South Songs.

SOUTH SONGS.

Your Mission.")

FOLD away all your bright-tinted dresses,
Turn the key on your jewels to-day,
And the wealth of your tendril-like tresses
Braid back, in a serious way:

No more delicate gloves-no more laces,
No more trifling in boudoir or bower;
But come with your souls in your faces—
To meet the stern needs of the hour!

Look around! By the torch-light unsteady,
The dead and the dying seem one.
What! paling and trembling already,

Before your dear mission's begun?

These wounds are more precious than ghastly; Time presses her lips to each scar,

As she chaunts of a glory which vastly
Transcends all the horrors of war.

Pause here by this bedside-how mellow
The light showers down on that brow!
Such a brave, brawny visage! Poor fellow!
Some homestead is missing him now:
Some wife shades her eyes in the clearing,
Some mother sits moaning, distressed,
While the loved one lies faint, but unfearing,
With the enemy's ball in his breast.

Here's another; a lad-a mere stripling-
Picked up on the field, almost dead,

With the blood through his sunny hair rippling
From a horrible gash in the head.

They say he was first in the action,

Gay-hearted, quick-handed, and witty; He fought, till he fell with exhaustion, At the gates of our fair Southern city.

Fought and fell 'neath the guns of that city,
With a spirit transcending his years.
Lift him up, in your large-hearted pity,
And wet his pale lips with your tears.

Touch him gently-most sacred the duty
Of dressing that poor shattered hand!
God spare him to rise in his beauty,
And battle once more for his land!

Who groaned? What a passionate murmur—
"In Thy mercy, O God! let me die!"
Ha! surgeon, your hand must be firmer;
That grapeshot has shattered his thigh.
Fling the light on those poor furrowed features;
Gray-haired and unknown, bless the brother!
O God! that one of Thy creatures

Should e'er work such woe on another!

Wipe the sweat from his brow with your kerchief;
Let the stained, tattered collar go wide.

See! he stretches out blindly to search if
The surgeon still stands at his side.
"My son's over yonder! he's wounded-
Oh! this ball that's broken my thigh!"
And again he burst out, all a-tremble,
"In Thy mercy, O God! let me die!"

Pass on! It is useless to linger

While others are claiming your care;