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By Robert Burton, who was brought up on the Adams, With his death-wound in his side; And who told the story to the Assistant-Surgeon, On the same night that he died.

But the singer feels it will better suit the ballad, If all should deem it right, To tell the story as if what it speaks of Had happened but last night.

"Come a little nearer, Doctor--thank you--let me take the cup: Draw your chair up--draw it closer--just another little sup!

Maybe you may think I'm better; but I'm pretty well used up-- Doctor, you've done all you could do, but I'm just a-going up!

"Feel my pulse, sir, if you want to, but it ain't much use to try--"

"Never say that," said the Surgeon, as he smothered down a sigh; "It will never do, old comrade, for a soldier to say die!"

"What you _say_ will make no difference, Doctor, when you come to die."

"Doctor, what has been the matter?" "You were very faint, they say; You must try to get to sleep now." "Doctor, have I been away?"

"Not that anybody knows of!" "Doctor--Doctor, please to stay!

There is something I must tell you, and you won't have long to stay!

"I have got my marching orders, and I'm ready now to go; Doctor, did you say I fainted?--but it couldn't ha' been so-- For as sure as I'm a Sergeant, and was wounded at Shiloh, I've this very night been back there, on the old field of Shiloh!

"This is all that I remember: The last time the Lighter came, And the lights had all been lowered, and the noises much the same, He had not been gone five minutes before something called my name.

'Orderly Sergeant--Robert Burton!'--just that way it called my name.

"And I wondered who could call me so distinctly and so slow, Knew it couldn't be the Lighter--he could not have spoken so-- And I tried to answer, 'Here, sir!' but I couldn't make it go; For I couldn't move a muscle, and I couldn't make it go!

"Then I thought: It's all a nightmare, all a humbug and a bore; Just another foolish _grape-vine_[25]--and it won't come any more; "But it came, sir, notwithstanding, just the same way as before: 'Orderly Sergeant--Robert Burton!'--even plainer than before.

"That is all that I remember, till a sudden burst of light, And I stood beside the River, where we stood that Sunday night, Waiting to be ferried over to the dark bluffs opposite, When the river was perdition and all hell was opposite!--

"And the same old palpitation came again in all its power, And I heard a Bugle sounding, as from some celestial Tower; And the same mysterious voice said: 'It is the eleventh hour!

Orderly Sergeant--Robert Burton--it is the eleventh hour!'

"Doctor Austin!--what _day_ is this?" "It is Wednesday night, you know."

"Yes--to-morrow will be New Year's, and a right good time below!

What _time_ is it, Doctor Austin?" "Nearly Twelve." "Then don't you go!

Can it be that all this happened--all this--not an hour ago!

"There was where the gunboats opened on the dark rebellious host; And where Webster semicircled his last guns upon the coast; There were still the two log-houses, just the same, or else their ghosts-- And the same old transport came and took me over--or its ghost!

"And the old field lay before me all deserted far and wide; There was where they fell on Prentiss--there McClernand met the tide; There was where stem Sherman rallied, and where Hurlbut's heroes died-- Lower down, where Wallace charged them, and kept charging till he died.

"There was where Lew Wallace showed them he was of the canny kin, There was where old Nelson thundered, and where Rousseau waded in; There McCook sent 'em to breakfast, and we all began to win-- There was where the grape-shot took me, just as we began to win.

"Now, a shroud of snow and silence over everything was spread; And but for this old blue mantle and the old hat on my head, I should not have even doubted, to this moment, I was dead-- For my footsteps were as silent as the snow upon the dead!

"Death and silence! Death and silence! all around me as I sped!

And behold, a mighty Tower, as if builded to the dead-- To the Heaven of the heavens, lifted up its mighty head, Till the Stars and Stripes of Heaven all seemed waving from its head!

"Round and mighty-based it towered--up into the infinite-- And I knew no mortal mason could have built a shaft so bright; For it shone like solid sunshine; and a winding stair of light, Wound around it and around it till it wound clear out of sight!

