O Southland!  O Southland! 
      Do you not hear to-day
    The mighty beat of onward feet,
      And know you not their way? 
    ’Tis forward, ’tis upward,
      On to the fair white arch
    Of Freedom’s dome, and there is room
      For each man who would march.

    O Southland, fair Southland! 
      Then why do you still cling
    To an idle age and a musty page,
      To a dead and useless thing? 
    ’Tis springtime!  ’Tis work-time! 
      The world is young again! 
    And God’s above, and God is love,
      And men are only men.

    O Southland! my Southland! 
      O birthland! do not shirk
    The toilsome task, nor respite ask,
      But gird you for the work. 
    Remember, remember
      That weakness stalks in pride;
    That he is strong who helps along
      The faint one at his side.

To Horace Bumstead

    Have you been sore discouraged in the fight,
      And even sometimes weighted by the thought
      That those with whom and those for whom you fought
    Lagged far behind, or dared but faintly smite? 
    And that the opposing forces in their might
      Of blind inertia rendered as for naught
      All that throughout the long years had been wrought,
    And powerless each blow for Truth and Right?

    If so, take new and greater courage then,
      And think no more withouten help you stand;
        For sure as God on His eternal throne
    Sits, mindful of the sinful deeds of men,
    —­The awful Sword of Justice in His hand,—­
        You shall not, no, you shall not, fight alone.

THE COLOR SERGEANT

(On an Incident at the Battle of San Juan Hill)

    Under a burning tropic sun,
    With comrades around him lying,
    A trooper of the sable Tenth
    Lay wounded, bleeding, dying.

    First in the charge up the fort-crowned hill,
    His company’s guidon bearing,
    He had rushed where the leaden hail fell fast,
    Not death nor danger fearing.

    He fell in the front where the fight grew fierce,
    Still faithful in life’s last labor;
    Black though his skin, yet his heart as true
    As the steel of his blood-stained saber.

    And while the battle around him rolled,
    Like the roar of a sullen breaker,
    He closed his eyes on the bloody scene,
    And presented arms to his Maker.

    There he lay, without honor or rank,
    But, still, in a grim-like beauty;
    Despised of men for his humble race,
    Yet true, in death, to his duty.

THE BLACK MAMMY