And there we were, indeed, and then and there was enacted such a celebration as I hope may never again be witnessed there or elsewhere on another fourth of July.  Even as I stand here before you, through the lapse of years and the shifting experiences of the recent past, visions and memories of those days rise thick and fast before me.  We did, indeed, crowd thundrously down to their feet.  Of the events of those three terrible days I may speak with feeling and yet with modesty, for small, indeed, was the part which those with whom I served were called upon to play.  When those great bodies of infantry drove together in the crash of battle, the clouds of cavalry which had hitherto covered up their movements were swept aside to the flanks.  Our work for the time was done, nor had it been an easy or a pleasant work.  The road to Gettysburg had been paved with our bodies and watered with our blood.  Three weeks before, in the middle days of June, I, a captain of cavalry, had taken the field at the head of one hundred mounted men, the joy and pride of my life.  Through twenty days of almost incessant conflict the hand of death had been heavy upon us, and now, upon the eve of Gettysburg, thirty-four of the hundred only remained, and our comrades were dead on the field of battle, or languishing in hospitals, or prisoners in the hands of the enemy.  Six brave young fellows we had buried in one grave where they fell on the heights of Aldie.  It was late on the evening of the first of July, that there came to us rumors of heavy fighting at Gettysburg, nearly forty miles away.  The regiment happened then to be detached, and its orders for the second were to move in the rear of Sedgwick’s corps and see that no man left the column.  All that day we marched to the sound of the cannon.  Sedgwick, very grim and stern, was pressing forward his tired men, and we soon saw that for once there would be no stragglers from the ranks.  As the day grew old and as we passed rapidly up from the rear to the head of the hurrying column, the roar of battle grew more distinct, until at last we crowned a hill, and the contest broke upon us.  Across the deep valley, some two miles away, we could see the white smoke of the bursting shells, while below the sharp incessant rattle of the musketry told of the fierce struggle that was going on.  Before us ran the straight, white, dusty road, choked with artillery, ambulances, caissons, ammunition trains, all pressing forward to the field of battle, while mixed among them, their bayonets gleaming through the dust like wavelets on a river of steel, tired, foot-sore, hungry, thirsty, begrimed with sweat and dust, the gallant infantry of Sedgwick’s corps hurried to the sound of the cannon as men might have flocked to a feast.  Moving rapidly forward, we crossed the brook which ran so prominently across the map of the field of battle, and halted on its further side to await our orders.  Hardly had I dismounted from my horse when, looking back, I saw that the head