ADDRESSES OF MAJOR LACEY 261 



years ago, a Grand Army post in Michigan telegraphed 

 to him words of good cheer. The dispatch read : 



We understand that they have put you in the hospital and 

 are clipping some more coupons off of you. God bless you, old 

 fellow ! the less there is of you the better we like you. 



I visited one of these old soldiers' graves the other day 

 at Memphis, Tennessee. Fourteen thousand of our dead 

 lie there and I wished to view the grave of my old school- 

 mate and comrade, George Godfrey, of the Third Iowa 

 infantry. He was laid to rest in a group of one thousand 

 Iowa soldiers, in one corner of the great cemetery, and 

 on each morning sunrise the flag for which he fought is 

 hoisted over the grave of the gallant farmer boy who 

 gave all he had — his life — for the preservation of the 

 Union. 



Standing by his grave after thirty-seven years, I could 

 not again realize the time when this gallant young man 

 and his fourteen thousand comrades lay down to sleep 

 beneath the sod of the Memphis National Cemetery. Not 

 far away the Mississippi flowed to the sea, and not a man 

 in the state of Tennessee could be found to regret that 

 the cause had succeeded for which George Godfrey gave 

 his life. 



The railways will be double tracked and improved but 

 the true opening for the surplus wealth of this country in 

 the future will be upon the deep. 



The sea power of the world passed step by step from 

 Tyre and Sidon to Greece and Carthage, to Rome, to Lis- 

 bon and Holland, and then to Great Britain. 



Ever onward has it gone and now our country lies mid- 

 way between the Orient and the Occident. 



No ancestry gives rank in this country, though the fact 

 that our forefathers fought on the right side in any of 

 the wars of the past is always a source of satisfaction to 



