THE RIDE OF COLLINS GRAVES.

'Tis a cloudy morn in the month of May,
And each hill and emerald plain
Has donned its spring-time's bright array
'Neath the touch of the gentle rain.
The rollicking boblink trolls his song
In the fields where the river rolls along,
Tossing in the air its snowy locks
As it leaps in its course the dripping rocks
Opposing its way in vain.

Fair smiles the Hampshire valley, to-day,
And no tremor is in the air
To foretell the death that is on its way
And bid the people beware.
No cry is heard, not a word is said
To call them out from the river's bed,
And bid them flee from their shops and homes
Ere the terrible rush of the river comes
Like a lion from its lair.

His brave horse struggles with panting sides,
'Neath the urging of voice and rein,
As into Skinnerville now he rides
And shouts with his might and main.
From the busy factories' open doors
The frightened body of workmen pours,
Rushes to hills on the left and right
While Graves still urges his headlong flight
And rides from the village again.

Five minutes have passed, — down comes the flood
With crashing timber and beam,
And on the spot where the factories stood
Is naught but the tawny stream.
Down crumble the masses of brick and stone
By the terrible might of the tide o'erthrown,
Dissolved like hay in the furnace's breath,
As the swirl of a brook sucks a leaf beneath, —
Gone like the forms of a dream.

Haydenville lieth two miles before, —
The flood, five minutes behind,
Tearing and gnawing the crumbling shore,
Comes rushing on like the wind.
Graves, turning his head, for an instant sees
A horror of bowing and twisted trees,
Of houses tossed on the wave like ships,
Of boulders hurled in the air like ships,
And hears the pebbles grind.

Haydenville lieth a mile below;
Four minutes behind the wave
Sweeps crushing on with a swifter flow
And a louder roar and rave.
Over the way but just now crossed
The towering mass of the flood is tossed,
Gulping down in its hungry maw
The solid road of a line of straw
In the wreck of that yawning grave.

Louder and closer the river's roar,
Swifter and nearer its flow,
And with its surges it melts the shore
Which was crossed three minutes ago.
Louder and louder the brave horse pants
As he rushes along like a flying lance,
While the rider, guarding 'gainst stumble and fall,
Hears just behind him the torrent brawl,
And the town half a mile below.

The river is rising beneath their feet
And climbing the rocky wall;
Two minutes behind them the billows beat
And the groaning forests fall.
Graves turns again, — the flood lies still
Within the arms of the circling hill; —
A moment only, but seconds are life
Before that roaring tumult and strife, —
And that moment effecteth all.

Loud in the street of Haydenville
There is heard a flying cry,
And a horse comes rushing below the hill
With pain in his staring eye.
His hot flanks heave, his skin of jet
Is tiger-striped with mud and sweat; —
His strength is gone, he staggers and falls
Beneath the shade of the factory's walls,
And the tossing wave is nigh.

A minute passes, — a towering wall,
A grinding, sickening roar,
And the muddy waters fiercely fall
Like the boiling surf on the shore.
Down with a moan go stones and bricks,
The strongest braces are snapped like sticks,
And up and down in a devil's dance
The heavy beams in the tumult prance;
Then sink to be seen no more.

But where is the rider and coal-black horse
Who brought the alarm so well?
Are they swept away in the mighty course
Of that boiling, seething hell?
Oh! Heaven be praised! we saw him lead
To a place of safety his gasping steed,
And though the flood rushed over the street
And strove to tangle their flying feet,
They are living the tale to tell.

The deed of Revere is grave on brass,
We read of Sheridan's fame,
But another there is whom none surpass
In the glow of an honored name.
And in the future the Hampshire vale
Shall echo the fame of that wondrous tale,
And white-haired grandsires long shall tell
How bravely the hero rode and well
In the day when destruction came.