We arrive an hour before the ceremonial commences, and walk about the pretty grave-garden and read the names upon the monuments, and listen to anecdotes of those who rest below. The old soldiers seem to love to talk of their dead comrades, to fight their battles over again. They tell us how this one, “such a fine, handsome young fellow,” rode always into battle whistling a merry tune as he dashed into the thick of it; and how this one with the spirit of the ancient Puritans uplifted his voice to the glory of God as he brandished his sword and rushed to the front.
Presently a slow solemn strain of music with the roll of the muffled drum reaches our ears. It comes nearer and nearer. There is a trampling of feet, “the tramp of thousands sounding like the tread of one,” and the committee, escorted by a detachment of soldiers with their arms reversed and followed by a multitude of people, make their way across the hilly ground, and through the winding pathways till they reach a wide grassy slope, where, railed in and reached by a flight of marble steps, there stands a huge plain shaft of granite, with the inscription in large gold letters, “To our Confederate Dead,” engraved thereon. A platform is raised in front of this, which is now occupied by some score or two of ladies, all dressed in deep mourning, each carrying a basket of flowers, which may be replenished from the miniature mountain of violets and pale wild roses which are heaped upon the ground. Lying around, spreading in all directions, are myriad nameless graves. Some have a white headstone a foot high, some have wooden crosses, some have but the green turf to cover them. Here Federals and Confederates lie side by side, no enmity between them now. The treaty of eternal peace has been signed by the sovereign lord, Death; all are now gathered together and are marching through the silent land, under the banner of their great Captain, Christ.
There was a slight stir and a few elderly gray-headed men, accompanied by a minister of the church, ascended the platform. A hush fell upon the multitude, and all listen reverently and bareheaded while an earnest simple prayer is offered up.
Then a tall, soldier-like man, a well-known general, who had faced a hundred fires, stepped forward and made a most touching and eloquent address--to which friend or foe, victor and vanquished, might listen with equal feeling of interest and respect,--glorifying the heroic qualities of those who fought and fell in the lost cause, but, while giving honour to the dead, detracting nothing from the living. The keynote running through the whole discourse was like a prayer that the seed sown amid fire and sword, and watered by the blood of patriots (patriots _all_; no matter on which side they fought, each believed they were fighting for their rights), might take root, grow, flourish, and yield a glorious harvest for the gathering of this great country, her unity never again to be disturbed and torn by the children of her love and pride.