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 ORATION 
 
 HON. ALBERT S. WHITE, 
 
 WITH OTHER PROCEEDINGS, 
 
 AT LAFAYETTE, INDIANA, 
 
 ON THE OCCASION OF THE DEATH 
 
 GEN. WILLIAM H. HARRISON, 
 
 LATE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 Published by Committee of Arrangements. 
 
 LAFAYETTE: 
 
 JOHN D. SMITH, PRINTER. 
 1841 
 
.W58 
 
 CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 Lafayette, April 19, 1841. 
 Sir: — The Committee of Ari'angements have instructed me to re- 
 (^uest of you a copy of your Address, deUvered at the Presbyterian 
 Church on the 17th inst, for pubUcation. 
 
 Respectfully yours, 
 
 HENRY OILAR, 
 Ch'n of Committee. 
 Hon. A. S. White. 
 
 Lafayette, April 20, 1S41. 
 ^•/r; — Without apology for the imperfections of an address which 
 >vas rather the spontaneous offering of the heart upcm the first intelligence 
 of the late national calamity, than the slower product of intellect, I 
 submit the paper to you for publication according to your request, if you 
 think proper to make that use of it. 
 
 With sincere respect, 
 
 Your friend and serv't, 
 
 ALB'T S. WHITH:. 
 Henry Oilar, Esq., 
 
 Ch'n of the Committee of ArrasigemeniB. 
 
 
PUBLIC MEETING. 
 DEATH OF €lEi\ERA5. HARRISON. 
 
 On receiving the official intelligence of the death of the President on 
 Tuesday evening, April 13th, 1841, a meeting of the citizens of Lafay- 
 ette was immediately called, to assemble at the Court House at candlc- 
 hghting. At the time appointed the Court Room was filled with an as- 
 semblage which in the sadness of the moment seemed to have forgotten 
 all former distinction of parties. 
 
 On motion of Dr. O. L. Clark, Dr. E, Deming, was appointed Pre- 
 sident; and on motion of A. Hatcher, Esq., Benj. Henkle was appointed 
 Secretary. The solemn occasion for which the meeting had assembled 
 was in a few words very impressively stated by the chair, after which 
 Dr. O. L. Clark ofiered the following resolution. 
 
 Resolved, That a committee of five be appointed by the President to 
 consider and report such resolutions and arrangements as may be proper 
 to express our sensibility to the national bereavement in the death of the 
 •President of the United States-, 
 
 Which was adopted, and the chair appointed O. L. Clark, Sam' 1 
 Hoover, A. Hatcher, T. T. Benbridge and J. L. Scott said committee, 
 who after having retired a few minutes, reported the following resolutions, 
 which were unanimously adopted: 
 
 Submitting with humble reverence to the dispensations of an all wise 
 I'rovidence, under whose guidance is the destiny of all nations, Resolved, 
 That we deeply deplore the death of William He.nry Harrison, late 
 President of the United States. 
 
 Resolved, That it is due, not only to the public services of the deceas- 
 ed, but also \o the exalted office of Chief Magistrate of this Union, to 
 which he had been called, that suitable demonstrations of respect be paid 
 to his memory, and that our gratitude be manifested for his long career of 
 patriotic service to his country. 
 
 Resolved, That the Hon. A. S. White be appointed to deliver an 
 address on Saturday, the 17th inst., commemorative of the Hfe, character 
 and public services of William HexXRY Harrison, late President of 
 the United States. 
 
 Resolved, That the Rev. S. R. Johnson be appointed to act as Chap- 
 Iain upon the occasion. 
 
 Resolved, That the chair appoint a committee of arrangements, con- 
 sisting of fifteen citizens to superintend the expcution of the foregoing 
 r.?.solutions. 
 
Resolved, That when thismceling adjourns, it will adjourn to meet on 
 Saturday next, at one o'clock, and that the citizens of the country be 
 respectfully invited to attend. 
 
 And as a C3:ii;ni"te3 of arrangements u:ider the 5ih 'resoluiion, the 
 chair named the following gentlemen, viz. Col. H. Oilar, Col. D. Braw- 
 ley, Col. W, M. Jenners, John Peltit, Esq., H. W. Ellsworth, Esq., A. 
 Ingram, Esq., Maj. J. L. Pifer, Wra. P. Heath, Israel Speucer, Maj. 
 D. Mace. S. Kennedy Esq., Dr. O. L. Clark, Ab'm Fry, VV. F. Rey- 
 nolds, A. Hatcher, Esq. 
 
 E. DEMING, Pres't. 
 B. Henkt-e, Sec'y, 
 
 Saturday, April 17, 1841. 
 This being the day fi.xed upon by a previous meeting of the citizens of 
 Lafayette, for the purpose of paying suitable demonstrations of respect 
 to the memory of Gen. WILLIAM H. HARRISON, late President, 
 of the United States; a numerous concourse of citizens assembled at the 
 Court House at the hour appointed, and amidst torrents of rain a proced- 
 sion consisting of several hundreds of persona was formed, which pro- 
 ceeded to the Chruch in the following order: 
 
 President and Vice President. 
 Orator and Chaplain. 
 The Cleregy Generally. 
 Committee of Arrangements. 
 Soldiers of the Revolutionary and late War. 
 Citizens Generally. 
 The incessent rain (for it rained all the afternoon,) seemed to have but 
 little influence in preventing an attendance upon the solemn ceremony, 
 as the Church was crowded to overflowing. At 15 minutes to 12 o'clock 
 the Rev. S. R. Johnson announced, in a most solemn and impressive 
 manner, the mournful objects of the meeting, which he followed by a 
 most fervent address to the throne of grace. Tho Hon. A. S. White 
 then pronounced an oration, replete with soul-stirring eloquence. 
 
ORATION. 
 
 Fellow citizens of the County of Tippecanoe: — 
 
 I rise to discharge the mournful and affecting duty that has 
 devolved to me by your request, overpowered with emo- 
 tions, which, while they bear the stamp of nature to the 
 sacredness of that duty, almost forbid its performance. A 
 great man has fallen in Israel! The Chief Executive Magis- 
 trate of a powerful nation, bearing a trust with which he had 
 been clothed by the suffrage of sixteen millions of free peo- 
 ple, has been suddenly called from the highest responsibility 
 on earth, to render for hiii-self, his final account at the throne 
 of the Eternal! The last enemy of Our race, respiting for a 
 moment his warfare upon tlie humble and the poor, abashes 
 the pride of man by entering with the stride of a conqueror 
 into the seat of power, and by snatching from the sacred 
 shrines of human autliority, the trophies of human sove- 
 reignty, and the dread symbols of earthly government. — 
 There, where the American people had deposited their sove- 
 reignty; where they had concentrated their mighty will, where 
 ihey had garnered up their energies, where their justice, 
 their virtue, their strength and majesty were represented, 
 even in those very abodes where their honor dwelt, and 
 where their perpetuity was planted, grim visaged death in 
 mockery of mortal effort, hath done his work of spoliation, 
 William Henry Haurison sleeps with his fathers, and 
 another holds his office. 
 
