On love of coun 
 Conf Pam 12mo #443 
 
ON LOVE OF COUNTRY. 
 
 AN ADDRESS, 
 
 D«LIViCRED BBFORE THE 
 
 YOUNG LADIES 
 
 OF THE OLIO SOCIETY 
 
 ov 
 
 OxtoKD Fbmaui CoLLKOi, June 2nd, 186i^, 
 
 Bt Col. D. K MoKAE 
 
 RALEIGH; 
 
 K^JC^aOflURIl k IIAACOft}, 8TIAM BOOK AN9 JOB PBllrTXSd. 
 
 1864 
 

 LOVE OF COUNTRY. 
 
 An Address y delivered before the Young Ladies of the Clio 
 Society^ of Oxford Female College, by Col. D. Ji. McHab, 
 June 2d, 1864. 
 
 Young TjAdies : 
 
 I have a riile so well established of not undertaking the 
 delivery of Literary Addresses, that I wonder to find my- 
 self in your presence to day. 
 
 How I came to deviate from this settled regulation I 
 canaot well explain — unless, that i felt constrained under 
 the unusual circumstances which surround us to rnake the 
 contribution wliich you ilesire, to the entertainment of this 
 occasion. ^ 
 
 I know no topic better litted for me to speak on, and you 
 to hear, than that of love. Be not startled. — 1 am not 
 about to summon you to a #eatiae,nn courtship and matri- 
 mony — nor yet to discuss the merits or enforce the claims 
 of filial love — the iirst pure, obedient^ reverential love of 
 children to parents— with its attendant duties and obliga- 
 tions. My object is, to measure in its strength and force 
 another broader and more comprehensive emotion — the 
 love of" country :^to enkindle in your every breast the 
 sparks of patriotism — to stir its ve&tal fires till they 
 burn and glow, that in their bright refulgent light you 
 may bring y'»ur young hearts for sacrifice, and on their liv- 
 ing, leaping flames you may scatter the fragrant incense 
 of a fresh, virgin loyalty. 
 
 The lote of country is a sacred instinct of the human 
 heart. No seed is needed to produce jt. It is born of the 
 Boul— spontaneous aud indit^vnous ; is v'ntered by th^^ "'I's'i 
 «;^ .- in'no'R of PF!3'-»'^»r-»i' )i) ,. luen- reasiUi opes he^ tu vao 
 
 rpc'\';aiti'^'^,<^'*s'n .rnnn;^ oljtcts. It <^t^ ' .iud expands 
 wit'^ ndvai/oing i.:teiiis^?nGe, and ii^ juh and b^^ars f'-uit 
 undci- the genial i^ifluence uf ed:vatir,»i and tuition in -hose 
 schools where philosophy and morality a?c Ihe t' • . .;. 
 
 The first faint spj,rk of this insticilve virtU" ^'" thecinid's 
 
 i0¥e o'" home — of fhnt narrow sp;.ce, where, limited withla 
 
 rest confines, the liiilo creature makes her v/oild — 
 
 .P33897 
 
her toy-world of wonders — which nought that she ever 
 after finds in the great, sjacious, varying real world shall 
 ever come to e^ual. Her bahy-house for dolls, scarce big- 
 ger than her head, with its tiny pretences of doors and win- 
 dows and chimneys and grates and closets and mantles and 
 parlors ; and her misses' chamber with its wardrobe and 
 paraphranalia, — within this domain, this little domain of 
 fancy, meagre and restricted to us, but broad, far stretch- 
 ed, continental, almost illimitable to her, lies her country : 
 and to that country with all her imagination and all her 
 soul, she entrusts her firl^t young germ t>f patriotism. 
 
