Page:Address of J. Wilson Gibbes at the Home-Coming Banquet of Citadel Alumni (1924).djvu/6

 We have not met, as the ancient Greeks were wont to do, to recite odes and tragedies; nor, like the Troubadours, to hold parliaments of love and poesy; nor for the discussion of politics or the advancement of science; but, in deep thankfulness to Almighty God, who has permitted them to mingle together again near that place sacred to so many memories of youth and learning, the sons of the Citadel return home today.

We come back hither from the rich experiences of life as a son returns to the household of his youth, with pulse stirred by fond emotions, and we lay aside the cares of business and the absorbing thoughts and ambitions that engross our daily lives, so that we may breathe a purer and serener air, as we refresh ourselves with inhalations of the old camaraderie, and surcharge our spirits with a nobler reach of vision.

We come, too, to present to our departed brothers an oblation of gratitude and respect, to inscribe their virtues on the urn which contains their ashes.

Such home-comings are also faithful pledges of the respect we bear to the memory of our ancestors and our cadet companions and of the tenderness with which we cherish the rising generation. "They introduce the sages and heroes of ages past to the notice and emulation of succeeding times; they are at once testimonials of our gratitude and schools of virtue to our children."

Tonight we are all first classmen and captains, members of the same happy family. This is the birthday feast for every one of us whose forehead has been sprinkled from the font inscribed "S. C. M. A." Where sits any one of the clan, "there is the head of the table."

It is my part to speak of the past—"The Citadel of the Eighties." Time limits me to some briefly stated facts and reminiscences.

As all of you know, the old Citadel Academy (occupied by United States troops for nearly 17 years after the Confederate War) was reopened on October 1, 1882, by an Act of the General Assembly of