Knoxville daily chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1882, 1881-05-08
LAST DYING WORDS.
How some Famous People Have Met Their
| Fate
London Globe.1

lLondon Globe
.'Help mel" are melancholy words, ut
tered by the man whose will moment be-
fore was paramount in the largest empire on
earth, and to whom more than So, 900, 900 of
| fellow-creatures were in subsection. Yet
these were, we are told, the last words of the
late Emperor, after the fatal bomb had done
| the work designed for it, on the banks of the
| Catherine canal What words were last
spoken by men who died in the field, or on
the scafold, or in bed, have been sufficiently
noted by history. Many such we doubtless
owe to the zeal of friends anxious for the
| final utterances to be in accord with the
character of the deceased Even when.
| however, the last words are beyond question
| authentic, they must not be estimated at too
high a rate. The Sir Thomas Moore or the
Madame Roland who perishes ON the scat
fold; the Mirabeau or the Goeth who dies
in his bed; even the Sir Philip Sydney or
the Sir Thomas Picton who is killed in battle,
meets fate with some degree of prepared
ness. Although nobody has served appren-
ticeship to dying, those named can not be
said to have reached their end unexpectedly
In the case of those to whom death comes
in the shape of an assassin there is, on the
contrary, an element of surprise, which
| gives to the last words, often uttered in a
stupefed and unconscious state, peculiar in
| terest?
The cry for help of the dead Emperor
was cry natural and not surprising. It
proved kindred between an autocrat and the
humblest peasant in Russia. There have,
however, been men in ancient and in mod
ern times whose last words in similar cir
cumstances have shown the character of the
speaker with as much distinctness as any of
the acts of their lives. That Brutus was
among the conspirators against his life, was
the cardinal consideration with Caesar when a
Senate drew their daggers against him. 1t
is said that after Casca had stabbed him in
the neck, this greatest of the ancients,
nobly resisted. When Cassius with furious
rage, wounded him on the head he still con-
tinued to struggle. But when he sew Brutus
aim dagger at his heart, the hero ceased
to contend with his assassins. ''And thou.
Brutus !" he muttered, as he covered his
! face and fell. Have not these last words in
describe pathos for all time? The concern
of the man who through life had been true
to friends was not that he was to die, but
that one of his friends should participate il
his murder. Cicero, when, after the forma
ton of the Second Triumvirate and the tri
umph of their party, he found his name OIL
the bloody list of prescription, did not show
nor could he be expected to show, that firm
ness in face of death which a man of wal
from youth, such as Caesar, is expected tc
possess. At first he meant to kill himself il
the house of Octavianus but his courage
failed him. He was not made of such stuff
as his contemporary, Cato, who fell on hi
own sword, and who, when his friends, tax
ing advantage of his fainting, replaced the
intestines that had fallen out, and sewed VI
the wound, tore them open on coming t.
himself. He fed. Still, in the final crisis
he comported himself with dignity. Whel
the assassins rushed at the litter in which b.
was being carried, he stretched out his necl
and exclaimed, "Strike!" with more elo
and received the fatal stroke without shrink
ing.
In all history, modern as well as ancient
profane as well as sacred, innumerable in
stances are found of men who have exhibited
what the first Napoleon called "two-o' clock
n-the-morning courage" in the presence o
the assassin. On the evening of that De
cember day, in ITO, when the courtiers o
Henry II. arrived at Canterbury, and foun'
Thomas A. Beckett at Vespers in the cathe
dral, the prelate's last words were in keepin
with his life. AS the assassins advances
toward him, with their draw
swords, he exclaimed that he died 70
the cause of God and in defens
of the rights of the church and, h
added, g charge you, in the name of tn
Almighty, to do no hurt to any other here
for none have any concern in the late trans
1 actions" Perhaps the most noble last word
: ever spoken were those uttered by Willia1
the Silent, the founder of Dutch liberty
Unlike Counts hammond and Hoorn, b
} escaped the scaffold and persisted by tn
hand of mean assassin. When Belchaze
Gerard, having obtained an introduction 0
{ the plea of being a messenger of mercy
suddenly turned and shot the Prince with
l pistol loaded with three bullets, William fel
7 calculating, my God! have mercy upo
me and thy poor people!" Taken by SUI
prise and sent to his reckoning withor
: warming, his concern was yet with the cou1
q try to which his life had been devoted an
= whose liberties he had secured. When til
Q cause of independence was precarious, whe
= it had been secured, and when it ha
' to be left to the care of others, his though
c was of his country; and "My God! hay
n mercy upon me and thy poor people" wei
the very words that might have been Q,
o pected from the great benefactor wh'
+ when the Prince made progress throug
;, Holland and Friesland, was received by IL
IL peasants as Father William"