Birmingham age-herald., 1895-05-31

 part as follows: 'The scene presented here today is one that could not be wit messed in any country but our own, and for that reason, if no other 1t possesses significance worthy of the gravest con
 sideration. A few years ago brave men from the north met a hostile array and the best blood of the country was pouredl
 out like water on many battleffelds.
 Thousands and hundreds of thousands
 of our bravest sleep in bloody graves,
 men who gave their lives to prove the
 faith of their convictions, and now the
 north and south standing by these
 graves wherever they may be, grasp hands across the bloody chasm and
 proudly claim federal and Confederate
 soldiers as Americans, men who have given to the world as noble examples of courage and devotion to duty as can be
 enrolled on the page of history. Nor is this all that marks this occasion as eX- ceptiona1 and remarkable. and which would render it memorable in our annals for all time to come. No monument in the world has such honorable history as attaches to wonder one that marks the graves of no victo- r1ous soldiers, but of followers of a lost cause; it stands not on southern soil, but on northern; the men who rest under it's shadow come from our far off southland, and 1t owes it's erection not to comrades of these dead soldiers, but mainly the generosity and magnanimity of their former foes, the citizens of this great city. All honor then, to the brave and liberal men of Chicago, who have shown by their action that they regard the war as over and that they can welcome as friends on this solemn and suspicious occasion their former enemies. "Of the 5000 Confederates buried here
 not one was an officer; all were privates,
 in no way responsible for the unhappy
 war which brought an Had of woes
 upon our country And yet these hum- O nf yu1a could have gained freedom by taking the oath of allegiance to the federal govern
 ment, preferred death to the sacrifice of their principles. Can any possible dis
 honor attach to the brave men of Chi cago because they are willing to recog
 nize the courage and the devotion to duty of these dead Confederates? I'm agine if you can, my friends. the des-
 pair, the horror of these poor privates.
 lingering in prison and dying for their faith. They died here in what they looked upon as foreign and hostile land, far from the land of their birth, with no tender hand of mother or wife to soothe their entrance into the dark valley of the shadow of death and with all the memories of their far off homes
 and loving kindred to add the sharpest bangs to death itself. They were true
 men, and say If you please that they were mistaken; that they were wrong no brave man on earth can fail to do honor to Inelf courage ana IHelr SIeduIdSt du- herence to what they conceived to be their duty. You, the brave citizens of Chicago. in doing honor to their mem- ory, honor yourselves and humanity. Nor will you blame us of the south, while appreciating gratefully your gen. erous action in behalf of our dead com
 rades, for cherishing with pride and rev erence their memory. You could not respect us were we to feel otherwise. Death places it's seal on the actions of men, and it is after death that we meas ure men.
 "We Measure After Death.'' "A king once said of prince struck down, Taller he seems in death And
 this speech holds true for them now as
 then.
 !" It is after death we measure men, And as the mists of the past have rolled Our heroes who died in their tattered Grow taller and greater in all their parts, Till they fill our mind, as they fill our And for those who lament, there is this That glory stands by the side of grief. f" The nation respects them. The east and
 The far off slope of the golden coast The stricken south and the north agree.
 Each valiant. in his own degree. whether ne Tell on the S0OTe OT Sei- Did deeds of which,
 This land, though rich
 In histories may boast, And the sages' book and the poets lay Are full of deeds of men in gray.
 ..No lion cleft from the rock is ours, such as Lucerne displays.
 Our only wealth is in tears and flowers and words of reverend praise.
 And the roses brought to this silent yard, Are red and white. Behold!
 They tell how S for kngy bagf 3 dan Left Britain story whose moral old
 Is fit to be grayen in text of gold The moral Is, that when battles cease The ramparts smile in the bloom of peace. ".And flowers were hither brought From the gallant men who against us York and Iancaster-gray and blue
 Each to itself and the other true And so I say
 Our men in gray
 Have left to the south and north a tale
 Which none of the glories of earth can pale
 'We of the south measure our dead
 comrades buried here by the standard
 applied to men after death, and you of
 Chicago have measured them by the
 same standard-the best standard by
 which we can measure men; and by ap-
 plying this you have shown that you
 have come to the highest standard
 vouchsafed to men, and on this north and
 south can stand with honor alike to both
 sections.
 Are any federal soldiers disloyal to
 the flag under which they fought be-
 cause they join in decorating the graves
 of brave men whom they met in battle?
 Thousands of federal soldiers rest under
 southern skies, in southern graves, and
 many in unknown graves.
 "'Where, some beneath Virginian hills, And some by green Atlantic rills Some by the water of the vest
 A myraid unknown heroes rest.
 "'Of them their patriot zeal and pride,
 The lofty faith that with them died