And so the little distinctions of rank that separated us in the service
are nothing here. Death has given the same brevet to all. The brilliant
young cavalry general who rode into his last action, with stars on his
shoulders and his death-wound on his breast, is to us no more precious
than that sergeant of sharpshooters who followed the line unarmed at
Antietam, waiting to take the rifle of some one who should die, because
his own had been stolen; or that private who did the same thing in the
same battle, leaving the hospital service to which he had been assigned.
Nature has been equally tender to the graves of all, and our love knows
no distinction.

What a wonderful embalmer is death! We who survive grow daily older.
Since the war closed the youngest has gained some new wrinkle, the
oldest some added gray hair. A few years more and only a few tattering
figures shall represent the marching files of the Grand Army; a year or
two beyond that, and there shall flutter by the window the last empty
sleeve. But these who are here are embalmed forever in our imaginations;
they will not change; they never will seem to us less young, less fresh,
less daring, than when they sallied to their last battle. They will
always have the dew of their youth; it is we alone who shall grow old.

And, again, what a wonderful purifier is death! These who fell beside us
varied in character; like other men, they had their strength and their
weaknesses, their merits and their faults. Yet now all stains seem
washed away; their life ceased at its climax, and the ending sanctioned
all that went before. They died for their country; that is their
record. They found their way to heaven equally short, it seems to us,
from every battle-field, and with equal readiness our love seeks them
to-day.