That night a group of Prussian officers going over the field with lanterns looking after their wounded, stopped near the spot where the old Sergeant had made his last stand for France.

"It was just here,' said one, splendid rally."

A second, looking at the body of an old French Sergeant, said simply:

There died a brave soldier.'

Another, stooping to examine the broken cross of the Legion on the dead man's breast, said reverently:

By HENRY WARD BEECHER, Clergyman, Editor, Author; Pastor of Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, N. Y., 1847-87. Born in Litchfield, Conn., 1813; died in Brooklyn, 1887.

From a sermon delivered to two companies of the "Brooklyn Fourteenth," many of them members of the Plymouth Church. Taken, by permission of the publishers, from "Patriotic Addresses" by H. W. Beecher, published by Fords, Howard & Hulbert, New York.

A thoughtful mind, when it sees a nation's flag, sees not the flag only, but the nation itself. And whatever may be its symbol, its insignia, he reads chiefly in the flag the government, the principles, the truths, the history, that belong to the nation that sets it forth. When the French tricolor rolls out to the wind, we see France. When the new-found Italian flag is unfurled, we see resurrected Italy. When the other three-colored Hungarian flag shall be lifted to the wind, we shall see in it the long buried, but never dead, principles of Hungarian liberty. When the united crosses of St. Andrew and St. George, on a fiery ground, set forth the banner of old England, we see not the cloth merely: there rises up before the mind the idea of that great monarchy.

This nation has a banner, too.

Not another flag on the

globe has such an errand, or goes forth upon the sea carrying everywhere, the world around, such hope to the captive, and such glorious tidings. The stars upon it were to the pining nations like the bright morning stars of God, and the stripes upon it were beams of morning light. As at early dawn the stars shine forth even while it grows light, and then as the sun advances that light breaks into banks and streaming lines of color, the glowing red and intense white striving together, and ribbing the horizon with bars effulgent, so, on the American flag, stars and beams of many-colored light shine out together. And wherever this flag comes, and men behold it, they see in its sacred emblazonry no rampant lion, and no fierce eagle; no embattled castles, or insignia of imperial authority; they see the symbols of light. It is the banner of Dawn. It means Liberty; and the galley-slave, the poor, oppressed conscript, the trodden-down creature of foreign despotism, sees in the American flag that very promise and prediction of God,—“ The people which sat in the darkness saw a great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up."

If one, then, asks me the meaning of our flag, I say to him, it means just what Concord and Lexington meant, what Bunker Hill meant; it means the whole glorious Revolutionary War, which was, in short, the rising up of a valiant young people against an old tyranny, to establish the most momentous doctrine that the world had ever known, or has since known the right of men to their own selves and to their liberties.

Our flag means, then, all that our fathers meant in the Revolutionary War; it means all that the Declaration of Independence meant; it means all that the Constitution of our people, organizing for justice, for liberty, and for happiness, meant. Our flag carries American ideas, American history, and American feelings. Beginning with the Colonies, and coming down to our time, in its sacred heraldry, in its glorious insignia, it has gathered and stored

chiefly this supreme idea: Divine right of liberty in man. Every color means liberty; every form of star and beam or stripe of light means liberty; not lawlessness, not license; but organized, institutional liberty-liberty through law, and laws for liberty!

OUR PLEDGE TO PUERTO RICO

By CHARLES E. Littlefield, Lawyer; Attorney-General of State of Maine, 1889-93; Member of Congress from Maine, 1899-. Born in Lebanon, Me., 1851.

From a speech delivered in the House of Representatives, February 23, 1900; the House having under consideration the bill to regulate the trade of Puerto Rico. See Congressional Record, Feb. 23, 1900.

