Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1882-02-28
and generou.-hearted free

nOnest-mindeo ana ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Hee-
thinker.
On the morning of Saturday. July second.
the President was a contented and happy
man-no. in an ordinary degree, but joyfully,
almost boyishly happy. On his way TO the
railroad station to which he drove slowly. in
conscious enjoyment of the beautiful morning.
with an unwonted sense of leisure and keec
anticipation of pleasure, his talk was all in
the grateful and grafuiatory vein He felt
that after four months of trial his admlnistra-
ton was strong in its grasp of affairs strong
in popular favor ard destined to grow stronger;
that grave difficulties confronting him at his
Inauguration had been safely passed; that
trouble lay behind him and not before him;
that he soon to meet the wife whom he
loved. now recovering from Illness which
had but lately disquieted and at times almost
unnerved him; that he going 10 his Alma
Mater 70 renew the most cherished assOcia-
tons of his vonng manhood. and to exchange
greetings v it'll those whose deepening interest
mad followed every step of his upward pro-
gress from the day he entered upon his
college course until he had attained the
loftiest elevation in the gift of his country
men.
| Surely if happiness can ever come from the
honors or triumphs of this world, on that
quiet July morning James A. Garfield may
well have been a happy man. No foreboding
of evil haunted him: no sill shtest premonition
of danger cloujed his sky. His terrible fate
was upon him in an instant. One moment
he stood erect, strong. confident in the years
stretching peacefully out before him. The
next he law wounded, bleeding, helpless,
doomed to weary weeks of torture. to silence,
and the grave.
Great in life, he was surprisingly great IN
death. For no cause, in the very frenzy of
wantonness and wickedness, by the red hand
of murder, he was thrust from its hopes, its
aspirations, its victories. into the visible
presence of death-and he did not quail.
| Not alone for the one short moment in which,
stunned and dazed, he could give up life,
hardly aware of its REIMBURSEMENT, but
through DAYS OF deadly languOr, through
weeks Of agony, that was not less agony be-
cause silently borne. with clear sight and
calm courage he looked into his open grave.
What blight and ruin met his anguished eyes,
whose lips may tell-what brilliant. broken
plans, what baffied high ambitions what sun
dering of strong, warm, manboods friend
ships, what bitter rending of sweet household
ties Behind him proud, cxpectant nation.
great host of sustaining friends, a cherished
and happy mother. wearing the full. rich hon
ors of her early toll and tears the wife of
his youth. whose whole life lay in his: the
little boys not yet merged from childhood's
day Of frolic: the fair young daughter; the
sturdy sons just springing into closest COM
panionship, claiming every day and every day
rewarding a fathers love and care; and in
his heart the eager, rejoicing power to meet
all demand. Before him desolation and
great darkness. And his soul was not shaken.
His countrymen were thrilled with instant,
profound and universal sympathy. Master
| T,l, l, al 10, III,
center of nations love, enshrined in the
prayers of world. But all the love and
all the sympathy could not share with him
his suffering. He trod the vine press alone
| With untaltering front he faced death. With
untailing tenderness he took leave of life.
Above the demoniac hiss of the assassin's
| bullet he heard the voice of God. With
simple resignation be bowed to the Divine
decree.
As the end drew near. his early craving for
the sea returned. The stately mansion of
power had been to him the wearisome hospital
of pain, and he begged to be taken from its
pris on walls, from its oppressive. sitting air,
from its homelessness and hopelessness.
Gently, silently. the love of great people
| bore the pale sufferer to the longed for healing
of the sea. to live or to die, as God should
will, within sight of its heaving pillows,
within sound of its manifold voices. With
wan, fevered face tenderly lifted to the cool
ing breeze. he looked out wistfully upon the
oceans changing wonders on its far sails
whitening in the morning light; on its rest
less waves, rolling shoreward to break and
die beneath the MONDAY sun; on the red
clouds Of evening, arching low to the horizon
on the serene and shining pathway of the
stars. Let us think that his dying eyes read
a mystic meaning which only the rapt and
parting soul may know. Let us believe that
| in the silence of the receding world he heard
the great waves breaking on a further shore,
and felt already upon his wasted brow the
breath of the eternal morning