"And, behold, as I approached it--with a rapt and dazzled stare-- Thinking that I saw old comrades just ascending the great Stair-- Suddenly the solemn challenge broke of--'Halt, and who goes there!'

'I'm a friend,' I said, 'if you are.' 'Then advance, sir, to the Stair!'

"I advanced! That sentry, Doctor, was Elijah Ballantyne!

First of all to fall on Monday, after we had formed the line!

'Welcome, my old Sergeant, welcome! Welcome by that countersign!'

And he pointed to the scar there, under this old cloak of mine!

"As he grasped my hand, I shuddered, thinking only of the grave; But he smiled and pointed upward with a bright and bloodless glaive: 'That's the way, sir, to Head-quarters.' 'What Head-quarters!'

'Of the Brave.'

'But the great Tower?' 'That,' he answered, 'Is the way, sir, of the Brave!'

"Then a sudden shame came o'er me at his uniform of light; At my own so old and tattered, and at his so new and bright; 'Ah!' said he, 'you have forgotten the New Uniform to-night-- Hurry back, for you must be here at just twelve o'clock to-night!'

"And the next thing I remember, you were sitting _there_, and I-- Doctor--did you hear a footstep? Hark! God bless you all! Good by!

Doctor, please to give my musket and my knapsack, when I die, To my Son--my Son that's coming--he won't get here till I die!

"Tell him his old father blessed him as he never did before-- And to carry that old musket"--Hark! a knock is at the door!

"Till the Union--" See! it opens! "Father! Father! speak once more!"

"_Bless you!_"--gasped the old, gray Sergeant, and he lay and said no more!

FOOTNOTE:

[25] Canard.

W. C. P. BRECKINRIDGE

William Campbell Preston Breckinridge, orator and journalist, was born at Baltimore, Maryland, August 28, 1837, the son of Rev. Robert J.

Breckinridge (1800-1871), and an own cousin of John C. Breckinridge (1821-1875). He was graduated from Centre College, Danville, Kentucky, in the famous class of '55, after which he studied medicine for a year, when he abandoned it to enter the Louisville Law School. Before he was of age he was admitted to the Fayette County Bar, and he was a member of it when he died. In July, 1862, he entered the Confederate Army as a captain in John Hunt Morgan's command; and during the last two years of the war was colonel of the Ninth Kentucky Cavalry. The war over, Colonel Breckinridge returned to Lexington and became editor of _The Observer and Reporter_, which he relinquished a few years later in order to devote his entire attention to the law. In 1884 Colonel Breckinridge was elected to the lower House of Congress from the Ashland district, and he took his seat in December, 1885, which was the first session of the Forty-ninth Congress. One of his colleagues from Kentucky was the present Governor of the Commonwealth, James B. McCreary; another was John G. Carlise, who was chosen speaker over Thomas B. Reed of Maine. Colonel Breckinridge served ten years in the House, closing his career there in the Fifty-third Congress. In Washington he won a wide reputation as a public speaker, being commonly characterized as "the silver tongue orator from Kentucky." In 1894, after the most bitter congressional campaign of recent Kentucky history, he was defeated for re-election; and two years later as the "sound money" candidate he again met defeat, Evan E. Settle, who was also known in Congress as a very eloquent orator, and who hailed from the Kentucky county of "Sweet Owen," triumphing over him. Colonel Breckinridge was never again a candidate for public office. In 1897 he resumed his newspaper work, becoming chief editorial writer on _The Lexington Herald_, which paper was under the management of his son, Mr. Desha Breckinridge, the present editor. During the last eight years of his life Colonel Breckinridge achieved a new and fresh fame as a writer of large information upon State and national affairs.