 "Where now, ye lying vanities of life! 
 Ye ever icmpting ever cheating train! 
 Where are you now?' 
 
 From the olden time, before the wand of this gaunt mes- 
 senger the mitre and the sceptre have both fallen, and now 
 also°the scroll of the Constitution. But though mitre, and 
 sceptre, and parchment be all buried in the dust, dealii is yet 
 the conqueror but of our mortal part. The church shall flourish 
 till its final triumph, and religion continue to afford its conso- 
 lations upon earth. Human Governments shall still rest 
 on their deep foundations, dispensing justice and security 
 to social man. Th^'re shall not fail to David a son to eit 
 upon his throne; and though the scroll of the Constitution 
 may be burned, and its every letter obliterated, its spirit shall 
 
"survive, and llie principles of liberty which it declared shall 
 remain warm and active in millions of bosoms; the Constitu- 
 tion shall be re-written from those living, burning characters, 
 and its protection be delegated to other Presidents through a 
 thousand successions. 
 
 While then, we lament the fall of a great and a good man, 
 hio-h in authority, we mourn not the decay of principles, nor 
 the downfall of institution.-*, of which he was tlie delegated 
 guardian, and the sworn defender. It is the chord of human 
 sympathy which is touched — it is man bereaved of his brother, 
 whose'memory is haHovved by a multitude of elevated and affec- 
 ting associations; inthepresent case, of an elder brother who 
 has stood to us in the place of a parent, our companion, and at 
 the same time our protector, our equal, yet our adviser. In 
 the whole circle of human relations, tliere are perhaps none 
 more tender, or more touching, than those which have exis- 
 ted between the late President William LIenry Harrison, 
 and the People whom I have now the melandioly honor to 
 address. What needs it that your orator should recall to 
 your memory the history of tliose stirring events, in wliich 
 for more than the period of an ordinary lifetime of labor. 
 General Harrison in this new empire of the West, illustrated 
 a chara -ter, which, in ancient times, would have secured to 
 him all the honors of cotemporary applause, and at his death 
 an apotheosis? Events, which in less than half a century 
 have multiplied the resources of our country a thousand fold, 
 have planted the free seat of empire in the agricultural States 
 behind the turreted Alleganies, have removed the Occident a 
 thousand miles towards the Pacific, and which, having now, 
 to a certain extent, accomplished their purpoies here, are 
 beginning to react with a restoring and beneficent energy upon 
 the old Colony of Jamestown, and upon the settlements of 
 the descendents of the Pilgrims. Of these, Harrison if now 
 living, might in the frankness and modesty of his generous 
 nature, say with iEneas "all of which I saw, and a great 
 part of which I was." — What needs it, that I should appeal 
 to the memory of your past hardships, to your border strifes, 
 to your hearths profaned by the savage massacre of beauty 
 and innocence, to the dawn of peace and the triumphs of 
 civilization, to your advancement in arts, science, and agri- 
 culture, to the proud and growing commerce of your great 
 waters, to your interior systems of manufactures and improve- 
 ments, to your schools adorning the face of society, to your 
 holy temples improving the morals, and reforming the life^ 
 in a word, the magic change from helpless infancy, beset with 
 clanger, and environed with gloom, to the splendid and manly 
 
achievements of the present day, and to those lofty expecta- 
 lions which, like thegeorgeous tints of our autumnal evening 
 sky, illume the horizon of the future — and remind you of 
 that soldier of fortune — no, not of fortune, but of liberty, 
 upon the morning of whose existence, while reclining in 
 ancestral halls of wealth and honor, visions of all these 
 things dawned through the tract of futurity? Of that son 
 of a revolutionary worthy, who, shaking off the slotli of 
 affluence and repudiating honors which were won by no 
 other claim than descent, rushed with his sword at his side, 
 but clad in a stronger armor of virtuous resolution, to pursue 
 a career, which, in its military character, (to use the lan- 
 guage of the Senate's address to President Adams, in refer- 
 ence to the venerated Washington,) was whiter than it was 
 'brilliant; and to meet a destiny more fortunate than falls to 
 the lot of Kings? 
 
 It is an impulse of our nature to regard with a grateful 
 veneration those who have exposed their lives for their 
 country upon the battle field. This sentiment, though often- 
 times misguided, is as honorable as it is natural. It is foun- 
 ded in a proper appreciation of those great principles whicli 
 make war justitiable. T'lere is no cause but that of one's 
 country, which may be brought to the arbitrament of blood. 
 For a friend, for a parent, to carry vengence from afar (excepi: 
 in the iniJiiediate defence of life or limb,) is murder; and to 
 rush on distant destruction, in even such a cause, is suicide. 
 But patriotism consecrates the last resort of injured nations, 
 strips the mortal combat of its ferocity, and crowns the victor 
 with the hero's wreath. It is indeed the military operations 
 of a people, whicli mainly give cast and feature to the era, 
 in which they occur. Marathon and Plataea, Phillippi and 
 Aclium, Hastings and Bannockburn, Bunker Hdl Tippeca- 
 noe and New Orleans, speak whole pages of history, and 
 impress upon the countries which claim them a character of 
 ages; but it may well be doubted, whether in the military annals 
 of any people, although achievements more dazzling and bril- 
 liant may be recorded, there are any to compare as illustrations 
 of the nobler and more heroic virtues, Vv^ith that long and painful 
 series of conflicts, which attended the settlement of the val- 
 ley of the Mississippi. In the character of the western 
 soldier, courage was not the mere vain and empty thirst for 
 glory.; it was not the habitual reckleness of the train-band 
 legions, accustom.ed to look upon life with contempt, because 
 they regarded war as a trade; it was not the unscrupulous 
 ferocity of the mercenary, nor the cruelty of the buccaneer 
 m bandit; nor was it constantly excited and stimulated by 
 
8 
 
 the drum's alarums, and by the pomp and circumstance and 
 glitter of a marshalled array — but it was the firm and patient 
 and inflexible contest of the pioneer and of the husbandman 
 fighting for a domicil and for an altar around which his 
 strongest affections had not even yet learned to cling, because 
 that home was new and not consecrated by old associations — ■ 
 contending, too, against all odds, with an enemy who held in 
 disregard the laws of war, and to whom the principles of honor 
 and religion were equally unknown — a merciless savage who 
 spared neither age nor sex. He fought against the opposing 
 elements, in a distant and inaccessible wilderness, and often 
 without muwiiions or supplies, where every conquest liad to 
 be maintained by the same gallantry and risk which won it, 
 and where there was no visible or probable termina- 
 tion to the campaign. It was through such a conflict, cover- 
 ing with more or less activity, the period of a third of a 
 century, tliat the Western country was settled, under circum- 
 stances calculated to evoke every energy of a free and bold 
 and lofty nature, in which woman, too, laying aside her 
 characteristic timidity, proved herself by her devotion in the 
 hour of greatest need, worthy of a soldier's pride, and a free- 
 man's love. 
 
