But, sir, the particulars of his career, both public and private, have been recounted by those who knew him well; have been recounted with great force, with great eloquence and propriety. There is, however, one part of that career to which I wish to refer. He was engaged in the memorable struggle which convulsed this nation from center to circumference and which fastened the gaze of the civilized world. I wish upon this occasion to say emphatically, that wherever we may have stood in that struggle, whatever was good and great in any man participating on either side of it is a precious heritage to the entire American people to-day. We proved that, North, South, East, West, we had not degenerated in the qualities which make a nation great.

Grant and Lee, Sherman, Sheridan, and the two Johnstons have gone from us forever, and every day the green sward of peace, the flowers of affection, are placed above the grave of some hero of the blue or the gray. But I love to think that above these graves stands the Genius of American freedom, serene and grand, and bids the world behold how brave the sons of the Republic were in the past; how united they are in one purpose and one destiny in the present; how certain they are to be a people noted for reasonable liberty, for perfect union, and for sufficient material power to be formidable and just alike to the other nations of the earth.

And so, sir, I come and lay the flowers of my Northern home upon the bier of this son of Virginia, this good citizen, this patriot, this man who, I am proud to believe, held even me in his affection. And when gentlemen here speak of the terror and the mystery of death, I tell them that to such a man death has no terrors, and that to the good man it has no mystery; for in that illimitable hereafter, which must be populated by all the sons of men, it must be, it will be, well with all of us.



ADDRESS OF MR. WILSON, OF WEST VIRGINIA.

Mr. SPEAKER: The House has already heard from his friend and successor the story of Gen. LEE's life. I shall not, therefore, repeat it even in briefest outline. Enough for me to say that he was one in a long lineage of noted men, who by some innate force and virtue had stood forth in three generations as leaders of their fellow-men; that he was the son of the greatest of all who have borne the name, and that in early manhood he exhibited the soldierly instincts and the soldierly capacity that seemed to be historically associated with it.

With such a lineage and with such a history he came to this House, and I believe I can offer no higher tribute to his memory to-day than to say that in all his associations with us here he was the embodiment of gentleness and modesty. Indeed, Mr. Speaker, as I now recall Gen. LEE, and explore with aching heart the memory of a close and cordial friendship with him, I can say with confidence that in the blending of these rare traits I have never known his equal. They were a part of his nature, not more illustrated in business and social intercourse with fellow-members than in his relations with the page who did him service and who learned to regard himself in some way as the special friend and associate of Gen. LEE.

Many of us doubtless can recall the evident pride of the little fellow who occasionally placed upon our desks the roses which his kindly patron brought by the basketful in the spring mornings from his Virginia home to brighten the sittings of the House. And this gentleness and modesty were the more attractive because they were the adornment of a sincere and manly character. How much came to him as the rich legacy of ancestral blood and how much was wrought into his nature by the training of his youth it is idle to speculate. In both respects he was lifted far above the common lot of men. Of his mother it is said by those who knew her well that she was one of the most accomplished and at the same time most domestic, sensible, and practical of women. Of his father's influence and teaching, to say nothing of his lofty example, we have the striking proofs, if any were needed, in letters that have been published. Let me cull but an occasional expression from these unaffected outpourings of the heart of Robert E. Lee toward the son he loved so well. "My precious Roon," as he was wont to call him.

When the boy was not yet ten years of age he closes a playful letter, adapted to such tender years, with these earnest words:

Be true, kind, and generous, and pray earnestly to God to enable you to keep His commandments and to walk in the same all the days of your life.

A year later, writing from the ship Massachusetts, off Lobos, to his two sons, a letter full of interest to boys, he urges them to diligence in study:

I shall not feel my long separation from you if I find that my absence has been of no injury to you, and that you have both grown in goodness and knowledge as well as in stature; but how I shall suffer on my return if the reverse has occurred. You enter into all my thoughts, into all my prayers, and on you in part will depend whether I shall be happy or miserable, as you know how much I love you.

Ten years later, when the son had become a lieutenant in the Army, he admonishes him:

I hope you will always be distinguished for your avoidance of the universal bane whisky and every immorality. Nor need you fear to be ruled out of the society that indulges in it, for you will acquire their esteem and respect, as all venerate, if they do not practice, virtue. I hope you will make many friends, as you will be thrown with those who deserve this feeling. But indiscriminate intimacies you will find annoying and entangling, and they can be avoided by politeness and civility. When I think of your youth, impulsiveness, and many temptations, your distance from me, and the ease (and even innocence) with which you might commence an erroneous course, my heart quails within me and my whole frame and being tremble at the possible results. May Almighty God have you in His holy keeping. To His merciful providence I commit you, and I will rely upon Him and the efficacy of the prayers that will be daily and hourly offered up by those who love you.

A year or two later, on New Year's Day, 1859, he writes:

I always thought there was stuff in you for a good soldier and I trust you will prove it. I can not express the gratification I felt, in meeting Col. May in New York, at the encomium he passed upon your soldiership, your zeal, and your devotion to your duty. But I was more pleased at the report of your conduct; that went more to my heart and was of infinite comfort to me. Hold on to your purity and virtue; they will proudly sustain you in all trials and difficulties and cheer you in every calamity.

So, too, when the young lieutenant had married and settled down a typical Virginian farmer upon the estate left him by his grandfather Custis, the well-known "White House" on the Pamunkey, the home of Martha Washington:

I am glad to hear that your mechanics are all paid off and that you have managed your funds so well as to have enough for your purposes. As you have commenced, I hope you will continue never to exceed your means. It will save you much anxiety and mortification and enable you to maintain your independence of character and feeling. It is easier to make our wishes conform to our means than to make our means conform to our wishes. In fact, we want but little. Our happiness depends upon our independence, the success of our operations, prosperity of our plans, health, contentment, and the esteem of our friends, all of which, my dear son, I hope you may enjoy to the full.

With such counsels, glowing with a father's love and enforced by the constant example of a father's life, it is no wonder that the son grew into the manliness, the gentleness and modesty, the charitableness of judgment, the unconspicuous and patient devotion to duty, and the personal lovableness of Gen. LEE.

Mr. Speaker, I might say much more from the promptings of a strong and unfeigned affection and from a sense of the public merits of our late colleague, but where there are so many to speak, it is not necessary for one to attempt a catalogue of his private virtues and of his public services.

Perhaps I may fitly add a word in closing as to Gen. LEE's military career. From a captain of volunteer cavalry he rose on his own merits at the age of twenty-six to the rank of major-general. I have not searched the annals of war to recite his military history, for it is not the soldier that I have been commemorating, but I may recall a testimony not improper to be placed on record here to-day. I happened to be in company with Gen. Joseph E. Johnston about the time that Gen. LEE was first nominated for Congress. The old commander, who, as all know, was not given to effusive speech, expressed to me his hearty gratification at the event, and in doing so his high estimate of Gen. LEE as a man and of his ability as a soldier. His praise was strong and unstinted, and no one will question its sincerity. Mr. Speaker, what more need I add than to say that in all the acts and relations of life, as son and soldier, as husband and father, as private citizen and as Representative of the people, as friend and as Christian, our departed colleague left a memory we may well cherish and an example we may well follow.



