Southern Historical Society Papers, Volume 9.
Reverend J. William Jones, Ed.

[502] spur of ambition, the love of glory or the hope of reward, other than that which the consciousness of duty well performed brings to every true and manly heart, through the summer's burning heat and the winter's pitiless cold, through rain, and snow, and ice, with bodies half clad and feet oftimes unshod, ill-fed, ill-armed and ill-equipped, worn down with hunger and disease, in victory and in defeat, followed the flag and fought the battles of the South with the sublime devotion of Christian martyrs and the knightly courage of Sydney and Bayard. These, these are they who deserve the highest meed of praise, and in their ragged, war-worn ranks were found, of heroes the truest, the bravest and the best, and earth has for me few more hallowed spots than the little grass-grown mound that marks the shallow grave where the unknown soldier sleeps, and after “life's fitful fever” sleeps well, we trust, in the great Confederacy of the Southern Dead.

Ah, realm of tombs! But let her bear
     This blazon to the last of times,
No nation rose so white and fair,
     Or fell so free of crimes.

The widow's moan, the orphan's wail
     Comes ‘round thee. Yet in truth be strong:
Eternal right though all else fail,
     Can never be made wrong.

It has sometimes been said, and the effort has been made to prove that the hearts of the private soldiers were not in that momentous struggle for home rule, for local self-government, for the preservation of the rights of the States and the liberties of the people. The charge is a compound slander, a slander alike on the living and the dead; for you know full well how all dissensions were healed, all party differences dispelled, when Mr. Lincoln's proclamation destroyed the last hopes of a peaceful separation of the States; how men of all ranks and professions and shades of opinion, unionists and secessionists alike, sprang to arms to repel the invaders of their rights and their soil.

Nor were the fires of patriotism kindled in the hearts of our men alone. ταυταν ὴ επε ταυτα, this or upon this, were the parting words of the Spartan mother as she gave to her son his father's shield, and sent him forth to die, if needs were, in defense of his country. And with a devotion purer, deeper, broader still, the glorious women of the South, mothers, wives and daughters girded the sword on the loins of their sons and their husbands, their sweet-hearts and their brothers, and with