 The military and colonial settlements of tlie Romans against 
 the surrounding barbarians, were stimulated by the hope of 
 agiarian plunder, but even they were poorly maintained, — 
 and their distant armies returned frequently from a provincial 
 campaign, to share the honors of a triumphal entry into the 
 eternal city. No such honors, no such inducements tempted 
 the prowess of the Western hunter and pioneer. It is remar- 
 kable that the army of Gen. George Rogers Clark, by whose 
 gallantry undoubtedly the boundary line ol '83 was fixed at 
 the Mississippi instead of the Ohio, v/ere, for a period of 18 
 months wliile the war of the Revolution raged, actively em- 
 ployed in the heart of a savage country, a thousand miles 
 from relief, without a single supply during that whole time 
 being transmitted from, or a single despatch sent to the gov- 
 ernment of Virginia, by whose authority they were enrolled. 
 
 It was to such a country as this, then unknown, and un- 
 claimed by the prophets of civilization for perhaps centuries 
 to come, at its very midnight of peril, while the lurid glare of 
 conflagration pointed out the fatal fields of llannar and St. 
 Clair, and the yell of the Indian, fresh from h'n ijloated car- 
 narge proclaimed him like an enchanting wizard, the invinci- 
 ble lord of these forests, that the genius and ardor of the 
 youthful Harrison led him, untrained as he was to a military 
 life, and undisciplined in hardships, to prove what a virtuous 
 
constancy may do; to vindicate as he has nobly done th« hon- 
 ors of an illustrious ancestor, and to reflect back new honors 
 greatly eclipsing those of his sire. Looking back now from 
 our seats of security we can scarcely realize the fearless gen- 
 erosity of those impulses, and that moral grasp of intellect 
 and genius, seeming already to possess the future, which 
 prompted Harrison and his zealous copatriots to attempt 
 against the very brow of fate to establish a name for himself 
 and his country. Happy and fortunate man to have realized 
 more than the dreams of youthful fancy could have painted! 
 Unconquerable spirit to have pushed such efforts through 
 half a century without turning backwards or courting a mo- 
 ment's repose! 
 
 It is not often that to those stern and rugged qualities which 
 fit a man for the adventures of border conquests, and for the 
 military occupancy of a hostile country, are united in the same 
 person, the milder attributes which the duties of civilization 
 impose. The field of the highland chieftain's glory is in the 
 fastnesses where he has struggled for the liberty of his ances- 
 ters, and the American pioneer has seldom exchanged the 
 hunting shirt for the robes of state — throughout all history, 
 viceroys, pioconsuls, and military commandants to whom has 
 been assigned the government of distant provinces, iiave 
 marked their careers with acts of tyranny and systems of 
 plunder which the rulers of metropolitan governments, 
 however arbitrary, have seldom dared to exercise. The ex- 
 travagance of the court has been fed, and partizan services 
 have been rewarded from the spoils of provinces and depen- 
 dant territories. How different has been the spectacle pre- 
 sented in the annals of the North Western Territory! It i.s 
 with the history and growth of that territory that the life and 
 glory of Genera] Harrison, are most intimately connected. — 
 And there is scarcely a trait in that eventful life but is calcula- 
 ted to excite our admiration. The settlement of the Western 
 country involved questions and relations of the most momen- 
 tous and delicate character. Not the least among them, were 
 those springing from the existence and occupancy of the 
 aboriginal tribes. However we may recognize as founded in 
 nature and in justice, that great law of society, tliat the earth 
 was made for civilized man, and tliat barbarous tribes must 
 surrender tlieir hunting grounds to civilized and christian ra- 
 ces, the practical expulsion and forcible extermination of the 
 Jiative inhabitants, was not a measure of unquestioned right, 
 nor readily reconciled to conscience. It was contrary to the 
 humane character of our institutions, and against the legacy of 
 our fathers, that our settlements should be made by fire and 
 
10 
 
 the sword. And yet to a certain extent the law of terror wal 
 the only authority which could bind the treacherous Indian. 
 He had been taught to regard the Americans as his natural 
 enemies, whose encroachments would ultimately drive him 
 into the great Ocean, and by bribes and stimulants of every 
 character, his jealousy and hatred had been inflamed to the 
 highest pitch. It is evident, and our subsequent experience 
 in another section of the Union has given us most unwelcome 
 proofs of the fact, that the manner in which the administra- 
 tion of the North Western Territory was conducted, would 
 determine, for an age at least, the character of our relations 
 with the Indian tribes. His management of this delicate duty 
 redounds forever to tlie honor of Gen. Harrison's name — at 
 various periods lie negotiated witli the Indians thirteen dif- 
 ferent treaties, extinguishing their title to more than 69,000,- 
 000 of acres, nearly three times the area of the State of Indi- 
 ana. Not one single act of cruelty or injustice has ascended 
 to heaven to be recorded agiinst him. And yet his authority 
 was respected and a subordination enforced among those law- 
 less tribes which perhaps no other man than one ever victori- 
 ous in battle could have secured. 
 
 What immense advantages accrued to our people from such 
 results in the rapid and secure growth of our settlements, in the 
 acquisition of the Indian trade, and in the establishing cfthst 
 friendship and respeet which has enabled us subsequently to 
 push our explorations, and extend our intercourse to the re- 
 motest corner of the Indian country, is too apparent to need 
 elucidation. It has often been remarked with what scrupulous 
 fidelity General Harrison disbursed the largo and discretionary 
 amounts of money with which he was entrusted in the con- 
 duct of our Indian affairs. I should do great injustice to his 
 memory to claim fcr him any extraordinary merit on this 
 score. In poetry, the sentiment may be beautiful enough that 
 "an honest man's the noblest work of God," but Cicero who 
 is a better moralist that Tope, has placed justice at the foun- 
 dation of all duty. To be honest requires but a mean capa- 
 city; to be just, is the prerogative of the Gods. Gen. Harri- 
 son's honesty saved the government a few thousand dollars 
 which might have been peculated or squandered; hisjustiee 
 has saved it millions in avoiding the consequences whicli a 
 contrary policy would have produced. If dishonest, he 
 would have contaminated himself; if unjust, he would have 
 involved his country in his own defilement, and the cry of the 
 Indian would have borne witness even agsinst posterity. 
 
