"
"I hadn't thought of that," said Warner soberly.
"There's a power of things the young don't think of," said the ancient
man. "Mebbe the South can be whipped, but she can't be moved. She'll
always be here. People hev made a war. I don't know who started it.
I reckon there's been some powerful mean an' hot talk on both sides.
I knowed great men that seed this very thing comin' long ago an' tried
to stop it. I went over in Kentucky more than once an' heard Henry Clay
speak. I don't believe there was ever another such a talker as he was.
He had sense an' knowledge as well as voice. He done his best to smooth
over this quarrel between North and South that others was eggin' on all
the time, but he couldn't, and I reckon when Henry Clay, the greatest man
God ever made, failed, it wasn't worth while for anybody else to try.
Ride on, young fellers, an' get yourselves killed. You ain't twenty,
an' I'm over eighty, but I guess I'll be lookin' at the green trees when
you're under the ground. Ride on in the rain an' the cold, an' I'll go
inside the shop an' warm myself by the forge fire.
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