The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1902-01-21
THE SONGS OF DIXIE
CONTINUED from Tenth Page)

lCOnLlnue0 from Ientn fdEe.D
as your fathers were before you; be-
cause the rays of glory which played
about their honored lives fall with
undiminshed brightness into your own,
this is the time and place to do hon.
age to the greatest American who ever
lived
There is no harder task master than
the principle we call duty. Flowers
may blow and streams may
leap to catch the coming light,
and song and laugh and jest
flash here and there in pleasures train,
but where duty moves the paths are
rough and stony, and trials and pains
are the grim servitors which follow
where 1t goes.
Robert Lee loved the Union. Peace
dwelt in his home; distinction was in
his profession. A thousand ties OF
friendship and pride and memory
bound him to the settled order Of
things. He loved the flag of his coun-
try. His fathers had hailed the mo-
ment it had first been flung TO the
breeze and had fought with perfect de-
votion that it might become thing to
honor and revere. When it waved at
Yorktown there was not a stain upon
it. AS its bright hues CLEANED
through the morning mists over the
blue waters of the Chesapeake it was
the flag of the brave and the free. 1t
had flashed to him through the
smoke of battle as he rode
through the lists at Chupultepec
like the colors of his lady-love to the
knight of olden time when he gave
battle in her praise. 1t had stood for
freedom not oppression; for honor, not
debauchery; for the purity and integri-
of the Anglo Saxon race, and not for
the cursed and abominable crime
against Civilizations and race and man
hood which men called Reconstruction.
1t had been "to the living a sign of life
and a shroud to the hero's form" Upon
the one hand he saw a people rich and
powerful; quick of mind and fertile of
resource. A trained army, and a navy
which dominated the western waters
at their commands financial credit at
their back, and n band of writer's at
their cali to fill the ear OF the world
with the tale of their contention. On
the other hand, a people whose pur-
suits were peaceful-tillers of the soil.
High minded, honorable, and, as his
tory will tell you, courageous beyond
belief. but as poverty stricken in the
things with which wars must be waged
as if their thoughts had never dwelt
on war. The one held out to him what
end the victorious side. The other
could only speak of home and country
and honor. The praise of the gods
sounded loud in his ears. but the echoes
in his heart came from the hard dry
voice of Cato. ., my countrymen! how
limited our speech, dumb stricken all
our thought, when we stand in the
presence of such a man! 1t is not that
he was a brave man, for millions have
rushed into the yawning jaws of death
until our civilization runs red with glo-
rious blood. 1t is not that he was skill
full. for there is scarce a page of his
tory that is not a monument to human
strategy.
Think of it. this soldier who has
long since gone to dust. was at the
head of a citizen-soldiery which but a
few months before had been ploughing
fields or sitting on the rude forms OF
country schools. Some had been bend
ing over ledgers and others had beer
expounding ancient laws to patient
judges. Some had never seen a towr
and others could not have told one
tree from another And yet in three
years time it had borne its bullet-torr
flags time and again through the SER
red ranks of armies thrice its strength
in numbers and equipment; had
stripped the laurels from the brows OF
six generals in chief of the enemy in
turn: had relieved its own capital and
threatened that of it's adversary: and
had carved into the records of time
and the memories of men Manassas
and Fredericksburg and the Wilder
ness and Petersburg and Gettysburg
and Cold Harbor and Sharpsburg and
Spotsylvania, and without food or raj
ment or ammunition, the enemy IN
.t,1H In I'D nft ax,ly
had stood at length eight thousand
strong against the resources of the
civilized world as ready and willing &c
fight as when Pickett went uD the
bloody nights of Gettysburg, and Cor
don swept over the Virginia fields ION
the glorious twelfth of May" Brave
and skillful truly. but these were OF
the least of the talents Lee had in his
keeping. When we think of him the
soldier is swallowed up i'm the larger
figure of the man. Greater in defeat
than in victory: iron of will and COM
passionate of SOUL fighting a losing
cause because 1t was the right as other
men would have fought for Kingdoms
and crowns; taking the storms
and disasters and poverty
of life because duty so de-
creed-this was Gods gentleman with
stainless heart and sword, dead for
many a year and sleeping where the
purple shadows of the Virginian hills
rest with loving softness on his hon
ored tomb. yet living as the sunlight
lives throughout the stretches of inn
mortal time. touching with beauty the
humblest thing on which IL falls.
THE Spartan taught the youth oil
his country TO meet the physical con-
tention OF his country's enemies by les.
sons which melted him 20 abstinence
through disgust and endurance
through torture. But you have beer
taught in higher. nobler ways. IL all
the inspirat lions of your lives were
taken from you one by one save but
the memory of Lee, that would still
make Of you a knightly.i glorious race
OF men seeing IN the humblest tasls
which crowd you with their cares Tho
GOd-sent opportunities to reach up.
ward 10 loftiest thoughts and hopes
! IN this hour Of your countrys need
when all tho lesser, moaner forces ol
the times mock ~ the simple faith on
/ which the republic rests. stand you
! countrymen Of Lee. steady in the ranlsi
the guards about the tonpic of hel