Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1886-12-11
OUR NATION.

Pryor delivered the following speech
in response to the toast, sour Ma
tion.,
Mr.. Chairman and Gentlemen Of
the Ne,c York Je,celers' association
In candor l must own that twenty
five years ago | should have felt
some embarrassment in responding
to the sentiment you have delivered.
For twenty-five years ago, we of the
South did not regard this Union as a
nation, but we believed it to be
merely confederacy of sovereign
states, disolnble at the will of any
member. In 1860 we essayed to
put our theory into practice, aud
four years conflict and carnage, the
Union emerged from the struggle
unbroken and embued with the pc.
tency and plenitude ola nationality.
And, gentlemen, we accept the res.
ult, not grudgingly, not as arbitration
of the sword, which we ale power
less to reverse, but from the con-
viction of our Judgment and the
impulse of our heart. The magnan.
unity of our government at the close
of the war produced upon the people
of the South q profound impression.
Here was a rebellion which you be-
lleved to be without provocation, a
rebellion which involved the sacri.
flee of countless millions of money,
and hundred thousands of heroic
lives, and yet not a drop of rebel
blood was exacted as an atonement
and Precipitation. Nay, more, we
who participated in the rebellion, we
who defiantly retired from your cap
ital to take up Confederate arms,
though you issued from the war in
absolute triumph, we are now prom
inent in the councils OF the govern
ment and potential in your halls of
justice. Still further, the leader of
the Cenfederacy lives unmolested
and is permitted to traverse the
country, indicating the validity OF
the lost cause, and l, follower of
him, am admitted to your hospital
ity and enabled to repair the wreck
of my broken fortunes. Gentlemen,
in vain will you search the annals of
history for a precedent, or a parallel
to such national magnanimity. APP
plause. True, indeed, it is, that
clemency no less than courage is
the armament of true chivalry.
To-day you will find no man in the
South outside of a lunatic asylum
who asserts the right of secession !;
and today if you will submit TO the
people of the South whether they
would retire into their Southern
Confederacy, they will remain with
you with even greater unanimlty
than that which characterized their
attempted departure twenty-five
years ago. Applause.
AS to slavery too-the character
istic institution of the South then
as to slavery, We had been taught
to believe, it to be legitimate in
stitution +; but now we see that it
was a moral, political and an econ.
omical evil, and there is not a man
in the South who would again bind
with the letters OF slavery the limbs
of the negro. Applause.
But, gentlemen our attachment
to the Union is not sentiment only I;
we are also attached to the Union
by cool calculations of selfinterest.
We see that we are members now OF
the freest and most enlightening
government on earth. We can see
that the American Union offers the
freest career for the pursuit of hu-
man happiness and human faculty.
We belong to government in which
the individual is not eclipsed by the
luster of the diadem of the royal
crown-a government in which is no
religious encroachment on the pre-
cints of conscience, government in
which is no military CONSUMPTION,
declmating the people and consum.
ing the people a government which
we feel only in its protecting power.
Applause.
Mr.. Chairman, with these feelings
and these convictions, the people OF
the South have come back to stay.
Loud applause. And if the integ.
rity of the Union shall ever be men
aced by peril they will be prompt to
defend it with their lives. With
these feelings and convictions, / feel
that may respond to your sent.
ment, and with all my heart ] will
drink with you to the American ma.
ton " May it grow ever and endure
and be perpetual"
The toast was drank amid cheers.
So far this season thirty-three
lives have been lost, and 100000 in