 In youth, ere yet the mind doth contemplate the exigen- 
 cies and the cares of life, when hope is fresh and fair — in 
 the early dawn, when the dew still lingers on the blossom 
 and bespangles it like a jewel, and never hoar-frost has 
 touched with withering lips its beauteous bright flower-^in 
 springy morning, while the sun shines splendid in the 
 heavens all perfect in their azure blue, and not as yet a 
 speck of cloud hath crossed his glorious disc, still less hath 
 lightning's flash or angry thunders threatened storm — in 
 these festive hours of gay and thoughtlesi and untroubled 
 youth, the eager, expectant Ijjpeful heart leaps to its de- 
 light amid the sports and pastnnes in its grasp, and wheth- 
 er fishing in the brook, or hunting on the hill, or plodding 
 at the school, or rambling in the holiday, it day by day 
 imbibes from every object dnd ever^ local association,. a« 
 from a perennial spring, deep draughts of patriotism. 
 
 I venture that there is not an eminence from which you 
 have watched the sinking sunset's varied glow — not a re- 
 cess of the vale where you have sought the shade — not a 
 solitude in the w:ood8 where you have seen the wild hare 
 make its burrow from the chase — not a crevice in the rock^ 
 where you have lingered to catch the murmur of the 
 »ea, from which you have not garnered up associations 
 that will lire and keep companionship with your existence^ 
 making for you memories of delight again fit the tedious 
 and wearisome hours when you shall take the world's bu- 
 siness in hand, to grapple with and overcome. , 
 
 Thus as it were, contifruous to the shores of life, between 
 the beach and whjere 'he breakers catch the curling billow* 
 and mark the boundary Mne between the shallows and the 
 depths profound, out o.' the ioam of young associations 
 comes forth the shape of patriotism, beautiful as Undine 
 from the crystal fountain, or as Venus the ^jJoddess of 
 
beauty, the Mother of Lovg, the queen of pleasure and 
 mistress of the graces when wafted hy the Zephyrs iVom the 
 froth of the sea into the arms of the Seasons, the daughters 
 of Jupiter. ^ 
 
 The savage, as the civilized man, loves h.is country ; his 
 untutored, heart throbs responsive to its calls, and whether 
 he dwell in the regions of Lapland and I^orwegia — where 
 the long — long nights prevail an 1 only snow and ice keep 
 outdoor commerce witli the wind and storm — or if he tread 
 the parched and arid wastes of ArahiR, and Sahara, his 
 nature habituates his affections to the sp >t of hia. birth and 
 the plant of patriotism roots and grows, howsoever sterile 
 may be the soil or ungcnial the clime. 
 
 Nothing is moro mournful in history— nothing more 
 tender in poetry^-nothing more touching in legend and 
 story, than the sad repining of the desolate Indian, when 
 the glen where his war songs were echoed — the forest 
 where his war councils were held and the wigv/ams where 
 his war-spoils were gathered, were wrested from his pos- 
 session, and in silence but in agony he bade adieu to the 
 hunting grounds of his people and the rude graves of his 
 fathers, 
 
 Campbell has faithfully delineated this sentiment in his 
 pathetic ballad of the Exile of Erin : 
 
 " Sad is my f.Ue, said tne liearN^ r k-n stranger, 
 The wil(i di'ti- and wolf to a coVt;rt (Mn Hee, 
 But I have no rclnge-fr'^rn famine and d^n^fer, 
 A hnrvie and a cou'Ury uroain not t,':> me. 
 N<^vor ao^n in the <!rren sunny brwors, 
 "\X"F»('rn my forerathi-is live!, shall I spend tho sweet houra, 
 Or covor niv harp with (be wi!<l wov(;n fl twerH, 
 ' And strike t() th<! uumhers of Erin gi Fiagh " 
 
 The love of family, parents, brethren and kin creates 
 mutual sympathy and impels to mutual protection and de- 
 fence, and the natural stilfishness of our nature relaxes to 
 the just claim" of consanguinity; but the lov(3 of country 
 rises above the ordinary affjctions of man Tor his fellow, 
 subdues and directs the^e lower emotions, and prompts to 
 more elevated inspirations ajnd loftier fK-lf- sacrifices. 
 * Mingling as it does in one 'common clement, the love pf 
 kin, love of home and ihe desirf of a pdsfJtumous^ fame 
 among posterity, as it is the notdest of human passions, so 
 it is the most powerful, for it embraces all others and is 
 nourished 1)Y nil. ^^ -. ^ ^ ^ m« 
 
