Clinging closely to each other, striving never to look round As they passed with silent shudder the pale corses on the ground,
Came two little maidens,--sisters, with a light and hasty tread, And a look upon their faces, half of sorrow, half of dread.
And they did not pause nor falter till, with throbbing hearts, they stood Where the drummer-boy was lying in that partial solitude.
They had brought some simple garments from their wardrobe's scanty store, And two heavy iron shovels in their slender hands they bore.
Then they quickly knelt beside him, crushing back the pitying tears, For they had no time for weeping, nor for any girlish fears.
And they robed the icy body, while no glow of maiden shame Changed the pallor of their foreheads to a flush of lambent flame.
For their saintly hearts yearned o'er it in that hour of sorest need, And they felt that Death was holy, and it sanctified the deed.
But they smiled and kissed each other when their new strange task was o'er, And the form that lay before them its unwonted garments wore.
Then with slow and weary labor a small grave they hollowed out, And they lined it with the withered grass and leaves that lay about.
But the day was slowly breaking ere their holy work was done, And in crimson pomp the morning heralded again the sun.
Gently then those little maidens--they were children of our foes-- Laid the body of our drummer-boy to undisturbed repose.
Drunk and senseless in his place, Prone and sprawling on his face, More like brute than any man Alive or dead,-- By his great pump out of gear, Lay the peon engineer, Waking only just to hear, Overhead, Angry tones that called his name, Oaths and cries of bitter blame,-- Woke to hear all this, and waking, turned and fled!
"To the man who'll bring to me," Cried Intendant Harry Lee,-- Harry Lee, the English foreman of the mine,-- "Bring the sot alive or dead, I will give to him," he said, "Fifteen hundred pesos down, Just to set the rascal's crown Underneath this heel of mine: Since but death Deserves the man whose deed, Be it vice or want of heed, Stops the pumps that give us breath,-- Stops the pumps that suck the death From the poisoned lower level of the mine!"
No one answered, for a cry From the shaft rose up on high; And shuffling, scrambling, tumbling from below, Came the miners each, the bolder Mounting on the weaker's shoulder, Grappling, clinging to their hold or Letting go, As the weaker gasped and fell From the ladder to the well,-- To the poisoned pit of hell Down below!