My Dear Sir:—
Many thanks for your kind New Year’s greeting! The friendship and good wishes which you express for me are cordially reciprocated. May you live many years in health, peace and prosperity, and may your great work prove to be a triumph for yourself and a lasting benefit for your country! I think you were right in not turning away from it to write a volume of four hundred pages, as a political hand-book for the next Presidential campaign. Such a volume would be highly useful and important, but it may well be prepared by Messrs. Burke and Gillet. Should they undertake the task, I would suggest that you recommend to them a careful perusal of the debates and proceedings of Congress during the extra session, after the election of General Harrison (first Session of 27th Congress, 1841). Mr. Burke was then a member of the House.
Thank God! I now enjoy reasonably good health.
Your friend, very respectfully,
James Buchanan.
CHAPTER XXX.
1868.
DEATH OF MR. BUCHANAN—HIS CHARACTER AS A STATESMAN, A MAN AND A CHRISTIAN.
Notwithstanding the prospect of longer life with which the year 1868 began for Mr. Buchanan, the end was drawing near. The world and the world’s interests faded away, the unknown future opened before him, and naught earthly remained for the strong old man, bound down by the infirmities of age, but the tender care of those who had assembled to soothe and cheer him.
When in health, he was very fond of having bright and cultivated women about him, and in sickness he was peculiarly dependent on their ministrations. For him, there had never been wife or child. But he was specially blest by female kindred, who never failed or faltered in their devotion to him. There were present at Wheatland, during his last illness, his brother, the Rev. Dr. Buchanan; Miss Henrietta Buchanan, daughter of that gentleman; Mr. and Mrs. Johnston; Mr. Henry, and the ever faithful “Miss Hetty.” Kind neighbors were at hand, among whom his friend, the Rev. Dr. Nevin, was one of the most assiduous. Doctor Buchanan was obliged to return to his home, near Philadelphia, two days before the death occurred, at which time the event was apparently not very near. Miss Henrietta Buchanan, whose absence from her uncle’s room, even for a short time, made him impatient, as well as Mrs. Johnston and Miss Parker, watched him with the utmost tenderness to the last. So did the others whom I have named. His death, the immediate cause of which was rheumatic gout, occurred on the morning of June 1st, 1868, in his 78th year. His last hours were free from suffering, and his mind was clear. Miss Annie Buchanan says, in a communication addressed to me:—
In his last year he began to feel that he was very old, and looked forward to death, and spoke as if he expected it constantly. Not that his health was such as to create this expectation, for it was as good as persons of his age usually enjoy. He had a very severe illness soon after his return from Washington.