President Roosevelt and the members of the cabinet were the first to pass by the bier, followed by the highest officers of the army and navy, Senator Hanna and many others high in public life.
Later the public was admitted to the chamber and thousands viewed the body. Mrs. McKinley and the relatives did not go to the courthouse. She stood the trip fairly well, and soon after arriving went to sleep in the old home.
Mrs. McKinley was almost the first to leave the train. She leaned heavily on the arm of Abner McKinley and was supported on the other side by Dr. Rixey. She walked slowly toward the carriage prepared for her and was taken to the home of which she has been mistress for so many years. There was not a person of the hundreds who saw her at the depot but who knew her. Her sweet face was not visible through the heavy black of her mourning veil, but her frail form and bearing made her instantly recognized by those assembled.
A sublime hush fell upon all. There were scores of women present and all were in tears. It was a great, silent outpouring of deep sympathy for the crushed soul of their beloved neighbor.
President Roosevelt and the cabinet left their car in the opposite direction and took their places in the closed carriages for the funeral procession. The great throng regarded them respectfully. For five years those gathered here had annually received as President of the United States their fellow townsman. The sorrow of the citizens of Canton was yet too poignant to permit of the expression of any other emotion than grief. Eight artillerymen and eight soldiers slowly trod down the steps of the Pacific, the car in which the President’s body rested. A passing cloud which had cast its kindly shade upon the dolorous form of the President’s widow now withdrew from the face of the sun so as to permit the warming rays to rest upon the casket of the dead President.
A window was raised toward the rear of the car, the same window through which the body had been passed thrice before. The opening looked very small. Eight of the guards, four bluejackets and four red-striped sergeants of artillery, stood below to receive the heavy burden. A moment later the end of the coffin, draped with the red, white and blue of its silken covering, protruded. A few of the onlookers had not thought it necessary to remove their hats, they had been so absorbed in the incoming of the train. Their heads were bared instantly. The eight soldiers and sailors received the great weight on their shoulders. They were sturdy men, but their limbs trembled under the strain.
Preceded by Judge Day and other members of the reception committee, the coffin was borne the whole length of the station platform, several hundred feet. The militia surrounding the station stood at present arms. At the end of the platform was the hearse chosen to carry the corpse in the procession to the courthouse.
“Present arms!” came the command from the sergeant of hussars opposite the hearse. Magnificently caparisoned in all the trappings of their full dress, Troop A of the Cleveland Hussars had been chosen to precede the hearse in the procession.
At the call one hundred swords were unsheathed and held pointing upward from the broad bosoms of the cavalrymen. The bright blades, freshly burnished for the occasion, flashed the sunlight like white fire. The gold lace shone, and the bearskin caps, towering above the erect heads of the hussars, added to the martial effect.
In the attitude of present, like a hundred equestrian statues, the hussars remained motionless until the casket had been placed within the hearse. If a horse moved its foot or whisked a fly from its sides the motion was not apparent. The air was still, the crowd was still, the engine at the head of the train was still, and the intense silence pervaded the entire surroundings.