ADDRESS OF MR. CUMMINGS, OF NEW YORK.

Mr. SPEAKER: Great as is our country, its history is comparatively brief. Though brief, it is exceedingly instructive. So far as there can be an outcome in ever-recurring events, it is the outcome of a tremendous social and political struggle. Sir, it hardly suits the occasion to refer to the origin of this struggle or to trace its progress, but the effort for popular government is discernible through many centuries. As we come nearer to our time it becomes more intelligent and determined. Our great Declaration was its best pronunciamento. Our written Constitution was its most concise expression. The events that produced them founded a normal school for patriotism. In it was perfected a new departure. Fealty to lord and king was supplanted by fealty to human rights. Proclaimed in the council chamber, these rights had to be won in the field. Yorktown completed our first endeavor at nation-making; we graduated masters at Appomattox. The first proclaimed the prowess of the Confederation, the second testified to the strength of the Union. Both astonished the world. Both transpired in Virginia.

Conspicuous in this analogue of our history were the Lees of Virginia. They have a lineage too illustrious for praise. Its escutcheons are too bright for adornment. It reaches back for centuries loyal to honor and to truth. Him we mourn to-day was a gifted scion of that great name. His highest distinction was won in Confederate arms.

Thank God, I can now speak of our civil war with satisfaction and not with reluctance. I allude to it with a satisfaction akin to that one feels in gazing upon a plain fertilized by an inundation. Flowers spring up, birds sing, and golden grain nods in the sunlight. But our civil war was more like an upheaval than like a deluge. It shook every timber in the grand structure with which we had surprised the world. Other governments have fallen of their own weight; our matchless edifice could not be shattered by an explosion.

Both contestants stood guard over the popular principle and would not let it be mined. They were instructed in the same school and by the same teacher. Local privilege was as strong with the one as with the other. The dispute was whether the Union should endure the strain of the race and slavery issue. The long and vexing argument was adjourned to the battlefield. In no other respect was our system even threatened. This close connection at the root made the angry divergence begin to assimilate at the very outset.

So kindred was it, that when Grant met his heroic opponent at Appomattox he says that he fell into such a reunion with him that he had twice to be reminded of the occasion that brought them together. He then conformed to it, and treated those who surrendered not as conquered, but as reclaimed. Lincoln went further. He found a Confederate legislature ready-made to his hand, and promptly permitted it to repair the situation. In thus mingling the gray with the blue he was neither color-blind nor purblind. He knew what he was doing. He desired to blend them, as emblematic of a more perfect Union. Possibly the Confederate legislature suited his purpose best.

After this testimonial it looks to me something like treason to that great name to try to exclude Confederate worth from the annals of the strife or from the glory of its grand consummation. Neither act nor actor can be profitably spared.

Mr. Speaker, the other day in this very Hall I laid a chaplet on the bier of a dead comrade. To-day I am trying to commemorate the virtues of a Confederate colleague. Both died while members of this House. That both were my countrymen warms my heart. As my countrymen I can make no invidious distinction. If living neither would permit it, and he is more reckless than I who would profane the memory of either.

Mr. Speaker, I have said that I could speak of the civil war with satisfaction and not with reluctance. The occasion prompted me to say so. The occasion requires that, as a Union soldier, I should state my reasons. We learn from experience, and war is the toughest kind of experience. When it raised its horrid front and began its work of seeming devastation, we shrank back from its terrible promise. The world looked to see us dismembered; but the great Republic, like a daring cruiser, emerged from the tempest sound from keel to truck. Not a brace swung loose, not a plank was sprung, no spar was shivered. Within there had to be readjustment. Aloft the Stars and Stripes rose and fell in graceful recognition of the trial. The thunder of her broadsides proclaimed the value of this object-lesson in nation-making.

We had learned a juster appreciation of ourselves as a whole people, and if this were all, it was worth the tuition. But we had besides garnered into our storehouse of knowledge vast consignments for the use of liberal economic government. We had infused into our laws, our language, and our institutions new vigor for conquest and for human enlightenment. Venality, that dogs great efforts, undoubtedly there was. But the high tide of the conflict showed no mercenary taint. On both sides it was urged from the highest motives of patriotism and of honor and in defense of the popular principle. That principle with us means local self-government and representative union. The rebel yell was because they thought local government in peril. The Federal huzza was for representative union. Together they were cheering the same deeply embedded sentiment.

Those who would study the phenomenon must remember that where opinions approximate on parallel lines, but from some interest or sentiment refuse to coalesce, the passions are liable to ignite. Fusion then takes place in a terrible heat. The heat must be sufficient to remove the obstacles that the mass may become unified. We have as a result a firmly established representative union of local self-governments. The cooling and finishing process has left no flaw. Sir, what sort of a soldier must he be who is not proud of having been tempered in such a trial? If after the unmatched tournament this is not the spirit of victor and vanquished, then the lights of chivalry are burnt out and magnanimity is no more.

Mr. Speaker, I know of no greater praise of a life than to say it was one of honest endeavor. Whatever faculties comprise it, this is the scope of human duty. When to this is added a conscience adequate to all the suggestions of a great and busy career, the sum of human excellence has been reached All this I believe in my soul can be truthfully said of "ROONEY" LEE. "Rooney" was his father's term of endearment, which all who knew him, without distinction of age, race, or sex, delighted to apply to him when absent. When present, it was always "general." A thorough soldier, there was an idyllic strain in his nature. He was essentially rural in his tastes. He loved the wheat fields and tobacco plantations of his native State. Its very air seemed to inspire him.

The Blue Ridge was to him the perfection of natural beauty. He was warm in his friendships and true to his kinships. Always dignified, there was a heartiness in his greetings that was irresistible. He was as broad as his acres. Riding or driving over his vast estate or in its vicinity, his cheerful halloo rang in the ears of those who had not seen him, and the cheery swing of his hat, though paid to all, was a cherished compliment. If the spirit of mortal be proud, it was not his spirit. Courteous, sympathetic, unobtrusive, patriotic, knightly, and beneficent, he was a part of the soil of Virginia itself. He had the loving hospitality that would take all into the march of progress. How much of these qualities was innate, how much he drew from his high lineage, how much from the teachings of his illustrious father, can never be known, but he blended them in a halo that will not soon fade from his memory.

Sir, others have spoken of the incidents of his life and of his unabated fidelity to its claims. I can not add to his record. I have met him in battle array; I have embraced him with a soldier's warmth. We entered Congress together; we have fought here side by side. It has fallen to my lot to eulogize him. This I will venture: It would mar the catalogue of bright names of which America is so proud if his were omitted from the roll.



ADDRESS OF MR. COWLES, OF NORTH CAROLINA.

Mr. SPEAKER: Truly "in the midst of life we are in death." There is scarcely one of the associates and colleagues of Gen. WILLIAM H.F. LEE who knew him here and up to the closing days of the late Congress who would have been deterred by the thought of personal risk from exchanging the chances of life or death with him for a few months; and yet, in so short a time the dread summoner, who soon or late is to call us all, has taken him from this life into that which fadeth not, neither does it die.

