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Show 1 WHERE LIONS STAND GUARD. If one goes down to one of the smelters in the valley, he wil see in front of the furnaces only an unsightly mass of broken rock and coke; he will watch as this is dumped intojhe furnace and going go-ing to the other side he will see the slag running out, and it is all noise and smoke and the order which seems confusion. But looking further, he will discover that by its own gravity all that was valuable and imperishable in the rock has come forth purified from the fiery ordeal. It is so with men. When they go down through the furnace which we call Death, whatever was preqlous and imperishable within their minds and hearts will be found shining in the crucible and the credit for its full value will be entered in the Great Ledger above. A superb old legend of an ancient Persian tribe was handed down from sire to son which declared that when their first king the founder of their little dynasty died in the wilderness, so grand of soul was he that he had impressed his greatness on the fauna of the forest Imd so the most majestic majes-tic lions of the wild gathered near and kept watch and ward over his remains until the time came to light the funeral prye. The legend was typical of what is often seen. Many a man and woman go down to death covered with reproaches, but when a generation or a few generations pass, it is seen that the Lions of Justice and Truth and Mercy have been keeping watch and ward over his or her memory and it shines out as clean as 'was the corpse of Patroclus after its celestial embalmment by Thetis. The lions surely kept watch and ward over the memory of the Maid of Orleans and struck down all the darts that foul tongues hurled at it. Was ever mortal more anathematized than was Napoleon when the sullen ship bore him away to St. Helena? But the Lions of Destiny, the most majestic of the wild, felt the impress of his fiery soul and. set their watch around him. So when the world had time to pause and reflect, it was seen that for centuries of wrong and tyranny and oppression of the poor there had to be retribution; retri-bution; that the tree of Liberty would never put out sheltering branches until the soil where its roots were planted was moistened by the blood of innumerable heroes, and so Napoleon, the master martial genius of all time, was sent to set the stage for the unaparalleled, sombre tragedy. The lions were on guard ,and when his dust was returned, re-turned, France forgot the husbands, sons and brothers that had under him gone down to death and with awed soul and uncovered head received H tenderly his remains. H When Washington died the land was filled with HH his enemies. There were doubts cast upon the in- H tegrity of his purposes; evil tongues sought to cast H dirt upon his sovereign name. But the lions gath- H ered near; the lions of Justico and Truth and Fa- H trlotism and Wisdom and of that Valor which H counts as nothing any sacrifice that duty demands, H lions of majestic frame and fiery eyes and took H up their watch and ward around his memory, and H the jackals of Envy and Detraction and Malice H skulked back into tho shadows from out of which H they had come and the simple sepulchre at Mount H Vernon became a shrine. One going there can H still, through the shadows and, the hush of a fin- H ished century, almost feel the majestic presence H of those guardian lions around that simple rest- H ing place. B |