From Farm House to the White House Part 61

"These are my wills. Preserve this one, and burn the other."

Dr. Craik arrived about ten o'clock, and remained with him until his death. Drs. Brown and d.i.c.k were sent for, and every effort possible made to save his life.

"I am much obliged for all your care and attention," he said to the physicians; "but do not trouble yourselves any more about me. Let me pa.s.s away quietly. I cannot last long."

Later he said to Dr. Craik:

"Doctor, I die hard, but I am not afraid to go." He was then struggling for breath.

At eight o'clock in the evening he appeared unable to speak. Mr. Lear says:

"I aided him all in my power, and was gratified in believing he felt it, for he would look upon me with eyes speaking grat.i.tude, but unable to utter a word without great distress."

At ten o'clock he appeared to make a desperate effort to speak, and at length said to Mr. Lear: "I am just going. Have me decently buried, and do not let my body be put into the vault in less than three days after I am dead."

Mr. Lear signified his a.s.sent by a nod.

As if not satisfied with that, Was.h.i.+ngton looked up to him again, and said:

"Do you understand me?"

"Yes, sir," Mr. Lear answered distinctly.

"It is well," added the dying man--the last words he spoke.

Mr. Lear describes the closing scene thus:

"About ten minutes before he expired, his breathing became much easier; he lay quietly. He withdrew his hand from mine and felt his own pulse. I spoke to Dr. Craik, who sat by the fire; he came to the bedside. The general's hand fell from his wrist; I took it in mine and placed it on my breast. Dr. Craik closed his eyes, and he expired without groan or struggle."

Mrs. Was.h.i.+ngton had been sitting in silent grief all the while, at the foot of the bed; but now she inquired with calmness:

"Is he gone?"

No one could answer; hearts were too full for utterance. But Mr. Lear "held up his hand as a signal that he was gone."

"It is well," responded Mrs. Was.h.i.+ngton, with firm, unfaltering voice.

"All is over now; I shall soon follow him; I have no more trials to pa.s.s through."

Mr. Custis says, "Close to the couch of the sufferer resting her head upon that ancient Book with which she had been wont to hold pious communion a portion of every day for more than half a century, was the venerable consort, absorbed in silent prayer, and from which she only arose when the mourning group prepared to lead her from the chamber of the dead. Such were the last hours of Was.h.i.+ngton."

The news of the ex-president's death spread rapidly for that day when railroads and telegraphs were unknown, and the sadness and mourning were universal. Congress was in session at Philadelphia, but did not receive the sad intelligence until the 18th of December, the day of the funeral at Mount Vernon.

The members of Congress appeared to be overwhelmed by the calamity, and immediately adjourned. On a.s.sembling the next day, they eulogized both by speech and resolution the ill.u.s.trious dead; ordered that a marble monument, bearing the record of his great achievements, be erected at Was.h.i.+ngton; and appointed General Henry Lee to deliver a eulogy before both branches of Congress on the 26th. The Senate addressed an eloquent and pathetic letter to President Adams, in which it was said:

"On this occasion it is manly to weep. To lose such a man, at such a crisis, is no common calamity to the world. Our country mourns a father.

The Almighty Disposer of human events has taken from us our greatest benefactor and ornament. It becomes us to submit with reverence to Him, 'who maketh darkness his pavilion.'... Thanks to G.o.d, his glory is consummated! Was.h.i.+ngton yet lives on earth, in his spotless example; his spirit is in Heaven.

"Let his country consecrate the memory of the heroic general, the patriotic statesman, and the virtuous sage. Let them teach their children never to forget that the fruits of his labors and his example are their inheritance."

The funeral ceremonies were performed at Mount Vernon on the 18th, under the direction of Rev. Mr. Davis, rector of the parish, a.s.sisted by other clergymen. The people came from many miles around to pay a grateful tribute of respect to the honored dead. Almost the entire population of Alexandria, nine miles distant, was there, including its military companies. Eleven pieces of cannon were sent from that city, and one of its leading citizens, Robert Morris, anch.o.r.ed a schooner in the Potomac, in front of the Mount Vernon residence, from which minute-guns were fired during the funeral exercises and the march of the long procession to the tomb.

