The Brownsville daily herald. [volume] (Brownsville, Tex.) 1897-1910, 1907-02-04
INGALLS, EULoGY ON GRASS.
Earth's Lowry verdurs Ranks Next In
importance to Water. Light and Air.

of Kansas, although published
many times. will bear much repe
titan. 1t may well rank as one o
our choicest literary gems:
Majestic, fruitful, wondrou:
plant The corn triumkhant, thai
with the aid of man hath made
victorious procession across the
tufted plain, and laid foundation
for the social excellence that is
and is to be. This glorious plant,
transmitted by the alchemy Of
God, sustains the warrior in battle,
the poet in song and strengthens
everywhere the thousand arms that
work the purposes of life.
Next in importance to the divine
profusion of water, light and air,
those three great physical facts
which render existence possible,
may be .reckoned the universal
bene6cence of grass. Exaggerated
by tropical heats and vapors to the
gigantic cane congested with its
saccharing secretion or dwarfed by
polar rigors to the hbrous hair of
northern soliu1des, embracing be-
tween these extremes the maize
with its resolute pennoss, the rice
plant of southern swamps, the
wheat, rye, barley, oats and other
cereals, no less than the humber
verdure of the hillside, pasture
and prairie in the temperate zone,
grass is the most widely distributed
of all vegetable beings and is at
once the type of our life and the
emblem of mortality. Lying in
the sunshine among the buttercups
and the dandelions of May, scarce
ly higher in intelligence than the
minute tenants of the mimic will
derness, our earliest recollection of
the grass, and when the ftful
fever is ended and the foolish
wrangle of the market and the
forum is closed, grass heals over the
scar which our descent has made
into the bosom of the earth and the
carpet of the infant becomes the
blanket of the dead.
Grass is the forgiveness of ma
ture-her constant benediction.
Fields trampled with battle, satur-
ated with blood, torn with the ruts
of cannon, grow green again with
grass and carnage is forgotten.
Streets abandoned with traffic be-
come grass grown like rural lanes
and obliterated. Forests decay,
harvests perish, flowers vanish,
but grass is immortal. Beleaguer-
ed by the sullen hosts of winter, it
withdraws into the impregnable
fortress gifts subterranean vitality
and energies upon the first solicit
tation of spring. Sown by the
winds, by wandering birds, propa-
gated by the subtle horticulture of
the elements, which are its minis
tiers and servants, it softens the
rude outline of the world. It's
tenacious fbres hold the earth i'll
its place, and prevent its soluble
components from washing into the
sea- 1t invades the soli-
tudes of the deserts, climbs the
inaccessible slopes and forbiddihg
of mountains, modifes
climate and determines the history
and destiny of the ma
tons. Unobtrusive and patient.
1t has immortal vigor and aggres-
sion. Banished from the thor
oughfare and the field, it bides its
time to return, and when vigilance
is relaxed or the dynasty has per
ished, it silently resumes the
throne from which it has been
but which it never abdi-
Gates. II bears no blazonry of
bloom to charm the senses with
fragrance or splendor, but its
homeIy hue is more enchanting
than the lily or the rose. It
yields no fruit in earth or air, and
yet should its harvest fail for a.
single year famine would depopu-
late the world.
ck:ll H.,vc-,,