The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-05-30

tify in Lees conduct many apparent violations
of sound principles of war. The various move
ments and the resultant battles by which he
sought to effect this object-the protection of
Richmond-were sketched with q bold hand.
His campaign against Mcclellan and Mcdowell
raised him in the minds of friend and foe to the
full stature OF great and daring leader. The
advance to the Rapidan, the invasion of
Maryland and the battle of Sharpsburg were
outlined. Here Lee, said the orator, gave that
supreme proof of greatness OF soul, as much
above depression under reverses as elation in
success.
In such moments the army feel the lofty
genius OF their leader. They acknowledge his
royal right to command, they recognize their
proud privilege to follow and obey. To such
leaders only Is it given 70 form heroic soldiers.
Such were the ragged, half starved men in gray
who stood with Lee at Sharpsburg.
IL Is the vision of some such moment, per-
haps, that our sculptor, Merce, has caught
with the eye OF genius and fixed IN imperish-
able bronze. The general has ridden up, it
seems to me- in some pause of battle to the
swelling crest of the front line. and, while the
eyes of his soldiers are fastened on him in keen
expectancy but unwavering trust, the great
leader-silent and alone with his dread respon-
slollity-is scanning, with calm and pene-
tIating glance, the shifting phases and chances
| or the stricken field.
Such is the commanding figure which will
| presently be unveiled your view, and dull,
indeed. must be the Imagination that does not
henceforth people this plain with invisible hosts
and compass Lee about, now and forever with
| the love and devotion of embattled ranks of
| heroic men in gray.
THE CAMPAIGN OF 1863
The campaign of 1853, with the battles of
| haDcelorsville-which in the orators opinion,
will rank with Blenheim, Austerlitz and Jena as
model battle-and Fredericksburg. resulting
IN forcing the union army behind the Kappa
| hammock, was next reviewed. Gettysburg and
Grants campaign in 1864, in which he steadily
Deat back Lee, who crossed his path and con-
fronted him at every turn, bring the orator up
TO the evacuation of Richmond when nothing
rpmaInQd IN ha Arm. Of Nrrfh haru mi Ia
put It's stainless honor; its unbroken courage
In those last solemn scenes continued Col.
Anderson, when strong men. losing all self
| control, broke down and sobbed like children,
Lee stood forth as great as in the days of victory
| ana triumph No disaster crushed his spirit; no
extremity OF danger ruffied his bearing He
| looked the stubborn facts calmly in the face,
and when no military resource remained when
| ne recognized the impoSsibility OF making
| another march or fighting another battle, he
| bowed his head in submission to that power
| which makes and unmakes nations
The surrender OF the fragments of the army
| or Northern Virginia closed the imperishable
record. of his military life. What catastrophel
| What moving and pathetic contrast!
On the one side complete and dazzling tri-
umph after long succession of humiliating dis
asters; on the other, absolute ruin and defeat
q crown of thorns for that peerless army WHICH
| hitherto had known only the vicuor's laurels.
| But the magnanimity of the conquerer, not less
| than the fortitude of the vanquished, shone out
on the solemn scRle and softened its tragic out
| lines of fate and doom. The moderation and
| good sense of the northern people, breathing
the large and generous air of our western world,
| quickly responded to Grants example, and
| though the north was afterward betrayed into
| fanatical and baleful excess on more than one
| great subject, all the fercer passions of a
bloody civil war were rapidly extinguished.
There was to be no Poland, no Ireland in
America When the Hollywood pyramid was
| raising over the confederate dead soon after
| the close of the contest. some one suggested
for the inscription classic verse, which may
| be rendered:
They died for their country-their country
| perished with them"
Thus would have spoken the voice of despair
Far different were the thoughts Of Lee He
had drawn his sword III obedience only to the
dictates of duty and honor, and, looking back
in that moment or utter defeat he might have
exclaimed with Demostbenes:
| " L say that If the event had been manifest to
| the whole world beforehand, not even then
| ought Athens to have forsaken this course If
| Athens had any regard for her glory, or for
her past, or for the ages to come
But. facing the duty of the hour, Lee saw
now that the question submitted to the great
aroitrament or war had been finally answered.
UNITY OF THE PEOPLE.
'He recognized that the unity of the Ameri-
can people had been irrevocably established.
He felt that it would be impiety ana crime to
dishonor by the petty strife of faction that pure
and unseldsh struggle for constitutional rights
which, while single hope remained, had been
loyalty fought out by great armies led by
| heroic captains and sustained by the patriotic
He, therefore, promptly counseled his old
soldiers to look upon the great country thus re-
united by blood and iron as their own, and to
| live and labor for its honor and welfare. His
own conduct was in accord with these teach
ings.
DAY by day his example illustrated what his
manly words declared, that human virtue
should be equal to human calamity"
After a brief reference to the remainder of
Lees life, passed in the discharge of his duties
as president of Washington college, the orator
ended his address as follows:
"As the people saw him fulfilling these modest
but noble functions; as they saw him with an
tique simplicity putting aside every temptation
to lse his great fame for vulgar gain; as thev
saw him, in self-respecting contentment with
the frugal earnings of his personal labor re-
fusiDg every offer of pecuniarY assistance; as
they realized his unselfish devotion of all that
remained of strength and life to the nurture of
the southern youth in knowledge and morals, a
new conviction of his wisdom and virtue gath
cred force and volume and spread abroad into
all lands.
''The failure of the righteous cause for which
he fought denied him that emnence OF civil
station in which his great qualities in their
happy mixture might well have afforded a
parallel to the strength and the moderation of
Washington. But what failure could obscure
that moral perfection which places him
easily by the side of the best men that have
ever lived as his heroic actions make him the
peer of the greatests
There are men whose influence on mankind
neither worldly success nor worldly failure can
affect.
".The greatest gift the hero leaves his race is
to have been a hero.' This moral perfection,
breathing the very spirit of his christian faith,
is no illusive legend of a succeeding generation,
exaggeratjng the worth of the past.
"Our belief in it rests upon the unanimous
testimony of the men who lived and acted with
him, among whom nothing is more common
than the declaration that Lee was the purest
and best man of action whose career history
has recorded In his whole life, laid bare to
the gaze of the world, the least friendly cr I'll
cism has never discovered one single deviation
from the narrow path of rectitude and honor.
What was strained eulogy when Montesquieu
said of another great soldier, Turenne, that
Ibis life was hymn in praise of humanity"
is, if applied to Lee, the language of sober
truth. No man can consider his life without
feeling Of renewed hope and trust in mankind.
HIS MORAL EXCELLENCE.
There is about his exhibitions of moral ex-
cellence the same quality of power in reserve
that marks him as a soldier. He never failed to
come up to the full requirements of AUG dtua-
tion, and his conduct communicated che i'm,
preston that nothing could as4ee to which he
would be found unequal His every action went
straight to the mark without affectation or dis
play.
1T cost him no visible effort to be good or
great. He was not conscious that he was ex-
ceptional In either way, and he died in the belief
that, as he had been sometimes unJustly blamed
SO he had as often been too highly praised. Such
Is the holy simplicity of the noblest minds. Such
was the pure and lofty man in wnom see the
Darfnct union of chrietian virtuefaud old Rnfnan