The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1896-07-03

were near the end of the column made
a splendid showing.
There were five camps of Conferedate
veterans in line.
st. Mary's boy drum crops, of Nor
folk was the smallest organization
represented.
When the procession reached the
park the military formed a complete
square around the grounds, prevent
ing any but those in the parade from
entering the enclosure. The Grand
Lodge of Masons which had joined the
procession at Adams street waited to
Law the corner stone until all the invit
ed guests had taken seats in the grand
stand. And the veterans organiza~
tions had been parked" Monroe
Park at this time was an almost solid
mass of humanity The Masons es-
corted by the Knights Templar, march
ed to the park where the corner stone
was laid with Masonic ceremonies.
Prayer was offered by Rev. DIR. Geo.
III. Raw. At the close of the Masonic
exercises Mr.. w. II. Thompson, Su-
perintendent of the Fire Alarm and
Police Telegraph, touched an electric
button which was signal for the
Howitsers out on the Lee monument
grounds to fire a salute of thirteen
guns.
Hon. j. Taylor Ellyson, president of
the Davis Monument Association came
forward and called on Bishop john
son c. Cranberry to offer prayer. Gen.
Stephen d. Lee was in troduced as the
orator of the occasion and made an
oh, In in aG
follows:
GENERAL LEES SPEECH.
'We are here to-day to honor the
memory of Jefferson Davis; to lay
the corner stone of a monument to one
who needs no monument in our gener-
alton beyond that in the hearts OF his
collntrymen. But we think it due to
erect one that posterity may know
the reverence felt for the great leader
of cause that failed. 1t is fitting that
he should rest here in Virginian-that
greatest of all States, the battle
Scared producer of warriors and
statesmen, fitting that he should rest
here among her immortals. But for
here generosity in ceding her vast
territory to the union, Kentucky
would have still been here, and he
would have been born her son. May
presidents, statesmen, soldiers, lie IN
Virginia soil-from Washington to
the present time-none greater than
Davis, but more fortunate.
"Fame has no trumpet for failure.
The world hears not the voice of the
vanquished. Yet history might teach
us strange things of men who fail and
causes that are lost. Genius did not
keen Hannibal or Napoleon from de-
feat: heroisni went with Joan OF Arc
to the stake, and Emmett to the scat
fold. The eloquence of Demosthenes
did not save Greece, or Cato's virtue
Rome. The courage of Kosinsco a
vailed naught for Poland and Hunga-
ry went down for all the patriotism
of Kossuth Sometimes defeat gives
a tragic pathos which lifts the COM
mon-place into the immortal, and ten
derly preserves the memory OF the
vanquished long after the victor has
been forgotten"
He followed with a review Of Davis
career and the issues which brought
about secession, and continued:
ST cannot hold him wise who could
willingly wound the patriotism of any
citizen of the republic. 10 Drand
such men as Albert Sydney Johnston,
Stonewall Jackson, Robert Il. Lee, or
Jefferson Davis as traitors is not TO
stain the whiteness of their lives, but
rather to spoil the word for any use
full purpose, to make of traitors title
which Hampden or Washington
might have borne as well had the for
tunes of war gone against them.
'The future historian will note with
astonishment that the Southern strug-
gle for independence began not with
committees of public safety, with de-
clarations of the rights of men or
enunciation of the mighty doctrine
that governments derive their just
powers from the consent of the gov
erned, but it began with public stat
utes, general elections and consitu-
tiona1 conventions. Mr.. Davis himself