We unhappily saw poor fellows passing in numbers,
Some of them showing how bitter the sense of their sorrowful flight was,
Some with a feeling of joy at saving their lives in a hurry. 
Sad was the sight of the manifold goods and chattels pertaining
Unto a well-managed house, which the careful owner’s accustom’d
Each in its proper position to place, and in regular order,
Always ready for use, for all are wanted and useful.—­
Sad was the sight of them now, on many a waggon and barrow
Heap’d in thorough confusion, and hurriedly huddled together. 
Over a cupboard was placed a sieve and a coverlet woollen;
Beds in the kneeding troughs lay, and linen over the glasses. 
Ah! and the danger appear’d to rob the men of their senses,
Just as in our great fire of twenty years ago happen’d,
When what was worthless they saved, and left all the best things behind them. 
So on the present occasion with heedless caution they carried
Many valueless chattels, o’erlading the cattle and horses,—­
Common old boards and barrels, a birdcage next to a goosepen. 
Women and children were gasping beneath the weight of their bundles,
Baskets and tubs full of utterly useless articles, bearing. 
(Man is always unwilling the least of his goods to abandon.)
Thus on its dusty way advanced the crowded procession,
All in hopeless confusion.  First one, whose cattle were weaker,
Fain would slowly advance, while others would eagerly hasten. 
Then there arose a scream of half-crush’d women and children,
And a lowing of cattle, with yelping of dogs intermingled,
And a wailing of aged and sick, all sitting and shaking,
Ranged in their beds on the top of the waggon too-heavily laden. 
Next some lumbering wheel, push’d out of the track by the pressure,
Went to the edge of the roadway; the vehicle fell in the ditch then,
Rolling right over, and throwing, in falling, the men who were in it
Far in the field, screaming loudly, their persons however uninjured. 
Then the boxes roll’d off and tumbled close to the waggon. 
Those who saw them failing full surely expected to see them
Smash’d to pieces beneath the weight of the chests and the presses. 
So the waggon lay broken, and those that it carried were helpless,
For the rest of the train went on, and hurriedly pass’d them,
Thinking only of self, and carried away by the current. 
So we sped to the spot, and found the sick and the aged
Who, when at home and in bed, could scarcely endure their sad ailments,
Lying there on the ground, all sighing and groaning in anguish,
Stifled by clouds of dust, and scorch’d by the fierce sun of summer.