Nor rocks nor forests stay the mighty mass,
And men and flocks in terror fly the death,
So thundering fell the columns of the foe,
Crushing through Sickles’ corps in front and flank;
And, roaring onward like a mighty wind,
They rushed for Little Round-Top—­rugged hill,
Key to our left and center—­all exposed—­
Manned by a broken battery half unmanned. 
But Hancock saw the peril.  On stalwart steed
Foam-flecked, wide-nostriled, panting like a hound,
That stalwart soldier—­Spartan to the soles—­
Came dashing down where, prone along the ridge
Upon the right, our sheltered regiment lay.
’By the left flank, forward—­double-quick!’—­We sprang
And dashed for Little Round-Top; formed our line
Flanking the broken battery.  Up the slope,
Like frightened sheep when howling wolves pursue,
Fled Sickles’ men in panic:  hard behind
On came the Rebel columns.  Hat in hand
Waving and shouting to his eager corps—­
Rode gallant Longstreet leading on the foe.

“Where yonder field-wall bounds the trampled wheat
By grove and meadow, see—­among the trees—­
Their bayonets gleam advancing.  Line on line,
Column on column, in the field beyond,
Their hurrying ranks crowd glittering on and on. 
High at the head their flaunting colors fly;
High o’er the roar their wild, triumphant yell
Shrills like the scream of panthers.

“Hancock’s voice
Rang down our lines above the cannons’ roar: 
’Advance, and take those colors’[C]—­Adown the slope
Like Bengal tigers springing at the hounds,
We sprang and met them at the border wall: 
Muzzle to muzzle—­steel to steel—­we met,
And fought like Romans and like Romans fell. 
Even as a cyclone, growling thunder, roars
Down through a dusky forest, and its path
Is strown with broken and uprooted pines
Promiscuous piled in broad and broken swaths,
So crashed our volleys through their serried ranks,
Mowing great swaths of death; yet on and on,
Closing the gaps and yelling like the fiends
That Dante heard along the gulf of hell,
Still came our furious foes.  A cloud of smoke—­
Dense, sulphurous, stifling—­covered all our ranks. 
Our steady, deadly rifles crackled still,
And still their crashing volleys rolled and roared. 
Our rifles blazed upon the blaze below;
The blaze below upon the blaze above,
And in the blaze the buzz of myriad bees
Whose stings were deadlier than the Libyan asp. 
Five times our colors fell—­five times arose
Defiant, flapping on the broken wall.

[C] These are the very words used by General Hancock on this occasion.

“We hold the perilous breach; on either hand
Our foes out-flank us, leap the sheltering wall
And pour their deadly, enfilading fire. 
God shield our shattered ranks!—­God help us!