 P33897 
 
If history be searclted for transcendent deeds of daring, 
 severe tests of endurance, threatening erxposures to peril 
 and cruel sacrifices to destruction, j)atriotism will be found 
 to originate them — the love of country bears them to com- 
 pletion. 
 
 It was this noble sentiment that animated the beautiful 
 w^ow of Manassas and gave her strength to go into the 
 camp of the Assyrian, in the Valley of Berthulia, wliich 
 imbued her with the courage to deck herself in costly and 
 splendid apparel to appear at the feast of Holofernes and 
 which ne^'ved her w;th the dauntless determination to 
 enterprise the destruction of her nation's foe when sur- 
 rounded by his guards in the midst of his tent. 
 
 Guido Reni, whose touches of nature are in its .softest 
 colors^ has made an immortal representation of tlie beau- 
 tiful Judith, the widow of Judea, who smote with t'lo axe 
 the head of the Captain of the host of Assur and 'saved her 
 people frora captivity. 
 
 All of you are familiar with the s d but romantic narra- 
 tive of the Maid of Domeremy, she who Avas born a poor 
 .peasiint girl of liumble lot and family in upper Lorraine, 
 on the slopes of the Vosges, near the town of Yancoulaurs, 
 who heard the blessed call to her glorious mission fiom the 
 celestial voices beneath tlje fairy tree at the medicinal fount 
 near the '' Chateau des Isles," who, moved by the mystic 
 faith in the heavenly summ.ons, came to tlie relief of the 
 Dau])hiu Charles the seventh, in his extremity, who, clad 
 in warrior's panoply and leading the armed hosts, raised 
 ^for him the seige of his beleagured city of Orleans, then 
 crowned his royal head . in his Cathedral of Rheim and 
 gave to France, over all her enemies, her rightful King ; 
 she who, after lier heroic achivements, fell at Compeigne 
 into the hands of the English and filled the measure of 
 patriotic devotion by perishing a blessed martyr in the 
 flames of persecution, in the city of Rouen. 
 
 In one of the most conspicuous positions near the Champs 
 Elysees, the courtly thorougufaj-e of Paris, on a pedestal of 
 finished execution, stands a lovely figure cut out of Parian 
 marble by a master hand, to represent the form and fea- 
 tures, to perpetuate the virtues and to attract' the pi^})ular 
 homage to the memory of the Maid of Orleans, Joan of 
 Arc. ' 
 
 History abounds with instances of heroic devotion to 
 country and sacrifices of self, and its dramatic records as- 
 
1 
 
 sign to woman the chiefest parts, and justly so, for being 
 by nature more tender and sensitive than. man, more im- 
 bued with pity and eothusiasm, she clings with a tenacity 
 closer than he to the delightful idealities of home and 
 country and yields to thorn the rich attributes of her imag- 
 inations radiant, and the uustinted wealth of her soul. 
 
 Zenobia, Clelia, Lucretia, V ittoria Colonna, Charl otte 
 Corday and that iucom parable leader of the G-ironde, the 
 idol of Vergniaud andi the companion in death of Brissot 
 and Bp^rbaroux and Louvet ; — she who addressed to Kobe«- 
 pierre, tlien in the zeuith of his power, from the gloom of 
 her dungeon in the conciergerie this noble emanation of , 
 conscious virtue, ^' and you, you cannot deny that none 
 who hatli ever known me can persecute me without a feel- 
 ing of reiiiorse, " the ai ^^^r before the scaffold of the su- 
 blime apostropiic, '^ (jh 1 Liberty, Liberty, how many 
 crimes are committed ii thy name" — the lovely, gifted, 
 Madame Ro-aiid, are types of these heroic virtues. 
 
