The Portland daily press., 1891-06-01
TO THE MEMORY OF THE BRAVE,
CONTINUED FROM FIRST pAGE.1


attesting the eternal greenness of their
memory
Almost generation of men has passed by.
new generation Las come, since they lived
and suffered and died. 1t is Eot an easy
thing now to 60 back in memory, in imagin-
alton even, to the early days of the war, to
the scenes, events and spirit of those times.
In the passes of the high Alps. there are
places, am told, where the guide bushes all
into utter silence, lest whispered word, the
mere motion of the air from the sound of the
voice, might start the avalanche. 1t ..was so
this nation moved during the later days of
1860 and the .early part OF 1861; it was so
our country moved, like such party of
Alpine travellers, breathless and silent, the
awful avalanche hanging above 1t, hanging
by thread. Treason seemed to have Joined
hands with madness to rule the hour and to
destroy the hope Of mankind. Treason and
madness, how insolently and defantly they
walked through the high places of the repub-
llc In Washington, seen to grasp with bloody
hands not only the sword of war, but the
lar more terrible torch of revolution. The
vast enegies Of the Republic were absorbed
In business, in the arts and enterprises of
peace. 1t was not used to war, it did not
know how to wage war. 1t dreaded war, and
civil war most of all. The genius of Grant
was slumbering at his village homo in the
siumbered before the battle of Edgebill.
On New England hills, in the fields Of the
West, In the crowded streets of Northern
cities. the men, the millions of men, who
within few months or years were to up
root from American soil the noxious grOwths
of secession and slavery, were lust lifting
their heads to catch upon the passing breeze
the first notes Of the strange and terrible
alarm.
One man had already been chosen and
called by that voice Of the people which is
the voice OF God. Abraham Lincoln had
Of tla
had not yet grasped the helm of State, with
the hand that was to hold 1t so truly, during
all the period of the war, till four wears
later he fell at his post. The deep lines and
burrows, "in which: grief and glory so
strangely wed" had mot yet written their
eyes did not then tell SO plainly Of the cease
less vigil of an overburdened mind, but the
vast responsibility and trust had already
been devolved upon him. Even then his
ing those skies of night and storm with eyes
which seemed to pierce to their very depths,
and ere long the clarion peal of that first in.
augural rang out. "My dissatisfied fellow
heaven to destroy this nation. while l have
the most solem oath recorded there to pro-
tect and defend it," 1t sometimes seams as
II this oath OF Lincoln was the key note to
all that followed-the rallying of the nation
to his support. to the defence of the Union,
Republic on land and sea by the great lead
ers whose names have become as household
words and part of our history forever two of
whom, the great general and the great admi-
raj recently dead, seem by their deaths to
nay new y" ana ,Ss peculiar ancty
waste. the ruin, the shock, the vicissitudes
of war, disaster after disaster gloomily re-
curing, the light of victory uncertain. rising
and falling, sometimes f1eeting as the will-o'-
the-wisp on stagnant meadows. but bursting
at last into the noon day of the final triumph.
History, poetry, art, el0quence, have We'd,
and will forever vie, in portraying the men
of this great epoch, but they can never do
more than fulfil the injunction of Cromwell
to the artist who was painting his portrait
Paint me as am" They can never do
If 1t was costly treasure. the treasure of
good government, that we bought. il was
paic for at O fearful price. The suffering Of
individuals in the agony of that great con-
fict. will never be told; no tongue can por-
tray what the imagination cannot conceive.
May our country never forget the single in
stances OF suffering and sacrifice, of hero
ism and duty, that made up the great resnlt
as the grains Cf sand make up the sea shore.
or the drops OF water mako up the rolling
tides of the rivers or seas.
There were great c0mpenSatiOns for the
terrible loss. 1t was war for the good Of
all, OF the vaneuished no less than the vic
tors. that this lofty dome of government
which our fathers built so well might not
fall and bury all In common ruin. Even the
sweetness and splendor of the final Victory
did not have the effect to make us martial
people, fond of war for itself. The war
over, the vast ornaments disbanded. the SOL
diers OF the republic melted into the mass of
the community as snowfakes melt into the
river; but they are not forgotten, The Bit
ter enmities of the war have disappeared, or
are already disappearing they will soon be
forgotten. but Its lessons will remain forever
engraved In letters of fire upon the national
mind and heart.
OF the distinguished men who illustrated
Cooper was one of the first to die, and an
other American author. writing of his
as nt Be and yaue @ viii
be conceded to American literature, which
have heretofore been denied to it. Time and
death have begun to hallOW it."
We all feel the hallowing effects of the
death of great authors upon the literature of
g country, and since the date of Cooper's
death the names of more distinguished Amer
lean authors have been transferred to the
skies to shine as stars of the first magnitude
In the armament Of our literature forever.
What Is true of the literature is true also
also OF the institutions of country. To us
all, America seems dearer from the fact that
the men whom we remember today have
lived and died for it; they have hallowed
they fell.
Ihave read that when an inquirer of old
was once interrogating the Greek Oracle, he
"How shall learn to live wisely ?" and the
answer came: Consult the dead" There is
depth Of meaning In this which we may
not at first observe. Ii one should study its
import until 1t had become part of the meth
DDS of his own mind and heart, 1t would lift
him above servility to external impressions,
to the accidents of place and time, TO the
things OF the senses, into the realm of
thought and emotion in which the dead live
still, where no barriers divide them from us,
where we may be immortal with them now
and they may meet us as Of old. When our
minds glow or thrill over eloquent and poet
ic pages, 1t matters not whether the author
of them is living or dead; our minds meet
his. II we were today to fulfil the injunc
tiOn of the Greek orarc!e and consult the
we should find, better than elsewhere or
otherwise, high and pure standard of pa
tri0tism for US all. They would charge us to
be vi gilant to do and to undergo whatever
pertains to good citizenship, to revere the
laws and institutions of our country, to do
what we can to preserve and to improve
them, to adapt them to the advancing de-
mands OF the times in which we live, to max Q
them firm. and at the same time flexible, so
that they may more and more give express
oiuu w tuo iOlty SpiIlt OI GOODWILL TO man
kind which informs them, and to perpetuate
them for posterity as we have received them
from the past.
Then the soldiers of the Republic, whose
memories we cherish and hold dear TODAY.
will not have lived and will not have died In
vain.
At the conclusion of Judge Symonds's ad.
dress, Shaw's quartette sang the selection,
SHERMAN" Colonel Cobb was to have fol-
lowed with an address, but was absent from
the city, and Past Captain r. l.. Whitcomb
of Shepley Camp, S. of ". gave a spirited
rendering of the poem entitled, "The Re-
turned Battle Flags of Maine." written by
the late Moses Owen.
After "Recollections of the War;" by
Chandler's Band, the chairman introduced
as the final speaker Hon. Henry B. Cleayes,
who spoke as follows:
HON. H. b. CLEAvEs's ADDRESS.
Comrades and Friends:
One by one the great commanders and
soldiers OF the war are passing away. A
year ago, when you assembled, Grant.
Logan and Sheridan bad gone to join their
comrades. We now miss Sherman, the great
military leader, and Porter, the great COM
mander. The people mourn the loss of Will
liam L. Sherman, the illustri0us soldier
they mourn the loss of Admiral Porter, a
devoted son of the Republicz
A few months previ0us tn the cnmmanoa