The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-06-02

I during the -FOUR Years Oh udLlOn1l agony,
| turned their back on home aud fortune, and
was sword which on the northern side
| developed a Grant, a Mcclellan, a
Hooker, a Hancock, a Sherman, a
| Sheridan, and Admirals Farragut and
/ Porter, and on the southern side a Lea, a
/ jackson, a Hill, Gordon and the John
stons, Albert Sydney and Joseph E. and
] Admiral Semmes, and many federals and
confederates VIII ise graves in national Gene
teries are marked unknown yet who
were Just as self-sacriicing and brave as
any of their major generals and whose
resting places ell up and down the banks of
the Ambrose 'ggin, the Hudson, the Poto-
mac, the Mississippi and the Alabama, have
recently been showed under with white
flowers typical of resurrection, and strewn
with red flowers commemorative of the
carnage through which they passed, and
the blue flowers illustrative of the skies
| through which they assembled.
But the sword is doomed. There is one
W I'd that needs to be written in every
| throne room, in every war office, in every
| navy yard, in every national council. That
word is disarmament. But no government
can afford to throw its sword away until all
the great governments have agreed to do
the same. Through the influence of the
recent convention of North and South
American government at Washington, aud
through the peace convention to be held
next July in London, and other movements
in which prime ministers, and kings,
and queens, and sultans, and cars shall
take part, all civilized nations will come to
disarmament and if few barbarian races
decline to quit war, then all the decent ma
tions will Sc I'd out a force of continental
police to wipe out from the face CT the
earth the mlscreants. But until disarma-
ment and consequent arbitration shall be
agreed to by all the great governments,
| any single government that dismantles its
fortresses, and spikes its guns, and breaks
| its sword, would simply invite its own de-
agreement, England sh Juld throw away
her sword; think you France has for
gotten Waterloo Suppose before such
| general agreement Germany should
throw away her sword; how long
would Alsace and Lorraine stay
as they area Suppose the Gar of Russ a
before any such general agreement should
throw away his sword; all the eagles and
vultures and lions of European power would
gather for a piece OF the Russian bear.
Suppose the United States without any such
general agreement of disarmament should
throw away her sword; il would not be long
before the Narrows of our harbor would be
ablaze with the bunting of foreign navies
coming here to show the folly of the "Mon-
roe Doctrine"
Side by side the two movements must go.
Complete armament until all agree 20 dis
armament. At the same command of
"Haltw all nations halting. At the same
command of "Ground arms!" all muskets
humping. At the same command of
Break ranksin all armies disbanding.
That may be nearer than You think. The
standing army is the nightmare of nations.
England wants to get rid of it, Germany is
h1sf For, hxrtN fe xraI
to death with it. Suppose that the millions
of men belonging to tue standing armies of
the world and in absolute idleness, for the
most part of their lives, should become
producers, instead of consumers. Would
not the worlds prosperity improve,
and the worlds morals be better? Or have
you the heathenish idea that war is neces-
sary to kill of the surplus populations of
the earth, and that without 1t the world
would be so crowded there would soon be
no reserved seats and even the standing
room would be exhausteds Ali | think we
can trust to the pneum )nlas, and the con-
symptoms, and the fevers, and the Russian
grippes to kill the people fast enough. Be-
81 ie that. when the world gets too full God
will blow up the whole concern and start
another world and better one. Besides
that, war kills the people who can least be
spared. 1t takes the pick of the nations
Those whom we could easily spare to go
to the front are in the penitentiary,
| and their duties detain them in that
limited sphere. No; it is the public spirited
and the valorous who go out to die. Mostly
are they young men. II they were aged,
and had only five or ten years at the most
to live. the sacrifice would not be SO great
But it is those who have forty or fifty years
In our war Col. Ellsworth, fell while yet a
mere lad. Renowned Mcpherson was
only 35. Magnificent Reynolds was
only A. Hundreds of thousands fell
between twenty and thirty years of age.
looked into the faces of the French and
German troops as they went out to fight at
Sedan and they were for the most part
armies of splendid boys. So in all ages war
has preferred to sacrifice the young Alex
ander the Great at 80. When war Stays the
| young it not only takes down that which
they are, but that which they might have
| been.
So we are glad at the Isaiahlc prophecy
| that the time is coming when nation shall
not lift up sword against nation. Indeed,
| both swords shall go back into the scabbard
the sword bathed in heaven and the
sword bathed in hell. In a war in Spain a
soldier went on skirmishing expedition,
and, secluded in bush, he had the oppor-
| tunity of shooting a soldier of the other
army, who had strolled away from his to t.
He took aim and dropped him. Running
up to the fallen man he took his knapsack
| for spoil, and a letter dropped out
of it, and it turned out to be letter
signed by his own father; in other
words, he had shot his brother. If the
brotherhood of man be true doctrine, then
| he who shoots another man always shoots
his own brother. What horror is war and
its cruelties. were well illustrated when the
Tartars after sweeping through Russia and
Poland, displayed with pride nine great
sacks filed with the right ears of the fallen
ard when a correspondent of the London
| Times, writing of the wounded after the
battle of Sedan, said: every moan that
the human voice can utter rose from that
heap of agony, and the cries of water! Fol
the love of God, water! A doctor
doctorl never ceased" After war has
wrought such c. uelties, how GLAD
we viii be to have the old monster himself
die. Let his dying couch be spread in some
dismantled fortress through which the
stormy winds howl. Give him for a pillow
a battered shield, and let his bed be hard
with the rusted bayonets of the slain.
| Cover him with the coarsest blanket thai
picket ever wore, and let his only cup be
the bleached bone of one of his war
chargers, and the last taper by hi
bedside expire as the midnight bias
signs into his ear: "The candle o.
the wicked shall be put out" To
night against the sky of the glori