Which waited but some chance, or act,
  To shiver the electric spell,
  And pour in one fierce cataract
  A rain of blood and fire of hell
  On Freedom’s temple spoiled and sacked.

  The politician plied his craft;
  The demagogue still schemed and lied;
  The patriot wept, the traitor laughed;
  The coward to his covert hied,
  And statesmen went distract or daft.

  Contention raged in Senate halls;
  Confusion reigned in field and town;
  High conclaves flattened into brawls,
  And till and hammer, smock and gown,
  Nor duty knew nor heard its calls!

  XVI.

  At last, incontinent of fire,
  The cloud of menace belched its brand;
  And every state and every shire,
  And town and hamlet in the land,
  Shook with the smiting of its ire!

  Men looked each other in the eyes,
  And beat their burning breasts and cursed! 
  At last the silliest were wise;
  And swift to flash and thunder-burst
  Fashioned in anger their replies.

  The smoke of Sumter filled the air. 
  Men breathed it in in one long breath;
  And straight upspringing everywhere,
  Life burgeoned on the mounds of death,
  And bloomed in valleys of despair.

  The fire of Sumter, fierce and hot,
  Welded their purpose into one;
  And discord hushed, and strife forgot,
  They swore that what had thus begun
  With sacrilegious cannon-shot,

  Should find in analogue of flame
  Such answer of the nation’s host,
  That the old flag, washed clean from shame
  In blood, should wave from coast to coast,
  Over one realm in heart and name!

  Pale doubters, scourged by countless whips,
  Fled to their refuge, or obeyed
  The motives and the masterships
  That time and circumstance betrayed
  Through Patriotism’s apocalypse,

  And, sympathetic with the spasm
  Of loyal life that thrilled the clime,
  Lost in the swift enthusiasm
  The loose intention of their crime,
  And leaped in swarms the awful chasm

  That held them parted from the mass. 
  The North was one in heart and thought;
  And that which could not come to pass
  Through loyal eloquence, was wrought
  By one hot word from lips of brass!

  XVII.

  The cry sprang upward and sped on: 
  “To arms! for freedom and the flag!”
  And swift, from Maine to Oregon,
  O’er glebe and lake and mountain-crag,
  Hurtled the fierce Euroclydon,

  Men dropped their mallets on the bench,
  Forsook their ploughs on hill and plain,
  And tore themselves, with piteous wrench
  Of heart and hope, from love and gain,
  And trooped in throngs to tent and trench.

  “To arms!” and Philip heard the cry. 
  Not his the valor cheap and small
  To bluster with brave phrase, and fly
  When trumpet-blare and rifle-ball
  Proclaimed the time for words gone by!