702 
May 19, 1917. 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
“ Memorial Day ” 
Oi.i) Days.—B ack in a hill town in 
Now Enjjland there is one of tin .-o lone¬ 
ly little graveyards some of you have 
seen. Those of you who are interested 
and have never seen the like might hunt 
iij) a copy of Whittier’.s poems and read 
his des(,Tiption. At the time of the war 
this graveyard was a sort of town juirk 
—neater than it is now—not so lonely 
somehow, and with a few well-trimmed 
shrubs and roses. The war ended that. 
.VImost everyone of the brown old farm¬ 
houses which you may see from the hill 
sent one or more big, strong farmers 
into the army. No one knew how many 
of them passed on to the great review 
until on the first Memorial Day the sur¬ 
vivors put little flags at the graves or 
<lecorated vacant places for the “missing.” 
'I'hen it seemed as if the entire ceme¬ 
tery had burst into color. For a time 
the graveyard was kept reasonably neat, 
but as farming decayed, and the young 
people moved away, the place fell into 
disorder. Somehow the ornamental 
shrubs seemed to take on thorns or teeth 
to protect themselves as man’s protec¬ 
tion fell away. The roses seemed to fall 
from their supports and go back to na¬ 
ture, wild and hateful as they sprawled 
over the ground. To the dead thi.s 
means little—to the living—those of us 
who go back now and then to the old 
town—the wild tangle which Nature is 
crowding over the place seems like a sha¬ 
dow upon life. 
The First Memorial Day. —It seemed 
that way to the vi.sitor as he came up 
the road on Memorial Day. lie had 
come across the farm where he worked 
as a boy. The scrub oaks and cedars 
had worked! into that field where they 
were planting potatoes when there came 
the sound of music from the road. You 
might call it music—I did on that far- 
off day—half a dozen young farmers were 
blowing into a set of battered “horns” 
trying to manufacture “The Star Span¬ 
gled Banner” with very clumsy fingers. 
There were several wagons filled with 
Grand Army men who had come to “dec¬ 
orate” our graveyard. One of them stood 
up in his wagon, waved a flag and called 
“Come on!” The farmer, while a strong 
patriot, was first of all a potato planter, 
and there was a cloud in the east which 
meant “storm” to him. So they kept on 
hoeing and the procession moved on, up 
the road. Those soldiers were young and 
strong and flushed with victory. In the 
great hope and joy of life Memorial Day 
<<uild not carry its full significance to 
them. 
The Last Soldier. —The visitor had 
this in mind as he walked on to the 
graveyard, but he did not undei’stand it 
fully until he saw the little group be¬ 
fore the monument. There were perhaps 
a dozen women—most of them of middle 
age—the others white-haired and bent. 
There were three or four farmers (men 
who still clung to the soil in this lonely 
l»art of the town) and a group of little 
children. They stood before the little 
“Soldiei-s’ Monument”—a grave, silent 
company. On the first step of the mon¬ 
ument stood an old man dressed in Grand 
Army blue. He held his hat with its gold 
cord in his hand and the brisk wind was 
blowing the white hair about his face. 
I lere was the last Grand Army man of 
the town. All the rest of that company 
of young hopeful men who had called 
from the road had i)assed out to the lar¬ 
ger human life, or into the narrower {)ath- 
way of the grave. Here was the true 
Memorial Day—l U- past of a nation 
standing in all the pathos and poetry of 
^ig('—trying to give its message to an un¬ 
heeding present. 
The Spirit ok .America. —I wi.sh you 
could have heard the old' man’s rambling 
ttilk. I’erhaps, I’owi've,, if j-ou are in 
the bloom of yc "rh ' . would be better 
that you did not ht-i.. it, for only years 
iind sadness can ever put the full glory 
and mt'tining into a dull, commonplace 
story of what these men from the old 
town did. They were very common men, 
private soldier.s. fiirmers, who fought 
their battles with poverty, who lived in 
the shadow of obscurity, and yet gave 
to their country- all they had. I’oor, 
plain common men they were—and yet, as 
the. old man prattled on one might see 
that after all they had won what the rich 
and great often miss, for with all their 
faults and human failings they were .still 
hei’oes in the eyes of these women—their 
wives and daughters. Then after the 
old man’s speech a woman, tall, erect and 
white-haired—spectacled and stern-faced 
—prayed that the youth of this nation 
might be given to understand what this 
service really meant to the country. I 
have a friend—an arti.st who says a lit¬ 
tle fretfully that he cannot find a suit¬ 
able figure to represent his great ideal 
of the strong, loyal spirit of American 
patriotism, lie has tried the beautiful 
woman, the strong soldier, the so-called 
statesman and the hopeful child, but they 
all seem to fall short of the truth. He 
should have seen that old woman, stand¬ 
ing there in that silent, lonely place amid 
the ruins of an industry and of a social 
life, praying that those who are to follow 
might be enabled to look below the tan- 
CAc RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
gle of the destroying years, and realize 
the true spirit of sacrifice*. The sun was 
in her fac<‘—her spectacle.s fla.shed like 
stai's, and her gray hair was blown 
loose*—there she stood—to you perhaps a 
homely old woman—a back number—a 
di.scard from the great sieve of life. Yet. 
