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The Soldiers Dream
Stock No: 000525
Height: 14 Inches / 36 cm
Reference: Harding Book 1, Page 252, Fig 903
A very fine figure Crimea figure of the soldiers dream. A Scottish soldier asleep, a flag to his side, seated cross-legged on a titled well coloured base, his left arm leaning on a drum, his hand to his head, a rifle under his legs, he wears a plumed hat, tunic, kilt and sporran, a scarf across his chest and shoulders.
There are many different versions of this figure but this is by far the best, the modelling and crispness are stunning, not to mention the way it has been coloured. The condition is near perfect having had two minor chips restored.
The figure could well be based on a poem by Thomas Campbell, which was revived during the Crimean War.
- Some interesting information
Our bugles sang truce; for the night-cloud had lowered,
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky;
And thousands had sunk on the ground overpowered,
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.When reposing that night on my pallet of straw,
By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the slain,
At the dead of the night a sweet vision I saw,
And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again.Methought from the battle-field’s dreadful array
Far, far I had roamed on a desolate track:
‘Twas autumn; and sunshine arose on the way
To the home of my fathers, that welcomed my back.I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft
In life’s morning march, when my bosom was young;
I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft,
And knew the sweet strains that the corn-reapers sung.
Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I swore
From my home and my weeping friends never to part:
My little ones kissed me a thousand times o’er,
And my wife sobbed aloud in her fulness of heart.
“Stay, stay with us — rest, thou art weary and worn:”
And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay;
But sorrow returned with the dawning of morn,
And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.