 To the American Philanthropist, to the Statesman, there is 
 no topic of more. painful and anxious solicitude waiting the 
 
11 
 
 aevelopment of lime, than the future condition of our Indian, 
 iribes. Nature seems to have set her eternal decree against 
 the blending of the two races, and the same irresistible law 
 has determined that that dominant race which sprung from the 
 mountains of Caucasus, having overrun Europe ^with their 
 arts and arms, and bounded over the mountain wave of the 
 Atlantic, shall have their victorious march arrested only at the 
 shores of the great Pacific. Whither then shall the Indian 
 fly, several millions of whom yet remain upon this continent? 
 It is one among the many causes of painful regret which now 
 wrino-s the heart of a great nation that its constitutional head, 
 the last link of the heroic age should have been so prema- 
 turely cut ofr, he of all others most likely under Providence, 
 to have settled upon some firm and successful basis our irre- 
 solute counsels in reference to the Indians. Much longer 
 that great measure cannot be deferred— more than an hundred 
 thousand emigrant Indians of various tribes are now concen- 
 trated upon our western frontier, skirting about 600 miles of 
 our interior border. The stipends and annuities upon which 
 they now subsist and by which tie alone they appear to be 
 bound to our government, are each year drying up, and the 
 capacity of the Indian to obtain his sustenance from the earth, 
 is but imperceptibly increasing. In a very few years under 
 the existing organization, famine and want must produce dis- 
 content, tlie immediate parent of vengeance, among the emi- 
 grant tiibes. Twenty thousand warriors with arms in their 
 hands are leady upon the incitements of hunger or upon the in- 
 stio-alion of any nation with whom we may be at war to spread 
 fire brands and death all along our borders. And besides 
 ihe wild hordes Iving south west of these emigrant tribes, 
 ihe whole region Jf the upper Missouri and its tributaries 
 contains an Indian population as yet unacquainted with the 
 white man, who each year are wantonly thinning for the mere 
 sport of the chase those immense herds of buffalo upon which 
 they might have subsisted for centuries. 
 
 What is to be the ultimate fate of these savage tribes, is a 
 question for the justice and humanity of this great nation yet 
 to settle. It happens to him who is now addressing you per- 
 sonally to know that our late President entered upon the dis- 
 charo-e of his high duties with sensibilities fully aroused to the 
 importance of the Indian question. Receiving upon his in- 
 duction into the august station which had been conferred upon 
 him, the personal congratulations of thousands of his fellow- 
 citizens who had repaired to the Capital upon that occasion, 
 and abating not one particle of that liberal hospitality vvhich 
 was kindred to his nature, he snatched not from the festal 
 
12 
 
 moments which his rejoicing countrymen demanded, but from 
 sleep, the hours which a wearied constitution craved for re- 
 pose, to devote them to that important interest of his country 
 involved in the most pressing aspect of our Indian aifairs, the 
 Florida War — ardently and with that esprit dii corps which 
 we might expect from the old Governor of the Indiana Ter- 
 ritory, and from the Commander of Tippecanoe, he appro- 
 priated the first hours of his oilicial life to a laborious ])er- 
 sonal examination of this troublesome subject, upon which 
 the blood and treasure of the nation have been so profusely 
 expended. Fram the sagacity of such a mind, and the au- 
 thority of his name and office, the most favorable issue of 
 that war might have been anticipated. By a fatality whicli 
 seems almost appropriate to the history of Gen. Harrison, his 
 last and expiring labours were for the peace of tiie frontier, 
 and the interests of one of our Territorial Governments. He 
 has not an enemy, if there bo sue-li a man, but must regret 
 that death did not allow those labours to become mature. 
 
 However the public mind may have been excited upon 
 many topics which would have engaged the deliberations of 
 our late President, if his life had been spared, and perliaps in 
 some degree have been shaped by his authority, and however 
 men may have differed in their estimate of the man and of his 
 capacity, from the solemnities of the grave tiie truth now 
 proceeds tliat for the care of many of our dearest interests 
 Providence had given him a peculiar adaptation. It is char- 
 acteristic of a republican people to be sternly watchful of 
 living rulers and jealous of those who exercise power. 
 These are the safe guards of liberty. But in no other form 
 of government are the rewards of patriotism so great. There 
 being no privileged orders, he who has distinguished himself 
 in the public service has been enabled to do so by the aids 
 voluntarily contributed by his fellow citizens. And when 
 he has applied the power thus conferred, in a manner 
 to produce successful and honorable results, there is a 
 sort of generous selfishness, if the expression may be 
 allowed, which prompts the country to award heartily 
 and without stint or envy the meed of praise. In our public 
 rejoicings tiie voice of the parasite is never heard. So in our 
 solemn assemblies the funeral dirge is chaunted only from 
 hearts of sensibility. No lioUow pa;{eantry, no idle ceremony 
 is this to day. It consecrates the memory of him who 
 ttiough dead survives in our living heart?. We gather in 
 mournful procession around the mortal remains of Harrison, 
 because we revere his virtues and love his character. By our 
 own voices we made him the father of his people, invested 
 
him with our highest dignities, elevated him to a place in our 
 conception above the throne of the Bourbons or the Planla- 
 genets, committed to his hands the sacred ensigns of our pow- 
 er. These honors were tendered because we considered him 
 worthy. And when in the face of men and angels, his hoary 
 locks uncovered to the wind, with uplifted hand and a loud 
 voice he swore to preserve protect and defend our Constitu- 
 tion and faithfully to perform the high duties of his office, the 
 prayers of millions of people accompanied that vow to heaven 
 in aid of his solemn purpose. That compact, the most sub- 
 lime which man can make with his fellow, is scarcely regis- 
 tered by the Eternal, before the affiant is summoned to °the 
 world of spirits, and absolved from all but the pure purpose 
 with which it was made. Without a murmur, but in silent 
 wonder at the ways of Providence who has not so dealt 
 with our fathers, we grieve that so affecting a relation has 
 been rent asunder. Our grief is sincere. It is consecrated 
 even by piety. While it is a tribute which our imperfect na- 
 tures may pay to departed worth, it is prompted no less by de- 
 votion to the interests of our country, than by an aflectionate 
 remembrance of him who is forever lost to its councils audits 
 hopes. Clouds and darkness rest upon these dispensations- 
 of Providence. We cannot penetrate the counsels of Om- 
 nipotence nor resolve the mystery why the Chief Magistrate 
 of so numerous a people should be removed by death, almost 
 at the altar where his vow was offered, e'er his career of use- 
 fulness had begun, and just when the public heart was throb- 
 bing with the highest expectation. If, as christain men, we 
 honestly believe that the deity often interposes by unseen 
 agencies in the affairs of nations, surely this is an occasion 
 when touching the heart-strings of a community by an un- 
 wonted calamity we have good reason to conjecture that he 
 intends some purpose of significant import to this republic. 
 Whatever that mysterious purpose may be, we should be re- 
 creant to the impulses of conscience if we did not as citizens 
 improve such a visitation by the most serious reflections, and 
 it will not be without its consolations if it shall teach us this 
 single lesson, that we are brethren. 
 
