A TRIUMPH OF ORDER.

A squad of regular infantry,

In the Commune's closing days,

Had captured a crowd of rebels

By the wall of Pere-la-Chaise.

There were desperate men, wild women,

And dark-eyed Amazon girls,

And one little boy, with a peach-down cheek

And yellow clustering curls.

The captain seized the little waif,

And said, “What dost thou here?”

“Sapristi, Citizen captain!

I'm a Communist, my dear!”

“Very well! Then you die with the others!”

— “Very well! That's my affair;

But first let me take to my mother,

Who lives by the wine-shop there,

“My father's watch. You see it;

A gay old thing, is it not?

It would please the old lady to have it;

Then I'll come back here, and be shot.”

“That is the last we shall see of him,”

The grizzled captain grinned,

As the little man skimmed down the hill

Like a swallow down the wind.

For the joy of killing had lost its zest

In the glut of those awful days,

And Death writhed, gorged like a greedy snake,

From the Arch to Pere-la-Chaise.

But before the last platoon had fired

The child's shrill voice was heard;

“Houp-la! the old girl made such a row

I feared I should break my word.”

Against the bullet-pitted wall

He took his place with the rest,

A button was lost from his ragged blouse,

Which showed his soft white breast.

“Now blaze away, my children!

With your little one-two-three!”

The Chassepots tore the stout young heart,

And saved Society.