Sterling Price, Marmaduke and Shelby and thousands of others who illus
trated American manhood on a thousand fields fighting for the South.
Young gentlemen, sons of Confederate Veterans, your presence here
to-day comforts our hearts. It is a sweet assurance to us that you are
not only not ashamed of your fathers, but glory in the record they made.
Yet a few years and these survivors will have passed from these scenes.
No longer by word or pen can they tell you the story of all they suffered
that you might inherit the blessings of self-government, which your grand-
sires founded and sanctified with their blood. The mantle will fall upon
you. Upon you must rest the duty of preserving unblemished the character
of Southern gentlemen. That you will do it, I doubt not.
To do it, however, you must not let mere materialism crowd out
the great purposes of your manhood. Study the Constitution of your
country and the teachings of the fathers. Take for your models the lives
of Davis, Lee, Polk and Price, and strive tor keep your eye on your models.
Strive to rebuild our beloved Southland and make it what it once
was — the fairest and happiest land on earth. Search, read and inwardly
digest the great principles for which your fathers died and all will be
well. The past is secure; see to it that you make the future worthy of
that past.