The hand of the reaper Takes the ears that are hoary, But the voice of the weeper Wails manhood in glory. The autumn winds rushing Waft the leaves that are searest, But our flower was in flushing When blighting was nearest.

Yes, death, the unsolved and unsolvable mystery, has enveloped him, and he has passed from our view never more to be seen and known of men on this earth. But yesterday the living, moving, brave, sympathetic, generous friend, and now, alas, but a memory—and yet a memory dear to all who knew and appreciated his noble attributes of heart and mind; a memory which has left its impress upon his fellow-men for nobility of character; a memory which can not wholly fade, but must influence for good not only his own immediate posterity, but all those who may come after him.

My acquaintance with Gen. LEE began in the early part of the war between the States. It was upon a night march, as we rode with the advance guard of the army, where we might expect at any moment a hostile volley. He related to me in a low impressive tone of voice an experience which had occurred to him when his command by reason of surprise had met with some disaster. What impressed me most at the time was that, although others must have been to some extent culpable, he took all the blame upon himself, and had not a word of complaint for either officer or man who served under him.

This trait of magnanimity, such a splendid companion to personal courage, I found afterwards to be characteristic of the man.

Though springing from a long line of heroic and patriotic ancestors, he had not a particle of pretentious pride, but to all men, privates in the ranks as well as officers, so that they were but brave and good soldiers, he always found "time enough for courtesy." He never tried to appropriate another man's laurels, but he possessed in a high degree that quality of courage which is so well described by Emerson:

Courage, the highest gift, that scorns to bend To mean devices for a sordid end. Courage, an independent spark from Heaven's bright throne, By which the soul stands raised, triumphant, high, alone. Great in itself, not praises of the crowd, Above all vice, it stoops not to be proud. Courage, the mighty attribute of powers above, By which those great in war are great in love. The spring of all brave acts is seated here, As falsehoods draw their sordid birth from fear.

In his friendship he was gentle and tender as one who is full of love and human sympathy. You might have thought him better fitted for the paths of peace, and yet upon the battlefield he was brave as the bravest. Whenever and wherever duty called him his personal safety was by him never considered. Often have I seen him in the thickest of the fight, by his presence and personal direction cheering and encouraging both officers and men. Though the son of the general in chief of the army, he took no favor by it.

He never took advantage of his rank to keep to the rear and send his regiments in. You could always measure his estimate of you by the manner in which he met you. The soul of candor, his heart shone in his eye, and placing a high estimate upon manhood, he loved all in whom he recognized it. For about two years during the latter part of the war I served in his command, and had every opportunity to observe and know him.

My acquaintance with him here was but a revival of old memories. I always loved him as one who—

Spake no slander; no, nor listened to it. * * * * * Who reverenced his conscience as his king.

Who, if he committed an error or wronged any man, was swift to redress it; never laying his blame at another man's door. Who excelled in all the virtues which go to make up a beautiful private life in all the essentials of faithful friendship and truthful character; who lived—

Thro' all this tract of years, Wearing the white flower of a blameless life.

Think for a moment how much better and happier every one would be if all men were earnestly to strive to live up to this high standard and how much of pain would be spared the world. He was one of the most faithful members upon this floor; faithful to the public interest, and whenever any proposition was under consideration which specially concerned his own people, they always had in him an able advocate and strong defender.

He is gone! sincere Christian, loving husband and father, trusted friend. The life that was given him has been taken away. The widow and the orphan mourn, and their grief is our grief; but a merciful Father has given him more than he has taken away, and this strength and comfort through the tender mercy of our Saviour is theirs—

I am the resurrection, and the life, he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live: and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die.



ADDRESS OF MR. BRECKINRIDGE, OF KENTUCKY.

Mr. SPEAKER: I never had the pleasure of Gen. LEE's acquaintance, so far as I could recall, until he entered this House as a Representative of the district which lies just across the river; but there were many things in common between us which soon caused a kindliness of feeling much warmer than the frequency of our association would indicate. It happened that we were almost of the same age, born within a few weeks of each other, and that on all great questions of the day we were singularly alike in our opinions, and, if I may use such an expression, even in our prejudices.

Amid all the trials of life we two found we had adhered to simple beliefs of those Southern homes in which we were the reared; that no advance in civilization, no pretense of progress, had ever obscured our views as to the olden beliefs and the simpler truths which had been inwrought into our being by the venerable fathers and beloved mothers with whom we had been blessed. The substratum of our beliefs was precisely the same. And we found that we were not ashamed of that substratum, that we were not given to apologizing for adhering to so-called "obsolete" traditions or to creeds "that were passing out of fashion."

We also found that on the political questions of the day we were similarly in accord. We believed in the same political principles. And so it was a very rare occurrence that when the roll was called in this House we were not found voting, even on what seemed to be trivial matters, upon the same side. It was not strange that with these coincidences of belief and with our having both served in the Confederate army and the local accident of the nearness of our seats which threw us together, there grew up a regard greater than was indicated by our association outside of this Hall.

If I were to select in my acquaintance him who, as much as any other, deserved the title, I would say of Gen. LEE that he was a gentleman. All that had concurred in producing him was of the best. The blood which gave him life, the soil out of which he grew, the kindly influences which always surrounded him, the molding powers to which he had been subjected—all were of the noblest. A son of such houses, reared at such knees, influenced by such powers, he passed early under the influences of Harvard. Later he took his young experience as a soldier under Albert Sidney Johnston. He began his civil life in a delicious home, with the love of an exquisite young wife. And in the Confederate service he was associated with the best and the bravest volunteers of the Old Dominion herself.

It was not strange that the product of such influences should be a gentleman. All that was courageous, all that was loyal to truth, all that was courteous to those with whom he came in contact, all that was gentle and kindly was not only the heritage which he received with his name and his blood, but it was developed by all the environments which he was so fortunate as to have surround him. If I were to select a character of which it might be said that it was round, without angles, even without salient points, it would be his—not because he was weak, but because the calmness, the serenity, and the magnificence (if I may use a word that seems to be hyperbolic) of the equipoise of his qualities made each of them seem less important than it would have seemed if other qualities had been less.

It would not be extravagant to apply to him the paraphrase of the apostolic description of a Christian gentleman—loving without dissimulation; abhorring the evil; cleaving to the honorable; preferring to confer honor rather than to receive it; earnest in the work of life, and careful of time and opportunity to labor; hopeful of all good; patient in tribulation; forbearing to resent trespass; charitable in thought and word, as in deed; given to hospitality; at peace with his own conscience and with God.

We live, Mr. Speaker, in a heroic age. I constantly hear of this being an age of materialism, of the worship of the "almighty dollar." I challenge all the past, in all the endeavors of man, to reach a higher level, to equal the heroism of the age in which we have been called to perform our part—the devotion to duty, the readiness to make sacrifices, the willingness to give all for the truth which have marked our generation—the era in which we have to act our part.

This simple, kindly, unaffected, modest gentleman; this man, with his sweet calm smile, who met us every day, passing in and out with a certain reticence of modesty, was himself but the type of the age in which he lived and of the people from whom he sprang. All modest as he was, he had given up everything at the call of duty. All simple and kindly as he seemed to be, he had at the head of charging squadrons captured cannon, and with more heroic endurance had lain without complaint in the cell of solitary confinement. He carried about with him in the simple modesty of his everyday life the heart that at a moment's notice was ready to still its beating at the call of duty; and with the same simplicity, with the same freedom from ostentation, with the same delicious smile, he would have walked into the jaws of death if it had become him as a gentleman to do so.

