The Crisis of the Revolution

              57    Sublime upon the stirrups rose
The mighty Lee behind,
And drove the terror-smitten cows,
Like chaff before the wind.
58   But sudden see the woods above
Pour down another corps,
All helter skelter in a drove,
Like that I sung before.
59
60
61
62
63
Irvine and terror in the van,
Came flying all abroad,
And cannon, colors, horse, and man,
Ran tumbling to the road.
Still as he fled, 'twas Irvine's cry,
And his example too,
' Run on, my merry men all—for why ?''
The shot will not go through.
As when two kennels in the street,
Swell'd with a recent rain,
In gushing streams together meet,
And seek the neighboring drain,
So meet these dung-born tribes in one,
As swift in their career,
And so to New Bridge they ran on—
But all the cows got clear.
Poor Parson Caldwell, all in wonder,
Saw the returning train,
And mourn'd to Wayne the lack of plunder,
For them to steal again.
64    For 'twas his right to seize the spoil, and
To share with each commander,
As he had done at Staten Island
With frost-bit Alexander.
65    In his dismay, the frantic priest
Began to grow prophetic,
You had swore, to see his lab'ring breast,
He'd taken an emetic.
66" I view a future day," said he,
"Brighter than this day dark is,
And you shall see what you shall see,
Ha! ha! one pretty marquis;
67    And he shall come to Paulus' Hook,
And great achievements think on,
And make a bow and take a look,
Like Satan over Lincoln.
68    And all the land around shall glory
To see the Frenchman caper,
And pretty Susan tell the story
In the next Chatham paper."
69   This solemn prophecy, of course,
Gave all much consolation,
Except to Wayne, who lost his horse
Upon the great occasion.
70    His horse that carried all his prog,
His military speeches,
His corn-stalk whisky for his grog—
Blue stockings and brown breeches.
71   And now I've clos'd my epic strain,
I tremble as I show it,
Lest this same warrio-drover, Wayne,
Should ever catch the poet.
%Z*t-#&* ***** r^^^^-e^e^^!^^
NOTES.
(For some of these notes I am indebted to Lossing's Tivo Spies (D. Appleton & Co., New York), but most
are from his Field-Book^ and a few are original.)
1 Wayne had been a tanner before the Revolution.
* Soupaan, or suppawn, the homely dish of Indian-meal mush and milk then common in the colonies, especially
New England.   See reference to it on page 23.
• Shoes were scarce in Washington's army, at all times.
T Freedom's Pole was a little settlement in Bergen County.