“Each lived to accomplish his appointed task. Each received the unbounded gratitude of the people of his time and each is held in great and ever-increasing reverence by posterity. The fame of each will never die; it will grow with the ages, because it is based upon imperishable service to humanity; not to the people of a single generation or country, but to the whole human family, wherever scattered, forever. “The present generation knows Washington only from history, and by that alone can judge him. Lincoln we know by history also, but thousands are still living who participated in the great events in which he was leader and master. Many of his contemporaries survived him; some are here yet in almost every locality. So Lincoln is not far removed from us; he may be said to be still known to the millions—not surrounded by the mist of antiquity, nor a halo of idolatry that is impenetrable. He never was inaccessible to the people; thousands carry with them yet the words which he spoke in their hearing; thousands remember the pressure of his hand; and thousands have not forgotten that indescribably sad, thoughtful, far-seeing expression which impressed everybody. Nobody could keep the people away from him, and when they came he would suffer no one to drive them back. So it is that an unusually large number of the American people came to know this great man and that he is still so well remembered by them. It cannot be said that they were all mistaken about him or that they misinterpreted his greatness. Men are still connected with the Government who served during his administration. There are at least two senators, and perhaps twice as many representatives, who participated in his first inauguration—men who stood side by side with him in the trying duties of his administration and who have been, without interruption, in one branch or another of the public service ever since. The Supreme Court of the United States still has among its members one whom Lincoln appointed, and so of other branches of the Federal judiciary. His faithful private secretaries are still alive and have rendered posterity a great service in their history of Lincoln and his times. They have told the story of his life and public services with such entire frankness and fidelity as to exhibit to the world ‘the very inner courts of his soul.’ [Illustration: ARRIVAL OF THE FUNERAL PROCESSION AT THE EAST FRONT OF THE CAPITOL, WASHINGTON.] [Illustration: SAILORS FROM THE BATTLESHIP ILLINOIS IN THE FUNERAL PROCESSION, WASHINGTON.]