 Kast and West— Trom tlie lofty central point of the St. 
 Gothard, extend the Alps, in the form of a mighty crescent 
 embracing the north of Italy and on every side environed 
 by tremedous cliffs and caverns, which ensnare the incau- 
 tious traveller with a veil of greyish snow. 
 
 Here is the horrid birth-place of the glacier and the ava- 
 lanche, liere alsd are the dens of the bear and the ure ox, 
 and through these wild fastnesses are re-echoed witli 
 frightful accord the screams of the Lammergeyer. Here 
 on these dizzy heights the battles of the storms are fought — 
 the vivid lightnings cross .bayonets in their charges from 
 peak to peak, and the live thunders entrenched among the 
 crags hurl their bolts in combat hand to hand. Here are 
 the sublimest castings of nature in her roughest -but grand- 
 est moulds. The iu'st populations of this ruggfed land 
 which are known to tradition, was a race of Gallic Celts, 
 who wandered from the Rhine and the Maine to the lake 
 of Geneva, and thence along the vale of Chamounix to the 
 Splugen Alps. They were a stout and hardy people, and 
 they originated what was afterwards known as Helvetia 
 from its ancient inhabitants, and as Sivitzerland from the 
 canton of Schwytz, which was the cradle of its independ- 
 ence. 
 
 In no country of the world has nature painted so diver- 
 sified a panorama ; for all is not uncouth as that I have 
 described. In Switzerland every extreme meets. These 
 
8 
 
 eternal Alphine snows are fringed with green and luxuri- 
 ant pastures, and yon enormous ice-bergs rise above valleys 
 aromatic with the sweets of flowers — and the everlasting 
 Winter, with its bald head of snow, stands hand in hand 
 with Summer, crowned '^vith her golden shocks. It is a 
 beautiful scene to watch from the lakeLeman, whose clear, 
 pelucid waters give birth to the '^swift-rushing arrowy 
 Rhone, '' th^ dazzling peaks of Mont Blanc, white, in the 
 first light of the morning— colored like a rose at mid-day — 
 and softened into a beautiful violet as evening declines and 
 twilight comes apace, according as the reflection ol the 
 Bun*s rays cast new and varying tints on their sheets of 
 eternal snow. 
 
 The men of these mountain regions who dwell in the 
 fertile valleys which are hollowed out in their flanks, are 
 vigorous and strong ; of tall and athletic frame ; of simple 
 and uncultivated manners and character, but erect, majes- 
 tic and courageous. The women are light and active ; 
 their shoulder.^ and arms, which they are accustomed to 
 bare, are supple and graceful and their limbs lithe and 
 elastic. Tiiey have generally auburn hair, blue eyes, 
 lieaKhy complexions, oval cheeks, curled lips and voices 
 sonoroi^i ancl tender. In the language of a beautiful au- 
 thor, they •• resemble Grecian statuqs placed on a pedestal 
 of snow aud animated by the fresh shivering air of the 
 J loraing. The dress of the Swiss maiden is simple and 
 cha':,ve L.3^ her person. Though Geneva is famed for its 
 stores of jewelry, its precious stones set with artistic skill in 
 s'd.ie viT^.luc, the women of the land wear few ornaments, their 
 long hair iloatsluxjiiriant over the neck ; they wear board hats 
 Tclt 'jr. straw, with heat and tasteful ribbands, a narrow 
 jbodice of wool restrains the waist, snowy white linen 
 plaited in a thousand folds covers the chest and a short pet- 
 ticoat, scarce reaching to the ankle, completes the pictur- 
 esque outfit of the peasant girl of Switzerland. They are 
 a race of peasants and never forget this national idiosyn- 
 cracy, however they depart in business from their primitive 
 occupations. 
 
