Ontario Readers Third Book, The

<h2><SPAN name="Burial" id="Burial"></SPAN>BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> <span>Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,<br/></span> <span class="i1">As his corpse to the rampart we hurried;<br/></span> <span>Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot<br/></span> <span class="i1">O'er the grave where our hero we buried.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span>We buried him darkly at dead of night,<br/></span> <span class="i1">The sods with our bayonets turning;<br/></span> <span>By the struggling moon-beam's misty light,<br/></span> <span class="i1">And the lantern dimly burning.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span>No useless coffin inclosed his breast,<br/></span> <span class="i1">Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;<br/></span> <span>But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,<br/></span> <span class="i1">With his martial cloak around him.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span>Few and short were the prayers we said,<br/></span> <span class="i1">And we spoke not a word of sorrow;<br/></span> <span>But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,<br/></span> <span class="i1">And we bitterly thought of the morrow.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span>We thought as we hollowed his narrow bed,<br/></span> <span class="i1">And smoothed down his lonely pillow,<br/></span> <span>That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,<br/></span> <span class="i1">And we far away on the billow.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span>Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,<br/></span> <span class="i1">And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,&mdash;<br/></span> <span>But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on,<br/></span> <span class="i1">In the grave where a Briton has laid him.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span>But half of our heavy task was done<br/></span> <span class="i1">When the clock struck the hour for retiring;<br/></span> <span>And we heard the distant and random gun<br/></span> <span class="i1">That the foe was sullenly firing.<br/></span></div> <div class="stanza"> <span>Slowly and sadly we laid him down<br/></span> <span class="i1">From the field of his fame fresh and gory;<br/></span> <span>We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone,<br/></span> <span class="i1">But we left him alone with his glory.<br/></span></div> </div> <p class="citation"><span class="smcap">C. Wolfe</span></p> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />