Introductory material
Reading edition · Edition 2
"I saw a dot upon the map, and a housefly's filmy wing— They said 'twas Dearborn's picket-flag, when Wilderness was King. * * * * * I heard the block-house gates unbar, the column's solemn tread, I saw the Tree of a single leaf its splendid foliage shed To wave awhile that August morn above the column's head; I heard the moan of muffled drum, the woman's wail of fife, The Dead March played for Dearborn's men just marching out of life; The swooping of the savage cloud that burst upon the rank And struck it with its thunderbolt in forehead and in flank, The spatter of the musket-shot, the rifles' whistling rain,— The sandhills drift round hope forlorn that never marched again." —Benjamin F. Taylor.