 These groups of mountains were for a long time held 
 under the rule and dominion of Austrian nobles. Counts of 
 Hapsburg, and others, who rivaled each other in the severe 
 and despotic sway they exercised in their government. 
 Their acts of tyranny were exceedingly galling to the spirit 
 of the hardy Swiss, which broke into a rude revolt on the 
 
occasion of an outrage upon the wife of a respected. 
 Then came the famous, or infamous Gessler ; the erection 
 of his celebrated pole , the arrest of William Tell the cruel 
 gentence which compelled him to five at an apple on the 
 Lead of his own boy ; the trial of skill ; the succors of the 
 archer ; the imprisonment of the father in breach of faith ; 
 the boat sail of Gessler ; the storm on the lake ; the escape 
 of Tell and the death of the tyrant. These events preced- 
 ed the 17th day of November, lo"7. On the night of that 
 day, thirty Confederates, led by William Tell, with a few 
 of the patriotic women, met on the small ])ioniontory of 
 Grutli, where the stormy waves of the lake of the four 
 Cantons on the one side, the peaks and glaciers on the 
 other, and the thick Germanic forest on the third, protect- 
 ed and concealed them. And there in the solemn stillness 
 of the night, amid these surroundings, did these heroic 
 freemen swear this memorable bath : ''We swear in the 
 presence of Almighty God, before whom Kings and people 
 are equal, to live or die for our fallen countrymen, neither 
 to suffer injustice nor commit tyranny; to respect the 
 rights and property of the Counts of Hapsburg ; to do no 
 violence to the imperial baliffs, hue to put an end to their 
 tyranny." 
 
 ^ On the first of January, 1308, they put this noble re- 
 solve into execution. Admitted by the aid of a young girl, 
 the patriots obtained possession of a fortress in the moun- 
 tains, the base of their future operations. For s(?ven years 
 they waged an unequal war and maintained their inde- 
 pendence. They established then a Confederate, republi-* 
 pan government, and from that day to this, now more than 
 five hundred years past and gone, amid all the revolutions 
 of Europe, they have preserved their freedom unimpaired, 
 and now to-day on theunconquered summits of Mont Blanc 
 and the Rhigi ; on the heights of the St. Gothard and the 
 Splugen, and in the sweet,' pleasaut, smiling vales of 
 Chamouni and Lucerne, a simple people, happy and con- 
 tent, blessed with comfort and free and independent, sing 
 songs and tell stories of the fame and valor of the patriot 
 Tell and his glorious associates, who bequeathed to them 
 tbe blessings of Liberty. . . 
 
 But as abundant as are the records of history of patriotic 
 example, plenteous as is tradition of its deeds of chivalry, 
 full teeming as is the poet's verse and the minstrers song of 
 heroic achievment, v^hat tongue can now utter in proper 
 
10 
 
 phrase, what imaginatioa depict "in appropriate terms the 
 true merits of Patriotism as they exist in these our days, in 
 this our country ? 
 
 We had once, Young Ladies, another country and an- 
 other government. , It was a grand, capacious, magnifioent 
 country ; it was a strong, powerful, invincihlc government. 
 The people of that nation strode with a mighty progress 
 from infancy to be giants, and the government, embraced 
 in a national and Federal union of thirty odd independent 
 sovereignties, defied the world's hostility, • ptovoked the 
 world's envy and attracted- the wondering admiration 
 of mankind. Like some grand, colossal edifice of solid 
 granite, it seemed perfect in architectural development as 
 it? vast dome swelled to the heavens and gatheved within 
 its spacious halls the teeming and increasing populations. 
 But in the mysteries of nature tliere 3,eems tobe.ever a limit 
 set to human grandeur and human power. Within this 
 gigantic frame, in ap] ircnt health and ripening vi'gor, there 
 were the seeds of iks own dissolution. Besides evil men 
 who sought and conspired for its destruction^ there were 
 natural, inate, uneradicable causes of decay and mortality 
 which art could not remove nor human skill mitigate. It 
 took long years to accomplish the sad but inevitable des- 
 tiny. The. yearning heart of loyal devotion, forbearing 
 and indulgent, clung with tenacity to the government 
 which our fathers had hewn out of the rock of affliction, 
 and not until wrong heaped on wrong, aggression on ag.- 
 gression b6came insupportable and intolerable ; not until 
 disgrace and slavery stared our people in the face, did they 
 yield to the necessity of separation^ and a final severance 'of 
 the bonds of association. The spiritual and ecclesiastical' 
 chords, the most exquisitely tender of all, first felt the ex- 
 plosive force of destructive antagonism and snapped assun- 
 der. The powerful, and by God's blessing, the eminently 
 useful and. in all good w'orks. Catholic body, the Methodist 
 Episcopal Church, lost its unity and attachment and array- 
 ed itself into two hostile bodies, the South being the injur- 
 ed and aggrieved. The Presbyterian and Baptist Church- 
 es divided. The rest was but the work of time, 
 and the political and social disruption was a legitimate 
 and necessary sequent of a spiritual breach that had be- 
 come irreparable. 
 
