President of the United States stood with hands crossed before him, as "Mark the perfect man" took his part in a scene without parallel in American history, as follows:

"President Garfield: The alumni of Williams College here gathered esteem it an honor that we are permitted to be the first to congratulate you in this house, now your home, on your accession this day to your great office as President of the United States; and they have deputed me to say a few words in their behalf.

"But before doing this I must be permitted to greet and congratulate you personally on my own behalf. This I venture to do, if for no other reason, because I have been told, and I suppose truly, that I am the only president of a college who has lived to see one who graduated during his administration attain to this high honor. This I am now permitted to see, and for it I give thanks to God. In this, with the exception of your honored mother and immediate family, there is no one who rejoices more than I do, and from the bottom of my heart I congratulate you.

"Having thus ventured to say a word for myself I now speak for the alumni.

"Since your graduation, sir, twenty-four years ago, your course has been conspicuous, and we have watched it with deep interest. We have seen you passing on and up without defeat, until by no political maneuvering, but by high statesmanship and continuous public service in the face of the American people, you have attained one of the highest positions this world has to give the presidency of the grandest republic hitherto known.

"We then, sir, may congratulate you, and I do it in the name of those who hold, or have held, high positions under the government, in the name of those

prominent in the several states from which they come, in the name of your classmates of whom so many are present, in the name of all present, I congratulate you, and assure you that we feel honored in your honor.

"And not in the name of these alone do I congratulate you, but in the name of the college, its trustees, and its alumni, wherever they may be. Standing as I do among the oldest of the alumni, and having taught so many of them, I feel authorized to speak for them. I know that they also feel honored in your honor, and that as a body they will be strongly in sympathy with your administration.

"To that administration we look forward with confidence. In view of its past responsibilities and grand opportunities we invoke upon you the blessing of Him who has led you hitherto: and we trust that in connection with it there will come to yourself still higher honor, and to the whole of this vast country, East, West, North and South alike, greater prosperity than it has hitherto known.'

None who were present forgot while they lived the yearning solemnity of the words, "We invoke upon you the blessing of Him who has led you hitherto." The words and men as they faced each other were remembered with a shock four months later when tragedy encompassed the President and the nation.

President Garfield was so moved by the utterance and presence as to say that Doctor Hopkins was more truly president than his pupil. No verbatim record was made of President Garfield's response. Only a skeleton outline, written later at the request of Colonel A. F. Rockwell, Garfield's classmate and intimate friend, remains. The substance is here, but not the elaboration and warmth of feeling :

"I am deeply grateful to you, and to the alumni of Williams College here assembled, for this cordial greeting. It will give me new strength for the duties of this place to know that I am welcomed and supported by this great company of educated men, whose lives illustrate and honor so many professions, and such wide fields of useful activity.

"It is especially gratifying to me that your greetings have been delivered by that venerable and venerated man, who was in our college days, and will always be, our President. I hope he will pardon me for a personal reference. For a quarter of a century Doctor Hopkins has seemed a man apart from other men-standing on a mountain peak - embodying in himself much of the majesty of the earth, and reflecting in his life something of the sunlight and glory of Heaven. His presence here is a benediction."

XXVIII

PITIFUL ENDING of a Great Career

THE Williams College thread ran through the brief life of the Garfield administration and the tragedy of his taking off. The President was in the Pennsylvania Railroad station in Washington, July 2, 1881, starting to participate in Commencement week at Williamstown, when all was changed by the assassin's bullet. General Garfield had represented the alumni at the inauguration of Paul A. Chadbourne in 1872, and President Garfield was to speak for the alumni at the inauguration of Franklin Carter. Nowhere was the consternation greater, the grief deeper, than among the men of Williams gathered in Berkshire for their festival. Under the shock there was talk of abandoning the exercises, but in the light of the subsequent hope that the President of the United States might live, the program was carried out, save that Francis Lynde Stetson replaced Garfield in speaking for the alumni, and a heavy cloud shadowed the valley.

Never was Fate more cruel than when it set before this man the opportunity of the chief magistracy, and gave him barely four months in which to prove himself. In that time nothing could be perfected. Congress was not in Washington. The few furrows he turned were not even planted. Yet from such

beginnings writers have ventured to infer that there would have been scant fruits of forward-looking accomplishment in government had Garfield lived and wrought. The injustice of the process must affront the judicially minded.

The venerated Lincoln and other presidents would have fared badly if likewise judged by their meager beginnings in the great office. Far more fortunate than Garfield in this respect were the other murdered presidents. From one who had done so much with his life hitherto, large things were to have been looked for in service and achievement,- for Garfield was always growing. He was without executive experience, but possessed a background of exceptional sweep. He had been quick to learn and had shown brilliant readiness of adjustment to new conditions. His had been a singularly well-rounded development.

The political thought of the moment was focused on the filling of offices. Old newspaper men will remember how watchful we were of appointments, always to be discussed in their factional bearings. Not conflict between parties was involved, but differences of factions in the dominant party. Agreeable to precedent Garfield called Blaine, foremost leader of the opposition to Grant, Conkling's most irritating opponent, to be secretary of state. Trouble soon or late with the imperious New York senator was inevitable, despite President Garfield's efforts during the campaign and after to establish an understanding. The open break was precipitated when the President abruptly nominated William H. Robertson to be collector of the port of New York. It was challenge