eagerly inquiring—­“What’s the matter?”—­“Has he fainted?”—­“Is he dead?” John Quincy Adams, while faithful at his post, and apparently about to rise to address the Speaker, had sunk into a state of unconsciousness!  He had been struck a second time with paralysis.  The scene was one of intense excitement.  Pallor, anxiety, alarm, were depicted on every countenance.  “Take him out,”—­“Bring water,”—­exclaimed several voices.  He had been prevented from falling to the floor by a member from Ohio, whose seat was near his—­Mr. Fisher—­who received him in his arms.  Immediately Mr. Grinnell, one of his colleagues from Massachusetts, was by his side, keeping off a press of anxious friends, and bathing his face with iced water.

“He was immediately lifted into the area in front of the Clerk’s table.  The Speaker instantly suggested that some gentleman move an adjournment, which being promptly done, the House adjourned.  A sofa was brought, and Mr. Adams, in a state of perfect helplessness, though not of entire insensibility, was gently laid upon it.  The sofa was then taken up and borne out of the Hall into the Rotunda, where it was set down, and the members of both Houses, and strangers, who were fast crowding around, were with some difficulty repressed, and an open space cleared in its immediate vicinity; but a medical gentleman, a member of the House, (who was prompt, active, and self-possessed throughout the whole painful scene,) advised that he be removed to the door of the Rotunda opening on the east portico, where a fresh wind was blowing.  This was done; but the air being chilly and loaded with vapor, the sofa was, at the suggestion of Mr. Winthrop, once more taken up and removed to the Speaker’s apartment, the doors of which were forthwith closed to all but professional gentlemen and particular friends.”

The features of the dying patriarch were almost as rigid as though in death:  but there was a serenity in his countenance which betokened an absence of pain.  There were five physicians, members of the House, present, viz.:—­Drs. Newell, Fries, Edwards, Jones of Georgia, and Lord.  These gentlemen were unremitting in their attentions.  Drs. Lindsley and Thomas, of the city, were also immediately called in.  Under the advice of the medical gentlemen present, he was cupped, and mustard plasters were applied, which seemed to afford some relief.  Reviving a little and recovering consciousness, Mr. Adams inquired for his wife.  She was present, but in extreme illness, and suffering the most poignant sorrow.  After a few moments’ interval he relapsed again into unconsciousness.  A correspondent of the New York Express describes as follows the progress of these melancholy events:—­

“Half past one o’clock.—­Mr. Benton communicated to the Senate the notice of the sudden illness of Mr. Adams, and moved an adjournment of that body.

“Quarter to two.—­Mr. Adams has several physicians with him, but exhibits no signs of returning consciousness.  The report is that he is sinking.