The Waterbury Democrat., 1935-06-28
By FRED EDWARDS


 As . wife's eyes flll when some
 sweet song,
 Brings "Lovc young dream" to
 mind,
 As traveller thrills at the
 thought of home
 And the friends he's left be.
 hind, -
 Co leaps my heart when I hear
 the drums
 And the regiment swings into
 view;
 And I think of the time, of my
 golden prime,
 When I was . soldier, too. -The Veteran.
 A great deal has been said in the past two years about the veterans, about peace veterans, and war veterans, Ind what difference there was between the two. The best definition so far, is, that of the late William Addison Ireland, for 35 years, scartoonlst for the Columbus Despatch, of whom 1t is said; "No Man had great CT courage; no man had great CT fearlessness in assualting the citadeis of evil; no man had keener vision into the complexities of. modern life; no man could cut with greater precision through pretense, and lay bare the underlying motives of false propaganda, and no man could turn his pen to happier things with greater understanding of human val. ues."
 He disagreed with, the un- American and far fetched the- ory that a veteran who had worn . uniform in the time of war was not in . special class, or that such veteran should be accorded no treatment dif- ferent from that accorded other citizens who did not wsar e uniform in any of Americas wars, at home or abroad. M
 In the name of the veterans of those wars, some still alive and others for whom r
 "The muffled drums sad note has beat The soldiers last tatool"
 He answered, and here is the answer
 "Wc, who have worn the uniform, hold that the mo. mont the soldier swears the oath and dons the uniform he mortgages his life--his govern. mcnt may quench it in subma. rine, airplane, or trench-he lives on borrowed time under voluntary sentence of death subject only to the fortune of the field--that anticipatory sacrifice make him . special Class"--he has deeded his life to his country!
 The sorrowful, pitiless propa- ganda ieveled at our war vet erans recalls the lines of Fin- ley Peter Dunne, in MT. Doo- ley's philosophy, as it appears under the caption of Public Gratitude:"
 "When a grateful raypublic. Mir. Hinnessy, builds an arch to it's conquering hero. 1t should be made of brick, so that we can have something convanient to hurl after him when he has passed by"
 These lines were written at the time 8 tickle public had forgotten what Admiral George Dewey had accomplished for American arms in Manila Bay. Another shameful es- pisode in our history, of which the New York Herald said: Have the echoes of the guns that woke the morning silence in Manila Bay that May two years ago died away? Has the memory of that gallant feat of arms faded?"
 At tndt tAilC tic NCW AOAh Life, coupling Dewey with an- other naval hero of the Span ish American war, Captain Richmond Pearson Hobson, who sank Q derelict at the mouth of Santiago harbor to prevent the Spanish fleet from getting out, and who went un- rewarded for 35 years for the daring deed that near cost him his fife, said:
 s'These hcroes-erst exfroIling--
 A fickIe public drops; Folks chase . ball that's rolis
 ing,
 And kick it when it
 stops"
 So the pages of history are full of the records of the "PuhiIc Ingratitude" Mir. Docley in5ortaiized in hls quaint philosophy.
 To go further back we have the case of Col. George Rog- CTS Clark, who prevented the