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immortal heroism, of love that counted not the cost, and patriotism that was faithful unto death, such words as these: "They were all wrong; it was all a mistake." Rather let their story be blotted out altogether, for their children will no longer be worthy to read or emulate their achievements. Until that hour every nameless grave, every tattered flag, every worn jacket of gray shall find hearts to lo\v and hands to cherish them. '
The people of the South would not exchange the story of the Confederacy for the wealth of the world. At their mothers' knees the coming generations shall learn from that story, what deeds make mm great and nations glorious.
The people who do not cherish their past will never have a future worth recording. The time is even now, that the whole people of the United States are proud of the unsurpassed heroism, sacrifice, and faithfulness of the soldiers and people of the Confederacy.
- * * * " The terrible past
Must be ours while life shall last.
Ours, with its memories; ours, with its pain;
Ours, with its best blood shed like rain;
The sacrifices all made in vain.
Forget? Never!"
IN PRISON AT FORT MONROE.
Singularly enough, however, it was after the war was over that the events occurred which endeared Mr. Davis most to the Southern peo- ple. I allude, first of all, to his long imprisonment at Fortress Mon- roe; the clumsy cruelty of putting the distinguished captive in irons, thrilled the South like an electric shock. It would be painful now, and humiliating, I venture to say, to Americans everywhere, to dwell upon the unhappy details of his confinement. Suffice it to say, that the result of it all was the very last thing that his jailers would have intended to make Jefferson Davis the most beloved man of his time. The men of the South recognized that he was suffering for an offence which they equally shared with him, and suffering in no figurative sense, in their place. One of the most exquisite scenes in the life of this remarkable man, occurred when he was a prisoner in the fort, when Dr. Minnigerode partook with him of the holy communion in the stillness of the night. The motionless figure of the Federal commander of the fortress, and the sentinels stand- ing guard over him, regarding the strange spectacle, and wondering perhaps, how their illustrious captive could have forgiven all the world.
