Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1870-06-08

deep poetic music of ancient mytholO
gy, but in none of the songs of the
troubadOurs is reference made to the
mythology of either Greece or Rome
The age of chivalry was an age oi
aimless wars and wild adventure, but
II gave US our highest ideals of honor
and personal liberty, and did more TO
elevate woman to her present proud
position than all the literature, phi
losophy, art and mythology of Greece
and Rome combined. It was in the
school of chivalry that mans love
rose from groVeiing passion to poetic
adulati0n-the Just homage ofstrength
to beauty. Here poetry first refined
the fiereeness of passion into generous
and gentle affection; a refinement so
perfect and beautiful, says Mrs. Childs,
that to-day, with lapse of more than
six hundred years, with all our vaunt-
ed progress and civilization, we can
look back with profit to the by-gone
days of the lance and shield for the
brightest pictures of mans love of
woman and his pride of race. 1t gave
US also our present conception of flow
ers-symbOls of purity, constaney,
tenderness and affection. The mis-
tress of the slain knight, in token Of
her love and constaney, was wont to
strew his rustic grave with flowers,
and this doubtless Is the origin of the
custom we this day commemorate
And l trust that this beautiful eere-
mony, conceived in chivalrie senti-
ment and sanctified love may be for
ever perpetuated. Let it be for all
time our most honOred anniversary.
Let us baptize anew the Roman Flora
in the limpid waters of a living patri-
otism, and under the bright trinity
of heroism, benifieence and love, and
may the fair women of America in
their unselfish devotion, make these
sacred places the Mecca of a worship
hOlier than the Saracenis.
1t would be well if we had more
honored anniversaries. Let US shake
oftener from our feet the dust of every
day travel, and let the sweet currents
of love mingle in prayer around the
hallOwed graves of our buried ehival-
Ty. Yes, bring the fadeIess eyergreens
and twine them for our heroes whose
names and fame like these shall be
ever green so long as liberty is sweet
syllabled word.
Bring flowers, too, bright, beautiful,
fragrant flowers; beside them how
poor and paltry are any words of ours.
Sweet epistles of all that is gentle and
tender in humanity, of all that is per-
feet and compassionate in God.
The heliotrope, white and delicate
and sweet, shall tell of the sincerity
and depth of our devotion, and the
lily of its purity and dunchangableness.
Our faithfulness shall be seen in the
violet's pleading eyes, and the aspho-
del is eloquent Of constancy, even un-
to death.
With wreaths of myrtle, the roses,
red and white, shall lavish fragrance,
loves offerings, Joined with beauty's
at the shrine of honor; while the
amaranthine wreaths, with the ivy
and the almond blossoms shall remind
us of that Immortality to which we
all are fastening.
These simple floral offerings are
more eloquent of our sorrow than sto-
ried urns or seulptured monuments
Bulwer says: "Stone cannot convey
melancholy, it is a shadow which
needs for its substance a living, NOR
tai heart" Our own immortal Irving
says: "Pathos expires and love is
chilled among the cold conceits of
sculptured marble, but the hand that
strews the flowers while the heart is
warm and tear falls on the grave of
affection is binding the ozier around
the sod" How sadly, sweetly true:
for it is the heart throbs, and not the
centuries, that build the most lasting