found in the firm and unshaken fidelity to convictions of duty, to the persistent and unswerving obedience to the monition of conscience. "The man who works with absolute integrity of spirit, in obedience to the higher law of his own nature, and not for the sake of external rewards, is the truly successful man, whether he secures the material rewards of success or miss them." It is not wealth in silver or gold, it is not intellect or social rank—it is character, and that alone, that attains to true success.
Don't heed the teachings of those who urge you to forget the past—who speak of it as dead and profitless. There may be those who may well wish to forget it, because for them the retrospect affords nothing on which the mind can linger with satisfaction or delight. But for us who have this priceless heritage of glorious memories and experiences—the past is rich in all the lessons taught by the soundest philosophy and the purest religion, as these are illustrated in those lives of surpassing grandeur that were lived among us, and with whom it was our happy privilege to render sacrifice and service.
LOST CHAPTER IN HISTORY.
We have reason to believe that, toward the close of the war, Prince Polignac, then commanding a brigade in the Confederate Army, under Lieutenant-General E. Kirby Smith, head of the Trans-Mississipi Department, was sent to Europe upon a very delicate and important mission. He was accompanied by Major John C. Moncure, a brilliant Southern officer. This much was well known among the officers at department headquarters, Shreveport, La. Gossip had it that Polignac went authorized from Richmond to offer to Louis Napolean all that part of Louisiana Purchase, then included in or claimed by the Southern Con-
