ion Forces of the East, under
Meade, gained the great victory of Gettysburg, and, driving the hosts of
Lee from Pennsylvania, put a second and final end to Rebel invasion of
Northern soil; gaining it, on ground dedicated by President Lincoln,
before that year had closed--as a place of sepulture for the
Patriot-soldiers who there had fallen in a brief, touching and immortal
Address, which every American child should learn by heart, and every
American adult ponder deeply, as embodying the very essence of true
Republicanism.

[President Lincoln's Address, when the National Cemetery at
Gettysburg, Pa., was dedicated Nov. 19, 1863, was in these
memorable words:

"Fourscore and seven years ago, our Fathers brought forth upon this
continent a new Nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the
proposition that all men are created equal.

"Now we are engaged in a great Civil War, testing whether that
Nation, or any Nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long
endure.

"We are met on a great battlefield of that War. We have come here
to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting-place for
those who here gave their lives that that Nation might live.

"It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

"But in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate,
we can not hallow, this ground. The brave men, living and dead,
who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our power to add
or detract.

"The World will little note, nor long remember, what we say here;
but it can never forget what they did here.

"It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the
unfinished work which they who fought here have, thus far, so nobly
advanced.

"It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task
remaining before us; that from these honored dead we take increased
devotion to that Cause for which they gave the last full measure of
devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not
have died in vain; that this Nation, under God, shall have a new
birth of Freedom; and that Government of the People, by the People,
and for the People, shall not perish front the Earth."]

That season of victory for the Union arms, coming, as it did, upon a
season of depression and doubtfulness, was doubly grateful to the loyal
heart of th