 Except the calamity of war, this nation, since the morning 
 when its independence was declared, has floated upon the 
 unobstructed tide of prosperous success. Those fathers of 
 the State, the predecessors of ou-r last Chief Magistrate, who 
 have departed from life, had first surrendered their trusts to 
 their country and in a good old age have carried with 
 them the benedictions which |their finished works did claim. 
 Some wees fortunate even in death, and their spirits tired of 
 
 2 
 
14 
 
 a wearied frame were borne to heaven upon the day of their 
 country's jubilee. Now for the lirst time we mourn the death 
 of an incumbent of the Presidential Chair. Like the leader of 
 the Israelites, General Harrison has accompanied his people 
 for forty years through the wilderness, and now from the top 
 of Pisgah this Moses must lay down his life. The inscruta- 
 ble decree of heaven has removed our leader before the banks 
 of the Jordan had been reached, and just when the full pro- 
 mise of a well regulated and useful life was spread before the 
 view of his whole country, and for the enjoyment and secu- 
 rity of which to them and to their children they had sum- 
 moned him to preside in their councils, confiding in the 
 assurance uf more than forty years' laborious preparation. 
 Apart from all other and profounder feelings, a misgiving, a 
 sense of disappointment, a mournful augury of possible bles- 
 sings which are lost, are calculated to m^ke such an event 
 peculiarly aHlictive. In hereditary governments, where the 
 reigning monarch assumes the crown for life, it is in the natu- 
 ral order of things that his subjects should at some time 
 mourn his demise — it is an expected event. The accession 
 of an infant, the intervention of a regency, are things of so 
 obvious occurrence as to produce no shock upon the public 
 mind. The action of the government is not apt to be changed. 
 The responsibilities of the ministry remain the same. In an 
 elective government like ours, the head is always selected in 
 relerence Vo his presumed fitness, for his eminent wisdom or 
 distinguished patriotism. Although he is the Representative 
 of the nation and supposed to reflect their will, yet we look 
 to his counsels, to his discretion, to his vigilance, and his la- 
 bors to give direction and success to our public affairs. In- 
 stead of being paralised by the will of his constituents, it is 
 that will which like the nerves of the natural system, pro- 
 ceeding from the great popular senscrium, acts upon the 
 muscular power of the President with which the constitu- 
 tion has invested him, giving him like the son of Titan, the 
 strength of an hundred hands, as well as the wisdom of many 
 heads. It was this rational responsibility which one of our 
 virtuous Ex-Presidents, (who yet survives to receive the 
 blessings of his* country) in an official message proclaimed to 
 the world. It was a glorious boast that a government may 
 be free without losing its strength, and a proper exhibition of 
 the popular majesty in aid of the enterprise of a conscien- 
 tious functionary who dared not to shrink from his duty, nor 
 to devolve responsibility where the Constitution had not 
 placed it. Such then being the reliance which in this free 
 |[overnment of ours the people place in their Chief Magis- 
 
15 
 
 trale, and correctly too in a government of reason, I shall 
 not, I am sure, wound the feelings of a single hearer when 
 I say that the late President, endeared to the^country as he was 
 by a life signally devoted to its interests, enjoyed in an emi- 
 nent degree that confidence, and concentrated in his official 
 person, expectations and hopes as various and momentous as 
 it has been the lot of any of his predecessors to bear. The 
 condition of our domestic affairs, especially in refereno3 to 
 our commerce, revenues and finance— the delicacy of some of 
 our foreign relations— and the temper of the times, all pro- 
 claim the truth of this remark. Far be it from your orator 
 to profane the present solemnity by the advancement of a 
 single partizan sentiment. The fame of our great men be- 
 longs to the country. The dead cannot be eulogized by par- 
 tizan adulation. Is there a man in this assembly who can 
 withhold his sympathy on such an occasion as this, which 
 but to mention "the conscious heart iff oli-irii^' '^Z'J.l ^^^^'^-"^ 
 That man I* r/jt t'.^. America'*. Iz taere a man who, when 
 a President, not of his choice, is removed by Providence from 
 tnc Chair of State, is not willing to forget his faults and tO: 
 herald his virtues as the common and boasted fame of the 
 ""."Cr.? i^'ut more uian an, is laere a man who will not ren- 
 der to the dead the tribute of truth? In these unvarying 
 scales, and posterity may hold them, every friend of our late 
 venerated President will desire that his actions may be 
 weighed. In the long career of prosperity and honor through 
 which every patriot hopes that his country has yet to run. 
 President Harrison, had he lived, was destined to have con- 
 tributed an impulse so powerful as to have been felt for ages. 
 His education, his habits, his associations were all with the 
 people. There is not a citizen from Maine to Georgia whose 
 welfare may, in the remotest degree, be affected by the action 
 of the government, but would have found in our late Presi- 
 dent a sympathizing heart and a consenting head. Happily 
 removed, during several of the last years of his life, from the 
 strife and turmoil of political discussion, venerable by his 
 age and illustrious for his services, there was no name which 
 like his, could have charmed the turbulent spirit of faction, 
 and in whose success tlie triumphs of party would have been 
 forgotten in the stronger sentiment which makes us feel tliat 
 we are one people, and that we have one country, one desti- 
 ny. Having no resentments to indulge, his administration 
 vv'ould have hnd respect to the good of the whole Union. 
 Men schooled in diplomacy have intrigued for office, and 
 without any thing like a settled depravity, have even while 
 practising an ambidexterous course in i\w exercise of power, 
 
16 
 
 Teh ihal tlieir own honor was concerned in a just aclministra- 
 tion. But his/her sanctions, and a purer purpose governed the 
 conduct of Harrison. It is recorded by the elegant and phi- 
 losophic historian of Rome, that Augustus was of such ca- 
 pricious morality as at one time to have proved himself the 
 enemy and again the father of his country. The farewell 
 ailmonition of the immortal Washington against the vile influ- 
 ences of parly, is too much disregarded by us all. It well 
 befitted 'he patriot and sage who lately occupied the seat of 
 Washington to give the sanction of his official and personal 
 authority to those wise maxims of his illustrious predecessor 
 — Hear what he says in his inaugural address, in which, like 
 Washington, he now speaks from the tomb: 
 
