"HALT! _Who comes there?_" The cold midnight air
And the challenging word chill me through.
The ghost of a fear whispers, close to my ear,
"Is peril, love, coming to you?"
The hoarse answer, "RELIEF," makes the shade of a grief
Die away, with the step on the sod.
A kiss melts in air, while a tear and a prayer
Confide my beloved to God.
Tramp! Tramp! Tramp! Tramp!
With a solemn, pendulum-swing!
Though _I_ slumber all night, the fire burns bright,
And my sentinels' scabbards ring.
* * * * *
"Boot and saddle!" is sounding. Our pulses are bounding.
"To horse!" And I touch with my heel
Black Gray in the flanks, and ride down the ranks,
With my heart, like my sabre, of steel.
THE HUMAN WHEEL, ITS SPOKES AND FELLOES.
[Illustration]
The starting-point of this paper was a desire to call attention to
certain remarkable AMERICAN INVENTIONS, especially to one class of
mechanical contrivances, which, at the present time, assumes a vast
importance and interests great multitudes. The limbs of our friends and
countrymen are a part of the melancholy harvest which War is sweeping
down with Dahlgren's mowing-machine and the patent reapers of
Springfield and Hartford. The admirable contrivances of an American
inventor, prized as they were in ordinary times, have risen into the
character of great national blessings since the necessity for them has
become so widely felt.
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