“Confined in hospital three days he lay
Fatigued and feverous, but tender hands
Nursed and restored him.  Our old Colonel came
And thanked him—­patting Paul paternally—­
And praised his daring.  ‘My brave boy,’ he said,
’Had I a regiment of such men, by Jove! 
I’d hew a path to Richmond and to fame.’ 
Paul made reply, and in his smile and tone
Mingled a touch of sarcasm: 

“’Thank you, sir;
But let me add—­I fear the wary foe
Would nab your regiment napping on the field. 
You have forgotten, Colonel—­not so fast—­
I am the man that slept upon his post.’ 
Our bluff old Colonel laughed and turned away;
Ten minutes later came his kind reply—­
A basketful of luxuries from his mess.

“Paul marched and fought and marched and fought again,
Patient and earnest through the bootless toils
And fiery trials of that dread campaign
Upon the Peninsula.  ’Twas fitly called
‘Campaign of Battles.’  Aye, it sorely pierced
The scarred and bleeding nation, and drew blood
Deep from her vitals till she shook and reeled,
Like some huge giant staggering to his fall—­
Blinded with blood, yet struggling with his soul,
And stretching forth his ponderous, brawny arms,
Like Samson in the Temple, to o’erwhelm
And crush his mocking enemies in his fall.

“Ah, Malvern! you remember Malvern Hill—­
That night of dreadful butchery!  Round the top
Of the entrenched summit, parked and aimed,
Blazed like Vesuvius when he bellows fire
And molten lava into the midnight heavens,
An hundred crashing cannon, and the hill
Shook to the thunder of the mighty guns,
As ocean trembles to the bursting throes
Of submarine volcanoes; and the shells
From the embattled gun-boats—­fiery fiends—­
Shrieked on the night and through the ether hissed
Like hell’s infernals.  Line supporting line,
From base to summit round the blazing hill,
Our infantry was posted.  Crowned with fire,
And zoned by many a burning, blazing belt
From head to foot, and belching sulphurous flames,
The embattled hill appeared a raging fiend—­
The Lucifer of hell let loose to reign
Over a world wrapt in the final fires.

“In solid columns massed our frenzied foes
Beat out their life against the blazing hill—­
Broke and re-formed and madly charged again,
And thundered like the storm-lashed, furious sea
Beating in vain against the solid cliffs. 
Foremost in from our veteran regiment
Breasted the brunt of battle, but we bent
Beneath the onsets as the red-hot bar
Bends to the sledge, until our furious foes—­
Mown as the withered prairie-grass is mown
By wild October fires—­fell back and left
A field of bloody agony and death
About the base, and victory on the hill.