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the strained and still attention of the little group around him as he steps into the light of the fire! Hear him! "I am dying, Egypt, dying! Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast, And the dark Plutonian shadows Gather on the evening blast. Let thine arms, O Queen, support me, Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear; Listen to the great heart secrets-- Thou, and thou alone, must hear. "I am dying, Egypt, dying! Hark! the insulting foeman's cry. They are coming! quick! my falchion!! Let me front them ere I die. Ah! no more amid the battle Shall my heart exulting swell-- Isis and Osiris guard thee-- Cleopatra! Rome! Farewell!" [Illustration: THE POET OF OUR MESS.] "Good!" "Bully!" "Go ahead, Jack!" "Give us some more, old fellow!" And he generally did, much to everybody's satisfaction. We all loved Jack, _the Poet_ of our mess. He sleeps, his battles o'er, in Hollywood. The _Singing_ man generally put in towards the last, and sung us to bed. He was generally a diminutive man, with a sweet voice and a sweetheart at home. His songs had in them rosy lips, blue eyes, golden hair, pearly teeth, and all that sort of thing. Of course he would sing some good rollicking songs, in order to give all a chance. And so, with hearty chorus, "Three times around went she," "Virginia, Virginia, the Land of the Free," "No surrender," "Lula, Lula, Lula is gone," "John Brown's Body," with many variations, "Dixie," "The Bonny Blue Flag," "Farewell to the Star-Spangled Banner," "Hail Columbia," with immense variations, and "Maryland, My Maryland," till about the third year of the war, when we began to think Maryland had "breathed and burned" long enough, and ought to "come." What part of her did come was _first-class_. How the woods did ring with song! There were patriotic songs, romantic and love songs, sarcastic, comic, and war songs, pirates' glees, plantation melodies, lullabies, good old hymn tunes, anthems, Sunday-school songs, and everything but vulgar and obscene songs; these were scarcely ever heard, and were nowhere in the army well received or encouraged. The recruit--our latest acquisition--was _so_ interesting. His nice clean clothes, new hat, new shoes, trimming on his shirt front, letters and cross-guns on his hat, new knife for all the fellows to borrow, nice comb for general use, nice little glass to shave by, good smoking tob
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