We have had a horrible glimpse of hell! The sight must convince us that the devoted labor of every one of us is needed to prevent the overthrow of the ideals of civilization! The hideous doctrine that might makes right, that crafty murder, “leaving no trace behind,” treacherous intrigue and shameless lying, are the proper occupation for “gentlemen” must be combated not by arms alone, but by the upholding of the high ideals of our own country. The memory of heroic deeds, of noble sayings, is the most precious inheritance of mankind. We who are now living have been inspired by it, we have held our course guided by its light, however much we may have stumbled on the way and fallen short of our ideals. The sacred fires of noble tradition must not perish. To pass on to our descendants the lighted torch received from our predecessors, glowing ever brighter with the fervor inspired by the heroic deeds of the present hour, is for us an imperative duty and a splendid privilege. THE END ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ● Transcriber’s Notes: ○ The description of chapter XI. in the Table of Contents was truncated— “Parade of”. This was amended to “Parade of the Ancient and Honorable Artillery.” ○ Missing or obscured punctuation was silently corrected. ○ Typographical errors were silently corrected. ○ Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation were made consistent only when a predominant form was found in this book. ○ Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_). End of Project Gutenberg's Memories grave and gay, by Florence Howe Hall