Simplicity was the goal toward which he seemed to strive in his discussions of great and small questions. His articles upon the Goebel tragedy were really State papers of importance. Upon more than one occasion his editorial utterances were wired to a New York paper, appearing simultaneously in that paper and in his own. He declined several offers to become editor of metropolitan newspapers. While at the present time Colonel Breckinridge is remembered by the great common people as an orator of unsurpassed gifts, and while a great memorial mass of legends have grown about his name, it is as a writer of real ability, who had all the requisites and inclinations of a man of letters save one of the chief essentials: leisure. When his speeches and writings are collected and his biography written his true position in the literature of Kentucky will be more clearly and generally appreciated than it now is. Colonel Breckinridge died at Lexington, Kentucky, November 19, 1904.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. The eulogy of John Rowan Allen is the finest summing up of Colonel Breckinridge's life and labors (_Lexington Leader_, November 23, 1904); _Kentucky Eloquence_, edited by Bennett H.

Young (Louisville, Kentucky, 1907). His papers, together with those of his grandfather and father, are now in possession of the Library of Congress.

"IS NOT THIS THE CARPENTER'S SON?"

[From _The Lexington Herald_ (Christmas Day, 1899)]

"And they told him that Jesus of Nazareth passeth by." And this has been the universal truth since those days--the one unchangeable, pregnant, vital truth of development, of progress, of civilization, of happiness, of freedom, of charity. The perpetual presence, the ceaseless personal influence, the potent force of His continual association alone renders human history intelligible or makes possible the solution of any grave problem which man meets in his upward march to better life and more wholesome conditions. And to-day the accepted anniversary of the birth of the "carpenter's son" is the one day whose celebration is in all civilized nations, among all independent people and in all learned tongues. The world has not yet accepted Him; there are nations very large in numbers, very old in histories, very devout in their accepted religions, which have not accepted His claim to be divine, nor bowed to the reign of His supreme authority. And the contrast between such nations and those who have accepted His claim and modeled their laws upon His teachings form the profoundest reason for the verity of that claim and the beneficence of those teachings.

Millions to-day will assemble themselves in their accustomed houses of worship, and with songs and instruments of music, with garlands and wreaths, with glad countenances and uplifted hearts, render adoration to the carpenter's son of Nazareth; adoration to the lowly Jew who was born in a manger and died upon a cross. Many millions will not attend worship, but still render unconscious testimony to the wondrous power which He has exercised through the centuries in the glad happiness which springs from conditions which are only possible under His teachings and by the might of His perpetual presence. They will not know that "Jesus of Nazareth passeth by," but the day is full of joy, the homes are radiant with happiness, the cheer is jovial and the laughter jocund, the eye brightens under the glances of loved ones--because He has passed by and scattered love and charity with profuse prodigality along the pathway He trod.

He has walked through the gay hearts of little children, and joy has sprung up as wild flowers where His footsteps fell; He has lingered at the mother's bedside and ineffable love has filled the heart of her who felt His gentle presence. In carpenter shops like unto that in which He toiled for thirty years, in humble homes, in the counting rooms of bankers, in the offices of lawyers and doctors, in the charitable institutions which are memorials of His teachings, He has passed by; those within may not have been conscious thereof; they were possibly too absorbed to feel the sweet and pervading fragrance of the omnipotent force which He always exerts; yet over them and their thoughts He did exert that irresistible power; and to-day the world is better, sweeter, more joyful, more loving, because of Him.

It is in its secular aspect that we venture to submit these thoughts; it is His transforming power secularly to which we call attention this sweet Christmas morning. "Christ the Lord Has Risen," but it is Jesus the man--Jesus of Nazareth, the son of the carpenter, the new teacher of universal brotherhood, the man who went about doing good; the obscure Jew who brought the new and nobler era of charity and forgiveness and love into actual existence that _The Herald_, a mere secular paper, desires to hold up.

And peculiarly to that aspect of His life that was social; the friend of Lazarus; the diner at the table of Zaccheus; the pleased and kindly guest at the wedding of Cana; the man who leaned His head on the breast of His friend, the simple gentleman who took little children in His arms and loved them; the obedient son, the loyal friend, the forbearing associate, the forgiving master, the tender healer of disease, the loving man who was touched with a sense of all our infirmities.

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