14.  Long live the Republic of Washington!  Respected by mankind,
    beloved of all its sons, long may it be the asylum of the
    poor and oppressed of all lands and religions—­long may it be
    the citadel of that liberty which writes beneath the Eagle’s
    folded wings, “We will sell to no man, we will deny to no
    man, Right and Justice.”

Long live the United States of America!  Filled with the free, magnanimous spirit, crowned by the wisdom, blessed by the moderation, hovered over by the guardian angel of Washington’s example; may they be ever worthy in all things to be defended by the blood of the brave who know the rights of man and shrink not from their assertion—­may they be each a column, and altogether, under the Constitution, a perpetual Temple of Peace, unshadowed by a Caesar’s palace, at whose altar may freely commune all who seek the union of Liberty and Brotherhood.

Long live our Country!  Oh, long through the undying ages may it stand, far removed in fact as in space from the Old World’s feuds and follies, alone in its grandeur and its glory, itself the immortal monument of Him whom Providence commissioned to teach man the power of Truth, and to prove to the nations that their Redeemer liveth.

    JOHN W. DANIEL:  Washington, 1885

15.  When that great and generous soldier, U.S.  Grant gave back to
    Lee, crushed, but ever glorious, the sword he had surrendered
    at Appomattox, that magnanimous deed said to the people of
    the South:  “You are our brothers.”  But when the present ruler
    of our grand republic on awakening to the condition of war
    that confronted him, with his first commission placed the
    leader’s sword in the hands of those gallant Confederate
    commanders, Joe Wheeler and Fitzhugh Lee, he wrote between
    the lines in living letters of everlasting light the words: 
    “There is but one people of this Union, one flag alone for
    all.”

The South, Mr. Toastmaster, will feel that her sons have been well given, that her blood has been well spilled, if that sentiment is to be indeed the true inspiration of our nation’s future.  God grant it may be as I believe it will.

    CLARE HOWELL:  Our Reunited Country, 1898

16.  Two years ago last autumn, we walked on the sea beach
    together, and with a strange and prophetic kind of poetry, he
    likened the scene to his own failing health, the falling
    leaves, the withered sea-weed, the dying grass upon the
    shore, and the ebbing tide that was fast receding from us.  He
    told me that he felt prepared to go, for he had forgiven his
    enemies, and could even rejoice in their happiness.  Surely
    this was a grand condition in which to step from this world
    across the threshold to the next!

    JOSEPH JEFFERSON:  In Memory of Edwin Booth, 1893