CHAPTER XLI.

McKINLEY LAID AT REST.

The mortal remains of President McKinley are at rest. For six days and through hundreds of miles a sorrowing nation has followed his bier. Now the last look has been taken, the last farewells have been said. The last salute to a dead President has echoed above his head.

His body was laid for the moment in the little cemetery of Canton, guarded by soldiers of the flag he loved so well, until it shall be placed beside the mother and other dear ones who departed before him. There the people who loved and honored him will raise a monument to his name and make of his grave a shrine.

But his highest monument must ever remain in the hearts of his countrymen. A mourning people raises its head from the dust and goes forward encouraged and guided by the life he lived.

Gray and somber dawned the morning of the entombment. There was a chill in the air indicating that nature was in full harmony with the multitudes who were here to see. It was just twenty years to the day since the death of James A. Garfield, the second martyred President, and many remembered that fact and were still further depressed.

Before the sun had been able to pierce its way through the clouds, infantry, cavalry and artillery were moving in the direction of the McKinley home. Long before 9 o’clock five thousand members of the Ohio National Guard were in position, some assisting in guarding the streets, others ready to take part in the funeral procession. Regulars were there in great numbers. Sailors and marines were out. Civic bodies were formed.

Entrance to the church was by card. Although the public knew this, all hoped against hope that by some chance they could force their way into the edifice. Hours before the doors were opened long lines were formed by the holders of cards, and back of them were thousands who were willing to stand in the chill air on a single chance that enough room might be spared for them to squeeze in.

The same eight stalwart soldiers and marines who had carried the coffin when it had been previously moved, shouldered it and bore it down the steps, down the path through the yard, with its beautiful lawn and flowerbeds gay with the blossoms of the late summer, out to the waiting hearse. The casket was draped in the flag that William McKinley had fought to maintain as that of an undivided country. About the coffin flowers were massed in such quantities as to fill the hearse.

A signal was given and the forward move began. Thayer’s military band led the way behind the police guard. As the hearse moved the familiar strains of “Nearer, My God, to Thee” were sounded. The music was soft and sweet, barely loud enough to be heard a block away.

The strains of “Lead, Kindly Light” announced the approach to the church, and a hush fell upon the struggling throng. The cavalry escort slowly swung into Tuscarawas street at the head of the funeral line, with the bugles silent and all orders given by signs. The cavalrymen formed three sides of a hollow square opposite the church doors, brought their swords to the position of “present arms” and sat like statues.

The great organ inside the church was waked by the first faint ripple of music from the street, which quivered through the black-draped doors, and commenced to breathe softly through the auditorium the solemn notes of Beethoven’s funeral march.

Four girls rose and joined their voices to the beautiful melody of the beautiful song, “Beautiful Isle of Somewhere.” It was like an answer to complaining hearts as it ran:

Somewhere the sun is shining; Somewhere the song birds dwell; Hush, then, thy sad repining; God lives and all is well.

Somewhere, somewhere, Beautiful Isle of Somewhere; Land of the true, where we live anew; Beautiful Isle of Somewhere.

Somewhere the load is lifted, Close by an open gate; Somewhere the clouds are rifted; Somewhere the angels wait.

Somewhere, somewhere, Beautiful Isle of Somewhere, Land of the true, where we live anew; Beautiful Isle of Somewhere.

Rev. O. B. Milligan, pastor of the First Presbyterian Church, led in prayer. In these words he asked for Divine light on a way out of the shadow cast upon the nation, and especially for heavenly assistance for Mrs. McKinley in her great sorrow.

Everybody in the church joined in the Lord’s prayer, Rev. Dr. John A. Hall, pastor of Trinity Lutheran Church, then read from the scriptures the Nineteenth Psalm, to which President McKinley was accustomed to turn for comfort when his heart was heavy. Rev. E. P. Herbruck, pastor of Trinity Reformed Church, also read from the scriptures, selecting the fifteenth chapter of the first epistle to the Corinthians, verses 41 to 58.

The quartet again arose and sang Cardinal Newman’s grand hymn, “Lead, Kindly Light,” the beautiful words floating through all the church.

Rev. Dr. C. E. Manchester, pastor of the First Methodist Episcopal Church of Canton, then delivered the funeral sermon.

“Our President is dead. The silver cord is loosed, the golden bowl is broken, the pitcher is broken at the fountain, the wheel broken at the cistern, the mourners go about the streets.

“One voice is heard, a wail of sorrow from all the land, for the beauty of Israel is slain upon the high places. How are the mighty fallen! I am distressed for thee, my brother. Very pleasant hast thou been unto me. Our President is dead.

