Perley's reminiscences of sixty years in the national metropolis, v. 1-2

by Benjamin Perley Poore

CHAPTER XXXVII. THE ASSASSINATION.

General Garfield was a singularly domestic man, and his life while he was a Representative, at his pleasant home on I Street was a happy one. Believing in the power of steady and sincere labor, he had mastered language, science, literature, and the fine arts. Artists found in him a zealous advocate for their employment and remuneration by Congress, and he was thoroughly acquainted with the works of the old masters. He was a great lover of scrap-books, and he had in his library a shelf full of them, containing articles and paragraphs relating to the subjects lettered on their back. In this work Mrs. Garfield rendered him valuable aid, cutting and sorting the scraps which he would mark in newspapers, and then pasting them into the scrap-books.

Freemasonry was very dear to General Garfield, who was a regular attendant on the meetings of the lodge, chapter, and encampment with which he was affiliated. He was the President of a literary association, the meetings of which he used to attend with great regularity. Occasionally he went to the theatre or to a concert, and I well remember the delight which he manifested when attending the "readings" of Charles Dickens. When the "Christmas Carol" was read, as Mr. Dickens pronounced the words, "Bless his heart, it's Fezziwig alive yet," a dog, with some double bass vocalism, stirred, perhaps, by some ghostly impulse, responded: "Bow! wow! wow!" with a repetition that not only brought down the house wildly, but threw Mr. Dickens himself into such convulsions of humor that he could not proceed with his readings. "Bow! wow! wow!" was General Garfield's favorite greeting for months afterward when he met any one whom he knew to have been at the lecture.

The White House, during the short time that General Garfield was permitted to occupy it, was a continued scene of domestic enjoyment. "Mother" Garfield had an honored place at the family table at her son's right hand, and was always waited on first, whoever else might be present. On the other side of the President sat Jamie, who was his father's pet. Harry, the oldest boy, always sat next his mother, and then Miss Mollie, who was approaching womanhood, Irwin, and little Abram, who was but nine years of age. Mrs. Garfield was a believer in good fare, and there was always an abundance of wholesome, nutritious food, with good coffee, tea, and milk. Flowers from the conservatory adorned the table at every meal. After dinner President Garfield used to indulge in a game of billiards, having promptly restored to its place the billiard- table banished by Mrs. Hayes. Occasionally he would indulge in a cigar, and he was not averse to a glass of champagne or Rhine wine or lager beer, although he drank temperately and without hypocrisy. He liked, as night came on, to take a gallop on horseback, and he was a fearless rider.

General Garfield displayed the advantage of having been regularly "trained" for his Presidential position. He heard the stories of all with a sympathetic manner that inspired confidence. He knew how to free himself from those who attempted to monopolize too much of his time, and he never gave place-hunters reason to believe that their prayers would be granted when he knew that it would not be so. There was not, after all, such a crowd of office-seekers as might have been expected at the commencement of a new Administration. Some members of the Cabinet had scores of political mortgages out, which they were called upon to redeem, and which gave the President a great deal of trouble. Then came the rejection of a Solicitor- General by the Senate, whose appointment was not acceptable to the pragmatical Attorney-General, New York troubles, the forced exposure of the Star-route scandals, and other antagonisms, rivalries, and dissensions. The Garfield Administration was on the verge of dissolution within four months after its creation.

Mrs. Garfield, familiarly called by her husband "Crete," held four successive receptions of invited guests immediately after the inauguration, at which her deportment and dress met with the heartiest commendation of "society." Lady-like, sweet-voiced, unruffled, well informed, and always appropriately dressed, she was eminently fitted to be "the first lady in the land," and she quietly yet firmly repelled any patronizing attempts to direct her movements. She had a natural aversion to publicity, but was anxious to entertain the thousands who flocked to the White House. To a stranger she appeared reticent and rather too retiring to make him feel at home, but the second and third time he saw her he began to appreciate her sterling, womanlike qualities, and to like her.

During the Presidential campaign Mrs. Garfield had been under a mental strain, and when installed in the White House the struggle between the contending New York factions gave her great uneasiness, for she possessed a complete mastery of politics. At last she was taken ill, and called in a lady physician, a responsible middle- aged woman, homoeopathic in practice, who had sometimes attended the children. When she grew worse they summoned Dr. Pope, a homoeopath of skill and reputation, and gave the case into his hands, retaining the lady as nurse. Last of all, as the physician wished consultation, they sent for Dr. Boynton, of Cleveland, a cousin of the President and a physician of good local practice. It was decided that Mrs. Garfield should seek change of air, and she left Washington and her husband for Long Branch, little dreaming that she should never see him again in health.

Then came the fatal morning of Saturday, July 2d, when—as we are told by Mr. Blaine, who accompanied him—General Garfield was a happy man, feeling that trouble lay behind him and not before him, that he was soon to meet his beloved wife, recovered from an illness that had disquieted him, and that he was going to his Alma Mater to renew the most cherished association of his early manhood. Thus gladsome, he entered the station of the Baltimore and Potomac Railroad, strong, healthy, and happy. There was a succession of pistol-shots, and he fell helpless, doomed to weary weeks of torture as he slowly descended through the martyr-gate into his grave.

The nation was inexpressibly shocked as the news of the assassination spread over the wires, and the deep anxiety which pervaded the popular mind showed the warm and intense love felt for their President, who was the incarnation of their own institutions. A special train carried Mrs. Garfield to Washington, bearing up under the weight of her sorrow with true womanly fortitude, and on her arrival she had the satisfaction of finding her husband alive and able to converse with her. There were hopes that with his heroic and cheerful courage, and his naturally strong constitution, he might struggle back to vigorous life. The bulletins issued twice a day by the physicians in attendance gave hopes, generally, of the ultimate recovery of the suffering patient, but there are good reasons for believing that these bulletins did not give a correct statement of the sufferer's condition. The President's family physician, Dr. J. H. Baxter, was not allowed to see him, and eminent surgeons, while they believed that death was inevitable, asserted that the entire diagnosis of the case was wrong from the beginning to the end. Meanwhile the patient endured pain with the calmness of a martyr, and he gazed on death with the eye of a philosopher. "I am not afraid to die," said he, "but I will try to live." He was finally taken to the seaside, and there he breathed his last.

His remains were conveyed to Washington, attended by his bereaved family, President Arthur, General Grant, and other distinguished persons, and escorted to the Capitol by the Knights Templar and the military. Twenty-nine weeks previous, when General Garfield had gone in state, in the strength of his manhood, along Pennsylvania Avenue, the Via Sacra of our Republic, to assume the responsible duties of Chief Magistrate, the bands had played patriotic airs, and he had received the loud acclaims of his fellow-citizens. Now, as his mortal remains passed over the same route in a hearse drawn by six white horses, the lively music was replaced by the solemn strains of funeral marches, and sorrow appeared to fill every breast.