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march in "Saul" was sung, accompanied by the band, as the remains were deposited. Thousands of persons were assembled at the cemetery before the arrival of the procession, occupying the succession of green hills, and the scene was one of the most intense solemnity. The landscape was beautiful in the light of an unclouded sun.

The religious exercises were commenced by the singing of a dirge. Then followed the reading of appropriate portions of the Scriptures and a prayer. After a hymn sung by the choir, the Rev. Mr. Hubbard read the last inaugural of President Lincoln. Another dirge was sung by the choir, when Bishop Simpson delivered the funeral oration. It was in the highest degree solemn, eloquent, and patriotic, and portions of it were applauded. Then followed another dirge and hymn, when benediction was pronounced by the Rev. Dr. Gurley. The procession was then re-formed, and returned to the city.

REMINISCENCES.

We have followed the remains of President Lincoln from Washington, the scene of his assassination, to Springfield, his former home and now to be his final restingplace. He had been absent from that city ever since he left it in February, 1861, for the National Capital, to be inaugurated as President of the United States. We have seen him lying in state in the Executive Mansion, where the obsequies were attended by numerous mourners, some of them clothed with the highest public honors and responsibilities which our republican institutions can bestow, and by the diplomatic representatives of foreign Governments. We have followed the remains from Washington, through Baltimore, Harrisburg, Philadelphia, New York, Albany, Buffalo, Cleveland, Columbus, Indianapolis, and Chicago to Springfield, a distance in circuit of fifteen hundred or eighteen hundred miles. On the route millions

of people have appeared to manifest by every means of which they were capable, their deep sense of the public loss, and their appreciation of the many virtues which adorned the life of Abraham Lincoln. All classes, without distinction of politics, spontaneously united in the posthumous honors. All hearts seemed to beat as one at the bereavement; and now funeral processions are ended, our mournful duty of escorting the mortal remains of Abraham Lincoln hither is performed. We have seen them deposited in the tomb. The bereaved friends, with subdued and grief-stricken hearts, have taken their adieu. and turn their faces homeward, ever to remember the affecting and impressive scenes which they have witnessed. The injunction, so often repeated on the way, "Bear him gently to his rest," has been obeyed, and the great heart of the nation throbs heavily at the portals of the tomb.

BISHOP SIMPSON'S FUNERAL ORATION.

"FELLOW-CITIZENS OF ILLINOIS AND OF MANY PARTS OF OUR ENTIRE UNION :—-Near the capital of this large and growing State of Illinois, in the midst of this beautiful grove, and at the open mouth of the vault which has just received the remains of our fallen chieftain, we gather to pay a tribute of respect and drop the tears of sorrow around the ashes of the mighty dead. Â A little more than four years ago, from his plain and quiet home in yonder city, he started, receiving the parting words of the concourse of friends who gathered around him, and in the midst of the dropping of the gentle shower he told of the pains of parting from the place where his children had been born and his home had been made so pleasant by early recollections. And as he left he made an earnest request in the hearing of some who are present, that as he was about to enter upon responsibilities which he believed to be greater than any which had fallen upon any man since the days of Washington, the people would offer up their prayers that God would aid and sustain him in the work they had given him to do. His company left your quiet city. But as it went snares were in waiting for the Chief Magistrate. Scarcely did he escape the dangers of the way or the hands of the assassin as he neared Washington, and I believe he escaped only through the vigilance of the officers and the prayers of the people; so that the blow was suspended for more than four

years, which was at last permitted, through the providence of God, to fall. How different the occasion which witnessed his departure and that which witnessed his return! Doubtless you expected to take him by the hand, to feel the warm grasp which you felt in other days, and to see the tall form walking among you which you had delighted to honor in years past. But he was never permitted to return until he came with lips mute and silent, his frame encoffined, and a weeping nation following as his mourners. Such a scene as his return to you was never witnessed among the events of history. There have been great processions of mourners. There was one for the patriarch Jacob, which came up from Egypt, and the Egyptians wondered at the evidence of reverence and filial affection which came from the hearts of the Israelites. There was mourning when Moses fell upon the heights of Pisgah and was hid from human view. There have been mournings in the kingdoms of the earth when kings and warriors have fallen; but never was there in the history of man such mourning as that which has accompanied the funeral procession and has gathered around the mortal remains of him who was our loved one, and who now sleeps among us. If we glance at the procession which followed him we see how the nation stood aghast. Tears filled the eyes of many sunburned faces. Strong men, as they clasped the hands of their friends, were unable to find vent for their grief in words. Women and little children caught up the tidings as they ran through the land and were melted into tears. The nation stood still. Men left their plows in the fields and asked what the end would be. The hum of manufactures ceased and the sound of the hammer was not heard. Busy merchants closed their doors, and in the exchange gold passed no more from hand to hand. Three weeks have passed. The nation has scarcely breathed easily yet. A mournful silence is abroad upon the land. Nor is this mourning confined to any class or to any district of the country. Men of all political parties and of all religious creeds seem united in paying this mournful tribute. The Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Church in New York and a Protestant minister walked side by side in the sad procession, and a Jewish Rabbi performed a part of the solemn service. There are gathered around his tomb representatives of the army and navy, senators, judges, governors and officers of all the branches of the government and members of all the civic associations, with men and women from the humblest as well as the highest occupations. Here and there, too, are tears, as sincere and warm as any that drop, which come from the eyes of those whose kindred and whose race have been freed from their chains by him whom they mourn as their deliverer. Far more have gazed on the face of the departed than ever looked upon the face of any other departed man. More eyes have looked upon the procession for sixteen hundred miles or more by night and by day, by sunlight,

