Page:Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (1892).djvu/585



N the day of the interment of the late James A. Garfield, at Lake View cemetery, Cleveland, Ohio, a day of gloom long to be remembered as the closing scene in one of the most tragic and startling dramas ever witnessed in this or in any other country, the colored people of the District of Columbia assembled in the Fifteenth street Presbyterian church, and expressed by appropriate addresses and resolutions their respect for the character and memory of the illustrious deceased. On that occasion I was called on to preside, and by way of introducing the subsequent proceedings (leaving to others the grateful office of delivering eulogies), made the following brief reference to the solemn and touching event:

"Friends and fellow citizens: 

To-day our common mother Earth has closed over the mortal remains of James A. Garfield, at Cleveland, Ohio. The light of no day in our national history has brought to the American people a more intense bereavement, a deeper sorrow, or a more profound sense of humiliation. It seems only as yesterday, that, in my quality as United States Marshal of the District of Columbia, it was made my duty and privilege to walk at the head of the column in advance of this our President-elect, from the crowded Senate Chamber of the national capitol, through the long corridors and the grand rotunda, beneath the majestic (577)