The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1899-08-24
TRIBUTE TO zEBULON B. VANCE.
The Speech OIL 7. Gray Esq., of Raleigh, Accepting
a Bust of Vance from the Class of 1899 at
the State University
the State University.


trying times Of the Civil War and in
1876, and as Senator. the burden upon
his soul was to uplift the State, protect
its soldiers and citizens and to advance
its prosperity and glory.
Young gentlemen. let the love which
Vance cherished for the State be an eX-
ample and inspiration to you in the
career upon which YOU are entering
with such bright hopes and suspicious
beginnings If you shall love your State
with the ardent affection of true sons
you will be useful in your day and gen
Grafton and being useful you will be
successful according to the true stand
ards. No son OF a mother really loves
her if he neglects or brings sorrow or
disgrace upon her. and if YOU shall bee
proud of your State and shall love her
with true and llnightly devotion your
brain and Drawn will ever be at work
10 devise and carry out plans for
her prosperity, peace and glory.
North Carolina deserves your love and
iustifes the pride. To tell Of her peo-
pie, so homemade and homogeneous
that we all know one another and can
trace one another's lineage so conserva-
tive and God-fearing that isms have no
place and inidelity no hold or cOunte-
nance: to sing Of her heroes and her
women. her climate and resources her
riches in possession and potential. her
history and her future, would require
a paean longer than Judge Gaston's
and a minstrelsy more perfect than that
with which the Highland harper told the
legends of his native hills or Jewish
captive in far off Babylon sang the
gories of his beloved Jerusalem.
I implore You no longer to regard
North Carolina as strip Of land be-
tween two States" as it has some times
derisively been called: nor as State
whose chief products, according to some
Biographies (and some | am sorry 80
say in use in our schools are tar, pitch,
turpentine and tobacco nor as Zip Van
Wrinkle stretching his laggard limbs in
sleep while others are awake, alive and
forging ahead in social moral and ma
terial prosperity. Where is the Common
wealth with the history she possesses?
At MeckIenburg declaring against tyran-
ny and at Alamance. Moore's Greek,
Kings Mountain and Guilford Court
House and on all the battlefeldS Of the
Revolution. making good her declaration
with her muskets. her cannon, her pixies,
her swords and her blood. and after the
battles had been fought and won. stand
ing in the Federal Congress and at her
convention in Fayetteville holding out
to the last in her contention for n Con-
Stitution that would preserve for pos
terity the fruits of their victory; and
lateE Won know how your fathers and
kinsmen the boys from the Cape Fear
and Pee Dee and Albemarle sections
with their brothers from the hills and
mountain coves unframed though they
were to feats of arms and gladiatorial
sports rushed to the cOnsecrated fields
OF Virginia and 10 all the backgrounds
Of the Confederdcy and stayed. and
stayed. and stayed-some forever more
than those Of any other Statel and
the others until their chieftlin said,
Enough go back and. whether dying
or surviving. illustrated on every field
by their daring, their courage and their
soldierly qualities the noblcst traits of
Southern manhood until an alluSion to
or comparison with Thermopylae be-
came tame and commonplace. And
still later. and within the memory Of MS
all. YOU know how North Carolina was
illustrated and new glory illumined the
name OF the State at Cardenas and San
Juan.
1t were commonplace to tell of her
material resources and how her rivers,
sounds and soil can fill the hungry
months and clothe the naked limbs of
an empire. while locked in the bosom
of her rugged hills are gold and gems
and precious stones enough to tempt
the avarice and make green with envy
the eyes Of at Croesus or n MonteZuma.
Her colleges are being endowed and
patronized as never before and churches
ana school houses, those foes from which
ignorance and vice flee as from a blight
ing pestilence. are increasing in every
town hamlet and township.
Another State has won the title Of
the Empire State" Of the South but
/ believe that the census of 1900 will
show that for the last decade North
Carolina has made greater progress in
material prosperity than any other
Southern State. A new era OF activity
in all lines has dawned upon the South
and North Carolina is receiving the bene-
fit of the genial and inspiring rays OF the
dawn. Heretofore the tide of immgra-
ton and investment of idle capital of the
money centres of the East and North
has flown To the Northwest. but tired
Of cyclones and billiards and dreading
anarchiSm, nihilism, socialism and
strikes, our rich friends OF New Eng
land and the North are turning their eyes
to the South whose genial sun makes
every day Except Sunday a work-day
and whore no isms and strikes make
investments unsafe and proiitless But
without foreign aid we have digged life
out of the ribs of what was once thought
to lie death and whether or no foreign
capital comes to aid her, North Caro-
Ina can contentedly and prosperously,
like little Aleck Stephens, continue to
tote her own skillet"
Again | say, let the life and virtues
of Zebulon Baird Vance be an inspira-
ton and an example to you; love and
serve your State as he did; remain with
her and work out your destiny with hers;
improve, obey and enforce her laws re-
spcct her courts of justice. clear her
forests, enrich her soil. open her mines.
harness her streams and utilize their
powers; build school houses and churches.
patronize and endow her colleges, es-
tablish libraries and ill them and your
public places with the statues and