 "To me it appears purfectly clear that the interest of that coun- 
 try requires that the violence of party spirit by which thosa 
 parties are at this lime governed must be greatly mitigated, if 
 iiOt £iivir*iw **Xwr."'"i'u3d, or consequences will ensue which 
 are appalling to be thonglvt of. It jmrtiGS in a Hrpi:--lie are 
 necessary to secure a degree of vigilance sufficient (0 keep the 
 public functionaries within the bounds of law and duty, at that 
 Doint their usefulness ends; beyond that they become destruc- 
 tive of public virtue, the parent of a spirit antagonist to that oflib- 
 BTiy, and eventually the inevitable conqueror. And so under 
 the operation of the same causes and influences it, (the spirit 
 of liberty) will fly from our Capitol and our forums. A ca- 
 lamity so awful not only to our country but to the world must 
 be deprecated by every patriot, "and every tendency to a state 
 of things likely to produce it immediately checked — such a 
 tendency has existed, does exist. Always the friend of my 
 countrymen, never iheir flatterer, it becomes my duty to say 
 to them from this high place to which tlieir partiality has ex- 
 alted me that there exists in the land a spirit hostile to their 
 best interests — hostile to liberty itself. It is a spirit contracted 
 i^l its views, selflsh in its objects. It looks to the aggrandize- 
 ment of a few even to the destruction of the interest of the 
 whole. The entire remedy is wi.th the people. Something 
 however may be effected by the means which they have 
 placed in my hands. It is union that we want not of a party 
 for the sake of that party, but a union of the whole country 
 for the sake of the whole country. As far as it depends up- 
 on me it shall be accomplished." 
 
 These were not adventitious opinions forced by the concur- 
 rence of circumstances, but the settled and habitual principles 
 of a statesman, who, owing nothing to political cabals preferred 
 his country to a party — they are the opinions of one who 
 .i^ever knew the weight of authority unless it was magnetised 
 
n 
 
 by reason — they are the sentiments of the author of the letter 
 to Bolivar. 
 
 This is not the time nor tho occasion to record the life of 
 Harrison. Recent circumstances have familiar. sed us with 
 most of the incidents of a life more than ordinarily eventful. 
 When the unfortunate divisions? of the present day shall have 
 been forgotten vvilh the transient objects that produced them; 
 when, perliaps, a too willing partiality or a blinded prejudice 
 equally culpable shall, in the glass of retrospection regard 
 realities instead of the phantasies which party spirit is per- 
 petually conjuring up before a disordered fancy, then will the 
 pencil of history assign to Harrison that space which he must 
 ever fill on the tablet of fame. There are, however, reflec- 
 tions arising from the acknowledged portions of his history, 
 which it would be criminal in the speaker, and unjust to his 
 audience not to notice. His life abounds with self-devotion 
 and a magnanimous disinterestedness. Born to hereditary 
 honors, too often the bane of our young men, he burst the 
 trammels of indolence, and spurned the temptations of 
 luxury. The young Ensign who, at the age of eighteen, 
 crossed the AUeghanies, could not have had in view the mere 
 excitement of adventure, or one campaign would have suf- 
 ficed to satisfy it. Joining the army of Wayne in the fol- 
 hjwing year, (to which the honor virtually belongs of closing 
 the war of tho revolution,) he linked his fortunes with the 
 growing destinies of a country which, though young, has 
 seen many generations in the transient character of its inha- 
 bitants. Few who came to the west witli Harrison had the 
 boldness and the energy to remain, and scarcely one of that 
 hjrdy band of border warriors who stood the successive , 
 shocks of merciless Indian warfare through that trying period, 
 have distinguished themselves in the arts of peace, or contri- 
 buted to build up the slate of which they were the gallant 
 founders. *'The dark and bloody ground" can tell many a 
 tale of chivalry which would have graced the ages of the 
 Troubadours, but those knights of the forest have never earned 
 the honors ol Legislators, Governors, and Ministers of State. 
 It was reserved for Harrison in his solitude of glory, to pass 
 through all these stages. Successively filling the offices of 
 Secretary of the north-western Territory, Delegate to Con^ 
 jjress from the same, and Governor of Indiana Territory, 
 which last commission he held thirteen years, he passed not 
 only through them all with a stainless reputation, but evinced in 
 an administration so full of new contingencies and trying emer- 
 gencies, an accuracy of judgment, a patience and a sagacity 
 which has so far outstripped all modern experience in simi» 
 
 2* 
 
18 
 
 lir spheres, as to make that period an era for reference, and 
 a standaid for comparison with all the lights that now sur- 
 ■round us. Rome boasted the virtues of her Romulus, and 
 claimed that her stakes were driven by tlie God Terminus. 
 Indiana asserts no fabulous origin, but proudly looks back 
 upon her early history, and rejoicing in her present greatness 
 more durable than tiie base of the Capitoline hill, alfection- 
 ately remembers her first Governor, and recognises the auspi- 
 ces under which she has marched to triumph and renown. 
 But through how many perils, under what discouragements 
 and hardships was all this accomplished! Let the inhabitant 
 of old post St. Vincent speak! Let the mothers who have 
 reared their infants in block houses, tell the tale! Your ora- 
 tor is too young. Or if all these are mute, (and the dead 
 speak not,) we summon from the field of Tippecanoe, those 
 heroes who, in that midnight affray, shed imperishable lustre 
 on our infant arms. We invoke the shades ot Owen, Spen- 
 cer, Daviess, Warrick, Randolph, Baen. We invoke thy 
 spirit, Harrison, from the ethereal fields to which it is now 
 translated. Alas, they come not to our call! Is there no 
 witness of that last scene of fearful peril which ushered in 
 the morning of security and happiness, upon a generation too 
 apt to contemn the labors of their predecessors? Some hon- 
 ored relics yet remain. Long may they live to sharejthe 
 gratitude of their country, and wben late they return to heaven, 
 may ihey bear full expiation to their comrades in arms for 
 our momentary forgetfulness in the pride of our prosperity! 
 
 It is not the object of your orator to trace the history of a 
 man who has stamped the impress of his character upon the 
 whole surface of our country, and with the point of a dia- 
 mond upon the West, but availing himself of so excellent a 
 model to deduce from occasional passages of his history, 
 morals and reflections which may excite others to a virtuous 
 emulation. The good which men do is not interred with 
 their bones, let what cynical philosopher pleases, declare the 
 doctrine. For the honor of human nature, we believe that 
 not much of that envy exists which will 'Hrack the steps of 
 glory to the grave." On the contrary, and let it be pro- 
 •claimed wherever desponding virtue fears to lift its head, and 
 dreads an unjust judgement, that 
 
 "Truih crush'd to earth will rise again 
 Th' eternal years of God are hers." — 
 
 Let the youth whose pathway uncheered by the sun of pat- 
 ronage or the smiles of greatness, may seem to lie through 
 thorns and brambles, remember that thougli 
 
19 
 
 "It is not in mortals to command success 
 They may do more — deserve it" 
 
 but that fortitiule, temperance, justice is the key which will 
 open its treasures. Let him remember that the young Lieu- 
 tenant in Wayne's legion who bore his orders to the most 
 dangerous points, rose through successive gradations to the 
 liighest honors in the Republic, and left to his country a 
 reputation mora valuable than her proudest dignities. 
 
