Holmes County farmer. [volume] (Millersburg, Ohio) 1857-1926, 1861-09-12
An Extract from WcD0yell's
Speech, Delivered at oxford,
August 12iE, 1851.

Fellow CITIZENS: s:-We hail you with the
great and glorious reflection that our homes
and villages aud fields are not horrible battle
fields, us is the case to-day with those Of many
OF our iellow-country men. Sirs. to-day many
of our gray headed pcasantry, who have faced
the chilling blasts and beaming suns of seven.
ty years in preparing home and support for
their decrcpid years, arc now harasScd with
armies, their laborS being demolished aud
destroyed their quiet homes changed to
scenes of carnage, and they driven wang0ring,
miserable tugitives from their homes and fire
sides. | ask you to think OF this, while we
of little Holmes are enjoying all the luNuries
Of nature; our homes are unharmcd, the
shricls of the wounded and dying are I'M
heard in our midst, aud the glorious sun that
illumcs our vallics and hills, and beams along
our p aims, finds rome of our citizens bleach
ing upon our fields.
Yes, would to God, my friends, that to-
day the chivalrous armies of the North and
South could be induced to lay down their
arms, abandon the battle field, and by equit-
able CONCESSIONS, bury their animosities in
! oblivion, and come together with united
hearts and interests, as did our veteran faith.
erS hail each other in the old Continental
halls of '76. OH glorious, yet glowing.
days and tle-fields of the Revolution
Could the mouldermg bones of Valley Forge,
of Trenton, Monmouth and Cambridge, or the
gal liant dead of Bunker llill--cou'd these
palsied patriots, from the North and South,
/ who, side by side, weltcred in the gore OF
human bl ood for the welfare OF the present
generation, now come forth from their desc
late and unknown graves, and behold this
mighty nation, which they assisted in giving
birth, for which they suffered all the horrors
of war and death to secure liberty, and which
is bound together by all the ties OF kindred
natures, now destroying itself, methinks they
would be horror stricken! They would call
upon the rocks and hills to tall upon them
and hide from their vision this wOelul shame
those nhcXablc nerves that were never known
to finch during the dangers aud pcrils of the
Revolution would become paralizcd, and
those brave hearts that were never known to
quail when che British cannon was belching
its iron missiles in taeir midst would remble
like the crater of terrific volcano
He who visits the grave of Marco Bozarcs
is reminded OF Spartan bravery; and the
shepherd who looks from his mountain home
and the husbandmau who drives his plow ia
the base of the halowed sepulcher OF Mara
than mound is reminded of the glorieS of his
ancestors or he who gazes to the heights
Pompei's pillar is reminded of his overthrow
at Phlrasaia by Caesar. But, alas these in.
stitutions and time hOnored fame have re ro-
graded and passed away, and toe day he who
visits tho rustic tomb of Washington is re-
minded of the sanguinc scenes OF the Rcvo,
luton, the dreary ralley at Valley Forge and
the glorious victory Of Trentrni or he who
gazes to tho heights of Bunker Hill monu-
ment is reminded OF the bravery of u Pres
colt, Warren and Il Putnam or he who
visits the sill ent, moSs-cOvered tomb of an
Otis, a Henry, Jefferson, Franklin, or an
Adams, feels the silent impulses of liberty
animating him he is reminded of the found.
ors of those itutions we now love aud
cherish and under which we have become a
great and powerful people. Now, my fellow.
citizens, have our instituIios commenced ret
rogradiugi are we not drifting along the