son of the soil--hearty, simple, gentle, true.

But, sir, the particulars of his career, both public and private, have
been recounted by those who knew him well; have been recounted with
great force, with great eloquence and propriety. There is, however, one
part of that career to which I wish to refer. He was engaged in the
memorable struggle which convulsed this nation from center to
circumference and which fastened the gaze of the civilized world. I wish
upon this occasion to say emphatically, that wherever we may have stood
in that struggle, whatever was good and great in any man participating
on either side of it is a precious heritage to the entire American
people to-day. We proved that, North, South, East, West, we had not
degenerated in the qualities which make a nation great.

Grant and Lee, Sherman, Sheridan, and the two Johnstons have gone from
us forever, and every day the green sward of peace, the flowers of
affection, are placed above the grave of some hero of the blue or the
gray. But I love to think that above these graves stands the Genius of
American freedom, serene and grand, and bids the world behold how brave
the sons of the Republic were in the past; how united they are in one
purpose and one destiny in the present; how certain they are to be a
people noted for reasonable liberty, for perfect union, and for
sufficient material power to be formidable and just alike to the other
nations of the earth.

And so, sir, I come and lay the flowers of my Northern home upon the
bier of this son of Virginia, this good citizen, this patriot, this man
who, I am proud to believe, held even me in his affection. And when
gentlemen here speak of the terror and the mystery of death, I tell them
that to such a man death has no terrors, and that to the good man it has