“We can hardly believe it. We had hoped and prayed and it seemed that our hopes were to be realized and our prayers answered when the emotion of joy was changed to one of grave apprehension. Still we waited, for we said, ‘It may be that God will be gracious and merciful unto us.’ It seemed to us that it must be His will to spare the life of one so well beloved and so much needed.

“Thus, alternating between hope and fear, the weary hours passed on. Then came the tidings of defeated sciences, of the failure of love and prayer to hold its object to the earth. We seemed to hear the faintly muttered words: ‘Good-by all, good-by. It’s God’s way. His will be done,’ and then, ‘Nearer, My God, to Thee.’

“So, nestling nearer to his God, he passed out into unconsciousness, skirted the dark shores of the sea of death for a time and then passed on to be at rest. His great heart had ceased to beat. Our hearts are heavy with sorrow.

“A voice is heard on earth of kinsfolk weeping The loss of one they love; But he has gone where the redeemed are keeping A festival above.

“The mourners throng the ways and from the steeple The funeral bells toll slow; But on the golden streets the holy people Are passing to and fro.

“And saying as they meet, ‘Rejoice. Another, Long waited for is come. The Savior’s heart is glad, a younger Brother Has reached the Father’s home.’”

“The cause of this universal mourning is to be found in the man himself. The inspired penman’s picture of Jonathan, likening him unto the ‘Beauty of Israel,’ could not be more appropriately employed than in chanting the lament of our fallen chieftain. It does no violence to human speech, nor is it fulsome eulogy, to speak thus of him, for who that has seen his stately bearing, his grace and manliness of demeanor, his kindliness of aspect, but gives assent to this description of him.

“It was characteristic of our beloved President that men met him only to love him. They might indeed differ with him, but in the presence of such dignity of character and grace of manner none could fail to love the man. The people confided in him, believed in him. It was said of Lincoln that probably no man since the days of Washington was ever so deeply imbedded and enshrined in the hearts of the people, but it is true of McKinley in a larger sense. Industrial and social conditions are such that he was, even more than his predecessors, the friend of the whole people.

“A touching scene was enacted in this church last Sunday night. The services had closed. The worshipers were gone to their homes. Only a few lingered to discuss the sad event that brings us together to-day. Three men in working garb, of a foreign race and unfamiliar tongue, entered the room. They approached the altar, kneeling before it and before his picture. Their lips moved as if in prayer, while tears furrowed their cheeks. They may have been thinking of their own King Humbert and of his untimely death. Their emotion was eloquent, eloquent beyond speech, and it bore testimony to their appreciation of manly friendship and of honest worth.

“It is a glorious thing to be able to say in this presence, with our illustrious dead before us, that he never betrayed the confidence of his countrymen. Not for personal gain or pre-eminence would he mar the beauty of his soul. He kept it clean and white before God and man, and his hands were unsullied by bribes. ‘His eyes looked right on, and his eyelids looked straight before him.’

“He was sincere, plain and honest, just, benevolent and kind. He never disappointed those who believed in him, but measured up to every duty, and met every responsibility in life grandly and unflinchingly.

“Not only was our President brave, heroic and honest; he was as gallant a knight as ever rode the lists for his lady love in the days when knighthood was in flower. It is but a few weeks since the nation looked on with tear-dimmed eyes as it saw with what tender conjugal devotion he sat at the bedside of his beloved wife, when all feared that a fatal illness was upon her. No public clamor that he might show himself to the populace, no demand of a social function, was sufficient to draw the lover from the bedside of his wife. He watched and waited while we all prayed—and she lived.

“This sweet and tender story all the world knows, and the world knows that his whole life had run in this one groove of love. It was a strong arm that she leaned upon, and it never failed her. Her smile was more to him than the plaudits of the multitude, and for her greeting his acknowledgments of them must wait. After receiving the fatal wound his first thought was that the terrible news might be broken gently to her.

“May God in this deep hour of sorrow comfort her. May His grace be greater than her anguish. May the widow’s God be her God.

“Another beauty in the character of our President that was a chaplet of grace about his neck was that he was a Christian. In the broadest, noblest sense of the word that was true. His confidence in God was strong and unwavering. It held him steady in many a storm where others were driven before the wind and tossed. He believed in the fatherhood of God and in His sovereignty.

“His faith in the gospel of Christ was deep and abiding. He had no patience with any other theme of pulpit discourse. ‘Christ and Him crucified’ was to his mind the only panacea for the world’s disorders. He believed it to be the supreme duty of the Christian minister to preach the word. He said ‘We do not look for great business men to enter the pulpit, but for great preachers.’

