From the celebration the President returned to the White House, and to relieve himself from the terrible thirst the heat had occasioned, in accordance with his primitive tastes, he partook freely of cold water and fruit. In less than an hour he was seized with symptoms of a fearful sickness. The announcement that the President was prostrated by indisposition, struck the people of Washington with prophetic terror, for the news went from house to house, as if presaging the fatal result. General Taylor, after the first paroxysms were over, seemed to anticipate that he would never recover. He yielded to the solicitations of his physicians, and the efforts of his afflicted family to assist him. On the evening of the third day of his sufferings, he said: “I should not be surprised if this were to terminate in death. I did not expect to encounter what has beset me since my elevation to the Presidency. God knows, I have endeavored to fulfil what I considered to be an honest duty; but I have been mistaken, my motives have been misconstrued, and my feelings grossly betrayed.” Mrs. Taylor, who heard these remarks, for the first time admitted to herself the possibility of her husband’s death. She then recalled, in the bitterness of her soul, the remark she made when it was announced to her that possibly General Taylor would be President: “It was a plot to deprive her of his society and shorten his life by unnecessary care and responsibility.” This was indeed about to happen, and in the agony of that hour she prostrated herself at her husband’s bedside, while her children clung around her. The sun, on the morning of the 9th of July, 1850 rose gloriously over the White House. The President’s family and Colonel Bliss had remained by his bedside all night, refusing the indulgence of necessary repose. Each hour it was evident that the catastrophe was nearer. Mrs. Taylor would not believe that death was possible. He had escaped so many dangers, had been through so much exposure, he could not die surrounded with so many comforts and loved so intensely by his family and friends. The emotions of apprehension were so oppressive, that overtaxed nature with Mrs. Taylor found relief in fits of insensibility. At thirty-five minutes past ten P. M., the President called his family about him, to give them his last earthly advice and bid them his last good-by. No conventional education could restrain the natural expressions of grief of the members of this afflicted household, and their heart-rending cries of agony reached the surrounding street. “I am about to die,” said the President, firmly, “I expect the summons soon. I have endeavored to discharge all my official duties faithfully. I regret nothing, but that I am about to leave my friends.”