The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1889-05-23

Around our knees, about our chairs, and in
the audience are gathered the eager upturned
faces Of those who are TO be the future citizens
of the Republic, asking What Is the meaning
/ of these ceremonials? Why arc flowers strewn
upon these graves? Why this gathering of the
people together? For what did these men
/ fight and die2 The answer to these questions
IS necessary now, aud will become more neces-
saTy every year to keep alive in the National
mind the value of our institutions and their
treasured cost. -Chauneey NJ. Depew.
I The past, rs it were, rises before me like a
dream. Again we arc in the great struggle for
/ National life We hear the sounds Of prepara-
tioa-th. music of the boisterous drums-tho
! silver voices Of heroic bugles We see thou
/ sands of assemblages, and hear the appeals of
orators; we see the pale checks of women and
/ the flushed faces of men, and in those assem-
! blages We see all the dead whose dust we have
covered with flowers We lose sight Of them
no more. We are with them ssRken they enlist
/ IN the great army Of freedoms We see them
part with those they love. Some are walking
for the last time in quiet, woody places with
/ the maideus they adore. Ne hear the whis-
/ peIings and the sweet VOWS of eternal love as
they lingeringly part forever. Others are
bending over cradles, kissing babes that are
asleep. Some are receiving the blessings of old
men. Some are parting with mothers who hold
them and press them 10 their hearts again and
aAA4A4s HN otig aADNAAi4I sttA oOA+4S sAA0 beAANA
with wives, aud endeavoring with brave words
spoken in the old tones, 10 drive from their
hearts the awful fear. We sec them part. We
sec the wife standing in the door with tho babe
4 IN her arms-staniing in the sunlight sobbiIg !;
at the turn Of the road a hand waves; she an
swers by holding high in her loving hands the
child; he is gone, and forever.
We see them all rs they march proudly away
under the Haunting flag, keeping time TO the
, Wild, grand music Of war, marching down the
stress Of the great city, through the towns
and acrbEs the praiTies, down to the fields of
clory. to do aud to die for the eternal right
We 90 with thsa, cue and ALL. We are by
their side on all the CORY icidsr IN all the hos
pitals of pain, on all the weary msSHAes. we
stand guard with them in the wild storms aud
under the quiet stars We are with them IN
ravines running with blood-in the furroFs of
old fields. We are with them between con-
tending hosts, unable to move wild with thirst,
the life ebbing slowly away among the with
cred leaves. We see them pierced by ball and
torn with shell in the trenches by forts, and in
the Whirlwind Of the charge, where men be-
come iron with nerves Of steel. We are with
them in the prisons of hatred and famine; but
human speech can never tell what they en-
dured. We are at home when the news comes
taat they are dead We see the maiden IN the
shadow of her FIRST sorrow. We see the silver
ed head of the old man bowed with the last
grief. The past rises before Us, and we see
100000 Of human beings governed by the
lash. We see them bound hand and foot; we
hear the strokes of cruel whips; we see the
hounds tracking women through tangled
swanIps; We see the babes sold from the breasts
OF mothers. Cruelty unspeakable! Outrage
jnfinitel
-Four million bodies in chains Four mil
lion souls in fetters! All the sacred relations
of wife, mother, father and child trampled be-
meath the brutal feet Of might. All this was
done under our own beautiful banner of the
free. The past rises before US. We hear the
roar and shrek Of the bursting she'll The
broken fetteFs fall. These heroes died. We
look. Instead OF slaves we see men and women
aud children. The wand of progress touches
the auction block, the slaYe-pen, the whipping
/ post, and we see homes and fresidcs and
I schOol-house5 and books; and where all was
want and crime and cruelty and fear we see the
faces Of the free. These heroes are dead. They
/ died for liberty-they died for us. They are
at rest. They sleep IN the land they made free,
under the flag they rendered stainless, uDGer
1 the solemn pines, the sad hemlocks, the tea full
4 willow, and tie embracing vines. They sleep
I beneath the shadows of the clouds. careless
alike Of sunshine or Of storm, each IN the
/ windowless palace Of rest. Earth may run red
with other waTs-they are at peace. In the
midst Of battle, IN the roar of conflict, they
! found the serenity OF death. have one senti-
ment for the soldiers living and dead-cheers
/ for the living and tears FOR the dead.
Col. Robert Ingersoll.
-Four hundred thousand men, the good, the brave
4 and irue,
/ IN tangled wood. in mountains glen,
! On battlefield, IN prison-pen,
lie dead for and You.
! -Four hundred thousand of the brave
/ Have made tiils ransOmed soil their grave,
/ For me and you, good friend, for me and you.
! In many a feyered swamp in many black bayou,
| IN many a cold and frozen camp
/ The weary sentinel ceased his tramp,
And died for me and you.
/ From western plain to ocean tide,
/ are stretched the graves Of those who dieS,
! Aud died for me and you, good friend
For me and you.
On many a bloody plain their ready swords they
And poured their life blood like the rain
home, heritage 10 gain,
To gain for me and you.
Our brothers mustered 10y their side,
| They marched, they fought, and brayey died,
I And died for me aud you, good friend,
For me aud you.
A debt we ne'er can pay to them Is Justly DUE
And 10 cur Nations latest day,
Cur children'5 children still shall say,
They died Tor me aud YOU"
/ -Four hundred thousand Of the brave
Have made this ransomed soil their grave
For me and you, good friend, for me and you.
Fourscore and seven years ago our father,
brought forth upon this continent a new Ma
ton. conceived in Liberty and dedicated to the
proposition that all men are created equal
Now we are engaged in q great civil war; test
ing whether that Nation, or any Nation so con
ceIvcd and SO dedicated, can long endure. VIZ
are met on a great battlefield OF that war W.
are met TO dedicate portion of it as the fna
resting-place Of those who here gave their Lives
that that Nation might live. 1t is altogether
fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in d larger sense we cannot dedicate
VIC cannot cOnsecrate we cannot hallow thi
ground. The bravo men, living and dead, wht
struggled here, have consecrated it far aboY
our power TO add or detract. The world vii
little note nor long remember, what we say
here; but It can never forget what they di(
here. 1t is for US, the living, rather to be dedi
Gated here 10 the unfinished work that the,
have thus far so nobly carried on. 1t is rathe
: for US to be here dedicated TO the great tasl
remaining before US; that from these honore
dead we take increased devotion to the caus
for which they here gave the last full measur
OF devotion that we here highly resolve tina
the dead shall not have died in vain; that th
Nation shall, under God, have a new birth
freedom, and that the Government OF the pee
pie, by the people and for the people shall nc
perish from the earth.
Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg, Noven
Der, 1858.
All Right Now.
Macon TeeOraph.l
& lady in the Sixth District of Worth Count,
| Ga, hearing that horseshoe in the fire weul
| keep the hawks from catching her chicken
put one in, but it only made the hawks thrt