The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1882-06-10
The Boys Who Never Got Home.


Ine Boys Who Never Got Home.
Az recent campfire, given by w.
a. Sargent Post. No. 20, g. A. r., of
GAINESVILLE, Wis.,. Comrade Thomas T.
Croit read letter of regret from one
q tneinvited guests. George NJ. Peck.
VINO was unable to attend. It IL
an amusing production. Says the
writer: II don't know what it Is.
OUT there is something in beans that
makes men sociable and reckless.
Beware of beans, Tom, as you value
your future happiness. Look not
upon the bean when 1t is baked and
giveth Its color in the pan, for at last
w swelleth like an acc0rdian and
0lteth like cucumber. But would
Ike 70 be there, Thomas, and take
the Old soldiers by the hands and look
INTO the eyes that are becoming dim,
and notice the effect of Father Times
penciilng on the face of the boys who
twenty yeais ago were full of vitality
and as kitteny as any man that ever
Kept step to the rafting of a canteen
against cartrldge-box. Boys, do
you realize thatyou are growing old {?
1t IS hard to realize it, but If another
war were to break out your little baby
that you left in mothers arms twenty
years ago. Growing at the "hand me
down" blue uniform in which you are
disguised, would be the chap the gov
eminent would want. Boys, you are
rapidly becoming ''oId back mum.
hers )" though you feel young enough
to stub round home, you are sex
empt" now. Do you realize that the
little baby girl that chung to you as
you said goodbye twenty years ago,
with tears In your eyes as big as a
glass paDer weight, or an editors dia-
mond pin, is now woman married.
and that another baby is trying to
utter the word grandpa" when you
come In putting on your youthful
airsY 1t is pleasant now to chase the
festive bean around the home camp
fire and talk of the nights when you
slept on the ground in pup tent, or
on some battlefield, with your wet
Handmuddy pantaloon legs frozen stiff
as dried Goldfish, while you dream
that every star that was looking down
from above was the eye of dear one
at home reckoning you to "Hold the
Fort" and hurry uD and get through
with the f0olishness and come home.
You can laugh now as you think how
you got up in the morning after such
a nights rest. looking as though you
had been drawn through a brush
fence. You who are left have right
to be happy, but in the midst of your
bean banquet let me ask you to stand
up with your tin cup of black coffee,
and drink to 1.-THE boys who never
got h0me," the brave fellows who
returned not to meet the loved ones
they parted with twenty years ago.
Let US hope that the great congress
above removed the disabilities" of
The boys who left vacancies in their
regiments. and that the few chickens
they took In the way of business from
the enemy will not he entered up
against them on the Big Book, but
that the provost. guard on duty at the
gates of the New Jerusalem will
'present arms" to them and tell the
boys that they are welcome to the
hest there is, and that when we all get
In our work here. and are ready to
join our regiment in Heaven, that the
fellows that we buried years ago may
stand on the parapet as we come
struggling in, and give US the old
soldiers welcome with a "three times
three" with a tiger. And we shall
say to them, ''all right, comrades we
should have been here before, only
we were detained by business"