The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1902-02-19
A Battle.

soldier fires away amid smoke. mist,
or hurries on to the charge in crowd
which hides everything from him. The
officer il too anxious about the per-
formance Of what he Is especially y
charged with to mind what others are
doing.
The commander cannot be prese ut
Ieverywhere, and seeevery wood, water
course or ravine in which his orders
are carried into execution; be learns
from reports how the work goes on. 1t
Is we'll !; for battle is one of those jobs
which men do without daring to look
upon.
Over miles of country, at every field
fence, in every gorge Of valley, or en-
try into a wood, there is murder COM
mitting-wholesale, continuous, recip-
rocal murder. The human form, God 's
image, is mutilated, deformed, lacera-
ted, in every possible way, and by
every variety of torture. 49,.
The wounded are jolted off in carts to
the rear, their barred nerves crushed in
to maddening pain at every stone or
rut; or the flight end pursuit trample
over them, leaving them to writhe and
groap without assistance; and fever
and thirst, the most enduring of pain
full sensations, possess them entirely.
Thirst, too, has seized upon the yet
able-bodied soldier, who, with blood
shot eye and tongue lolling out, plies
his trade; Disappearing, killing with
savage delight. Callous when the
brains of his best-loved comrade are
scattered over him! The battlefield is,
if possible, q more painful object of
contemplation than the combatants.
They are in their vocation, earning
their bread. What will not man do
for shilling day? .
But their work Is carried on amid
the fields, gardens, and homesteads of
men unused to war. They left their
homes, with all that habit and happy
associations have made precious, to
bear it's brunt. The poor, the aged,
the sick are left in a hurry, to be killed
by stray shots or beaten down, as the
charge or counter-charge goes over
them. The ripening grain is trampled
down; the garden is trodden into a
black mud the fruit trees, bending
beneath their luscious load, are shatter-
ed by the cannon-shot; churches and
private dwellings are used as fortresses
and ruined in the conflict; barns and
granaries take fire, and the confagra-
ton spreads on all sides.
At night the steed is stabbed beside
the altar, and the weary homicides OF
the day complete the wrecking OF
houses to make their lairs for slumber.
The fires of the bivouac complete what
the fires kindled by the battle have
not consumed.
The surviving soldiers march on. to
act the same scenes over again else
where; and the remnant Of the scat
tered inhabitants return, to find the
mangled bodies of those they had low
ed amid the blackened ruins of their
homes; to mourn with more than ag.
onizing grief over the missing, of
whose fate they are uncertain to feel
themselves bankrupt in the worlds
stores, and look from their children to
the desolate fields and garners, and
think of famine and pestilence, engen-
dered by the rotting bodies of the half
buried myriads of slain.
Give me the money that has been
spent in war and [ will purchase every
IOOC Ol lauu upou lue eiooe' WI.
clothe every man, woman, and child
in an attire of which kings and queens
would be proud. will build a school
house on every hillside and In every
valley over the whole earth. / will
build an academy and endow it, and q
college in every State, and fill it with
able professors. will crown every
hillside with place of worship conse.
Grated to the gospel of peace. 1 will
support in every pulpit an able teacher
of righteousness, 80 that on every Sab.
bath morning the chime on one hill
should answer to the chime on anoth-
er around the earth's wide circumfer-
ence, and the voice of prayer and the
song Of praise should ascend like a
universal holocaust to heaven.