his farm devastated, his slaves
free, his stock killed, his barns empty, his trade destroyed, his money
worthless, his social system, feudal in its magnificence, swept away;
his people without law or legal status; his comrades slain, and the
burdens of others heavy on his shoulders. Crushed by defeat, his very
traditions are gone. Without money, credit, employment, material, or
training; and beside all this, confronted with the gravest problem that
ever met human intelligence--the establishing of a status for the vast
body of his liberated slaves.

What does he do--this hero in gray with a heart of gold? Does he sit
down in sullenness and despair? Not for a day. Surely God, who had
stripped him of his prosperity, inspired him in his adversity. As ruin
was never before so overwhelming, never was restoration swifter. The
soldier stepped from the trenches into the furrow; horses that had
charged Federal guns marched before the plow, and fields that ran red
with human blood in April were green with the harvest in June; women
reared in luxury cut up their dresses and made breeches for their
husbands, and, with a patience and heroism that fit women always as a
garment, gave their hands to work. There was little bitterness in all
this. Cheerfulness and frankness prevailed.

Never was nobler duty confided to human hands than the uplifting and
upbuilding of the prostrate and bleeding South--misguided, perhaps, but
beautiful in her suffering, and honest, brave and generous always. In
the record of her social, industrial and political lustration we await
with confidence the verdict of the world.

The new South is enamored of her new work. Her soul is stirred with the
breath of a new life. The light of a grander day is falling fair on her
face. She is thrilling with the consciousness of growing power and
prosperity. As she stands upright, full-statured and equal among the
people of the earth, breathing the keen air and looking out upon the
expanded horizon, she understands that her emancipation came because
through the inscrutable wisdom of God her honest purpose was crossed,
and her brave armies were beaten.

This is said in no spirit of time-serving or apology. The South has
nothing for which to apologize. She believes that the late struggle
between the States was war and not rebellion; revolution and not
conspiracy, and that her convictions were as honest as yours. I should
be unjust to the dauntless spirit of the South and