The Arizona champion., 1889-06-01
Hon ". c. Stewards Speech.

This 30th day of May we have met, in our beautiful mountain town in common with millions of paople all over this broad land, to express our grateful remembrance of depart. ed union soldiers. It is wisely ordered that upon this day of each passing year, we shall withdraw ourselves from employment, and stop the whirl of business to listen to the voices which come from those momentious years that were stai0ed with the blood of our patriots,
 And we can hear the echoes of those voices now, repeating in tones of uudiminiShed distinctness things which come from the hearts and minds of loyal men and women, while the mighty struggle for national life, liberty, and for free institutions was going on. We do not honor tho departed as the people of ancient nations honored their heroic dead, merely for deeds oi daring which covered theT names with lnarsial glory, hut we honor them for the patriotism which let them to offer their muscle, bone and blood, to save our cnuu,ry in the hour of its greatest pacil Many of them had no desire for military glory, but preferred the peaceful pursuits of life, and the comforts of a quiet home. Nothing but the danger to which their country was exposed, could have let them to exchange these fer tho t,ustle of camp, the toilsons march, the privation of war and the carnage of battle. The fearful alternative presented itself to them, to sec the country they loved die, or to give themselves to save it, ond in the fuilness of their patriotism they chose the latter. Ours then, is not an act of hero worship, but a great full expression oi regard for the patriotic dead. The occasion that csAs us together, the. act we have to perform, and the. attending circum- stances are patriot. The theme they suggest is true pasriosisn, its nature and its manifestation among us as people.
 Patriotism is not wild and passion, but giorioas realty. The virtue, tkat gave to Paganism its dazzling lustre, to Barbarism it's rGdca,aiu8 trait, to Christianity its heroic form, It Is the love of Country. Such love as aims to serve ones country eithcr by defending it from invasion, or protecting its rights and maintain- ing its laws and institutions. A good citizen IS a patriot, and it is the noblest passion that animates man in the character of a citizen, the true patriot loves the very soil, rocks, mountains, hills, valleys, rivers, lakes and creeks of his native land; the people, assooiations, in- and everything that copstitute a part CT feature of his country. The love for his couRtry is instilIed into him along with the,I love for the home of bis childhood.
 Bereft of pGt.iosism. the heart of a nation woUla be cold, cramped and sordid; the arts would have no enduring impulse, and commerce no invigorating soul, society would degenerate, and the wran and vicious triumph.
 Patriotism is not dead. I stiil lives to console, to sanatify humanity. l It has his altar in. every cline; it's worship and festirities oa every soil. 1 One may. travel in foreign clin-as, he may travel far froul hi, native land, | rar from the ol6 homf,tead yet, ke l .oxas thepa stij, and tenderly thinks of them as parts and fsatlres of the Iand he once called home # asked I why he loves his country, he may be
 
 able to. give no other reason than shat he loves his country because it Is his own. The poet saySof patriots They love their land because it is their own, and scorn to give aught | other reason why" This principal $ universal, pervading all nations, md existing among even savage .
 'hns Montgomery says: