Jasper County Democrat, Volume 22, Number 14, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 17 May 1919 — Ingersoll’s Tribute To Those Who Died for Their Country [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Ingersoll’s Tribute To Those Who Died for Their Country

E cover the graves of the heroic dead with flowers. The past rises before me, as it were, like a dream. Again we are In the great struggle for national life. We hear the sounds of preparation — the music of the boisterous drums, Mie silver voices of heroic bugles. We see the pale cheeks of women and the flushed

faces of men, and In those assemblages we see all the dead whose dust we have covered with flowers. We lose sight of them no more. We are with them when they enlist In the great army of freedom. We see them part with those they love. Some are walking for the last time in quiet woody places with the maidens they adore. Others are bending over cradles kissing babes that are asleep. We see them all as they march proudly away, under the flaunting flags, keeping time to the grand, wild music of was? —marching down the streets of the great cities, through the towns and across the prairies, down to the fields of glory, to do and to die for the eternal right. We go with them, one and all. We stand guard with them in the wild storm and under the

quiet stars. We are with them In ravines running with blood, In the furrows of old fields. We are with them between contending hosts, unable to move, wild with thirst, the life ebbing slowly away among the withered leaves. We see them pierced by balls and torn with shells Ln the

trenches, by forts and in the whirlwind of the charge, where men become iron with nerves of steel. We are at home when the news comes that they are dead. We see the maiden in the shadow of her first sorrow. We see the silvered head of the old man bowed with the last grief. These heroes are dead. They sleep under the solemn pines, the sad hemlocks, the tearful willows and the embracing vines. Earth may run red with other wars—they are at peace. In the midst of battle, In the roar of the conflict, they found the serenity of death. I have one sentiment for the soldier living and dead —cheers for the living, tears for the dead.