dawn, twilight and by torchlight, than ever before watched the progress of a procession. We ask why this wonderful mourning, this great procession? I answer: First, a part of the interest has arisen from the times in which we live, and in which he that has fallen was a principal actor. It is a principle of our nature that feelings once excluded from the object by which they are excited, turn readily to some other object which may for the time being take possession of the mind. Another principle is, that the deepest affections of our hearts gather around some human form in which are incarnated the loving thoughts and ideas of the passing age. If we look, then, at the times, we see an age of excitement. For four years the popular heart has been stirred to its utmost depths. War had come upon us, dividing families, separating nearest and dearest friends-a war, the extent and magnitude of which no one could estimate--a war in which the blood of brethren was shed by a brother's hand. A call for soldiers was made by this voice, now hushed, and all over this land-from hill to mountain, from plain to valleythey sprung up, hundreds of thousands of bold hearts, ready to go forth and save our National Union. This feeling of excitement was transferred next into a feeling of deep grief, because of the dangers in which our country was placed. Many said, Is it possible to save our nation? Some in our own country, and nearly all the leading men in other countries, declared it to be impossible to maintain the Union; and many an honest heart was deeply pained with apprehensions of common ruin; and many, in grief, and almost in despair, anxiously inquired, 'What shall the end of these things be?' In addition, the wives had given their husbands, and mothers their sons. In the pri·le and joy of their hearts, they saw them put on their uniform-they saw them take their martial step-and they tried to hide their deep feelings of sadness. Many dear ones slept on the battlefield-never, never, to return again-and there was mourning in every mansion and in every cabin in our broad land. Then came a feeling to deepen sadness, as the story came of prisoners tortured to death, or starved, through the mandates of those who are called the representatives of the Chivalry, or who claim to be the honorable ones of the earth; and as we read the stories of frames attenuated, and reduced to mere skeletons, our grief turned partly to horror, and partly into a cry for vengeance. Then, the feeling was changed to one of joy. There came signs of the end of the rebellion. We followed the career of our glorious Generals. We saw our army, under the command of the brave officer who is guiding this procession, climb up the heights of Lookout Mountain, and drive the rebels from their strongholds. Another brave General swept through Georgia, South and North Carolina, and drove the combined armies of the rebels before him-while the honored Lieutenant-General held Lee and his hosts in a death-grasp. Then the tidings came

that Richmond was evacuated, and that Lee had surrendered! The bells rang merrily all over the land. The booming of cannon was heard. Illuminations and torch-light processions manifested the general joy, and families were looking for the speedy return of their loved ones from the field of battle. Just in the midst of the wildest joy-in one hour, nay, in one moment the tidings rang throughout the land that Abraham Lincoln, the best of Presidents, had perished by the hands of an assassin! And then, all that feeling which had been gathered for four years-in forms of excitement, grief, horror, and joyturned into one wail of woe: a sadness inexpressible, anguish unutterable. But it is not the time merely which caused this mourning the mode of his death must be taken into account. Had he died on a bed of illness, with kind friends around him ; had the sweat of death been wiped from his brow, by gentle hands, while he was yet conscious; could he have had the power to speak words of affection to his stricken widow; words of counsel to us all, like those which we heard in his parting for Washington-in his inaugural, which shall now be immortalhow it would have softened or assuaged something of the grief. There might at least have been preparation for the event. But no moment of warning was given to him or to us. He was stricken down when his hopes for the end of the rebellion were bright, and the prospects of a joyous life were before him. There was a Cabinet meeting that day, said to have been the most cheerful and happy of any held since the beginning of the rebellion. After this meeting, he talked with his friends, and spoke of the four years of tempest, of the storm being over, and of the four years of pleasure and joy now awaiting him, as the weight of care and anguish would be taken from his mind, and he could have happy days with his family again. In the midst of these anticipations, he left his house, never to return alive. Though the evening was Good Friday-the saddest day in the whole calendar for the Christian Church-henceforth in this country to be made still sadder, if possible, by the memory of our nation's loss. And so filled with grief was every Christian's heart, that even all the joyous thoughts of Easter Sunday failed to remove the crushing sorrow under which the true worshipper bowed in the house of God. But the great cause of this mourning is to be found in the man himself. Mr. Lincoln was no ordinary man; and I believe the conviction has been growing on the nation's mind, as it certainly has been on my own, especially in the last years of his administration, that, by the hand of God, he was especially singled out to guide our government in these troublous times. And it seems to me that the hand of God may be traced in many of the events connected with his history.

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