 An ancient writer has said "that it is glorious even to fail 
 in a great undertaking." No one who peruses the history 
 of the early life of Harrison but must believe that hii purpo- 
 ses extended beyond the present hour. We do not ima- 
 gine that even to his clear mind that was revealed which now 
 in the retrospect we can hardly separate from fiction, the 
 astonishing and rapid growth of the country watered by the 
 Mississippi and its tributaries. Lideed for several years 
 after Harrison came to the West the Mississippi boun- 
 ded our dominions, and it was only willim the pre- 
 sent century that the purchase from France added to 
 those dominions the vast expanse of Louisiana — at t!ie timo 
 too of Harrison's emigration to the west and for sevsral 
 years thereafter, our land system was not established, and in 
 fact no guaranty or promise was afforded that these fertile 
 plains would for an age be wrested from the dominion of 
 nature and the savage so as to furnish a theatre for the exer- 
 cise of the talents of civilized man. But as in the expanse 
 of the heavens there are stars of the first magnitude which, 
 by their superior brilliancy seem to illumine the track of the 
 lesser planets and to unfold to our delighted vision the gorgeous 
 drapery of the skies studded with a thousand gems, so in the 
 ranks of men, there are some bold and lofty spirits who impa- 
 tient of opportunity, seem to overstep the bounds of fate and 
 to forestall success, opening in the void through which they 
 have moved a passage for men of lesser stature or of feebler 
 mind. Such were Harrison and bis brave cotemporaries who 
 made the west for themselves and opened the avenues through 
 -which population, wealth, enterprise and intelligence have 
 since poured in with such a ceaseless and overwhelming flood. 
 Whatever his purposes were, and no prophet could have revealed 
 the success which awaited them, they were liberal, far 
 sighted, magnanimous and bold. This is honor enough in 
 the conception, and all tlie people will say that the author of 
 such an enterprise deserved the fruit which he has reaped. 
 Among the benefactors of their race will ever be classed the 
 settlers of our western wilds, whether we regard the arduous- 
 nes9 of their labors or the splendour of their restilts. 
 
20 
 
 Uavinor hitherto lixed our eye most attentively upon tliat 
 portion of the life and actions of Gen. Harrison, where we 
 find him connected with the building up of our frontier set- 
 llemenls, and with the development of society in the west, 
 we shall despatch the residue of our duty with a hurried 
 gla^iCe, relieved as ^we are by the conscious oentiment of 
 millions of our fellow citizens, and by the operation of 
 causes now in mighty progress of exhibition. This is the 
 period of liis iiistory upon which we most delight to dwell. 
 As citizens of Indiana, we share the honor which he earned 
 in this preparatory school. The good man struggling with 
 the storms of fate, is said to be a spectacle in which tho 
 Gotis delight. Equally arduous is the labor of him who 
 shall tame the savage mind, who shall build an empire in the 
 woods, who shall carry lawf, literature and religion into 
 rude and untrodden lands, and earn for himself a niche in the 
 same temple with Numa, with Charlemagne, with Alfred, and 
 with Peter the Great. It is tlie process by which great minds 
 work their ends, more than the consummation which interests 
 and instructs us. In the languago of Gifford, "We love to 
 dwell on every circumstance of splendid preparation, which 
 contributes to fit the great man for the scene of his glory. 
 We delight to watrh fold by iold, the bracing on of his Vul- 
 canian panoply, and observe with pleased anxiety the leading 
 forth of that chariot, which, borne on irresistible wheels, and 
 drawn by steeds of immortal race, is to crush the necks of 
 the mighty, and sweep away the serried strength of armies." 
 
 Undoubtedly, the character of General Harrison received 
 its stamp in that laborious school where we liave been chiefly 
 contemplating him,'"and which terminated with the resignation 
 of his military comnfission in the spring of 1814 as Com- 
 mander in Cliief of our North Western Army during the 
 second war with Great Britain — yet it was his destiny there- 
 after to adorn many high stations in the other spheres. In 
 1810 he was elected from Ohio a member of the House of 
 Representatives of ll^e United States. Activity and useful- 
 ness in every department of duty were his ruling traits, and 
 no less in the halls of legislation than in the camp or upon 
 the frontier. Participating honorably in a variety of the busi- 
 ness of Congress during his term as a Representative, he en- 
 tered, however, with most peculiar zeal into the subject of a 
 re-organization and improvement of our militia establishment 
 a subject which has engaged the attention of every adminis- 
 tration from Washington to the present time, but presents 
 such difficulties as yet to have baffled all adjustment. As early 
 as the year 1810, when war with Great Britain became pro- 
 
21 
 
 bable, the military and cautious mind of Harrison foresaw 
 }iow much in such an event we must rely upon our citizen 
 soldiers, and in a series of letters to Gov. Scott of Kentucky, 
 lie pressed the subject of militia reform with great zeal and 
 ability upon the attention of the nation. The several able re- 
 ports and plans for that purpose submitted by him while in Con- 
 gress must ever remain among the brilliant monuments of an 
 illustrious life. To his latest hours the improvement and ele- 
 vation of our militia occupied his most serious thoughts; and 
 when the events of his life shall liave been compiled by the 
 historian it will fee found that in various letters and conversa- 
 tions he has given to this interesting subject as well the weight 
 of his private influence and long personal experience, ag of 
 official recommendation. In 1819 he was elected to the Sen- 
 site of the Slate of Ohio, and in 1824 was chosen a Senator 
 of ihe United States from the same State. Of the subjects 
 that received particular attention from him during this legisla- 
 tive career, time allows us only to quote a synoptical state- 
 ment Irom some outlines of his life recently published. — 
 Such are the organization of the militia; the introduction of a 
 more equal system of military education than now exists; the 
 -recognition of the independence of the Spanish American 
 l^epublics; the improvement of the moral conlition of the 
 army by augmentmg the inducements to respectability on the 
 part of the non-commissioned officers and soldiers; the intro- 
 duction of uniformity as to military pensions; and above all, 
 his strenuous exertions in behalf of the claims of the survi- 
 ving officers and soldiers of the Revolution. 
 
