Between Culp's Hill and Wolf's Hill flows Rock Creek. It is very
shallow and winds through a wild ravine. What news it could tell
of those three days of fighting if we were able to interpret its
rippling music. But the vast numbers who listened to its softly
murmured notes have long since gone, borne down the rippling
stream of Time, from which there is no returning.
Here we learned why the soldiers made such a desperate attempt
to secure Culp's Hill, for what use would it have been to get
Cemetery Hill and leave a back door open, as it were, for the
enemy to pass through.
Here in spring the ravine is gay with the blossoming dogwood and
the redbud fills the place with its royal purple.
As we gazed at the many fine monuments on this, the best marked
and most beautiful of ail battlegrounds in the world, we thought
of the terrible waste of life. But then had it been wasted,
after all? As we passed down by the peach orchard, we saw a
battle between two robins being waged. Then we thought how each
spring, from remotest times this same battle-ground has been
used by Nature's children to settle questions of gravest import
to their race. Each season brings renewed conflicts. Down by the
Devil's Den ground squirrels wage their battles again and again.
Aerial battles, too, are fought by hawks above the tree tops.
In Nature, to the strongest usually comes the victory.
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