 Yet it was a goldes chain which bound the sovereignties 
 of the States to the sovereignty of the Union ; its links had 
 been moulded out of ancifent association, cherished memo- 
 
11 
 
 rics, fond affections and histori6 actions riveted by actual 
 benefits, farther promises acd yet more distant anticipa- 
 tions. Naught could have ixiolted so v3iiduring a material 
 but an intense fire of persecution. Fanaticism lighted the 
 coals and its untiring arm ".iii:.e'd them to a flame until 
 they burned into a cons'^.'aing, destroying blaze. The 
 chain melted in the fervonfc heat and not a link remains of 
 the once beautiful golden girdle. ]\or is there in the sub- 
 tlist ingredient in alchemy ; nor in the depths of the ear.th''s 
 bowels a mattrial for .its reconstruction. 
 
 When the separation occurred it was not effected by a 
 Tudo and riotous rebellion. It was conducted under the 
 authority of State sovereignty, in accordance vritl; the long 
 reC(tjL'"ulzed principles ^' that when a form of government 
 becomes deslructive of il^ t.ids^ «t is the right of tlie peo- 
 ple to alter and abolish it'and to substitute a n6w govern- 
 ment, deriving its jus' powers from the consent of the g*)V- 
 erned. ' By 'virtuo ;)f these p;iiiciples we had a riglit to 
 expect the privilege of departing in peace to our own ways 
 to work out unmolested our own destiny. 
 
 But such was uot the intention of the wrong-doer ; his 
 purpr^e was to force Upon our necks an imposed govern- 
 ment, to coerce an allegiance that was no longer volun- 
 teered, and ■ to exercise an authority inadmissible and 
 usurped. To accomplish this h€f waged war upon us, he 
 sen. his fleets and armies to occupy our seaports and com- 
 mand our habors ; he shut the door of nations in our face, 
 seized upon the eminent domain, which is the na- 
 tional property, and directed upon our unoffending people 
 the muzzles of his murderous artillery. This wanton con- 
 sumation of enormous wrong and unmitigated outrage in- 
 flamed to fury the pride and dignity of the land ; the youth, 
 of Charleston, glorious, immortal,' unconquerable Charles- 
 ton, whose very ashes now bid defiance to her assailants, 
 ca'^ght the enthusiasm, and the Cadets of Charleston, find- 
 ing a Federal craft prowling in the waters of her tranquil 
 Bay, lighted the match and sped the first solid shot for the 
 preservation of our liberties. 
 
 For now three years and more, <var has raged through- 
 out the land, its fierce havoc has been felt in every house, 
 by every fireside. The efforts of our enemies have been 
 gigantic and persistent. Every base passion they appeal- 
 ed to, every cunning art and stratagem applied for our 
 subjugation and destruction. Finding the real Yankee un- 
 willing to face the dangers of the field they have miscege- 
 
12 • . 
 
