Many a
wild flower formed by the Almighty Hand to be a perfumed goblet for
the dew, felt its enamelled cup filled high with blood that day,
and shrinking dropped. Many an insect deriving its delicate colour
from harmless leaves and herbs, was stained anew that day by dying
men, and marked its frightened way with an unnatural track. The
painted butterfly took blood into the air upon the edges of its
wings. The stream ran red. The trodden ground became a quagmire,
whence, from sullen pools collected in the prints of human feet and
horses' hoofs, the one prevailing hue still lowered and glimmered
at the sun.
Heaven keep us from a knowledge of the sights the moon beheld upon
that field, when, coming up above the black line of distant rising-
ground, softened and blurred at the edge by trees, she rose into
the sky and looked upon the plain, strewn with upturned faces that
had once at mothers' breasts sought mothers' eyes, or slumbered
happily. Heaven keep us from a knowledge of the secrets whispered
afterwards upon the tainted wind that blew across the scene of that
day's work and that night's death and suffering! Many a lonely
moon was bright upon the battle-ground, and many a star kept
mournful watch upon it, and many a wind from every quarter of the
earth blew over it, before the traces of the fight were worn away.
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