Evening capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1888-1893, 1891-06-01
FLOWERS FOR BOTH SIDES
A UNIQUE MEMORIAL DAY SERVICE
IN BROOKLYN TABERNACLE.

Or. TaImage breaches Sermon Abou
the Soldiers of the Civil War, and or
fers Garland for the North and on'
for the South.
BROOKLYN, May 81. Yesterday hav
ing been observed as Decoration Day
DR. Talinage this morning preached an
appropriate sermon. 1t was a move
and unprecedented service. as in differ
ent parts of the audience were many OF
those who had belonged to both Fed
eral and Confederate armies, the sub
ject having been previously announced,
namely, Two Garlands for Northern
and Southern Graves. Over the pull
pit were two wreaths of beautiful flow
ers, and they were linked together so
that they were an object lesson of the
subject presented. Text Isaiah xiii
6-ST will say to the north, Give up,
and to the south, Keep not back. y
AN APPROPRIATE TEXT.
Just what my text meant by the
north and south cannot say, but in
the United States the two words are so
point blank in their meaning that no
one can doubt They mean more than
east and west, for although between
those last two there have been rivalries
and disturbing ambitions and infelicities
and silver bills and Worlds fair contro
versies, there have been between them
no batteries unlimbered, no intrench-
ments dug, no long lines of sepulchral
mounds thrown up. 1t has never been
Massachusetts Fourteenth regiment
against Wisconsin zouaves; it has nev
er been Virginia artillery against Mis-.
sissippi rifles.
East and west are distinct words,
and sometimes may mean diversity of
interest, but there is no blood on them.
They can be pronounced without any
intonation of wailing and death groan.
But the north and the south are words
that have been surcharged with TRACE
dies. They are words which suggest
that for forty years the clouds had been
gathering for a four years tempest
which thirty years ago burst in a fury
that shook this planet as it has never
been shaken since it swung out at the
first world building.
thank God that the words have
lost some of the intensity which they
possessed three decades ago; that a
vast multitude of northern people have
moved south, and vast multitude of
southern people have moved north,
and there have been intermarriages by
the ten thousand, and northern colo
nels have married the daughters of
southern captains, and Texas rangers
have united for life with the daughters
OF New York abolitionists and their
children are half northern and half
southern and altogether patriotic. But
north and south are words that need to
be brought into still closer harmoniza-
ton.
thought that now, when we are half
way between presidential elections, and
sectional animosities are at lowest ebb
and now just after presidential jour
ney, when our chief magistrate, who
was chiefly elected by the north, has
been cordially received at the south /;
and now, just after two Memorial Days
one of them a month ago, strewing
flowers on southern graves, and the
other yesterday, strewing flowers on
northern graves, it might be appropri
ate and useful for me to preach ser
mon which would twist two garlands,
one for the northern dead and the
other for the southern dead, and have
the two interlocked in a chain of flow
ers that shall bind forever the two sec.
tions into one; and who knows but
that this may be the day when the
prophecy of the text made in regard to
the ancients may be fulfilled in regard
to this country, and the north give up its
preiudices and the south keep not back
its confidence II will say to the
north, Give up, and to the south, Keep
not back.
THE PAINTINGS.
But before | put these garlands on
the graves ! mean to put them this
morning a little while on the brows OF
the living men and women of the north
and south who lost husbands and sons
and brothers during the civil strife
There is nothing more soothing to a
wound than a cool bandage, and these
two garlands are cool from the night
dew What a morning that was on the
banks OF the Hudson and the Savan-
nah when the son was to start for the
warl What fatherly and notherly
counsell What tearsl What heart
breaksI What charges to write home
often What little keepsakes put away
in the knapsack, or the bundle that was
20 be exchanged for the knapsackl
The crowd around the depot or the
steamboat landing shouted, but father
and mother and sister cried. And how
lonely the house seemed after they
went home, and what an a'wfully va.
cant chair there was at the Christmas
and Thanksgiving tablet And after
the battle, what waiting for newsl
What suspense till the long lists of the
killed and wounded were made out I
All along the Penobscot, and the Con
necticut, and the st. Lawrence, and the
Ohio, and the Oregon, and the James
and the Albemarle, and the Alabama
and the Mississippi, and the Sacramento
there were lainentation and mourning
and great woe, Rachel weeping for her
children, aud refusing 10 be colnforted
because they were not The world has
forgotten il, but father and mother