 In 1828 he was appointed Minister Plenipotentiary to the 
 Republic of Colombia, but a change of administration very 
 soon producing his recall from that station, there are no mon- 
 uments left of his diplomatic career. There is peculiar fitness 
 that one who through a long life of vicissitude and labor had 
 borne the most dangerous posts of honor at hom.e, should 
 when age had set the seal of wisdom and authority on his 
 brow, participate in the glory of representing our national 
 dignity abroad. Who so well qualified to reflect at the turbu- 
 lent courts of those new Republics at the south the example 
 of a virtuous and free people, as that soldier of liberty, him- 
 self the founder of a State, the accomplished civilian and 
 scholar? The single semi-official act of Harrison while Min- 
 ister at Colombia, his letter to Bolivar, will be read in after 
 ages, and admired by every magnanimous lover of liberty. 
 
 For twelve years after his return from Colombia, General 
 Harrison lived in retirement upon his farm at North Bend. 
 
 Ills summons from that retiiement to preside over the des- 
 
22 
 
 liniesof this nation, is an event more marked and distinguish- 
 ing in its character than any which has occurred in the history 
 of free governments. It has been a problem witli political 
 philosophers whether the continuance of an elective govern- 
 ment was practicable. The advocates of the hereditary sys- 
 tem admit that it must excite an indignant smile to relate that 
 on the father's decease the properly of a nation like that of a 
 drove of oxen descends to his infant son, as yet unknown to 
 mankind and to himself; and that the bravest warriors and the 
 wisest statesmen relinquishing their natural right to empire, 
 approach the royal cradle with bended knees and protestations 
 of inviolable fidelity. But they contend that although satire 
 and declamation may paint these obvious topics in their most 
 dazzling colors, our more serious thouglits will respect a use- 
 ful prejudice that establishes a rule of succession independent 
 of the passions of mankind. They say, that though in the 
 cool shade of retirement we may easily devise imaginary forms 
 of governmsnt in which the sceptre shall be constantly be- 
 stowed on the most worthy by tlie free t;::d incorrupt suffrage 
 of the whole community, experience overturns these airy fa- 
 brics and teaches us that in a large society the election of a 
 monarch can never devolve to the wisest cr to t!;e rncs: numer- 
 ous part of the people. — That the army is the only order of men 
 sufficiently united to concur in the same sentiments, and pow- 
 erful enough to enforce them on the rest of their fellow citizens. 
 That the acknowledged right of birth extinguishes the hopes 
 of faction, and the conscious security disarms the cruelly of 
 the monarch. 
 
 Among the lessons which our institutions have taught 
 mankind, these two stand prominent — that governments may 
 be supported M ithout standing armies, and that their organiza- 
 tion may be sustained by the voice of the people. "I contend" 
 said Gen. Harrison in his letter to Bolivar "that the strongest 
 of all governments is that which is most free. Not so much 
 from the terrors o^ the guillotine and the gibbet as from the 
 aroused determination of the nation, exhibiting their strength 
 and convincing the factious that their cause was hopeless." 
 In the elevation of Gen. Harrison to the Chief Magistracy 
 we have seen a mighty nation with all its passions excited, with 
 two rival parlies nearly equally balanced contending with 
 the most unlimited licence of freedom, when all the elements 
 of society had been aroused into sensitive and vigorous ac- 
 tion, proceeding to change the chief administration of their 
 government, without violence and without disorder. So far 
 from Ate with her fire brands inflaming the minds of men to 
 fi'ction and to blood, the election proceeded with the sounds 
 
23 
 
 of rejoicing and with the transports of good will. Such a 
 spectacle, sublimely beautiful, was worth a thousand parly 
 triumphs. It was the genuine triumph of liberty in which 
 every American was a victor, it was the consummation of 
 popular government! 
 
 Bui he in whose person the chief glory of our institutions 
 was so brilliantly illustrated, has suddenly surrendered his 
 unfinished trust to God. As he was elevated by the people 
 so the only official address which he was permitted to make, 
 was to those people. Removed from political strife before 
 his election, his official memory as President rests upon those 
 durable principles of free government announced in his inaug- 
 ural. No partial measures, no divided opinions detract from 
 the entirety of his fame. Happy in his death as in his life, 
 his whole energies have been given to his country. Com- 
 mending in his inaugural address that country to the guidance 
 of the supreme ruler of men and nations, and invoking the 
 mild influences of religion upon all its counsels, his latest 
 breath was an aspiration for the welfare of our government 
 and for the eternity of its Constitution. 
 
 To you vvho knew him it is unnecessary to speak of his 
 private life distinguished throughout by unvarying honor and 
 self-denying benevolence. He has left the scene of his 
 labors and his earthly honors, and nothing now remains of 
 Harrison but his bright example. Virtus alone survives. 
 He came like the son of Jesse unarmed with power and with 
 patronage to a giant wilderness; and having lived to see those 
 waste places smile like a cultivated garden, to see five mil- 
 lions of freemen inthe full enjoyment of tlie highest order cf 
 civil and religious liberty where the footsteps of civilized 
 man^could not be traced before, to be honored with the title 
 of venerable father of that new though mighty community, 
 he has returned in the name of that people and of our com- 
 mon country in civio triumph to the capitol, and from the 
 summit of human ambition has now gone to reap his reward 
 in heaven! 
 
 Such imperfectly, is the life o/ the first American President 
 from the north-west territory. No higher fame can crown 
 the future history of that Territory, than to have furnished, 
 many more such sons. 
 
RESOLUTIONS. 
 
 At the conclusion of the oration, Dr. 0. L. Clark offered the Allowing 
 resolutions which were unanimously adopted. 
 
 It having pleased the Almi^^hty disposer of human affairs, to ter- 
 minate the mortal existence of the President of the United States: 
 
 Resolved, That with humble submission to this sudden and affiicting dis- 
 pensation of Providence, we deeply lament the irreparable loss of our 
 country. 
 
 Resolved, That we sympathize with our fellow-citizens, throughout the 
 Union, in the bereavement visited upon the nation. 
 
 Resolved, That as citizens of the West, the theatre of the long ca- 
 reer of military and civil services of William Henry Harrison, we are 
 doubly bereaved in the loss of the Chief Magistrate of the nation, and the 
 early defender of the western settlements. 
 
 Resolved, That as citizens of Indiana, ever grateful for the eminent 
 and distinguished services-of our first Governor, we are especially called 
 on to mourn over his sudden severence from the discharge of the high 
 and important earthly trusts to which his country had so recently called 
 him. 
 
 Resolved, That as a testimonial of respect for the character and public 
 cervices of the illustrious deceased, we will wear the usual badge of 
 mournuig for the space of thirty days. 
 
 Ordered, That tho proceedings of this meeting, with the foregoing 
 Resolutions be published; And the meeting adjourned. 
 
 E.'DEMIXG, Pres't. 
 R. S. Ford, Vice Pres't. 
 
 B, Henkle, Sec'y. 
 
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