White Cloud Kansas chief. [volume] (White Cloud, Kan.) 1857-1872, 1857-12-03
CHAPTER III.
And voice was poured on the fee winds far,
And the land rose up at the sign Of war.


HEsASs.
o, Fame, Fame Fame next grandest work God.
ALExiSDER SMITH.
Years, thick, crowding, and full of strange,
gallant, daring deeds, unknown before in the
worlds history went by. An infant people had
thrown off their shackles, and proudly taken Il
place among the nations of the earth.
There were brave words, thrilling thousands
of stout American hearts, spoken in Congress;
there were tales of war and victory repeated
over at nightfall, beside every hearthstOne in
the land; there were battles and the flush of
conquest.
But ali, the picture has darker side!
There were sufferings which had no parallel
in the peoples annals. An army of men resolved
to fight to the DEATH" lay at Valley Forge,
almost naked and starving, in the dead of Sc
we're winter Mothers girded the sword to their
sons breasts, and sent them forth to the battle
field with " God speed " on their lips.
But over all of these suffering soldiers the ca
gle spirit Of brave man held sway; through all
the toll and bloodshed of the eight years war,
his eagle eye saw the future glorious destiny Of
his country.
And lie of the eagle spirit and eye, was that
great, good man, GEORGE WASHINGTON; and be-
side him, sustaining and helping him in his ar
duous tolls, were brave and gallant aids, fore
most among whom stood Benedict Arnold.
And in those years of peril and struggles, by
deeds of gallant daring, his star attained its re-
NTH. Certainly, if ever man won glory by roll
and bravery, that man was Arnold.
Through the dark pine forests of Maine, with
his band of iron men, through deep wilderness
ses shrouded in SHOWS, across rivers, cold, dark,
and turbid, down sleeps and rapids, and penetra-
ting the tangled, unbroken Businesses of an I'M
trodden region, had he accomplished perilOus
journey.
And then, when keeping guard by the watch
fires without the city on the heights of Quebec,
in the keen, piercing cold of a Canadian winter,
on the victorious battle plain, the gallant deeds
of this brave man attested that the tide of pat
riotism ran strong within his veins.
And afterward, at Saratoga, where his good
right arm turned the tide of battle and won the
victory-at the glorious sea fight of Lake Cham
plain, where he was at once hero and general
America had no need of more daring men to
fight her battles than thesame Benedict Arnold,
For then that foul stain, which no hand can
wipe away, had not settled down, down, like a
cloud Of blackness, upon his name. No, thank
God, there soere years when he was no traitor.
To his after life belongs this foul deed. lie;
Us not talk of it nOv-enly of his glory. Time
,cas when no truer, more patriotic heart beat in
an American bosom tia p his.
Who, then, looking down the dim vista of the
future, would have said:-" This man will be,
tray his country"
That man of foresight and prudence, George
Washington, did not look for such treason,
when, in letter to Congress, recommending
that Arnold should be sent to the northern ar.
my, he wrOte:-
He is active, iudicious, and brave, and an
officer in whom the militia will reposs great con.
Hdence."
Arnold himself knew not to what depths he
should fall, when, CALLED by the hardness of his
country in comforting the rank upon him he had
so fully earned, he resigned his commission with
these proud words
al am ready to risk my life for my country
but honor is sacrifice that no man ought to
make" ----H
o, no; his star, which had risen so brightly at
TiconderOga and Quebec, which had eliminated
at Saratoga, had not yet begun to slope down
] the sky Of honor, when. alas! it was star no
more, but brilliant meteor flashing down a
darkening sky-a blazing ship, "with broken
masts dismAntled al, !" adrift, and going down in
black, midnight sea-
There were Eve long years Of glory granted
70 Benedict Arnold-'6ve years, wherein he
wrote the record Of dazzling deeds upon the
scroll of fame-6vs years wherein his heart