Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1904-02-20


people were being led to believe that
he was an unspeakable monster.
When Senator Hanna showed me the
telegram from Mckinley his eyes
twinkled and he said: THAT sounds
all right doesn't it, but Mckinley can
not pull the wool over my eyes. He is
afraid will so up there and make a
fool of myself in the enemy's country.
am not going to do that but am go
ing up there and square myself with
the people and take crack at some Of
those liars on the other side. He went
as he said he would and am sorry
was not able to go with him for I
! learned afterward that he simply
made tour Of triumph, won the peo-
Pile TO him in crowds and had them
| following him from one town to an
other to hear him speak. That Is the
way he always did when he came in
contact with the people,"
Senator Hanna's last days were very
pathetic. When he got so weak he
could not talk the physicians would
ask MIN to aid them in their treatment
and the expression on his face would
7
will power to do as they asked. Be
Hanna was continually giving exhibit
lions Of his strong personality. He did
not hesitate to complain Justify at any
thing that he did not like, and de.
lighted his physicians with flashes of
temper. He would also in the midst
of his fever yield to his irresistible
temptation to joke, and often when his
physicians would give him his little al
lowance OF milk or kumyss he would
remark that it was "a mighty poor
meal to give man."
The devotion of many friends was
most notable in the crowds that stayed
about the Arlington day and night Az
ter his condition became criti-
cal there were dozens of
prominent politicians from Ohio and
elsewhere who remained at the hotel
day and night with the small army of
newspaper men who never left the cor
ridors, only getting little snatches of
sleep in the big arm chairs or on the
settees.
The ratification of the Panama ca
nal treaty has been fastened rather
than delayed by the death of Senator
Hanna. He was intensely interested
in the construction of the canal by the
Panama route, and all the weight of
his great personal influence had been
thrown in it's behalf for more than
year. Senator Hanna became con-
WINGED that it was easier to build the
canal by way of Panama than by way
of Nicaragua. He opposed Nicaragua
and subjected himself to severe criti-
cism by those who could not be made
to believe his motives were entirely
pure. HeSwas charged with being the
agent of the transcontinental railroad
combine, and it was freely alleged he
favored the Panama route merely to
kill off the Panama canal and thus
leave the transcontinental railroads
masters of the situation, as they are
today.
Since the mud singing of the Nc
Kinley campaign Senator Hanna has
been subjected to few such trials as
those which followed his advocacy Of
the Panama canal route for a canal be-
tween the two oceans. He lived down
these ISLANDERS exactly as he lived
down those of 1896, by attending to his
business, by remaining steadfast in
the purpose with which he started out
and by relying upon time and tho good
sense of the people to justify his ac-
ton. When Mark Hanna took up the
Panama canal there were few others
in Washington to talk on the same
side except half dozen people who
were generally supposed to be needy
and unreliable adyenturers. Mr.. Han
ma believed thoroughly in the Panama
canal and held constant conferences
with representatives of the French
company, and it is undoubtedly true
the American people owe it to Sena-
tor Hanna more than to any one man
that the canal across the isthmus is
now so nearly an accomplished fact.