“It is well known that his godly mother had hoped for him that he would become a minister of the gospel and that she believed it to be the highest vocation in life. It was not, however, his mother’s faith that made him a Christian. He had gained in early life a personal knowledge of Jesus which guided him in the performance of greater duties and vaster than have been the lot of any other American President. He said at one time, while bearing heavy burdens, that he could not discharge the daily duties of his life but for the fact that he had faith in God.

“William McKinley believed in prayer, in the beauty of it, in the potency of it. Its language was not unfamiliar to him, and his public addresses not infrequently evinced the fact. It was perfectly consistent with his lifelong convictions and his personal experiences that he should say at the first critical moment after the assassination approached, ‘Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done.’ He lived grandly; it was fitting that he should die grandly. And now that the majesty of death has touched and calmed him, we find that in his supreme moment he was still a conqueror.

“My friends and countrymen, with what language shall I attempt to give expression to the deep horror of our souls as I speak of the cause of his death? When we consider the magnitude of the crime that has plunged the country and the world into unutterable grief, we are not surprised that one nationality after another has hastened to repudiate the dreadful act.

“This gentle spirit, who hated no one, to whom every man was a brother, was suddenly smitten by the cruel hand of an assassin, and that, too, while in the very act of extending a kind and generous greeting to one who approached him under the sacred guise of friendship. Could the assailant have realized how awful was the act he was about to perform, how utterly heartless the deed, methinks he would have stayed his hand at the very threshold of it.

“In all the coming years men will seek in vain to fathom the enormity of that crime. Had this man who fell been a despot, a tyrant, an oppressor, an insane frenzy to rid the world of him might have sought excuse; but it was the people’s friend who fell when William McKinley received the fatal wound.

“Himself a son of toil, his sympathies were with the toiler. No one who has seen the matchless grace and perfect ease with which he greeted such can ever doubt that his heart was in his open hand. Every heart throb was for his countrymen.

“That his life should be sacrificed at such a time, just when there was abundant peace, when all the Americans were rejoicing together, is one of the inscrutable mysteries of Providence. Like many others, it must be left for future revelations to explain.

“In the midst of our sorrow we have much to console us. He lived to see his nation greater than ever before. All sectional lines are blotted out. There is no South, no North, no East, no West. Washington saw the beginning of our national life. Lincoln passed through the night of our history and saw the dawn. McKinley beheld his country in the splendor of its noon. Truly, he died in the fullness of his fame.

“With Paul he could say, and with equal truthfulness, ‘I am now ready to be offered.’ The work assigned him had been well done. The nation was at peace. We had fairly entered upon an era of unparalleled prosperity. Our revenues were generous. Our standing among the nations was secure. Our President was safely enshrined in the affections of a united people.

“It was not at him that the fatal shot was fired, but at the very life of the government. His offering was vicarious. It was blood poured upon the altar of human liberty. In view of these things we are not surprised to hear from one who was present when this great soul passed away that he never before saw a death so peaceful, or a dying man so crowned with grandeur.

“Let us turn now to a brief consideration of some of the lessons that we are to learn from this sad event. The first one that will occur to us all is the old, old lesson that ‘in the midst of life we are in death.’ ‘Man goeth forth to his work and to his labor until the evening.’ ‘He fleeth as it were a shadow and never continueth in one stay.’

“Our President went forth in the fullness of his strength, in his manly beauty, and was suddenly smitten by the hand that brought death with it. None of us can tell what a day may bring forth. Let us therefore remember that ‘no man liveth to himself and none of us dieth to himself.’ ‘May each day’s close see each day’s duty done.’

“Another great lesson that we should heed is the vanity of mere earthly greatness. In the presence of the Dread Messenger how small are all the trappings of wealth and distinctions of rank and power. I beseech you, seek Him who said, ‘I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in Me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth in Me shall never die.’ There is but one Savior for the sinsick and the weary. I entreat you, find Him, as our brother found Him.

“But our last words must be spoken. Little more than four years ago we bade him good-by as he went to assume the great responsibilities to which the nation had called him. His last words as he left us were:

“‘Nothing could give me greater pleasure than this farewell greeting—this evidence of your friendship and sympathy, your good will, and I am sure the prayers of all the people with whom I have lived so long and whose confidence and esteem are dearer to me than any other earthly honors.