To live in such an age, to be associated with such men—and, thank God, they are not uncommon amongst us—the bar at which I practice, the tables at which I sit in the kindliness of social intercourse, the men with whom I have been blessed enough to be called into contact, the very strangers who call on business at my house, rank among them men just like unto him. I say to live in such an age, to be associated with such men, to play a part, however obscure, in such drama, make life worth the living; make the hereafter nobler for him who has been so blessed.

Mr. Speaker, to-day, in the midst of this the ending of the nineteenth century, we who will soon pass away, we who are but the remnants of a generation of war, can proudly hand over to those who shall come after us the example of lives that in war feared nothing but God, in peace strove for nothing but the good of the people.



PROCEEDINGS IN THE SENATE.

EULOGIES.

MARCH 4, 1892.

The VICE-PRESIDENT. The Chair lays before the Senate resolutions from the House of Representatives, which will be read.

The resolutions were read, as follows:

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, February 6, 1892.

Resolved, That the business of the House be now suspended, that opportunity be given for tributes to the memory of Hon. WILLIAM HENRY FITZHUGH LEE, late a Representative from the State of Virginia.

Resolved, As a further mark of respect to the memory of the deceased, and in recognition of his eminent abilities as a distinguished public servant, that the House, at the conclusion of these memorial proceedings, shall stand adjourned.

Resolved, That the Clerk communicate these resolutions to the Senate.

Mr. BARBOUR. Mr. President, I offer the resolutions which I send to the desk.

The VICE-PRESIDENT. The resolutions will be read.

The resolutions were read, as follows:

Resolved, That the Senate has heard with profound sorrow the announcement of the death of Hon. WILLIAM H.F. LEE, late a Representative from the State of Virginia.

Resolved, That the business of the Senate be now suspended, in order that fitting tribute may be paid to his memory.

Resolved, That as an additional mark of respect the Senate shall, at the conclusion of these ceremonies, adjourn.



ADDRESS OF MR. BARBOUR, OF VIRGINIA.

Mr. PRESIDENT: The resolutions just read were passed by the House of Representatives on the 6th day of February last in respect to the memory of WILLIAM H.F. LEE, deceased, late a member of that body from the Eighth Congressional district of Virginia.

Before asking the Senate to adopt the resolutions it is incumbent upon me, as one of the Senators from Virginia, as it is in harmony with my own personal feelings, to submit some remarks in explanation of their purpose and object; a sad and mournful duty to be performed on my part.

Gen. LEE was my immediate successor in the House of Representatives, and served with ability and efficiency in both the Fiftieth and Fifty-first Congresses. He was reelected to the present Congress, but his career was arrested by that higher and supreme Power to which we must all yield, and on the 15th of October, 1891, he departed this life at his home in the county of Fairfax, and in the midst of his family and friends.

I do not consider it necessary in this presence or on this occasion to go into much detail touching the life and character of the deceased.

The full and eloquent tributes paid to his memory in the House of Representatives show the high appreciation in which he was held by his associates in that body, and express in far more fitting terms than I could employ their estimate of his character, services, and virtues.

Gen. LEE came from a distinguished lineage. Two of the family signed our Magna Charta, the Declaration of Independence, and another was Attorney-General under Gen. Washington.

On the paternal side he could refer to his distinguished grandfather, Gen. Henry Lee, of the Revolutionary army, who was known as Light-Horse Harry, the commandant of Lee's Legion, so conspicuous in the annals of that period. His maternal grandfather was the late G.W. Parke Custis, of Arlington, the stepson of Gen. Washington, and familiarly called in his day the child of Mount Vernon.

His father, Gen. R.E. Lee, the chief military figure on his side in the late civil war, was too well known for comment at my hands. It is the boast of some of the old baronial families of England that their ancestors rode with William the Conqueror at Hastings. To a certain extent the pride of ancestry is an ennobling sentiment, and Virginians must be pardoned when tempted to refer to the illustrious names which their State in the past has furnished to the nation. The name of Lee has been a household word in Virginia for three generations of men. In the death of Gen. WILLIAM H.F. LEE the State has lost one of her truest and worthiest sons and the Federal Government a faithful and patriotic Representative.

Although acquainted personally with Gen. LEE for many years, it was only within a year or two before his death that I had the opportunity to appreciate fully the high personal qualities of the man and to understand the real nobility of his nature. The more I saw of him the higher became my respect and admiration. He grew upon me with closer contact and more intimate association.

I was greatly impressed with his invariable courtesy of manner and great amiability and kindness of heart, to which was added a knightly bearing and cordiality of greeting which, combined, made Gen. LEE with all classes of society an imposing and attractive figure.

He has gone to his last resting place, mourned by his family and friends and lamented by an extensive acquaintance throughout the country. He had filled the measure of his duties in every respect, and was entitled, as he passed from the stage of action, to the plaudit, "Well done, good and faithful servant."



ADDRESS OF MR. PASCO, OF FLORIDA.

Mr. PRESIDENT: My acquaintance with WILLIAM HENRY FITZHUGH LEE commenced in the summer of 1854, when we met at Cambridge as members of the new freshman class at Harvard College. He was just then entering his eighteenth year, was well grown for his age, tall, vigorous, and robust, open and frank in his address, kind and genial in his manners. He entered upon his college life with many advantages in his favor. The name of Lee was already upon the rolls of the university, for other representatives of different branches of the family had entered and graduated in the years gone by and had left pleasant memories behind them. His distinguished lineage made him a welcome guest in the older families of the University city, and of Boston, its near neighbor, who felt a just pride in the historic and traditional associations connected with the earlier history of the country, and many of the influential members of the class belonged to such families.

He was rather older than the average age of his classmates, and his life had been spent amid surroundings that had enabled him to see a good deal of society and the world, so that he brought with him into his college life a more matured mind and a greater insight than the student usually possesses at the threshold of his career. He had enjoyed excellent advantages in preparing for the entering examinations, and was well grounded in the languages as well as mathematics, so that he entered the class well fitted for the course of study to be pursued. Thus, from the first, he was prominent in the university, and soon became popular among his classmates, and his prominence and popularity were maintained during his stay among us.

This was due not to superior distinction in any particular study or in any one feature of college life, but rather to his general standing and characteristics. He kept pace with his classmates in the recitation room, not so much by hard and continuous study as by his quick comprehension and ready grasp of the subject in hand and the general fund of knowledge at his command. He was of a friendly and companionable nature, and there were abundant opportunities in a large class to develop this disposition, cultivate social intercourse, and strengthen the bonds of good fellowship. He had been accustomed to an outdoor life in his Virginia home, and his manly training had given him an athletic frame which required constant and vigorous exercise. This he sought in active sports on the football ground and in the class and college boat clubs, where he was welcomed as a valuable auxiliary.

