The Call to Battle

The vesper-bell, from church and tower,
Had sent its dying sound;
And the household, in the hush of eve,
Were met their porch around.

A voice rang through the olive-wood, with a sudden trumpet’s power--
“We rise on all our hills! Come forth! ’tis thy country’s
gathering-hour:
There’s a gleam of spears by every stream in each old battle-dell.
Come forth, young Juan! Bid thy home a brief and proud farewell!”

Then the father gave his son the sword
Which a hundred fights had seen--
“Away! and bear it back, my boy!
All that it still hath been!

“Haste, haste! The hunters of the foe are up: and who shall stand
The lion-like awakening of the roused indignant land?
Our chase shall sound through each defile where swept the clarion’s
blast,
With the flying footsteps of the Moor, in stormy ages past.”

Then the mother kiss’d her son with tears
That o’er his dark locks fell:
“I bless, I bless thee o’er and o’er,
Yet I stay thee not--Farewell!”

“One moment! but one moment give to parting thought or word!
It is no time for woman’s tears when manhood’s heart is stirr’d.
Bear but the memory of my love about thee in the fight,
To breathe upon th’ avenging sword a spell of keener might.

And a maiden’s fond adieu was heard,
Though deep, yet brief and low:
“In the vigil, in the conflict, love!
My prayer shall with thee go!”

“Come forth! come as the torrent comes when the winter’s chain is
burst!
So rushes on the land’s revenge, in night and silence nursed.
The night is pass’d, the silence o’er--on all our hills we rise:
We wait thee, youth! sleep, dream no more! the voice of battle
cries.”

There were sad hearts in a darken’d home,
When the brave had left their bower;
But the strength of prayer and sacrifice
Was with them in that hour.