Charleston

Calm as that second summer which precedesThe first fall of the snow,In the broad sunlight of heroic deeds,The City bides the foe.

As yet, behind their ramparts stern and proud,Her bolted thunders sleep--Dark Sumter, like a battlemented cloud,Looms o'er the solemn deep.

No Calpe frowns from lofty cliff or scarTo guard the holy strand;But Moultrie holds in leash her dogs of warAbove the level sand.

And down the dunes a thousand guns lie couched,Unseen, beside the flood--Like tigers in some Orient jungle crouchedThat wait and watch for blood.

Meanwhile, through streets still echoing with trade,Walk grave and thoughtful men,Whose hands may one day wield the patriot's bladeAs lightly as the pen.

And maidens, with such eyes as would grow dimOver a bleeding hound,Seem each one to have caught the strength of himWhose sword she sadly bound.

Thus girt without and garrisoned at home,Day patient following day,Old Charleston looks from roof, and spire, and dome,Across her tranquil bay.

Ships, through a hundred foes, from Saxon landsAnd spicy Indian ports,Bring Saxon steel and iron to her hands,And Summer to her courts.

But still, along yon dim Atlantic line,The only hostile smokeCreeps like a harmless mist above the brine,From some frail, floating oak.

Shall the Spring dawn, and she still clad in smiles,And with an unscathed brow,Rest in the strong arms of her palm-crowned isles,As fair and free as now?

We know not; in the temple of the FatesGod has inscribed her doom;And, all untroubled in her faith, she waitsThe triumph or the tomb.