River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1879-11-27
mated by the hope of plumber or the
love Of conquest. They fought TO pre-.

mated by the hope Of plumber or the
love of conquest. They fought to pre-
serve
THE HOMESTEAD or LIBERTY,
thatitheir children might have peace.
Ihey were the defenders Of humanity,
the destroyers of PREJUDICE, the break
efs of chains, and iii the name OF the
future they ssluted the monsters Ct
their time. They finished what the sol
diers of the revolution commenced.
They relg1ted the torch that fell from
their august hands, and filled the world
again with light. They blotted from
the statute books the laws that had been
passed by hypocrites at the instigttion
of robbers, and tore with indignant
hands from the constitution that infs-
nous clause that made men the catch
ers Of their fellow man. They made it
possible for judges to be just and states.
men to be human, They broke the
.hackles from the limbs of slaves, from
he souls Of masters, aud from the north
ern brain. They kept our country on
The map of the world ard our flag in
heaven. They rolled the stone from
he sepulchre of progress, and found
therein two angels clad in shining gar
ments-nationality and liberty.
The soldiers were the saviors of the
nation. They were the liberators of
man. In written proclamation of
emancipation, Lincoln, greatest of our
mighty dead, whose memory is as gen.
lie as the summer air when reapers
singing mid gathered sheaves, copied
with the pen what Grant and his brave
comrades wrote with swords.
GRANDER THAN THE CREEK,
nobler than the Roman. the soldiers of
the republic, with patriotism as shore
less as the air, battled for the rights Of
others, for the nobility of labor; fought
that mothers might own their babes; that
arrogant idleness should not scar the
back of patient toll; that our country
should not be many-headed monster,
made of warning states, but a nation
sovereign, great, aud free.
Blood was water, money was leaves,
and life was only common air, until
one flag foated over the republic with
out master and without o
slave. Then was asked the
question, viii a free people tax
themselves TO pay the nations debt?
The soldiers went home to their
waiting wives, to their glad children.
and to the girls they loved. They went
back to the fields, the shops and mines.
They had not been demoralized. They
had been ennobled. They were as hon.
est in peace as they were brave in war.
Mocking at poverty, laughing az re-
verses, they made friend of toll. They
said, we saved the nations life and what
is life without honor. They worked
and wrought with all Of labor's royal
sons, that every pledge the nation gave
might be redeemed. And the great
leader, haqing put q shining band OF
friendship, girdle of clasped and hap
by hands, around the globe, comes home
and finds that every promise made in
the war has now the ring and gleara OF
gold.
There is another question still. Will
all the wounds of war be healed ] an
swer yes. The southern people must
submit not to the dictation of the north,
but
TO THE NATIONS WILL,
and to the verdict of mankind. They
were wrong, and the time will come
when they win say that they are victors
who have been vanquished by the
right. Freedom conquered them, and
freedom will cultivate their feelings, ed
ucate their children, weave for them
the robes of wealth, execute their laws,
and fill their land with happy homes.
The soldiers of the Union saved the
south as well as the north. They made
us nation. Their victories made us
free, and rendered tyranny in every
other land as insecure as snow upon
volcanoes lips.
And now let us drink to the volun-
teers. To those who sleep in unknown
sunken graves, whose names are only
in the hearts of those they loved and
left, OF those who often hear in happy
dreams the footsteps of return. Let us
drink to those who died while hpless
famine Knocked. One to all the MAIN
ed whose scars give modesty a tongue
and all who dared and gave to chance
the care, the keeping of their lives; to
all the dead; to Sherman, to Sheridan,
and to Grant, the foremost soldier OF
the world; and, last, to Lincoln, whose
loving life, like a bow of peace, spans
and arches all the clouds of war.