“‘To all of us the future is as a sealed book, but if I can, by official act or administration or utterance, in any degree add to the prosperity and unity of our beloved country, and the advancement and well-being of our splendid citizenship, I will devote the best and most unselfish efforts of my life to that end. With this thought uppermost in my mind, I reluctantly take leave of my friends and neighbors, cherishing in my heart the sweetest memories and thoughts of my old home—my home now—and I trust my home hereafter so long as I shall live.’

“We hoped, with him, that when his work was done, freed from the burdens of his great office, crowned with the affections of a happy people, he might be permitted to close his earthly life in the home he loved. He has indeed returned to us, but how? Borne to the strains of ‘Nearer, My God, to Thee,’ and placed where he first began life’s struggle, that the people might look and weep over so sad a home-coming.

“But it was a triumphal march. How vast the procession. The nation rose, stood with uncovered head. The people of the land are chief mourners. The nations of the earth weep with them. But, oh, what a victory! I do not ask you in the heat of public address, but in the calm moments of mature reflection, what other man ever had such high honors bestowed upon him and by so many people? What pageant has equaled this that we look upon to-night?

“We gave him to the nation but a little more than four years ago. He went out with the light of the morning upon his brow, but with his task set, and the purpose to complete it. We take him back a mighty conqueror.

“‘The churchyard where his children rest, The quiet spot that suits him best; There shall his grave be made, And there his bones be laid. And there his countrymen shall come, With memory proud, with pity dumb, And strangers far and near, For many and many a year, For many and many an age, While history on her ample page The virtues shall enroll Of that paternal soul.’”

Venerable Bishop I. W. Joyce of Minneapolis then led in brief prayer. He had been conducting the East Ohio Methodist Episcopal conference at New Philadelphia when the President died. The conference adjourned, and Bishop Joyce and his cabinet have been ever since at the disposal of the friends of the President. He especially remembered President Roosevelt in his petition this afternoon.

The choir then sang “Nearer, My God, to Thee,” at first softly, and then rising into the passionate declaration, “Still all my song shall be.” It was as if the whole nation were being brought closer to the great white throne by the sacrifice of their President’s life.

Rev. Father Edward J. Vattmann of Chicago pronounced the benediction. He is chaplain of the United States Army at Fort Sheridan.

It was after 3 o’clock when the silent and anxious throngs outside the church saw the solemn pageant reappear through the church doors. A more impressive sight than the cortege of the President from the church to the cemetery has seldom been witnessed in this country. Nominally it was a private funeral. Actually it was a national demonstration. More than 12,000 marching men were in line. About 6,000 were the citizen soldiery of Ohio. The others were old soldiers and members of civic and fraternal organizations from all quarters of the state.

The head of the cortege arrived at Westlawn Cemetery at 3:30 o’clock. The roadway from the gate to the receiving vault was carpeted with flowers. Geraniums, carnations, sweet peas and roses had been strewn in great profusion. The old soldiers who had marched the weary march to honor their old comrade a last time could not forego the chance to take away a fragrant souvenir of his earthly end. One by one they stooped to gather a flower, and when they had passed the roadway it was almost bare.

The funeral car reached the cemetery gates at 4 o’clock. From the hilltop the President’s salute of twenty-one guns, fired at intervals of one minute, announced its coming. The military guards came to a “present” with a snap as the funeral car approached for the last scene in the life and death of William McKinley—a scene beautiful and impressive as his life had been.

After the arrival of the casket there was a moment’s pause as Colonel Bingham looked to see that all was in readiness. He then looked toward Bishop Joyce, who read the burial service of the Methodist church, slowly but in a voice that could be heard distinctly by all who were grouped about the vault. Instantly from the eight buglers rang out the notes of the soldier’s last call, “taps.”

With bared heads the President and members of the cabinet, who were followed by the officers of the army and navy, stood on each side of the walk, the lines reaching just to the edge of the roadway. Within a minute after the formation of the lines, the funeral car came up to the walk. The casket was gently lifted from the hearse, and borne to the floor of the vault, where it was rested upon the catafalque.

The last of the procession passed the bier at 5:45 o’clock, and then orders were given by Captain Riddle that the cemetery be cleared. This was quickly done, and the President was left in the care of his guard of honor. The first sentry to be posted in a tour of guard duty before the doorway was Private Otto White of Company C, Fourteenth Infantry, whose home is in Genoa, Ohio.

The vault gates closed with a hollow clang as the soldiers took up the weary round of sentry duty in the lonely cemetery. Two miles away, in the cottage so lately the home of a President, a heart-broken widow wrestled with her grief.

And the funeral of William McKinley was over.