“But not a hurrah!  Not one!  It was the cry of a great people asking to know how their President died.  The blood bounced in our veins, and the tears ran like streams down our faces.  How it was done I forget, but Butler was pulled through, and pulled up, and entered the room where we had just walked back to meet him.  A broad crape, a yard long, hung from his left arm—­terrible contrast with the countless flags that were waving the nation’s victory in the breeze.  We first realized then the sad news that Lincoln was dead.  When Butler entered the room we shook hands.  Some spoke, some could not; all were in tears.  The only word Butler had for us all, at the first break of the silence was, ‘Gentleman, he died in the fullness of his fame!’ and as he spoke it his lips quivered, and the tears ran fast down his cheeks.

“Then, after a few moments, came the speaking.  And you can imagine the effect, as the crape fluttered in the wind while his arm was uplifted.  Dickinson, of New York State, was fairly wild.  The old man leaped over the iron railing of the balcony and stood on the very edge, overhanging the crowd, gesticulating in the most vehement manner, and almost bidding the crowd ‘burn up the rebel, seed, root, and branch,’ while a bystander held on to his coat-tail to keep him from falling over.

“By this time the wave of popular indignation had swelled to its crest.  Two men lay bleeding on one of the side streets, the one dead, the other next to dying; one on the pavement, the other in the gutter.  They had said a moment before that ‘Lincoln ought to have been shot long ago!’ They were not allowed to say it again.  Soon two long pieces of scantling stood out above the heads of the crowd, crossed at the top like the letter X, and a looped halter pendant from the junction, a dozen men following its slow motion through the masses, while ‘Vengeance’ was the cry.

“On the right suddenly the shout arose, ‘The World!’ ‘The World!’ and a movement of perhaps eight thousand to ten thousand turning their faces in the direction of that building began to be executed.

“It was a critical moment.  What might come no one could tell, did that crowd get in front of that office; police and military would have availed little, or been too late.  A telegram had just been read from Washington, ‘Seward is dying!’ Just then, at that juncture, a man stepped forward with a small flag in his hand and beckoned to the crowd.

“‘Another telegram from Washington!’

“And then, in the awful stillness of the crisis, taking advantage of the hesitation of the crowd, whose steps had been arrested a moment, a right arm was lifted skyward, and a voice, clear and steady, loud and distinct, spoke out: 

“’Fellow-citizens!  Clouds and darkness are round about Him!  His pavilion is dark waters, and thick clouds of the skies!  Justice and judgment are the establishment of His throne!  Mercy and truth shall go before His face!  Fellow-citizens!  God reigns and the Government at Washington still lives!’