The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1901-08-09

them and laid down their guns,
there was no shout of victory, no
flourish of trumpets, but only ST.
lence and tears.
when that conflict had ended
the Confederate soldier proudly
stood among the blackened walls
of his ruined country, magnificent
in the gloom of defeat and still a
hero.
CHS sword was broken, his
home was in ashes, the earth was
red beneath him, the sky was black
above him. He had placed all in
the scale of war and lost all save
honor, but he did not sit down in
despair to weep away the passing
years. His slaves were gone, but
he was still master. Too proud
to pine, too strong to yield to ad-
versity he threw down his musket
and laid his willing, but unskilled
hand upon the walking plow. He
put away the knap-sack of war and
turned his face toward the morning
of peace. He abandoned the rebel
yell to enter the forum and
the court room and the hus-
tings. He gave up the sword
to enter the battles of industry and
commerce--and now in little
more than third of a century the
land of desolation and of death,
the land of monuments and mem
ories has reached the spring time
of a grander destiny, and the sun
shines bright upon the domes and
towers of new cities built upon the
old and the cotton fields wave their
white banners of peace and the
fields of wheat wave back their
banners of gold.
"Who can portray the possibiIi-
ties of a country which has pro-
duced the Lees and Jackson's and
the brilliant Gordon and the dash
ing Joe Wheeler who is as gallant
in the blue as he was glorious in
the gray, and the impetuous and
immortal Bedford Forrest, the
Marshal Ney of the Gonfederacy.
"Who can portray the possibili-
ties of a country which has pro-
duced the stalwart and sinewy lnen
of the rank and file, who followed
the stars and bars through the
smoke and flame of every desper-
ate battle and stepped proudly in
to history as the greatest fighters
the world has ever known.
"a country SO richly blessed,
not only with brave men and
beautiful women, but whose blos-
soming hills and verdant valleys
are so generous and kind, and
whose mountains are burdened
with coal and copper and zinc and
lead enough to supply the world
for u thousand years; whose virgin
forests yet stand waiting and sigh
ing for the woodman's axe; and
whose winding rivers flow clear
and cool and make music as they
flow.
''It is the beautiful land of love
and liberty, of sunshine and senti-
ment, of fruits and flowers, where
the grape vine staggers from tree
to tree as if drunk with the wine
of its own purple clusters; where
peach and plum and blood-red
cherries and every kind Of berries
bend bough and bush, and glow
like showered drops of rubies and
of pearls. II is the land of the
and the melon, the para
disc of the cotton and the cane.
They tell us now that II is the new
South, but the same old blood
runs in the veins of these old vet
Grams and the same old spirit
heaves their bosoms and flashes in
their eyes.
"The same old soldiers who
welded the musket long ago, are
nursing their grandchildren on
their knees to-day and teaching
them the same old lessons Of honor
and truth and the same old love Of
liberty, the mocking bird sings
the same old song in the same old
trees and the brooks leap and
laugh down the same old hoIlows.
We till the same old feldsand drink
from the same old springs and
climb among the same old rocks
CONTINUED on Second papn.l