'Talk of pluck!' pursued the Sailor, <br />Set at euchre on his elbow, <br />'I was on the wharf at Charleston, <br />Just ashore from off the runner. <br /> <br />'It was grey and dirty weather, <br />And I heard a drum go rolling, <br />Rub-a-dubbing in the distance, <br />Awful dour-like and defiant. <br /> <br />'In and out among the cotton, <br />Mud, and chains, and stores, and anchors, <br />Tramped a squad of battered scarecrows - <br />Poor old Dixie's bottom dollar! <br /> <br />'Some had shoes, but all had rifles, <br />Them that wasn't bald was beardless, <br />And the drum was rolling Dixie, <br />And they stepped to it like men, sir! <br /> <br />'Rags and tatters, belts and bayonets, <br />On they swung, the drum a-rolling, <br />Mum and sour. It looked like fighting, <br />And they meant it too, by thunder!'<br /><br />William Ernest Henley<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/romance-40/
