Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 23.djvu/376

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-!7<> Southern Historical Society Papers.

be done. Eddie (her baby) will be fourteen next spring, and he can take Billy's place."

The hero of this great epoch is the son I have described, as his mother and sister will be the heroines. For years, day and night, winter and summer, without pay, with no hope of promotion nor of winning a name or making a mark, the Confederate boy-soldier trod the straight and thorny path of duty. Half-clothed, whole-starved, he tramps night after night, his solitary post on picket. No one can see him. Five minutes' walk down the road will put him beyond re- call, and twenty minutes further and he will be in Yankee lines, where pay, food, clothes, quiet, and safety all await him. Think of the tens of thousands of boys subjected to this temptation, and how few yielded. Think of how many never dreamed of such a relief from danger and hardship ! But, while I glorify the chivalry, the forti- tude, and the fidelity of the private soldier, I do not intend to mini- mize the valor, the endurance, or the gallantry of those who led them.

MEMORIES OUTLAST TIME.

I know that the knights of Arthur's Round Table, nor the Pa- ladins and Peers, roused by the blast of that Font-Arabian horn from Roland at Ronces Valley, did not equal in many traits, or no- bility of character, in purity of soul, in gallant, dashing courage the men who led the rank and file of the Confederate armies from lieu- tenant up to lieutenant-general. There were more rebel brigadiers killed in battle for the Confederacy than in any war that was ever fought. When such men and women have lived such lives, and died such deaths in such a cause, their memories will outlast time. Martyrs must be glorified, and when the world knows and posterity appreciates that the war was fought for the preservation and per- petuation of the right of self-government, of government by the people, for the people, and to resist government by force against the will of the people, then the Confederacy will be revered like the memories of Leonidas at Thermopylae, and Kosciusko, and Kossuth, and all the glorious army of martyrs.

THE CONFEDERATE MEMORIAL.

It is to commemorate these principles, and this heroic conduct, this patriotic sacrifice of men and women, that we propose to erect here a memorial hall of the Confederacy.