Page:The Wreck of a World - Grove - 1890.djvu/68

52 turies made their country the greatest and richest in the world. Up to last year it seemed that nothing could destroy our position and prosperity. Where is it now? What has become of the great American nation with its genius, its learning, and its wealth? So far as we know it is gone for ever. But let us remember that those great qualities of union and self-reliance will enable us to do again the noble deeds of our ancestors. Few as we are, we are enough to found a new Jefferson in some other land, and revive, if God will, the glory of our nation elsewhere than in our old home. This is the last Fourth of July we shall spend in our dear country. But though we never see it again, if only we do our duty I feel as certain as I stand here that our sons or grandsons will reconquer this great inheritance which now we have lost, and raise up a new America, greater and nobler, may be, than the old."

So we steamed away, the tears standing on the cheeks of the men and the women, many of them sobbing aloud at quitting the dear homes and graves of their loved and lost. But presently the requirements of practical life overcame this sentimental sor-