The Kinsley graphic. [volume] (Kinsley, Kan.) 1890-1940, 1891-06-05

IN what prisons they suffered, but all
that viii come too late. One word in
the living ear of praise for their hon
esty and courage viii be worth to them
more than military funeral two miles
long OF a pile OF flowers half a mile
nigh and ten bands of music playing
over the grave ''Star Spangled Banner
or Way Down South in Dixie"
Now, while they are in their declin-
ing years and their right knee refuses
they got sleeping on the wet ground on
the banks of the ChiclkamRuga, or their
digestive organs are or on furlOugh be-
cause of the six months of prison life
in which their ratiOns were a big slice
of nothing, and their ears have never
been alert since the cannOnade in
which they heard so much they have
been able to hear but little since. in
these cases I call upon the people OF
north and south to substitute little
ante-mCrtem praise for the good deal of
pOst-mOrtem eulogium.
But we must not detain the two gar
lands any longer from the pillows OF
those who for a quarter of a century
have been PROSTATE in dreamless slum-
Der, never oppressed by summer heats
or chilled by winters cold Both gar
lands are fragrant Both have in them
the sunshine and the shower of this
springtime. The colOrs of both were
the sky and the gold of the sunset and
the green of the grass and the white
ness of the snow crystal And L do not
care which you put over the northern
grave and which you put over the
southern grave.
Does anyone say; What is the useP
None of them will know it; your deco
ration days both sides Mason and Dix
on's line are a great waste of flowers"
All! see you have carried too far my
idea that praise for the living is better
than praise for the departed. Who
says that the dead do not know of the
flowers? I think they do. The dead
| are not dead The body sleeps but the
| soul lives and is unhindered- No two
cities on earth are in such rapid and
constant communication as earth and
! Heaven, and the two decoration days of
north and south are better lrn0svn in
realms celestial than terrestrial it'll
| what interest we visit the placS our
birth and of our boyhOod or God
days! And have the departed n5sznter-
est in this world where they were born
and ransomed and where they suffered
and triumPhed? My Bible does not
| positively say so, nor does my cate
chism teach 1t, but my common senses
declares it
Among the thousands of gatherings
at the north and at the south for decor
! L
vice is uniQ ue and that 1t Is the only
one in which there has been twisted
| two garlands, one for the grave of the
northern dead and the other for the
| grave of the southern dead. o, Lord
God of the American union, is it not
time that we bury forever our old
grudges? Ny! MY! Can we not be at
peace on earth when this moment in
Heaven dwell in perfect love Ulysses s.
Grant and Robert E Lee, William T.
Sherman and Stone wall Jackson and
tens of thousands of northern and
southern men who, though once looked
askance at each other from the OppO-
site banks of the Potomac and the
Chicxahominy and the James and the
Tennessee, now are on the same side OF
the river, keeping jubilee with some of
those old angels who near nineteen cen
turtles ago came down one Christmas
night to chant over Bethlehem: GLORY
to God in the highest; on earth peace.
good will to men!
have been waiting for some years
for someone else to twist the two gar.
lands that I to-day twist, but no one
doing it, in the love of God and my
country / put now my hand to the
work, and next spring about this time,
if am living and well, Will twist two
more garlands for northern and south
ern graves, and every springtime until
cheered a little in the struggle of this
life shall come out and put a pansy Oh
two on my own grave But if the time
should ever come when this land shall
be given over to sectional rancoI
and demagogism. and the north and
south, or east and west shall forget
what the good God built this natiOr
for, and It shall halt on its high career
, of righteousness and liberty and peace
and become the agent of tyranny and
wrong and oppression, then let some
; young man whom I have baptized IL
1 infancy at these affairs go out to Green
: wood and scoop up my dust and scatter
t It 20 the four winds of heaven, for d.
l not want to sleep, and I will not sleeI
5 in land accursed with seetionalisrn o.
oppression.
And now I hand over the two gar
lands, both Of which are wet will
: many tears, tears of widovhOod anC
: Orphanage and childlessness, tears o
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