In a large university—and Harvard had gained that rank even as far back as those days—there are various fields of action, and other honors are recognized than those marked on the catalogue or contained in the degrees. The graduate who excels in mathematics, the languages, the arts and sciences, is decked with the highest honor on commencement day, but there are unwritten honors given by general consent of classmates to those who have developed a superiority in any mental or physical excellence. When in after life the members of a class meet on some public college anniversary or gather together at a reunion and the memories and traditions of college life are talked over anew, the merits of those who excelled in pleasant companionship, in kindly bearing, in generous conduct towards their associates, in outdoor games and sports requiring strength and dexterity, are pleasant subjects to dwell upon, even if the possessors failed to stand among the highest upon the roll of scholarship.

Thus it was that LEE established himself among his associates during the three years that he remained among us, and though he contented himself with a medium standing in scholarship and exhibited no ambition to gain a high rank upon the college rolls, he won the regard and confidence and respect of all his classmates and held a warm place in the hearts of those with whom he was most intimate.

Towards the close of our junior year, in the early part of 1857, upon the recommendation of Gen. Winfield Scott, he received a commission as second lieutenant in the Army, and was assigned to the Sixth Regiment of Infantry, which was ordered into active service on the Western frontier, and took part in the expedition to Utah which was commanded by Col. Albert Sidney Johnston. LEE accepted this appointment, closed his connection with the college, and our paths in life diverged for more than thirty years.

In 1887 we both became members of the Fiftieth Congress. I well remember his coming to me, with kindly face and outstretched hand, on the first day of our session in December, as I sat in my seat in this Chamber, expressing pleasure at meeting me after so many years of separation and satisfaction that we were to have opportunities of renewing the acquaintance and friendship of our early days. Though the exacting duties of Congressional life gave me fewer opportunities of associating with him than I could have wished, yet I saw much of him during the years we spent here together, and I shall always remember those occasions with satisfaction. Sometimes it was only a word in passing, a shake of the hand, a brief conference on public business, but whether the interview was brief or prolonged his manner and conduct were always kind and friendly and sincere.

While we were together in Congress he often referred to our college life and its associations, and remembered them with evident satisfaction. He became a member of the Harvard Club here in Washington, and I recall a pleasant evening when he was one of the after-dinner speakers there. In the summer of 1888 he went to Cambridge, to revisit the old scenes and once more meet his friends and associates of the olden time. He attended the commencement exercises and spoke pleasantly at the class supper. His classmates who then met him will long cherish the remembrance of that last visit, his hearty greetings, his cordial manners, the interest he manifested.

The renewal of our acquaintance soon satisfied me that the experience of life had strengthened and developed all that was good and noble and manly in the young student. The same warmth and cordiality which had endeared him to his classmates won the regard and affection of his associates here. The same general ability and rotundity of character which had made him prominent in the little world of college life made him useful and influential in various lines of duty in the wide field of Congressional legislation.

During the intervening years the manly bearing, the physical superiority, the nobility of spirit which had characterized him in the earlier days had made him a leader among men when the storm of war raged over the land. Brief as were the days of the unacknowledged Southern Confederacy, his name was enrolled in bright letters upon the pages of its history, and his brave deeds will in future days be chronicled in song and story by those who admire true courage and recognize all that was gallant and noble and heroic in the lives of all those who fought on both sides of our great struggle as worthy of preservation and commemoration.

When LEE first left college his military duties, as has been already stated, carried him to the far West, and he there saw some rough service. The Utah expedition was a training school for soldiers and generals, and many who afterwards gained renown and fame, under the different standards were there associated together in a common duty. Besides the leader and commander, Col. Johnston, were Robert E. Lee, Hardee, Thomas, Kirby Smith, Palmer, Stoneman, Fitz Lee, and Hood. When the Army first entered upon this service there was a small cloud of war in the horizon, but it soon cleared away, and the company to which LEE was attached was assigned to a dull and monotonous routine of garrison life. This possessed no attractions for the young lieutenant, and there were other influences drawing him towards his native State. He resigned his commission, returned to Virginia, and settled at the White House, in New Kent County, where George Washington had married the widow Custis.

The plantation had descended to her son, George Washington Parke Custis, and from him through LEE's mother to the grandson. He soon established his cousin, Miss Wickham, as queen of this historic home, and he was here with his little family amid these surroundings, with everything to make life attractive, when Virginia and her sister States of the South passed their ordinances of secession and sent delegates to Montgomery to unite in the attempt to form a Southern Confederacy. LEE never doubted that allegiance was due first to his State, and when war followed he drew his sword in defense of Virginia.

As long as the strife continued he avoided no danger, he shunned no peril, he feared no adversary.

Now with a company, now a squadron, now a regiment, now a brigade, now a division of cavalry behind him, he went upon the march, formed the line of battle, or rode into the enemy's lines. Whatever duty was assigned to him, he entered upon its discharge with energy and vigor. In the varying fortunes of war he was wounded, captured, held as a hostage; but the day of recovery and exchange came, and he once more headed the brave followers who loved and honored and trusted him, and during the last year of the struggle he again shared their hardships and privations and dangers. But the end came at last, the issue was settled, the arbitrament of war was decided adversely, and he sheathed his sword and returned to the place where his home had been.

The year 1865 marked a low ebb in the fortunes of the Southern people, and perhaps it may not be unprofitable to dwell briefly upon their conduct when under the shadow of defeat and disaster. The distinguished father of him to whose memory we are this day paying tribute went from the head of a great army to train the new generation of young men of the South in the halls of a university to usefulness in the various walks of citizenship. The students who enjoyed the privilege of sitting at the feet of this grand college president there learned lessons of patriotism. They were advised to build up the places left waste and desolate, and to look hopefully forward to a reunited country and a more prosperous future.

Whatever public disappointment or private grief or loss he suffered was buried in his own breast. He advised his countrymen that the great questions which had long divided the country, and upon which opinions had been so diverse that legislative debate and administrative action had failed in finding a solution, had been finally settled by the sword, and that henceforth their duty was to the Union restored and indissoluble.

With so illustrious an example the immediate restoration of peace and good order all over the South is not to be wondered at. The annals of all nations may be searched in vain for a parallel. It is an easy task for men who have accomplished all they desired to lay down their arms and return to their homes and resume their former avocations.

The Southern soldier did all this after failure and defeat. The cause was lost; his efforts availed nothing. The homes of many were in ashes; sorrow was in every household; many were stripped of their all. The labor system of the country was destroyed; commerce was dead. Many had not seed to plant their lands. The workshop, the manufactory, the shipyard were silent as the grave. The arts of peace seemed to have perished. The soldiers were disbanded without the means of reaching their homes, and the few survivors of those who went forth with bright hopes, proud and confident in their strength, returned one by one weary and footsore and disheartened.

The history of other nations would have suggested to the historian that the result must be open riots and secret assassinations, a reign of violence and terror, years of turbulence and lawlessness, before society would settle down to its former condition. But how different was the result. The parole upon which the soldier was released was in no instance violated. The situation was accepted without a murmur or complaint. The laws were obeyed. The terms imposed were acceded to. Soon the busy hum of industry was heard through the land. The arts of peace were revived. Agriculture and trade once again flourished, and our fair country began to bloom again into something like its old-time beauty and prosperity.

