Song of the Railroad Train by Mrs. John Loye

How grand by night o'er the country side
Is that wild melodious strain;
And music blown at the eventide,
Is the song of the railroad train.
Its torn strains to our fireside trill
In the throes of the blizzard blown;
Or soar on high in the tempest rain,
So shrill, the song of the railroad train,
Oe'r the thunder's loud detone.

Whose lonely cry can the herdsman hear
In the still 'neath the starry sky,
As it fades away o'er the prairie drear,
And the coyote's weird reply.
The Sioux bent with a startled ear
When first in the wilds it cried,
And echoed over the virgin plain,
So strange, the song of the railroad train,
And far in the foothills died.

I've heard that song in the midnight far,
From the spans of Victoria sound,
With the rumble of the tubular,
And the freight to the seaboard bound.
I've heard it rise from the Vermont hills
And float in the sunset o'er
The placid waters of Lake Champlain,
So plaint, the song of the railroad train,
And down by the wooded shore.

We listened once in the twilight shade
To the trains on the Erie far,
As they passed with many a blue brigade
To the fields of the Civil war.
The whistle blows in the gloaming still
From the bridge in the Portage glen,
Like Lincoln's call to the North again,