New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1879-07-04
PEEJyNJNEENCE.

Whrre are the Fourth Of Juys of our younger
daysi DO the crackers snap as bTi'kly do the
guns roar as sonOrOusly do the flags iIu rs gayly
90 the bells ring as meodionsly, do the soldiers
march as proudly, a. they did when we looked
week, ahead tor the anniversary, and feared hat 1t
never would arrive! How enthusiastically and
methodlcay the National Dir, hday used TO be kept
fifty years ago! How we began with the hrst gray
dawn to celebrate, and how kept II up until set
Of sun, when the last salyo was fired aud the last
peal ruuC! We crowded and elIowed our way into
the overlooking church, where choir was sing
ing an anthem at the risk of bursting blood-yessels
and listened to the stately reading of the Declare
ton of Independence and afterward to the Grafton
viii we thought the most beautiful piece of
rhetoric that ever fell from human lips. Yet If
you brushed away the tawdry flowers and dlsre-
garded the fustian you found that the sound and
fury sgulfed something. For those were days
in which the Republic was hardly older by many
years than we WERE They had always a special
barouche in the procession for survivors OF the
revolutionary army, white-haired old fellows with
no nonsense about their patriotism, and quite ready
to fight again If only their arms had their ancient
pth. And there WAS the dinner afterward with the
thirteen regular toasts-" The Day We Celebrate"
"Tbe President of the United States" The
Memory of Washington etc; all received with
where We boys smelling the anniversary
vands and listening to the eloquence whicn came
through the open tavern windows. All! Fourth of
July was something then.
Doubtless the old-fashioned quantness Of the OBJ
servance Is gone. Some of the features we keep,
but we have lost the hearty relish which we had
for the Fourth. when Its memories were hardly older
than yesterday. when our festival days were fewer,
and public enjOyments not frequent We who
take our liberties a. matter of course, and all
bessiu Is if they belonged 10 us, cannot be ex-
peced to remember the sel-abnegatiOn and persist
ence aud varying fortunes of our fathers. We have
driitcd away too, from the simplicity of time
when the Nation neither very great nor very
rcl-the day of small things, AZ we are pleased TO
regard seedtime though 1t Of all opulcnce
and splendid might. We puioaophize "A good deal
about orr relation to the State, but II longer
natural and ial intuition. Days OF public danger
bring back the old emotion, but It subsidies when
the days of prosperity and safety return; and once
more We are merry-makers, pleasuIe-seekers, our
proud sense OF freedom unqulckened by apprehen-
SION All the old great heroic names are as great
and heroic as ever, If only we are capable OF find
ing them 50. The events of the Seventies are as
epical, as grandly historical as they once were the
fainter color the diminished sense OF reality, the
mythical character. are III our sluggish veins and
faded memories. The Fourth is no more than any
other day, ii our souls not alive to It's signil-
canoe.
But enough of hOmily There will be celebration
to-day sufficient to show ms that the patriotic idea
still lives, and would surely be quickened into a
flame by any emergency. We must remember that
the old Fourths were yialzed by n sense of perlls
escaped, and by equal sense of perils impending.
There was peryadng carnestuess then in the land
which was not ashamed to exhibit itself. Let as
hope that there is an equal eanestness now though
1t may not be so vigorously demonstrated.