 Hated the negro to the ranks, and Massachusetts gold is iu 
 the markets of the world to buy assassins and mercena- 
 ries to accomplish our overthrow. ' . 
 
 'But the Mighty God hath been our helper and defender 
 and under his all powerful care have we maintained our 
 defence. Our people have come from all dei)artment8 of 
 business and every avenue of life, to confront want and ex- 
 posure and privation "and disease and peril and death. 
 4^nd as brave a, band (Tf heroes, as noble an. army of mar- 
 tyrs as the world ever gazed on, have stood and still stand 
 a living wall of fire between our ruthless invaders and the 
 homes of our people and the government of their choice. 
 
 The world hath never conceived, history hath never re- 
 corded examples of patriotism more illustrious than the 
 Buhordinate olncer;s and private soldiers of the Confederacy 
 have funiisljtd to the cause of independence. And well 
 thor might, for as the war was right in fche origin because 
 commenced for the maintenance of social and political 
 equality, so has iis s^iccessful prosecution become necessa- 
 ry bocaiu^e now ij^raver, more momentous, more vital ques- 
 ti'^ns are involvitd in the issue. Advancing step by step 
 t(.7/ards I 't'^ real but originally disg'uised object of the in- 
 VMGivii/tl -J I''ederal government has put under its foot every 
 d. a? 'V "^ nianifostation gf oj^positiou among Its own peo- 
 r"-, / ' ' ''^<'v-v hardy enongh and powerful enough in its 
 ^ declare its purpose to confiscate our property, 
 ij'.';V.r oiate go.arnments and subjugate our people 
 -iO ^'^yz i,a.sl>o.;n raised^ save by a weak and power- 
 1 . ; ^.1' J ly. that utters any other language or inspires 
 ^ . ••(> th it the issue is reduced to victory and in- 
 •xC^. iidence on the one hand, or death or slavery en the 
 otner. 
 
 When these iss' ncs have -ever been presented to brave 
 men ar-d coujager. rs women, they hiive never failed to draw 
 fortfb the mlgh':y' resources of determined and indomitable 
 nature ; and no instance stands recorded in the history of 
 the civilized world where a people struggling for freedom 
 in a rigliteous war have ^ver been subdued by another na- 
 tion fighting to overthrow them. Switzerland against 
 Austria, Prussia against the Allies, the Netherlands 
 against rhirope, the thirteen colonies against Great Brit- 
 ain, are historic witnesses of the capabilities of a people^ 
 upheld by right, to resist superiority of numbers and rer 
 
13 • 
 
 •ources when used for the perpetration of wrong and impo- 
 sition of despotism upon civilized nationalities. 
 
 This memorable contest of ours, now waged on the 
 grandest and most terrific scale that mankind hath ever 
 beheld, bears coiroborating testimony to this historic truth. 
 We have confronted with a success far outstripping in 
 point of decisiveness the successes which brought final 
 triumph to the combatants whose cases I have cited. And 
 now_, advanced into the fourth year of the strife, we present 
 an array of more indepen(]ent resource, more recovery of 
 lost advantages, more strt^ngth of discipline, more fixed 
 determination and more '}»ositive, actual, decided victory 
 than at any period ' since the 8trug>;le began. Texas^, Ar- 
 kansas and Louisania hav( been almost entirely relieved ; 
 much of our hiastern District - ecovered ; Florida saved 
 and Charleston standing uadaunted and defiant and old 
 Sumter knock-ec^ into a iieap of ruins, but ruins more 
 ■formidable and more invincible than when sIjc stood in her 
 pride of place the guardian of the gate, when Beauregard, 
 the' peerless genius of the war^ first hurled against her em- 
 battlements the iron mesFicngers of the. popular indigna- 
 tion. And, now, when with concentrated effort they rush 
 in overwhelming numbers on beleagured Richmond, the 
 same Beauregard on the one side and that incomparable, 
 wise,, able, glorious Captwin Robert E. Lee, on the other, 
 with their heroic troops have hurled back their assaults 
 amid havoc, confusion and slaughter, that has made the 
 drunken giant reel and stagger like an ox beneath the 
 blows of the butcher. 
 
