both at Lexington; they also had "obstructed an officer" with brave words.

British soldiers, a thousand strong, came to seize them and carry them over sea

for trial, and so nip the bud of Freedom auspiciously opening in that early

spring. The town militia came together before daylight, "for training." A great,

tall man, with a large head and a high, wide brow, their captain,--one who had

"seen service,"--marshalled them into line, numbering but seventy, and bade

"every man load his piece with powder and ball. I will order the first man shot

that runs away," said he, when some faltered. "Don't fire unless fired upon, but

if they want to have a war, let it begin here."

 

Gentlemen, you know what followed; those farmers and mechanics "fired the shot

heard round the world." A little monument covers the bones of such as before had

pledged their fortune and their sacred honor to the Freedom of America, and that

day gave it also their lives. I was born in that little town, and bred up amid

the memories of that day. When a boy, my mother lifted me up, one Sunday, in her

religious, patriotic arms, and held me while I read the first monumental line I

ever saw--"Sacred to Liberty and the Rights of Mankind."

 

Since then I have studied the memorial marbles of Greece and Rome, in many an

ancient town; nay, on Egyptian obelisks have read what was written before the

Eternal raised up Moses to lead Israel out of Egypt; but no chiseled stone has

ever stirred me to such emotion as these rustic names of men who fell "In the

Sacred Cause of God and their Country."

 

Gentlemen, the Spirit of Liberty, the Love of Justice, were early fanned into a