Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-05-30

MS amDltlon, the defeat or the confeder-
Following him, 1 said to the audience
there assembled. as 1 say to you gathered
here today under the ancestral axis of Lee
that If he could have pierced the veil of the
future but for the years you and 1 have
seen inscribed the tablets Of time, his
dependency could well have changed to
exultation, for then he would have .nown
mattoX the south in all material respects,
so far as relates to development, progress
improvement, wealth, was by the force of
our conQuering arms propelled forward a
century in advance of any point she could
have reached under the order of things pre-
vailing in 1860. 1t is settled for all time
that are nation instead of a confeder-
alton of states. a NATION. and the letters,
if you please. as large as possible-a nation
that shall exist whIe time lasts and until
Almighty God shall call the roll of the gov
ernments of the earth.
Duty Well Performed.
We have also a consciousness of duty
DONE the rapturous realization of the fact
that all who follow us are our debtors, and
that when we shall pass over into the
beneficent regions of eternal peace and re-
port there to the founders of the republic,
We can meet them front face with heads
erect, conscious that we did our duty; that
we preserved to the fullest extent what the
fathers had founded; that we made prog
ress; that lifted the flag higher than II
lldO ever Deen l1jeu De1OEc, anu tllsit we
vitalized the forces of civilization and Chris
tlanity and made them more powerful than
they had been.
In the need OF praise we bestow today
let there be generous share for those who
at home so Loyalty held up our hands In
every possible way, and of that praise. in
common justice. give by far the larger
amount to the women of our time. Mortal
lips We're never able, and never Will be
able, to do them justice. With courage
equal to the Spartan mothers, they sent
their loved ones forth to the conflict, and
in fun accord with the mothers of CEN
turtles ago, who handing their sons their
war shields gave them the simple injunc-
| ton, Return with it or on it,
Theirs was an anxiety and a continued
agony beyond what in the field knew.
We knew the worst when night fell. Be
sides that we had much of pleasantly in
the camp; we had the diversions of march
and the fierce. all-engrossing excitement
of the battlefield.
They. If they learned that we had been
safe on certain date, knew not what
| might have occurred since, so the heart
agony continued.
INCREASINGLY they labored for our COM
fort in the field and to keep the home
going, and when We came back their low
ing and plying hearts took us in, and in
so many instances, where our lives seemed
hopelessly broken they inspired US with
the courage to defy adverse fate and to en-
deavor to make mans fight for mans
place in the world.
our mortal existence. through long years of
loving association, the material of which
Gods angels are composed.
Wars Great Compensation.
A few days ago, in speaking of this day
and of the address which he is proba bly,
delivering this moment at Indianapolis,
the President said that, while the day is
pre-eminently the day of the Grand Army,
and while, of course, we felt rightly
great sense of loss in the death of our
comrades, still there was large compensa-
ton therefor, for they died gloriously and
for great purpose, and that he thought
our greater regret and grief might well be
for the wives and the children they left
behind who suffered such irreparable loss.
I agreed with him, and I did not hesitate
to inform him that the next move of the
organized forces Of the Grand Army
would be when Congress meets again, and
1t will be in an effort to give the widows
of our comrades something more than SIS
or $40 per month. He will help us. No
among realizes more fully than
Theodore Roosevelt that while bouquets OF
flowers and speech are fragrant and pleas
ing, bread is the first necessity.
l have a word Of reproOf to utter to my
comrades who survive. 1t Is over forty
two years since the bugles sang truce at
Appomattox and flags were furled. l find
that many of our comrades speak I'M
patiently of the ignorance or Indifference
manifested by the people of today to a
considerable extent regarding the events of
those times l would ask them to pause
and consider these facts When the storm
of civil war broke upon us, the population
of this nation numbered a little over
thirty millions of people. OF those millions,
it is safe to say that of those who when
Sumpter was fired upon had reached years
of understa nding, even in the first degree,
% per cent have passed into the eternal be-
yond. l very much doubt II am extrava-
CANT in my estimate, that of those thirty
IaNv
But today our population numbers upward
of eighty millions, thus showing that since
the days when we last stood in battle array
there have come into life under our flag, by
birth or immigration. siXty-fve millions of
people. Who should wonder, then, that there
is so little known in detail of that contest,
Nay, nay, my comrades, let us not be i'm
patient or petulant that our people and
the world at large know so little of the
details of that awful struggle. They know
of the results in the concrete. They know
that we measured up to the full require
ments of the hour. They know that We pre-
served the nation, that we tore IRON the
flag the one foul blotch which besmirched
its escutcheon, and made 1t in reality what
we had boosted 1t was before, the most
beautiful flag on all Gods earth, and for a
verify the flag of the free
Recent War With Spain.
To us who survived, there came the proud
knowledge in '9S that the tide Of patriotism
was in full flow in the generation follow
ing
The flag was outraged and humanity S
cause cried out to us. The response was
instantaneous and universal. The old eagle
reused himself from the letharty of nearly
thirty-live years. In the American Con-
gress on a resolution placing SoO,OC0.cOO at
once in the hands of the President, the roll
call produced one unbroken AYE" all down
the line That unanimous expression of
opinion from all sections of our country
was worth every penny of the fifty millions
involved 1t was the positive notice that
the country was one again, In sentiment
and purpose. as well as geographically. The
northern boy looked at the Grand Army
button In the lapel of his fathers coat, and
very likely said, Father, I've got to 60"
and the old man nodded acquiescence, but
with a sudden realization Of the agonizing
fear he had caused his father and mother In
the long ago. a fear he had never measured
properly then.
And we can easily imagine that the
southern boy thought even more deeply as
he gaZed upon the confederate button in