I wish that this year, on the most 
thoughtful Memorial Day this nation has 
ever known, this voice of the pa.st could 
reach every hopeful youth in the nation. 
YoL'Tir Is Served. —Aft this meeting 
the peoi)le slowly walked away to their 
homes. The New England people are not 
demonstrative—they cannot expia'ss their 
emotion as othei-s do. The old sf)ldier 
was a little stiff, and he walked slowly, 
lie stood in the road for a moment to 
talk with some old friend when, sudden¬ 
ly, iiround a dusty corner iind out of a 
little grove, there da.shed a hetivy car at 
full .speed. Two young men were in it. 
They never thought of stopiting, but came 
dashing on sounding their “warning” and 
yelling at the old man to “get out.” lie 
jumped just in time—falling heavily at 
the side of the road—and the car da.shed 
on. The two young men glanced back 
with a laugh as if it were all a good 
joke. The women helped the old soldier 
up. lie was not badly hurt, but the hat 
with the gold cord was crumided and 
dusty, and there was a little rent in the 
blue army coat. The old man limped off 
down the road, but before he went he 
pointed with his stick after the flying 
car. He did not curse or threaten, but 
merely said a little sadly: “That was 
•Tohn Benson’s money. There is a curse 
on it.” 
Maxiiood and Mo.xey. —The story they 
told that day could be rcjjcated in every 
New England town, and in a larger way 
was also a national story. When the 
war broke out these fiirmers “offered 
their lives to their country.” I have 
seen men sneer when perfunctory orators 
get off that phrase, but it was ju.st ex¬ 
actly what these loyal, unthinking far¬ 
mers did. There was another class of 
men who took these simple, big-hearted 
farmers right at their word. John Ben¬ 
son was one of them. When his neigh¬ 
bors went to the front he stayed in the 
rear. He organized a little shoe factory 
at the water power, and through some 
politician got a government contract. The 
.shoes he nuide melted like paper on the 
feet of his old neighbors at the front, but 
Benson was paid full price in gold and 
bonds. He spread out into new business 
until he controlled most of the home sec¬ 
tion. His neighbors were paid .$12 and 
$1G a month for fighting—and paid most¬ 
ly in greenbacks. This money was sent 
home to support the families, and .John 
Benson discounted it. At the end of the 
war the survivors came home to find most 
of their farms mortgaged to .Tohn Ben- 
.snn-—the strong man of the section who, 
though he had never been within 100 
miles of a battlefield, was known as “Cap¬ 
tain” and “one of our great business 
nu'u who saved the cn'dit of the na¬ 
tion.” 
A I’uzzLE.—That is what it was to 
those farmer-.soldiers. They had stood 
out in the mud and rain with rifles 
against the enemy while men like .Tohn 
Ben.son had' rifled the government. They 
seemed to have the glory and the debts, 
while he h.ad the money and the power. 
They went on fighting their old battles 
over—largely for the benefit of politicians 
—while he went on into new battles for 
the benefit of himself. It is strange to 
me that these old soldiers could not .see 
what was coming, but four years of 
fighting—away from home—somehow 
changed their mature. The nation was 
under the most solemn obligation to 
them, but somehow they did not enforce 
it in the right w.ay. Thus in many or 
most Ea.stern f:irm sections the money 
and power of the neighborhood slowly 
drained into the hands of “John Ben¬ 
.son !’' It did not remain in the neighbor¬ 
hood, but was sent away to Boston or 
New York or “out West” to develoj) 
towns and farms. And every doll:ir 
which went in that way made a double 
wound. It hurt the productive {lower of 
the home section, and added to the pull 
oil the imagination of the young peoiile. 
And now. on Memorial Day, the insolent 
grandson of .Tohn Benson could ride over 
th(‘ last Grand Army man and drive him 
olV th(* road ! 
The Les.sox. —I have little space left 
(o go on and ajiply these things to our 
present war troubles. I must leave that 
for you to think out, and I am sure you 
can do it. Tlu* farmers who fought in 
the Civil War were outwitted by design¬ 
ing men who kept at tne rear and pulled 
wire.s. The same thing had happened 50 
times before in history, and in much the 
same, way, by making the plain people 
think that their .share of glory is fully 
eipial to the other share of gain. What 
we as farmers ought to learn is the fact 
that so-called “glory” is often the poor- 
est_ sort of “guff,” and that when the 
{loliticians compare manhood and money 
they would like to sejiarate them entirely, 
while the salvation of the nation depends 
uiion tying them close together. There 
was no manhood in the money of the 
rich slacker—so his insolent grandson 
rode over the Grand Army man. There 
was no money in the old man’s manhood, 
.so he mu.st stand the indignity. In the 
final review before the Great Throne, 
however, which do you think will dodge 
out of the way? What should civiliza¬ 
tion be but an effort to bring those better 
conditions u])on earth—where they be- 
hDlg? H. w. c. 
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