Part 5

I thank God for this war--it means so much for us, and through us for mankind. Look at its vast significance. Our nation has experienced a deep awakening such as this generation never felt before, and such as it needed. Its conscience has been cultivated; all the nobler sentiments of life have been given a wondrous new strength. These rose to dominion in our lives, new impulses moved us, new ideals passed before us--we have entered upon a new career of moral life, upon a higher plane, for we undertook a great work for humanity and counted not the cost. We became free from our habitual indifference, we despised our very lives, offering them a ransom for the oppressed. Such a six-months of self-forgetting morally enthusiastic life and oblation of peace, comfort, treasure, and blood, were worth more to us than any score of slothful years lived only for material gain. A nation may indeed be "beastly prosperous." America, thank God, is not; though prosperous, she is beyond example. Never did there live a people who made such worthy, such philanthropic uses of their prosperity. Never did rich and poor, the monarch of millions, and the possessor of a bare competence, make in any land or time so noble a use of his material means. Witness our colleges and universities, our churches and charitable institutions, our libraries and museums; witness this war for an oppressed people.

Thank God we are not insensible of high demands upon us! Thank God we are not wholly mercenary and materialistic! Thank God we are responsive, disinterestedly, but with wealth and life itself, to other claims than those of self and selfish getting and sending! We, who are called pig-stickers, are capable of generous action--we have given ourselves for the deliverance of the oppressed, thank God!

Who complains now that this generation is degenerate? Who now is pessimistic? Who now taunts the youth of the land with being unworthy sons of worthy sires? Who that knows of San Juan and El Caney, of Santiago Harbor and Manila Bay, sighs for the heroic days of old and the braver men?

The events of the last six months should give us confidence in the better possibilities of ourselves. Europeans taunt us with having everything "big" but nothing "great;" big cities, big rivers, big lakes, big mountains, big crops, but no great works of art, no great achievements in science and literature, no great men. False to begin with. This generation is destined to prove it more glaringly so. There is nothing too great to be achieved by those who felt and responded to the high motive of this war.

What is the national result of the conflict? New impulses, new motives, new interests, new ideals, new duties, broader views, vaster undertakings, a richer national life. Put the oak that has planted his roots deep and far out into the nurturing soil and lifted his storm-defying brow toward heaven; put the lordly oak tree back into the acorn hull; or seize the strong-pinioned eagle after he has soared above the mountain peaks and challenged the tempests of the sea, seize and cage him again in his broken shell, and then you may hope to diminish our country to what it was, confining its expanded members by the old bonds and subjecting its enlarged activities to the old ideals.

When were the great days of Greece? After the stormy period of the Persian wars. It was struggle that made her great. It was Philip of Macedon that crowned Demosthenes prince of orators; it was Xerxes and Darius of Persia that laureled so many poets of the city they sought to destroy. It was the shock of the tumultuous waves of an invading host, it was the tempest of war that roused the life-forces of classic Helena, and after the days of heroic struggle came the period of great achievement in the pursuits of peace. It was then that art, sculpture, music, poetry, and eloquence flourished as never in secure days of slothful ease.

No argument this for wanton insolence, provoking war; far be it ever from us to be aught else than a peace-loving, peace-preserving nation; but, before God, realizing our great strength and high mission, let us ever hold some things inviolable and dearer than our own comfort, wealth and life. Still to be ready to fight and to die for justice and freedom to mankind marks a people as courageous and noble. Let such courage, such nobleness be forever the possession of the American people!

CHRONOLOGY.

April 27.--Enlistment at Kansas City, Mo.

May 7.--Departure for Jefferson Barracks.

May 8.--(Sunday) Day of work, fasting and prayer in Camp Stephens.

May 14.--Muster into the United States service.

May 26.--Departure for Falls Church, Virginia.

May 29.--(Sunday) Arrival, erection of tents.

June 28-30.--Practice--march to Difficult Run.

July 24-August 4.--First Battalion, Major Kelsey, at Colvin Run, constructing rifle-range.

August 3.--Departure for Thoroughfare Gap.

August 3-4.--Burk Station.

August 5-6.--Bull Run.

August 7-8.--Bristow.

August 9-22.--Thoroughfare Gap.

August 23-September 6.--Camp Meade, Middletown, Pennsylvania.

September 6-9.--Return to Kansas City.

September 9-October 21.--Fairmount Park.

October 16.--Dismissal on 30 days furlough.

October 21.--Camp Graham.

Nov. 7.--Muster out.

LIST OF THE DEAD.

Honor the dead who died for Freedom's sake! Time will their memory but greener make!

Brown, Philip, private, Company F.--Died of typhoid fever at Fort Myer Hospital, July 30th; buried at Arlington National Cemetery.

Carr, James E., private, Company F.--Killed by railway train, August 27th, at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and buried there.

Gray, Arthur W., private, Company K.--Died October 26th, at St. Joseph's Hospital, of typhoid; buried at Forest Hill Cemetery.

Kleinke, Otto R., private, Company D.--Died of typhoid fever, August 25th, in field hospital at Camp Meade; buried in National Cemetery at Gettysburg.

Kinnard, Wm. G., sergeant, Company I.--Died at St. Joseph's Hospital, Kansas City, Missouri, September 22d, of typhoid; buried at Forest Hill Cemetery.

Lautterbach, Charles, private, Company L.--Died September 23d, in Pennsylvania Hospital, Philadelphia; buried in that city.

Maloy, Richard D., private, Company D.--Died at Fort Myer Hospital, July 22d, of typhoid; buried at Elmwood, Kansas City.

McNair, John S., corporal, Company I.--Died in field hospital, Camp Alger, July 15th, of appendicitis; buried at National Cemetery of Arlington.

Mericle, Charles, bugler, Company F.--Died of typhoid fever, September 22d, at Independence, Missouri, and there buried.

Murphree, C. B., private, Company A.--Died of typhoid fever, June 19th, at Fort Myer Hospital; buried at Arlington.

Murray, John P., private, Company M.--Died of typhoid, September 5th, at field hospital, Camp Meade.

Nicholas, Henry G., private, Company F.--Died at Fort Myer Hospital, August 16th, of typhoid; buried at Lathrop, Missouri.

Parker, Fred, Sixth Company, signal corps (transferred thither from Company F).--Died September 5th, at field hospital, Camp Meade, of typhoid; buried at Independence, Missouri.

Rockwell, Samuel, private, Company C.--Died of delirium tremens, at Fort Myer Hospital, June 18th; buried at Arlington.

Sargent, Wm. A., member of U. S. A. Hospital Corps, transferred from Company C.--Died September 17th, of typhoid; buried at Sabetha, Kansas.

Spriggs, Elwood W., private, Company G.--Died September 16th, at Kansas City, Missouri, of typhoid; buried at Medaryville, Indiana.

Thraen, Sigmund, private, Company A.--Died at Fort Myer Hospital, July 26th, of typhoid; buried at Arlington.