 Out of this successful resistance, from these repeated vic- 
 tories we are at liberty to draw, we cannot help drawing 
 the assurance of final triumph. I not only hope for it, 
 but 1 look for the success of our arms, the achievement of 
 our independence, the freedom of my country with as 
 earliest a confivience as the christian believer looks foi> the 
 falfilm oni of the promiaes that the Lord, the Kighteoui 
 JTudge, hfta given to hir children. 
 
 Not long in the fntnre Young Ladies, is the blessed 
 day ""^hen thesv^ hard trials will and — when the bitter 
 mauming will cease, when the tear-streaming eyes will be 
 dried and the wounded hearts healed — when the sterm 
 alarums of war will be changed to the meiry greetings of 
 peace. 
 
14 
 
 The dawn of that day is breaking, when our soldiers 
 from the field will return to their homes ; rough and. 
 weather-beaten will they come, tattered and torn by ex- 
 posure in the battle and on the watch — rude of speech and 
 unused for a while to the <;ourtly elegance of peaceful, 
 social life. But they will come with heads erect and steps 
 precise and measured — with martial tread, time-keeping 
 to the music of the spirit-stirring drum and the ear-pierc- 
 ing fife and the trumpet's pealing note. And the glorious 
 sitnshine of cloudlef5s skies shall hallow their march, and 
 all along their path, the purest, and most virtuous "and 
 most beautiful maidens of the land shall strew flowers of 
 brightest colors and sweetest fragrance ; and aged fathers 
 shall lay ^mternal blessing— their hlessing and God's — on 
 their brave hero boys ; and loving mothers shall clasp in 
 holy embrace the sons of their heart ; and sisters shall 
 spring to fondle on the neck of brothers»^and wives their 
 husbands n^cet in indescribable rapture ; and all the bells 
 shall chant a iiielody, and harmless artillery unladen jvith 
 the deadly missile shall roar for joy, and multitudes of 
 peo] le, young and old, men and women, boys and girls, 
 shrli rend the air with acclamations of honor, praise and 
 gratitude to tliose our deliverers ; and this will be the 
 nation's ju' dice ; and to God, the mighty Lord, the giver 
 of this good, in solemn awful strain will be rendered fit- 
 ting homage foi the glory of our redemption. 
 
 And to the patriots who have perished will the nation 
 pay becoming tribute. Enduring monuments, with ima- 
 ges of appropriate c.ast, wrought out with most artistic skill, 
 will be built towards the. sky, and on their sides heroic 
 names will be inscribed with truthful epitaphs ; and after 
 you and I fire past away and gone, generations yet to 
 come, far down the aisles," beneath the fretted dome in the 
 grand temple of time^ in future ages," will come out of the 
 sacked chapels with reverential awe to admire the virtue, 
 approve the valor and huiior the memories' 'bf the ^■klla^nt 
 dead, who died for freedom in this revob'ti'^". W>nn it 
 B>inl1 please Divine Pr-'^vn'^eBce to '..csiow iliw dcsiraK>ie 
 h»' * ' , be it then our universal duty to devote 
 
 our .iiiUds {•. . .energies to the establishment 6f good gov- 
 ernratnt ; where art and sci'^nc^. educiti^Ti, charity, pub- 
 lic and private, And true fjoc-^'>ii may prevail. And to- 
 wards thi^ '^urpose, sc 'beneficent for the human race, do 
 
15 
 
 you J Young Ladies, direct your aspirations — that you may 
 go cultivate your gifts and improve your advantages, that 
 you may bring all the enaobling influence of woman in 
 her true dignity, to the great work of advancing the 
 standard of human excellence and the promotion of social 
 iinprove, lent 
 
Hollinger Corp. 
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