There were few Southern soldiers who returned to a greater desolation than did our late associate, Gen. LEE. Fate seemed to have done its worst. The beloved wife and the two dear children who had made his home at the "White House" a paradise had died in 1863, while he was held as a prisoner and a hostage at Fort Lafayette and Fort Monroe. The place had been occupied by Union troops; the mansion, with all its surroundings, had been destroyed by fire, and, as has been well said by another, there was "not a blade of grass left to mark the culture of more than a hundred years." Had he been an ordinary man he would have sunk with the load of sorrow and trouble which weighed him down. But he had a brave heart, which defeat and affliction and disaster with united effort could not conquer.

With the same noble spirit which had actuated his father, the elder Lee, he threw aside his discouragement and took up the duties of life and citizenship anew. He had made himself famous as a soldier; he now began in earnest to cultivate the arts of peace. It was no easy task, for the era of reconstruction immediately succeeded the war, and only those who were actually under its ban can realize the burdens and hardships it entailed upon an unfortunate people emerging from a disastrous conflict.

He rebuilt and reestablished his home at the White House plantation. He was married November 27, 1867, to Miss Mary Tabb, daughter of Hon. George W. Bolling, of Petersburg. In 1874 the family removed to Ravensworth, in Fairfax County.

At both these places he cultivated his broad acres and interested himself in all matters relating to agricultural progress and development. He advanced and promoted these interests as president of the Virginia State Agricultural Society. He represented his county for a term in the State senate, but declined a reelection, and returned to his plantation and the enjoyment of home life. After a few years of quiet he was called, in 1886, to a new field of activity by neighbors and political friends, who desired his services at the national capital, and he became the Representative from the Alexandria district in the Fiftieth Congress, and he was in his third term, when, on the 15th day of October, 1891, the hand of death removed him from his career of usefulness. For weeks his strong constitution and vigorous frame had resisted disease in his Ravensworth home. All that kindness and skill could suggest was done in his behalf, but skill and kindness were of no avail, and he bade adieu to home and family, companions and associates, earthly duties and surroundings, and entered upon his eternal rest. His mortal life was closed.

I well remember a day spent in his company nearly four years ago, and its occurrences gave me an opportunity to witness the regard in which he was held by those among whom he had lived and to whom he was best known. It was on Decoration Day, in a section of country where he had seen service as a soldier, not far from where he had lived in his early childhood. He was the orator of the occasion. Many of his old companions in arms and members of their families were among his audience, and they listened eagerly as he made appropriate reference to the departed comrades who slept under the little hillocks near by them, bright and fragrant with the flowers of early summer, which the loving hands of woman and childhood had heaped upon them. As he descended from the platform he was surrounded by old and young, who thronged about him to shake his hand or give expression to a friendly greeting. Admiration and affection were expressed upon their countenances for the brave man before them, whose gallant deeds had been told at every fireside in the country around, and who was loved and honored because, in addition to his own merits and virtues, he represented the great leader whose name was the embodiment of a precious memory.

I have portrayed WILLIAM HENRY FITZHUGH LEE as a student, a soldier, a planter, a public man representing his people in the State legislature and the National Congress.

Some have united in paying tribute to his memory because they were born and reared in the State which gave him birth, some because they shared with him the hardships and dangers of his military career, some because they were associated with him in Congressional life and committee work. But while I take a great pride in all that he accomplished in the after years, it is more pleasant to me to recollect him as the student, for in that relation I was first drawn into companionship with him; it was during that period of our lives that I first learned to regard him, and my tribute is to my classmate and friend of auld lang syne. May he rest in peace in the bosom of the honored State he loved so well and served so faithfully.



ADDRESS OF MR. STEWART, OF NEVADA.

Mr. PRESIDENT: The biography of WILLIAM H.F. LEE has been furnished by his colleagues and associates. I do not propose to dwell upon the details of his public or private career, or that of his distinguished ancestors, who acted so conspicuous a part in the history of the American Colonies and in the trying times of the Revolution by which our independence was gained.

I had the good fortune to form the acquaintance of Gen. LEE and his estimable wife at the beginning of the Fiftieth Congress. I was strongly impressed with his noble presence, and his genial, modest, and dignified bearing. He seemed to me an ideal specimen of true American manhood. His wife was a lady whose appearance at once attracted attention and whose qualities of head and heart charmed and delighted friends and associates. He was a devoted husband. His tender and gentle bearing toward his wife were natural and unaffected. The daily life and conduct of both were a conspicuous example of the benign influence of a husband and wife who love, honor, and respect each other.

My impressions of him were so favorable and agreeable as to create a desire on my part to cultivate his acquaintance and know more of his character. We met frequently, and discussed freely the social and political topics which engaged the attention of members of Congress at the national capital. He was modest and unobtrusive in the expression of his opinions; but as I knew him better I was profoundly impressed with the scope and breadth of his information.

His judgment of men and measures was as free from local prejudice and partisan bias as any man's I ever met. He was induced by his generous nature to attribute good rather than unworthy motives to those with whom he differed. He was honest, true, and unsuspicious. On all occasions he expressed attachment to the Union of the States, and manifested a patriotic devotion to the Constitution as the charter of our liberties.

He was a brave soldier, and fought on the losing side in a war that convulsed the continent and astonished the civilized world; and as a brave soldier he accepted without reservation the verdict of the war. It is to be regretted that his heroic services were not on the side of the Union, but the conditions which placed him in hostility to the flag of the United States are forever removed. Every cause which produced that terrible conflict was eradicated and obliterated in carnage and blood. The horrors of that fratricidal war are now history. The glorious results achieved are being realized in the abolition of slavery; in the Union of the States restored, strengthened, and cemented; in the respect, confidence, and just estimation of the people of all the sections for each other, and in the establishment beyond question of the capacity of the citizens of the Republic to dare and to do in great emergencies what to all the world seemed impossible.

To-day the virtue, the patriotism, and the renown of the fathers of the Revolution and the founders of our free institutions are the common heritage of all the people, both North and South. The gallant and daring exploits of Legion Harry or Light-Horse Harry Lee, the grandsire of the deceased, inspire the same admiration and respect in the sons of the North as in the sons of the South. It is most gratifying that the descendants of the comrades in war and associates in council who gained the independence and established the Government of the United States are again united in stronger bonds of interest, good fellowship, and respect than ever before existed.

Generations to come will enjoy not only the fruits of the Revolutionary struggle and the establishment of constitutional liberty, but they will be blessed with liberty that knows no slavery and with a Union forever indivisible, and they will contemplate with no partisan feeling the sacrifices which were necessary to secure such results. The type of manly virtue of which our deceased friend was a conspicuous example is one of the best fruits of free institutions. His death in the prime of his manhood and in the days of his usefulness was a great loss to the country and a bereavement to his family for which there is no earthly compensation. But he has left for them in his good name, his unimpeachable character, and his many virtues an inheritance more valuable than gold.

He has gone where all must soon follow. The wealth of his example is an inspiration to the living to emulate his virtues, enjoy a conscience void of offense, and leave to surviving relatives the inheritance of an honored name. Such an ambition is worthy of an American citizen, and the value to humanity of such a life as that of Gen. LEE can hardly be overestimated.