In 1898 the army of the United States, in a war declared in the interest of humanity, and upon the proposition that the old flag would carry with it liberty and freedom and equal opportunity and all the blessings of a Christian civilization, went where? It went to the island of Puerto Rico, and Major-General Miles held the standard. In the proclamation with which General Miles signalized his advent upon Puerto Rican soil, he said: "We come bearing the banner of freedom, inspired by a noble purpose, to seek the enemies of our country and yours, and to destroy or capture all who are in armed resistance. We bring you the fostering arm of a nation of free people, whose greatest power is in its justice and humanity to all those living within its fold. We have not come to make war upon the people of a country that for centuries has been oppressed, but, on the contrary, to bring you protection, not only to yourselves but to your property, to promote your prosperity, and to bestow upon you the immunities and blessings of the liberal institutions of our government.

Relying upon this proclamation these people did what?

They prostrated themselves before him; they covered him with wreaths and garlands of flowers; they kissed the flag that was carried there under that promise, and the delegates

from Puerto Rico stand here, asking the Republican party to make good the promise made by General Miles for the Republic, when they eagerly delivered "The Ever-Faithful Isle" into his all-conquering hands. Miles, the magnificent representative of our institutions, the typical American citizen, who won his way, by sheer force of merit, ability, and valor, from the position of a common soldier, step by step, to the position of leader of the Armies of the Republic.

I never will vote to violate the promise he made or to repudiate the pledge. The Republic cannot afford, in this or any other campaign, to violate that sacred promise. It is written in the blood of our heroes that fought at El Caney, San Juan, and Santiago. It was made in the presence of all Christendom, and it is sealed by the God of battles. The Republic cannot violate that promise made to this weak and helpless people, without sullying its honor and tarnishing its fame.. Why, gentlemen here say that we are about

to inaugurate a policy of colonial government. I want to ask the gentlemen in this House if they desire to signalize their entry upon a colonial government, in their very first act, by a breach of good faith. Do you remember the history of proud Spain? What is it? What is it that has characterized Spain ever since the sixteenth century, ever since Pizzarro rode ruthless and roughshod over Mexico, and the Duke of Alva filled the Netherlands with carnage, blood, butcheries, and indescribalbe horrors, in his infamous attempt to crush out the very beginning of civil and religious liberty? What is it that has characterized her and made her contemptible before every honorable nation upon the earth? It is her duplicity and her breaches of good faith.

Puerto Rico kneels to-day, weak, helpless, starving, with her hands held toward us in supplication. She pleads for the fulfillment of this promise. Her prayers may fall upon deaf ears, that will not hear in this House, but there is one tribunal to which I fully believe they may confidently appeal

-the enlightened, unselfish, Christian conscience of a great and free people.

We hear a great deal in these days about the glory of the Republic, the grandeur of its institutions, its unparalleled civilization. May the action of the House worthily exemplify these lofty sentiments. Then may our flag float over the whole Republic, in the Occident as well as the Orient, over the Pearl of the Antilles, and the Thousand Islands near far-off Cathay, upon land and sea, over schoolhouse and church, the emblem of our integrity and good faith, of liberty and freedom, of the inestimable blessings of a Christian civilization. Thus, and only thus, will it be and ever remain, by the blessing and favor of Almighty God, the unsullied and untarnished symbol of our honor, our glory, and our splendor.

HORACE GREELEY

By HENRY WARD BEECHER, Clergyman, Editor, Author; Pastor of Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, N. Y., 1847-87. Born in Litchfield, Conn., 1813; died in Brooklyn, 1887.

Spoken at the funeral of Horace Greeley, November, 1872.

There is no one that dies whose death is not momentous, if we but behold it as God's angels do. Every day hundreds and hundreds are borne through your streets and laid away to sleep in yonder Greenwood, leaving behind them sorrow and tears, and many reverent thoughts; yet no one, I think, has gone bearing with him so many sympathies, so much kindness, so many tender recollections, as he who lies before you.

Who is this man, bearing upon him all the civic honors that the land could give him? Who is this man? One whose wealth has made him a prince in benevolence? He was not rich in living, nor in dying rich. Who is this man? Some one gifted with all kindness of heart, and singular tact of administration, that should make every one his friend who came near him? But he was a man of war, who for thirty