We people of the South lived on. We have tried to do our duty. We have even tried to forget the past, though often it may not seem so to our fellow citizens.
In 1898 it was my privilege to enlist in the glorious service of our reunited country. Of course every youth who then donned the uniform imagined that he would proceed at once to Cuba and do battle for the liberation of that country from the tyranny of the Spanish monarchy. My first evening in camp, under the old flag of the Union,was an experience never to be forgotten. I believe that all of the thousand young men in the Alabama regiment with which I served felt their hearts moved by something of the same great emotion. We were to be under the command of Nelson Miles and Fitzhugh Lee, of Wesley Merritt and Joe Wheeler.
The heat and noise of the day gave way to the soft, warm flush of the evening. Such an evening! Under the clearest of skies and the brightest of stars I stood on guard at midnight. My mind seemed to be so passive, so sensitive, so subjected to the thoughts that rushed out of the universe, from the past and the mysterious present and the unknowable future, to take possession of my soul. I saw my country ennobled by the great task of liberty and of love to which she had set herself on that occasion. United at last! United in a common cause! Reforming a Union which had always existed in the hearts of all, underneath those superficial forces whichso long troubled us and kept us apart. And now a great fountain of joy and of pride, pressing from the heart, filled every artery almost to bursting. On that night I first understood my country and saw, emblazoned in the sky, the part to which the Lord of Hosts had called her.
To a young man whose heart is truly enlisted in the issue of a great war, the mighty thrill of the soul is the ultimate experience of life. So is the banner of his country raised aloft. So are his arms consecrated by the deepest impulses of the spirit. Lyric poetry has often exhausted its meters and its music at the altar of the lesser loves. On that strangest of nights I knew that here was a love that makes the heart of youth deny all that comes from self and lift burning eyes to the stars.
Oh my people—soldiers—workers—pioneers—adventurers—saviors—in the four quarters of the earth! Be you—your deeds—your vision,—all in all—imperishable! The world listens to hear the sound of the song you sing upon the march. Somehow I feel and know that you shall live—gloriously—throughout the ages.