News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1896-06-04

ton on soldiers t1mbs oftener repeated
than any other-'UnLnown." When,
about 81 years ago l was called to de-
liver the Grafton at Arlington Heights,
| Washington, | was not so much i'm
I pressed with the minute guns that shook
the earth or with the attendance of pres
| ident and cabinet and foreign ministers
and generals Of the army and commo-
dores of the navy as with the pathetic
and overwhelming suggestiveness of
that epitaph on so many graves at my
feet, "Unknownp' "Unknownp' 1t
seems to me that the time must come
when the government of the United
States shall take off that epitaph. They
are no more unknownl We have found
them out at last. They are the beloved
sons of the republic.
Would it not be we'll to take the
statue of the heather goddess off the top
of the capitol (for have no faith in the
morals Of a heather goddess) and put
one great statue i'll all our national
cemeteries-a statue of liberty in the
form of a Christian woman with her
hand on an open Bible and her foot ON
the Rock of Ages, with the other hand
pointing down to the graves of the I'M
known, saying, "These are my sons who
died that might live" Take off the
misnomer. Everybody knows them. 1t
is of comparatively little Importance
what was the name given them in bap-
tism of water. In the holier and might
Ter baptism of blood we know them, and
yesterday the nation put both arms
around them and Rugged them to her
heart, crying, mime foreverp
Again, by this national ceremony we
mean the future defense Of this nation.
By every wreath of flowers on the sol
diers' graves we say, "Those who die
for the country shall not be forgotten, "
and that will give enthusiasm to our
young men in case our nation should in
the future need to defend itself in battle
| We shall never have another war be-
tween north and south. The old decayed
bone of contention, American slavery,
has been cast out, although here and
there depraved politician takes it up
| to see if he can't gnaw something off it.
| We are floating off farther and farther
from the possibility of sectional strife
Everything For Defense.
possibility of civil war. But about
foreign invasion am not so certain
When I spoke against war, 1 said moth
ing against self defense. An inventor
told me that he had invented style of
weapon which could be used in self de-
Tense, but not in aggressive warfare.
said, "When you get the nations to
adopt that weapon, you have introduced
the millennium. | have no right to go
on my neighbours premises and assault
him, but if some ruffian break into my
house for the assassination of my fam
lily, and can borrow gun and load it
in time and aim it straight enough,
will shoot him.
There is no room ON this continent for
any other nation except Canada, and
better neighbor no one ever had. If you
don't think 50, go to Montreal and To-
ronto and see how well they will treat
you. Other than that there is absolutely
no room for any other nation. l have
been across the continent again and
again and know that we have not
half inch of ground for the equity foot of
foreign despotism to stand on. But am
not so sure that some of the arrogant
nations of Europe may not some day
challenge u.s. do not know that those
forts around New York bay are to sleep
all through the next century. | do not
know that Barnegat lighthouse will not
yet look off upon a hostile navy l do
not know but that half dozen nations,
envious Of our prosperity, may want to
give us wrestle. During our civil war
there were two or three nations that
could hardly keep their hands off us. 1t
is very easy to pick national quarrels
and if our nation escapes much longer it
will be the exception.
| If foreign foe should come, we want
men like those of 1912 and like those of
1862 to meet them. We want them all
up and down the coast, Pulaski and
Fort Sumter in the same chorus of
thunder as Fort Lafayette and Fort
Hamilton-men who will not only know
how to fight, but how to die. When
such time comes, if it ever does come
the generation ON the stage of action
will say: my country will care for my
family as they did in the soldiers asy-
lum for the orphans in the civil war,
and my country will honor my dust as
it honored those who preceded me in
patriotic sacrifice, and once a year at any
rate, on Decoration day, l shall be res
directed into the remembrance of those
for whom l died Here go for God and
my country! HuzzaP'
If foreign foe should come the old
sectional animosities would have no
power. Here go our regiments into the
battlefeld-Fifteenth New York volu-
teers, Tenth Alabama cavalry, Four
teenth Pennsylvania rifiemen, Tenth
Massachusetts artillery, Seventh South
Carolina sharpshooters. do not know
but It may require the attack of some
foreign foe to make us forget our absurd
sectional wrangling. have no faith
in the cry, "No north, no south, no
east, no westp' Let all four sections
keep their peculiarities and their pref.
erences, each doing its own work and
not interfering with each other, each of
the four carrying its part in the great
harmony-the bass, the alto, the tenor,
the soprano--in the grand march of
Union.
Promise of the Resurrection.