Why should death be regarded as a calamity? It is the inevitable fate of all the living. May it not be a part of life? The hope of immortality is the greatest boon conferred upon the living. On an occasion like this words will not soothe the grief of those who are near and dear to the deceased. Their consolation must be in the hope of reunion beyond the grave.



ADDRESS OF MR. COLQUITT, OF GEORGIA.

Mr. PRESIDENT: It is a difficult and delicate task to draw with justice and propriety the character of a public man. Fulsome panegyrics have often been pronounced upon the character of the dead either out of flattery to the deceased or to gratify the ambitious desires of the living.

In paying a tribute to WILLIAM H.F. LEE I am not influenced by any such questionable views. To do honor to his memory I need only say what justice and truth dictate. There is little danger, in speaking of him, of committing the offense of exaggerated eulogy. There is more danger of doing the injustice of understatement in commemorating a character so rounded and symmetrical.

As a son, Gen. LEE's filial piety was so marked as to make him an example worthy of all imitation by the youth of his country. In every post of honor or trust to which he was called—and they were many and exalted ones—he met his engagements with such fidelity and courage as never to incur censure and seldom provoke criticism.

His bearing as a private citizen was of such dignity and benevolence as to secure the love, while it evoked the admiration, of all who knew him.

His character was made up of blended chivalry and courtesy and adorned with the mild luster of a religious faith.

He was frank and open, plain and sincere, speaking only what he thought without reserve, and promising only what he designed to perform.

As he was plain and sincere, so he was firm and steady in his purposes; courteous and affable, he was not influenced by servile compliance to his company, approving or condemning as might be most agreeable to them. He was a man of courage and constancy, qualities which, after all, are the ornaments and defense of a man.

He had in the highest degree the air, manners, and address of a man of quality; politeness with ease, dignity without pride, and firmness without the least alloy of roughness. He loved refined society, but he had great respect and sympathy for those who had been reared in simple habits and the toils of life.

He possessed an even and equal temper of mind. Those who best knew him can testify of him what has often been asserted of his great father, that they never heard an acrimonious speech fall from his lips; that his whole temper was so controlled by justice and generosity that he was never known to disparage with an envious breath the fame of another or to withhold due praise of another's worth.

Mr. President, the friends of Gen. LEE do not claim for him brilliant talents and the gifts of genius. It is doubtless a beneficent ordination of Providence that the best interests of society are not solely dependent on what in common parlance is called genius. Fortunately for the good of mankind, great gifts and powers of mind are not indispensable to our happiness or to a safe and salutary development of social conditions.

Patient industry and impregnable virtue are the essential cardinal qualities that make the man, in the vast majority of cases, worthy of love and honor, and which conserve the best interests of the world.

That man who in his career and relations to society has gone on from day to day and from trust to trust, never disappointing but always realizing every just expectation, it seems to me is the character who deserves of his fellow-men the highest meed of praise, and gives in his person and example the surest guaranty that the world will be all the better for his agency in shaping its affairs.

The friends of Gen. LEE enjoy the perfect assurance that in every walk of life, on every occasion when duty called him, his responses were ever marked by a dignified and intelligent performance of the tasks assigned him.

What higher honor can we ask for him than this: that weighty as were the responsibilities that devolved upon him by inheritance and high as the expectations which were the natural implications of this inheritance, he fully and nobly met them. Much as was expected of him, he more than realized the claims and obligations of a noble lineage. His fellow-citizens and his contemporaries regard his career as an honor and his companionship as a delight and a resource that adds poignancy to their grief in the loss of so loved and valued a friend.

I might refer to the incidents of his military career to illustrate his courage and fidelity, but it may not be considered appropriate to the time and the occasion. It is cheering, however, to believe that in this exalted body there is not to be found that spirit of truculent uncharitableness which refuses any credit to an honorable adversary.

Time, which touches all things with mellowing hand, has softened the recollections of past contests, and they who looked upon him as a foe now only remember the glory of the fight, and would join hands with us to weave the garland of his fame.

Securely may the friends and admirers of this noble character rest in the belief that his name for generations to come will be enrolled in the glorious list of worthies that has for all time made the name of Virginia illustrious and among the foremost of all the commonwealths of the ages past.



ADDRESS OF MR. BUTLER, OF SOUTH CAROLINA.

It was my good fortune, Mr. President, to know Gen. WILLIAM H.F. LEE with the intimacy of personal friendship for more than a quarter of a century, and I can pass no higher encomium upon him than by saying he had all the qualities that constitute a true gentleman, a gentleman in the highest and best sense. He inherited from a very illustrious and distinguished ancestry a prestige rarely enjoyed in this country, and yet he was as unpretending, unaffected, and modest as the humblest man. His self-contained dignity of character never deserted him. His placid, well-balanced, well-poised equanimity always sustained him.

It would be extravagant to say he inherited the commanding abilities of his illustrious father, but it would be entirely within the line of a just criticism to affirm that he did inherit many of the highest characteristics and qualities of that great man. In personal demeanor, in that suave, gracious, considerate, self-respecting, and respectful bearing which give assurance of the perfect gentleman he very much resembled his father. He was always approachable and cordial, and yet I doubt if any man ever attempted an improper liberty or ventured undue familiarity with him. His high character and affability of manner protected him against such relations.

In the late civil war we served side by side in the same cavalry corps in the same army almost continuously from the beginning to the end. I therefore had the best opportunities of forming a correct estimate of him as a soldier and man, and it is within the bounds of just judgment to place him among the most distinguished in that brilliant array of American soldiers and men of that eventful period.

I recall with vivid recollection my first association with him at Ashland, Va., in June, 1861, where he was stationed as a young captain of cavalry at a school of instruction. Thence he rose by regular gradations to major-general of division, resigning his sword with that rank.

Gen. LEE never aspired to be what is sometimes called a "dashing" soldier. He was quite content with the serious, earnest, steady performance of his duties. It would be no compliment to say that a son of Robert E. Lee and grandson of "Light-Horse" Harry Lee had courage. Such a quality is a necessary ingredient of such a man's character. But his courage was not of that frothy, noisy kind so often paraded to attract attention. In battle he was as steady, firm, and immovable as any soldier who ever wielded a sword or placed a squadron in the field. In his relations to his subordinates he was the perfection of military propriety, always considerate and kindly, but firm and impartial in the enforcement of discipline.

Towards his equals and superiors in rank he bore himself with a knightly chivalry that at once commanded respect and confidence. How could he have been otherwise, descended from such a noble sire, with such an example of courtly dignity and untarnished manhood?

After the close of hostilities, having discharged his whole duty as he understood it with fidelity and courage, he retired to his native State, to his farm, and there, by the same quiet, honorable, manly course of conduct devoted himself to the duties of civil life, establishing by his example a standard of citizenship worthy the great Republic to which he renewed his allegiance.

The people of the Commonwealth of Virginia could not and did not permit a man of his exalted character, sound intellectual qualities, and safe, conservative judgment to remain in private life. His services and example were too valuable to the public, and he was called into the public service, first as senator in the State legislature, later into the lower House of Congress.

