However, of thousands of admiring and delighted spectators none
shared an exactly like opinion except in this, that the statue bore
no individual resemblance; but that also was contradicted by a young
lady whom I heard exclaim: "Girls, surely that looks like Buckie
O'Neill, but in love and war men are not themselves!" "How do I know?
Oh, mamma said so!"
During the ceremony of unveiling the monument a dark, ragged storm
cloud hung over the Aztec mountain, fast overcasting the sky.
Thousands of people strained their eyes and held their breath in the
glad anticipation of seeing the features of their lamented friend,
Prescott's honored mayor, immortalized in bronze. When after moments
of anxious suspense the veil which draped the statue parted and fell
to earth, the sun's rays pierced the clouds, while deafening cheers
rent the air. I thought I heard a weird, faint cry, an echo from the
past--but cannons boomed, drums crashed as a military band rendered
its patriotic airs.
And we saw--not the familiar, fine features of our soldier hero, so
strikingly portrayed by a famed artist and molded into exact,
lifelike resemblance, but instead we beheld an unknown visage--a
type, merely the semblance of a "Rough Rider," its rigid gaze riveted
on the Idol-mountain, forever enthralled by the Sphinx.
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