Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1911-04-27
FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY
FOR THE MEN IN GREY
Memorial Day Was Appropriately Observed
in Americas Yesterday.

Drawing an unusually disagreeable
day for April, a large crowd of vet
Grams and their friends assembled yes
terday afternoon at the High School
auditorium to participate in Memorial
Day exercises.
1t was most fortunate in view of the
unpleasant weather that the arrange
ments for holding the exercises out Of
doors were abandoned some time ago,
as the latter part of the exercises,
which must necessarily be held in the
open, gave those present a sufficient
touch of the raw, biting east wind that
blew necessarily throughout the day
The military parade was carried out
in due form and the final salute clos
ed the days exercises.
The auditorium of the High School
building proved a satisfactory place
for the exercises, and it was appro-
priately decorated for the occasion
with Confederate flags, flowers and Il
touch of evergreens. The observance
of the day by local business houses
furnished an audience that filled the
building.
In graceful and appropriate speech
DR.. Lansing Burrows, the orator Of
the occasion, was introduced by Prof,
C. C. Youmans, of the High School
faculty. DR.. Burrows discussed with
a rare sympathy and insight that
comes from personal experience the
meaning that Memorial Day has for
Southern hearts.
After abiding to the fact that the
day was the fiftieth anniversary of
his marching forth to the camps
around Richmond, DR.. Burrows spoke
of the "Reviving Power of the Dead"
Here is a power, yearly drawing us
by magnetic influence aroand graves
to yoice our gratitude for men who
gave up their lives for us. 1t is a day
set apart to think of those who have
ain nearly a half century dead. The
affection for them is as strong as ever
it was and the heart grows more ten
der toward the lessening battalions or
grim and grizzled warriors who stand
amid the sepulchres of their compan-
ions of the bivouac and battlefield.
1t is not strange that out of these
graves a new life springs. The re-
membranes stirred by graves that hide
away the true and noble are a kind of
resurrection. | could wish these ga
land decked graves might rise between
us and the temptation to think that all
this sacrifice was needless. The bless
ed thing about this ceremony is the
knowledge that as a people the prin-
cipal motive for action was not money
getting. The page on which is writ
ten the prosperity of the South is a
glowing one, but that on which ITS
devotion to duty is superb. We speak
Of the times of great prosperity, d
Golden Age" but crimson is the
royal color. The pages that record no
bility of character and achievement
are written in blood The Golden Age
decayed with the rot of luxury, the Ian
guor of self-ease, the loss of honor,
the captivity of effeminacy. England
was redeemed by blood; Italy was
united by blood; Switzerland became
free through blood; Germany was
emancipated by blood; America was
born in blood The great hope that
lifts us unto things invisible and
eternal came by blood.
This sacrifice of blood has not
proven useless. These men We honor
| are not mistaken. In the light OF
the fact that the great underlying
principles of civil war to which they
devoted themselves are most strenu-
ously held today in all portions of ou1
common country, established by its
highest courts they cannot be called
m staken. The sacrifice was far from
useless. 1t is better to have the her
itage of their devotion than the in
teritance of successful commercial
ventures. The name is better thai
the estates. To descend from mel
who died for principle is better thar
to have money piled up by greedy ant