, the implements of toil
Snatched from dead hands, to rust as useless here;
All they could rake or glean from hut or soil
Piled their lean ponies, with the jackdaw's greed
For vacant glitter. It were scarce a foil
To all this tinsel that one feathered reed
Bore on its barb two scalps that freshly bleed!

IV

They brought with them, alas! a wounded foe,