The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1894-05-30

Again to the sound of fife and drum
khe grav-haired veterans of battles and
tampaigns keep time to the music
that cheered them as they plodded
Through the mud or dust, under the
blowing sun or drilling rain,
towards those fields where they fought
30 nobly for their country and the
principles of liberty. Not now, as OF
old, do they march forth to fight, but
Abey bear to the "bivouac of the dead"
the tokens of love and memory, and
lay them over the mounds beneath
which lies the dust once sentient with
patriotisrn and courage. Cornelia of
old cast the dust of her murdered sons
into the air, and in time there sprang
from it, as from the tabled dragon s
teeth, an avenger of their blood. Our
newer. better republic needs no red
handed Marius to deal death TO her
enemies. She has laid the dust of her
murdered sons on a thousand battle
fields, and from it have sprung forbear-
ance, mutual forgiveness and patriot
ism bounded by no lines of politics or
faction.
The veterans of her fields and camps
sleep dreamlessly in numberless peace
ful churchyards, and though their
tombstones bore only the words: HE
was a soldier of the republic" the
epitaph would still be one more glori-
Gus in the eyes of his countrymen
that any of the records of ''storied
sch tal 70 tho lirlnn tho
story of liberty 'imperiled and res
cued. We honor the dead soldier as
the living soldier, with our need of
praise. He stands to US not as. the
embodiment of brute force of des-
potism. not as the stern henchman of
war, but as the type of citizenship
which in time of danger risks every
thing for his country's honor. dares
and does all for her glory. Our stand
ing army to-day would not cover one
fourth the shortest of our frontier
lines; but in the hour of Americas
Peril every artisan, clerk, farmer.
every man able to raise hand in her
defense becomes a warrior for her
homer. Ask the gray-haired veteran,
laying so tenderly the emblems of i'm
mortality over the grass-grown grave
of the dead: What is the bulwark Of
our nations might?'' and hear him
answer: THE strong arms and true
hearts of her sons, the prayers and
self-sscrifce other daughters"
The red tide has ebbed from Shiloh,
Antietam. Gettysburg, the Wilderness,
and the souls of brave men that it left
dead behind it, the tears and groaus
that were the echo of its shot and
shell, the heart-break and agony of
widows and orphans, have risen to the
throne of the Great All Father, and
thence again human sorrow and suffer
ing have descended to earth, robbed
of pain and hideousness, and have
fructified the seed of good lying hid
den In the bosom of calamity and
made it bear rich fruit to all the ages.
Thus the nations dead have become
eternal Every stride of the freed slave
howard moral and intellectual liberty
Is the impulse given by their hands.
Every sound of free and happy labor,
where once the wailing of the OPP
pressed was heard, is the TIE Dsum of
their souls, every heart-throb of prog
ress a pulsation from those silent
breasts.
Let us then keep in memory their
lives by this yearly pilgrimage to the
shrine of glory and honor-the SOL
diers graves. Let Us lead our children
by the hand to the cemetery, and, as
Hamilcar caused his son Hannibal to
be led to the affairs of the gods, that he
might swear there undying hatred to
Rome. let us pledge our children to eter-
nellove of freedom. Let us sit with them
at the feet of the veterans, and, as they
tell their stories of stricken fields and
dreary marches, listen to the pean OF
patriotism that swells through even
the humblest of those tales, and re-
fresh our souls as from living foun-
tains.
We thank God for Peace, with all her
blessings, her happy homes, her hum
of commerce-but let us be grateful
also for n war which revealed to this
nation the greatness of her sons. No
longer does the proud south stand
aloof, seeing in the sons of the north
the progeny of puritan and peasant:
no longer does the north view the
sons of the southland as partakers OF
vermont theories of the aristocrzcy
OF blood. The scales have fallen
from the eyes, and we are brothers
where once we were foemen, sons of
the same divine Liberty who stands on
the highest mountain top and In the
lowest valley of our land, challenging
the world to love her by the calm Dig
nifty of her mien and the noble ideals
she creates. Let the strains of Dixie
be mingled with our anthem, for there
Is no longer any south or north, but
one union, grit by seas and lakes, one
country, reigning in the hearts of the
people. one hope for us and for our chill
dren.
When the last veteran shall be gath
cred to the breast of earth and shall
speak only with the dumb eloouence
of these myriad mounds. the lesson of
his patriotism shall still be repeated.
md with each recurring season the
gathered sweetness of the first fruits
Of the springtime shall be brought to
these sacred shrines as ernblems that
as long as the sun shines TO call forth
the hidden life from the soul. as long
rs the rain fails and the devs bedev
the verdure in the hills and meadows
and the sky arches above Us. so long
shall the liberty the soldier loved be
cherished by the nation as its dearest
possession