The Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1837-1867, 1862-06-20
Our Wounded Soldier Boys.


We meet occasionally in our busting
streets young men in tarnished uniforms,with
thin, patient faces, and perhaps a hmping
leg or an arm in sling. Others we meet
from whose frames the vitality has ebbed a.
way through hardship and disease, as if they
were bleeding from an unseen wound. DO
We think sufficiently of what these silent suf-
ferers have been and are? 1t is only few
months since they left us,in all the pomp and
circumstance of glorious war, with streaming
banners and inspiring music and the fash of
glittering steel. Then our national center,
the very hear; Of the republic, was menaced
by the :nsurgent hOrdes, and the pride of our
New England fresides, their youth and
bloom and promise. gathered in eager ranks
and pressed forward to meet the foe. That
was no empty, holiday parade when they
marched through our streets, and our deli
cate daughters greeted them with boquets of
flowers; they were themselves boquets of
priceless worth, flowers gathered from a
thousand homes to wreathe around the altar
of their country to garland the sacrifice that
might be withheld. For our precious institu-
tions, that had seemed to US free gifts like
those of sun and rain, were all bought with
price, and the hour of payment had come
The nation asked sacrifice of life that
might redeem her own, and she did not ask
in vain. Frankly, firmly, fearlessly, those
brave boys stepped between US and the ad-
vancing foe. We cheered them on with vol
ces ehoked with tears, We waved them for
ward with eager, trembling hands; they were
the pc; lambs of our flock, yet We stood be-
meath our vines and fig trees while they went
calmly forward to arrest the approaching
doom.
We knew even then that they would not all
come back. They took their vigorous youth,
their JOY in the present, their hopes Of the fu-
ture, all these rich gifts they bore lightly in
their hands, ready to yield them at a word or
sign. And they have done so. One by one,
stricken down by deadly disease or fallen in
murderous fight. those bright heads lay in a
soldiers naaleless grave. Yet not all our
heroes die. To some is allotted sadder fate
than death. 1t is theirs to drag out blight
ed life, palsied and crippled and SCARED, the
dew of their youth exhaled in the hot breath
of wa., its vigor and its hope among forgot
ten things. Their valor has preserved for US
life and all that makes it precious, but they
bought it at fearful price. They gave their
hopes for ours. Shall We forget the debt We
owe them? Shall We pass them coldly by,
because they come singly and in silence p
, Shall We turn from the living sufferer, tc
heap vain honors upon the unconseiou:
dead? We would not pluck one laurel from
the wreaths of the departed, but We ask
something better than laurels, We ask kind
words aid grateful thoughts for those whc
have returned. We ask warm place fol
them by the fresides for which they fought
We ask full sheaves and baskets from the sol
for which they bled. Could their fallen bro
theirs speak audibly from their bloody grave
they would say, Cherish, for our dear sakes
our stricken friends; for US, We shall nee,
: your loving cares no more."-Sprinofls
Reputlican.