of governments that would ensue from the novel character of the social institutions and the new type of heroism of which Washington and America were models for the world at large,—­France, I repeat, should depart from established usages and do honor to one whose fame is beyond comparison with that of others.

    “The man who, amid the decadence of modern ages, first dared
    believe that he could inspire degenerate nations with courage to
    rise to the level of republican virtues, lived for all nations and
    for all centuries; and this nation, which first saw in the life
    and success of that illustrious man a foreboding of its destiny,
    and therein recognized a future to be realized and duties to be
    performed, has every right to class him as a fellow-citizen.  I
    therefore submit to the First Consul the following decree:—­
      “Bonaparte, First Consul of the republic, decrees as follows:—­
      “Article 1.  A statue is to be erected to General Washington. 
      “Article 2.  This statue is to be placed in one of the squares of
    Paris, to be chosen by the minister of the interior, and it shall
    be his duty to execute the present decree.”]

About the same time, if tradition may be trusted, the flags upon the conquering Channel fleet of England were lowered to half-mast in token of grief for the same event which had caused the armies of France to wear the customary badges of mourning.

If some “traveler from an antique land” had observed these manifestations, he would have wondered much whose memory it was that had called them forth from these two great nations, then struggling fiercely with each other for supremacy on land and sea.  His wonder would not have abated had he been told that the man for whom they mourned had wrested an empire from one, and at the time of his death was arming his countrymen against the other.

These signal honors were paid by England and France to a simple Virginian gentleman who had never left his own country, and who when he died held no other office than the titular command of a provisional army.  Yet although these marks of respect from foreign nations were notable and striking, they were slight and formal in comparison with the silence and grief which fell upon the people of the United States when they heard that Washington was dead.  He had died in the fullness of time, quietly, quickly, and in his own house, and yet his death called out a display of grief which has rarely been equaled in history.  The trappings and suits of woe were there of course, but what made this mourning memorable was that the land seemed hushed with sadness, and that the sorrow dwelt among the people and was neither forced nor fleeting.  Men carried it home with them to their firesides and to their churches, to their offices and their workshops.  Every preacher took the life which had closed as the noblest of texts, and every orator made it the theme