His remains were deposited in the old family vault, which was so dilapidated that the proprietor was thinking of building a new one. Only two or three days before he was taken sick, he called the attention of his nephew to the spot where he should build it, and, referring to other work demanding his attention, he added:

"But the tomb must be built first, since I may need it first."

It would be quite impossible to describe the scene of sorrow that pervaded the country when the death of Was.h.i.+ngton became known. Congress enacted that the 22d of February, Was.h.i.+ngton's birthday, should be observed for funeral services throughout the nation. Every method of expressing grief known to an afflicted people was called into requisition. Houses of wors.h.i.+p, public halls, State capitals, schoolrooms, stores, and even dwellings were hung in mourning draperies on that day. Sermons, eulogies, and resolutions by public bodies were multiplied throughout the Union. The sorrow was universal.

Irving says:

"Public testimonials of grief and reverence were displayed in every part of the Union. Nor were these sentiments confined to the United States. When the news of Was.h.i.+ngton's death reached England, Lord Bridport, who had command of a British fleet of nearly sixty sail of the line, lying at Torbay, lowered his flag half-mast, every s.h.i.+p following the example; and Bonaparte, First Consul of France, on announcing his death to the army, ordered that black c.r.a.pe should be suspended from all the standards and flags throughout the public service for ten days."

The great American orator of that day, Fisher Ames, delivered a eulogy before the Ma.s.sachusetts Legislature, in which he said:

"The fame he enjoyed is of the kind that will last forever; yet it was rather the effect than the motive of his conduct. Some future Plutarch will search for a parallel to his character. Epaminondas is perhaps the brightest name of all antiquity. Our Was.h.i.+ngton resembled him in his purity and the ardor of his patriotism; and like him, he first exalted the glory of his country."

Lord Brougham said:

"How grateful the relief which the friend of mankind, the lover of virtue, experiences, when, turning from the contemplation of such a character [Napoleon], his eye rests upon the greatest man of our own or of any age; the only one upon whom an epithet, so thoughtlessly lavished by men, may be innocently and justly bestowed!"

Edward Everett, by whose efforts and influence "The Ladies' Mount Vernon a.s.sociation of the Union" were enabled to purchase (twenty-five years ago) two hundred acres of the estate, including the mansion-house and tomb, for preservation and improvement, says, in his biography of Was.h.i.+ngton:

"In the final contemplation of his character, we shall not hesitate to p.r.o.nounce Was.h.i.+ngton, of all men that have ever lived, THE GREATEST OF GOOD MEN AND THE BEST OF GREAT MEN!"

Posterity honors itself by calling him

"THE FATHER OF HIS COUNTRY!"

XXV.

EULOGY BY GENERAL HENRY LEE.

In obedience to your will, I rise, your humble organ, with the hope of executing a part of the system of public mourning which you have been pleased to adopt, commemorative of the death of the most ill.u.s.trious and most beloved personage this country has ever produced; and which, while it transmits to posterity your sense of the awful event, faintly represents your knowledge of the consummate excellence you so cordially honor.

Desperate, indeed, is any attempt on earth to meet correspondently this dispensation of Heaven; for while, with pious resignation, we submit to the will of an all-gracious Providence, we can never cease lamenting, in our finite view of Omnipotent Wisdom, the heart-rending privation for which our nation weeps. When the civilized world shakes to its centre; when every moment gives birth to strange and momentous changes; when our peaceful quarter of the globe, exempt, as it happily has been, from any share in the slaughter of the human race, may yet be compelled to abandon her pacific policy, and to risk the doleful casualties of war; what limit is there to the extent of our loss? None within the reach of my words to express; none which your feelings will not disavow.

