Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 20.djvu/378

 372 Southern Historical Society Papers.

hold the purse and the sword it was patriotic." " The Southern people had not accepted the amendments to the Constitution in good faith." " They had their heroes and their anniversaries." " They exalted their leaders above the leaders of the Union cause."

To these charges that the South has its " heroes and its anni- versaries;" that it "exalts its leaders above the leaders of the Union cause" we plead guilty ; and we are proud of our guilt. Yes, the South has its heroes and its anniversaries. The State of Virginia has, by solemn enactment of her General Assembly, made the natal day of her illustrious son, Robert E. Lee, a legal holiday, equal in in its observance to the birthday of her other great son, George Washington, the father of his country.

If that be treason, let them make the most of it.

OUR HEROES AND OUR ANNIVERSARIES.

And why shall not the South have its heroes and* its anniversaries? The South has its history; its traditions; its wrongs; its ruins; its victories; its defeats; its record of suffering and humiliation; its destruction and, worse still, its reconstruction. She has many ceme- teries filled wiih her own patriotic dead, slain fighting her battles; and she has on her soil, beneath her bright skies, larger, more nume- rous, and more populous cemeteries, filled with brave men, slain in battle by the hands of her warriors.

Is there nothing worthy the song of the heroic muse in all this?

For four years the Confederate government floated its flag over every State beneath the Southern cross, and the Confederate armies carried their battle-flag in triumph from the Rio Grande almost to the capital of the Keystone State, and spread terror to the Great Lakes. Its little navy showed the strange colors of the new-born nation from the Northern sea to the equator, driving the American merchant marine from the high seas, until scarcely a ship engaged in commerce dared show the Stars and Stripes on the Atlantic ocean.

For four bloody years the Confederacy stood the shock of all the power and resources of the greatest republic on the face of the globe, and fought for independence on more than one hundred battle-fields, and at last, when her armies were worn away by attrition and her means of resistance exhausted, succumbed to " overwhelming num- bers and resources."