The Nation's Sorrow.

Houses Draped.

Minute Guns Fired.

capital, in the mansion appropriated to the special use of the chiefest among the conspirators, he had been permitted to send words of greeting to the nation.

When he fell, treason throughout the land lay gasping dying.

It needed not that dismal, dreary, windy April day to in tensify the sorrow. As on the wings of lightning the news sped through the land - "The President is Shot" - " is Dying"-"is Dead"-men knew scarcely how to credit the tale. When the fearful certainty came home to each, strong men bowed themselves and wept-maid and matron joined in the plaint. With no extraneous prompting, with no impulse save that of the heart alone, the common grief took one common garb. Houses were draped-the flag of our country hung pensive-at half-mast-portraitures of the loved dead were found on all.

And dreary as was the day when first the tidings swept through the country, patriot hearts were drearier still. It was past analysis. It was as if chaos and dread night had come again.

Meanwhile the honored dead lay in state in the country's capitol.

On that dreamy, hazy nineteenth of April-suggesting, were it not for the early green leaves, the first springing grass, the glad spring caroling of birds-"that sweet autumnal summer which the Indian loved so well" on that day when sleep wooed one even in the early morn, his obsequies were celebrated in the country's metropolis.

And throughout the land, minute guns were fired, bells tolled, business suspended, and the thoughtful betook themselves to prayer, if so be that what verily seemed a curse might pass from us.

Thence the funeral cortege moved to the final resting-place -the remains of a darling son, earlier called, accompanying those of the father-by the route the President had taken

The Funeral Cortege.

Death of the Assassin.

Burial at Springfield.

when first he had been summoned to the chair of State. Before half of the mournful task was done, came tidings that the assassin had been sent to his final account by the avenger's hand, gurgling out, as his worthless life ebbed away, ' useless! useless!"

As the sad procession wended its way, where hundreds had gathered in '61, impelled by mere curiosity or by partisan sympathy, thousands gathered, four years later, through affection, through reverence, through deep, abiding sorrow. Flowers beautified the lifeless remains-dirges were sung -the people's great heart broke out into sobs and sighing. And so, home to the prairie they bore him whom, when first he was called, the Nation knew not whom, mid the storms and ragings of those years of civil war, they had learned, had loved, to call father and friend.

In the Oak Ridge Cemetery, in his own Springfield, on the Fourth of May, 1865, they laid him to rest, at the foot of a knoll, in the most beautiful part of the ground, over which forest trees-rare denizens of the prairie-look lovingly. There all that is mortal of ABRAHAM LINCOLN reposes. "The immortal?" Hail, and farewell!

CHAPTER XXVI.

THE MΑΝ.

Reasons for His Re-election-What was Accomplished-Leaning on the People-State Papers-His Tenacity of Purpose-Washington and Lincoln-As a Man-Favorite Poem -Autobiography-His Modesty-A Christian Conclusion.

WHAT shall be said, in summing up, of Abraham Lincoln as a statesman and a man? That from such humble beginnings, in circumstances so adverse, he rose to be the Chief Magistrate of one of the leading countries of the world, would

The Prosident as a Man.

Why Re-elected.

were it in any other country, be evidence of ability of the very highest order.

Here, however, so many from similar surroundings have achieved similar results that this fact of itself does not necessarily unfold the man clearly and fully to us. He might have been put forward for that high station as a skillful and accomplished politician, from whose elevation hosts of partizans counted upon their own personal advancement and profit. Or he might have been a successful general; or one possessing merely negative qualities, with no salient points, all objectionable angularities rounded off till that desirable availability, which has at times been laid hold of for the Presidency had been reached; or, yet again, one who had for a long time been in the front ranks of an old and triumphant party, and, therefore, as such matters have been managed with us, admitted to have strong claims upon such party; or, lastly, one who, having for many years schemed and plotted and labored, in season and out of season, for the nomination, at last achieved it.

For such Presidents have been furnished us. But he was neither. And yet the highest point to which an American may aspire he reached. Clearly, then, there must have been something of strength and of worth in the man.

He was reëlected, the first President since Jackson to whom that honor had been accorded. And thirty-two years had passed-eight Presidential terms since Jackson's reëlection. He was, moreover, reëlected by a largely increased

vote.

The years covered by his administration were the stormiest in American history, "piled high," as he himself said, "with difficulties." No President was ever more severely attacked, more unsparingly denounced than he. None more belittled than he. And yet he was triumphantly reëlected. Why? For the same reason that first brought him before the country. Primarily and mainly because the mass of the people had

Devotion to Principle.

As a Statesman.

Leaning on the People.

unbounded confidence in his honesty and devotion to principle. Though these qualities, it is pleasant to say, have been by no means rare in our Presidents, yet Abraham Lincoln seemed so to speak, so steeped and saturated in them that a hold was thereby obtained upon the common mind, the like of which no other President since Washington had secured. The bitterest opponent of his policy was constrained, if candid, to admit, if not the existence of these qualities, at least the prevailing popular belief in their existence.

What shall be said of him as a statesman?

That he found the fabric of our National Government rocking from turret to foundation stone that he left it, after four years of strife such as, happily, the world rarely witnesses, firmly fixed, and sure; this should serve in some sort, as

an answer.

But might not this be owing, or principally so, to the ability of the counsellors whom he gathered about him ? Beyond a doubt the meed of praise is to be shared. Yet we should remember that few Presidents have so uniformly acted of and for themselves in matters of state policy, as did Mr. Lincoln. Upon many questions the opinions of his Cabinet were sought-a Cabinet representing the various shades of thought, the various stages of progress, through which the people, of whom they were the exponents, were passing from year to year-after obtaining which, he would act. But, in most instances, perhaps, he struck out for himself, after careful, conscientious reflection, launching his policy upon unknown seas, quickly assured that truth was with him and that he could not be mistaken. Nor was he often.

Having to feel his way along, for the most part-groping in the dark-he could not push on so fast and far as to leave the people out of breath or staring far in his rear. Still, it must not be understood that he never acted against what was plainly the popular will. The man was not of that mould. Unquestionably in his dealings with the two leading Euro

Mr. Lincoln's Self-reliance.

Reliance on the People.

State Papers.

pean powers he often acted in direct opposition to the popular wish. Nothing would have been easier than for him to have brought a foreign war upon the country; and in such action, for a time at least, he would have been sustained by the mass of the people. So, too, as to vindictive measures towards the rebels. By adopting these he would, oftentimes, have been in harmony with the general wish for vengeance and retaliation. In both these instances to name no others -he chose to act counter to the current sentiment. More politic, with a more piercing outlook than the mass, he saw the end from the beginning, and in the one case chose to overlook what was, to his mind, grossly wrong, and in the other, to stand up for the general interests of humanity through all time rather than to cater to the desire of the hour, natural and, perhaps, pardonable though it was.

What is meant is this that, in the complications in which the country was involved, he invariably acted, where expediency simply and not principle was concerned, so as to feel sure that the body of the people were with him. If failure were to result, he would have them feel that the responsibility for it rested as much upon them as upon him. He earnestly endeavored to point out what he judged the better way and to bring the people to his conviction; but, if they retracted, he waited till they should have advanced where, or nearly where, he was.

This was generally felt, and it added largely to the confidence reposed in him. By means of it, a general acquiescence was procured in many measures earlier than could have been gained by any other course. We Americans are a peculiar people in some respects. We dislike to be led by any man. Nay, we stoutly deny that we are. We are notwhen we see the leading strings.

Mr. Lincoln's state papers in their structure and composition were not always what a critical scholar would have desired. Some would say they were presented quite too often in undress. The people are not profound critics. They