Comrades, you bid me speak for you. What language can
I borrow that will hold the meaning of this hour ? How translate into mortal tongue the power and
glory of immortal deeds ? Where can I find a strain to sound these depths
of
memory or sweep those heights of harmony ?
Visions trooping by me in solemn proud procession overcloud the
present, till it drifts away to dream and
shadow and they alone are the living and unchanged. Emotions struggling up
through the dark and bloody years choke down my utterance.
No! Rather do you speak to me ; you who return my greeting to those unseen and silent to mortal sense , comrades in soul...you drown my faltering words in your vast accord.God be praised that this same old suffering Army ...scoffed at for many a deed but never, for dying not enough , took up the ensign and together went straight forward .
So it rises and stands before me. The glorious pageant ,the ranks once again are all full - you the living and they the immortal , swelling together answering to the roll call of honor
