Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 20.djvu/377

 Unveiling of Statue of General A. P. Hill 371

No mercenary motives influenced a single individual to mourn for him. And yet the whole Southland, all the sons and daughters of the Confederacy, all their children and their grandchildren, from the gray-haired veteran to the infant of tender years, wept over his bier and mourned with genuine heart-felt sorrow for Jefferson Davis.

Dead, but his spirit breathes;

Dead, but his heart is ours; Dead, but his sunny and sad land wreathes

His crown with tears for flowers.

A statue for his tomb ;

Mould it of marble white ; For wrong, a spectre ot death and doom ;

An angel of hope for right.

They mourned for him, not because they grieved for the proud banner which was furled, or for the cause which was lost, but because he had been their President, just and true, in the days of their trial and adversity, and because he had been persecuted for their sakes.

History records no more touching scene than the South weeping at the grave of Jefferson Davis a scene which touched even the bitterest foes of the sad mourners.

Mr. Ingalls, then United States Senator from the State of Kansas ; a man as noted for his hatred of the Southern people as for his bril- liant talents, from his place in the Senate chamber said: " He could understand the reverence of the Southern people for Jefferson Davis." " He honored them for their constancy to that heroic man." "Ideas could never be annihilated." " No man was ever converted by being overpowered." "Davis had remained to the end, the immovable type, exponent, and representative of those ideas for which he had staked all and lost all."

Such a tribute was scarcely to have been expected from that source, and seems to have been wrung reluctantly from him by the admiration excited by the spontaneous outpouring of the sorrow of a whole people over the loss of their loved and faithful leader. Had these words been all, spoken by that brilliant but bitter man on that occasion, it would have been better for his future fame and better for the country.

But he said more that was uncalled for and unjust to his fellow- citizens of the South. He said: " The South had not forgiven the North for its supremacy and superiority." " If the South could