No days of lingering sickness came
To warn us of his death;
No vision from the silent land
To tell of parting breath."
A post-mortem examination revealed an enlarged heart but no trace of tuberculosis, which he had in his younger days and from which he was miraculously healed and preserved.
His spirit was very tenacious of life. As ill as he was, he arose every morning at his regular early hour, and through the day engaged to a slight extent in writing. Even the day before he died he was on his feet a part of the time.
The funeral was held on the camp-ground on Sunday, the 15th. A brief notice of his death was inserted in the Gospel Trumpet of December 12. In the succeeding issue the obituary appeared in full between draped column rules.
Of the last hymn he attempted he completed only the first stanza, one half of the chorus, and the first line of the second stanza, the hymn as he left it appearing thus:
Shall my soul ascend with rapture
When the day of life is past?