For His Country and Grandmother and the Crow by Marshall Saunders

Author:Marshall Saunders [Saunders, Marshall]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2016-09-06T22:00:00+00:00

The consultation below had broken up, and several of the doctors had crept to the door of the room, but the boy did not seem to notice them. His attention was riveted on the children, to the exclusion of all others.

"Give brother the flag!" he murmured, when they finished.

They handed him the Stars and Stripes, but he could not retain it, and the princess, quietly moving to the bedside, steadied it between his trembling fingers.

"Now sing with brother."

The two children lifted up their little quavering voices, and turning his own face to the ceiling, a face illumined by a joy not of this world, he tried to sing with them:

"My country! 'tis of thee,

Sweet land of liberty,

Of thee I sing!"

Here his voice faltered, his radiant face drooped, and his darkening eyes turned beseechingly in my direction.

In a choking voice I finished the verse, as I had once before finished it for him:

"Land where my fathers died,

Land of the pilgrims' pride,

From every mountainside

Let freedom ring!"

His head was on the pillow when I finished, but his fingers still grasped the flag.

"Gerald," said the princess, tenderly, "do you understand?"

"Yes, I understand," fluttered from his pale lips.

"And are you contented?"

He pressed her hand slightly.

"Would you rather die, or live to grow up and forget your country, as you surely would do if you lived all your young life among strangers?"

"I would rather die!" and here his voice was so firm that all in the room heard it.

"Dottie and Howard!" he murmured, presently, and the princess drew back. After all, she was only a stranger.

He died, with their little faces pressed close to his own. "Give my love to mamma, dear mamma!" were his last words. Shortly after the nurses drew the children away. The boy had had his wish. He had died for his country as truly as if he had fallen in battle.

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