The founder of our federate republic, our bulwark in war, our guide in peace, is no more. Oh that this were but questionable! Hope, the comforter of the wretched, would pour into our agonizing hearts its balmy dew; but, alas! there is no hope for us. Our Was.h.i.+ngton is removed forever. Possessing the stoutest frame and purest mind, he had pa.s.sed nearly to his sixty-eighth year in the enjoyment of high health, when, habituated by his care of us to neglect himself, a slight cold, disregarded, became inconvenient on Friday, oppressive on Sat.u.r.day, and, defying every medical interposition, before the morning of Sunday, put an end to the best of men. An end did I say? His fame survives, bounded only by the limits of the earth and by the extent of the human mind. He survives in our hearts, in the growing knowledge of our children, in the affections of the good throughout the world; and when our monuments shall be done away, when nations now existing shall be no more, when even our young and far-spreading empire shall have perished, still will our Was.h.i.+ngton's glory unfaded s.h.i.+ne, and die not, until love of virtue cease on earth, or earth itself sink into chaos.

How, my fellow-citizens, shall I single to your grateful hearts his pre-eminent worth? Where shall I begin in opening to your view a character throughout sublime? Shall I speak of his warlike achievements, all springing from obedience to his country's will, all directed to his country's good?

Will you go with me to the banks of the Monongahela to see your youthful Was.h.i.+ngton supporting, in the dismal hour of Indian victory, the ill-fated Braddock, and saving, by his judgment and by his valor, the remains of a defeated army, pressed by the conquering savage foe? Or when oppressed America, n.o.bly resolving to risk her all in defence of her violated rights, he was elevated by the unanimous voice of Congress to the command of her armies, will you follow him to the high grounds of Boston, where, to an undisciplined, courageous, and virtuous yeomanry, his presence gave the stability of system, and infused the invincibility of love of country? Or shall I carry you to the painful scenes of Long Island, York Island, and New Jersey, when, combating superior and gallant armies, aided by powerful fleets, and led by chiefs high in the roll of fame, he stood the bulwark of our safety, undismayed by disaster, unchanged by change of fortune? Or will you view him in the precarious fields of Trenton, where deep glooms, unnerving every arm, reigned triumphant through our thinned, worn down, unaided ranks, himself unmoved? Dreadful was the night! It was about this time of winter. The storm raged; the Delaware, rolling furiously with floating ice, forbade the approach of man. Was.h.i.+ngton, self-collected, viewed the tremendous scene; his country called. Unappalled by surrounding dangers, he pa.s.sed to the hostile sh.o.r.e; he fought, he conquered. The morning sun cheered the American world. Our country rose on the event, and her dauntless chief, pursuing his blow, completed on the lawns of Princeton what his vast soul had conceived on the sh.o.r.es of the Delaware.

Thence to the strong grounds of Morristown he led his small but gallant band, and through an eventful winter, by the high efforts of his genius, whose matchless force was measurable only by the growth of difficulties, he held in check formidable hostile legions, conducted by a chief experienced in the art of war, and famed for his valor on the ever-memorable heights of Abraham, where fell Wolfe, Montcalm, and, since, our much lamented Montgomery, all covered with glory. In this fortunate interval, produced by his masterly conduct, our fathers, ourselves, animated by his resistless example, rallied around our country's standard, and continued to follow her beloved chief through the various and trying scenes to which the destinies of our Union led.

Who is there that has forgotten the vales of Brandywine, the fields of Germantown, or the plains of Monmouth? Everywhere present, wants of every kind obstructing, numerous and valiant armies encountering, himself a host, he a.s.suaged our sufferings, limited our privations, and upheld our tottering republic. Shall I display to you the spread of the fire of his soul by rehearsing the praises of the hero of Saratoga and his much loved compeer of the Carolina? No: our Was.h.i.+ngton wears not borrowed glory. To Gates, to Greene, he gave, without reserve, the applause due to their eminent merit; and long may the chiefs of Saratoga and of Eutaws receive the grateful respect of a grateful people.