There, as elsewhere, he soon took rank among the wisest and safest legislators in the body pursuing the even, modest tenor of his way with that faithful regard for his duty to his constituents and his country that characterized every relation and position of his life.

Those of us, Mr. President, who were favored with his acquaintance recall with a respect bordering on reverence his commanding figure as he came in this Chamber, his courtly presence, his gentle bearing, persuasive conversation, amiable, respectful manners. The consciousness that we shall never see him again is a sad and depressing reflection, and a mournful reminder that it is only a question of time—how long mortal man can not foretell—when those of us who survive him must obey a similar summons, and disappear, as he has done, from the scenes of life forever.

In paying tributes of respect and affection to departed friends I know how hard it is to impose restraint upon our partiality for them and how strong the temptation to indulge in expressions of exaggerated eulogy. Knowing Gen. LEE as I did, I can say of him with absolute sincerity and truth that he was as free from the small and petty faults of our nature as any man I have ever known. In his private relations he was literally without guile or deceit. Straightforward, honorable, just in all his dealings, he was a model citizen and faithful friend.

In his public life he proved himself equal to every station. Zealous, attentive, conscientious, untiring, he met every responsibility with fidelity and confidence. He never disappointed a friend, betrayed a trust, or took unfair advantage of an opponent. In a word, Mr. President, he lived a perfect gentleman, discharged faithfully every duty of life, and died honored and beloved by his friends.

Others have spoken of the life and character of this distinguished man more in detail, more eloquently, with more finished oratory, but I yield to none in the sincerity of my humble tribute to his memory.



ADDRESS OF MR. DOLPH, OF OREGON.

Mr. PRESIDENT: The echoes of the voices of those who pronounced eulogies upon the life and character of the late distinguished Senator from Kansas have hardly died away in this Chamber, and we have again laid business aside to pay our tributes to the memory of a late honored member of the House of Representatives and a distinguished son of Virginia.

These sorrowful occasions, which are deprecated by some as involving a loss of the time of the Senate and needless expense to the Government, I can not think are unprofitable to us or to the country. Surely in the mad rush and hurry of business we may be permitted to halt long enough to take notice of the invasion of our ranks by death and to voice our esteem for a departed member. The death of an eminent member of the Senate or of the House is not only a loss to his immediate constituency, but to the whole country, and, in accordance with a long and honored usage, demands from his former associates formal and appropriate action.

After such an hour spent in the contemplation of the common end of all that live, in introspection and retrospection, who of us does not again take up the burdens of life with renewed resolutions to redouble our energies to faithfully discharge every public and private duty.

My acquaintance with Mr. LEE was not intimate. I frequently met him socially, but he did not belong to the party with which I am affiliated, and no fortuitous circumstance occurred to bring us together in the discharge of public duties. The incidents of his life, his public services, and his domestic relations have been fittingly alluded to by others, and it only remains for me to cast an evergreen upon his grave, to add my poor tribute to his memory, and give expression to the emotions awakened by the occasion and the exercises of the hour. Coming from a long line of distinguished ancestors, serving with marked distinction in the Confederate army until the cause he championed was hopelessly lost, honored by the people of his State by election to high civil positions, in which he did credit to himself and honored them with a rounded character and well-developed manhood, at once the incarnation of gentleness, tenderness, and courage, it is not to be wondered at that sorrow for his death hung over his State like a funeral pall, and all parties vied with each other in giving expression to the universal sense of private and public loss.

He was the son of a distinguished sire, who in life was the idol of the people of Virginia; but he was held in the highest esteem by the people of his State not so much on account of his illustrious father as on account of his own ability and worth. His public services and his blameless life, touching, tender, and beautiful, won the tributes to his memory pronounced by his colleagues at the other end of this Capitol. Fortunate, indeed, is the man who can win such admiration from his associates.

What higher eulogy can be pronounced on any man than that in every station, public and private, he was true to himself and faithful to the people and was equal to the duties of his station? Not every man can become great; genius is the gift of the few, but goodness and fidelity to duty are within the reach of all. He has gone the way of all the living. He has found the level of the grave. Our words of eulogy can not reach him there.

Can honor's voice provoke the silent dust, Or flatt'ry soothe the dull, cold ear of death?

Solomon, summing up this question, said:

For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten.

Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under the sun.

To human reason the death of him we mourn was untimely. He was born May 31, 1837, and died October 15, 1891. He was therefore in the prime of manhood, and apparently had many years of useful life before him. But death sometimes strangely selects his victims. No season, no station, no age is exempt from his fatal shafts. When death comes to the aged as the end of a fully completed life we regard it as natural. But when death comes to the young, the gifted, and the promising, we with our finite vision look upon it as sad and mysterious. We are constantly reminded that—

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, Await alike the inevitable hour. The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

It is creditable to our humanity that at the grave animosities are buried, and those who speak of the dead remember their virtues and pass over their frailties.

Death is a mighty mediator. There all the flames of rage are extinguished, hatred is appeased, and angelic pity, like a weeping sister, bends with gentle and close embrace over the funeral urn.

The reconciling grave swallows distinction first that made us foes; there all lie down in peace together.

To the grave, "the world's sweet inn from pain and wearisome turmoil," we are all hastening. Earth's highest station and meanest place ends in the common receptacle to which we shall all be taken. Dark and gloomy indeed would be the grave without a hope in a personal immortality, a belief that the soul survives the body, and that to this immortal part the tomb is the gate to heaven. When one feels like Theodore Parker when he said:

When this stiffened body goes down to the tomb, sad, silent, and remorseless, I feel there is no death for the man. That clod which yonder dust shall cover is not my brother. The dust goes to its place; man to his own. It is then I feel my immortality. I look through the grave into heaven. I ask no miracle, no proof, no reasoning for me; I ask no risen dust to teach me immortality. I am conscious of eternal life.

Or like Byron when he wrote:

I feel my immortality oversweep all pains, all tears, all time, all fears, and peal, like the eternal thunders of the deep into my ears this truth—thou livest forever!

Death loses its terrors and the grave becomes a welcome goal for weary and buffeted mariners on life's stormy sea—the gate to endless life.

By these oft-repeated scenes in this Chamber; by the frequent visits of the stern messenger to both Houses of Congress to summon a member from his field of labor here to the bar of the Supreme Ruler of the Universe above; by the constant changes going on around us in obedience to the inevitable law of nature, by which death everywhere succeeds to life, we are reminded that we shall not long continue as we now are. It is possible that as we are startled by the announcement of the death of an associate we mentally ask ourselves, Who will be called next?

So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan which moves To that mysterious realm where each shall take His chamber in the silent halls of death, Thou go not, like the quarry slave at night, Scourged to his dungeon; but sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave Like one that wraps the drapery of his couch About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.



ADDRESS OF MR. DANIEL, OF VIRGINIA.

Mr. PRESIDENT: The late Gen. WILLIAM H.F. LEE was conspicuously connected with the public affairs of his State for more than thirty years. He was deservedly honored, loved, and trusted by the people. For two terms he represented the Eighth district of Virginia in Congress and he was elected for a third term, but when Congress met in December last his chair was vacant. Surrounded by his beloved family and bemoaned by all who knew him he peacefully breathed his last at Ravensworth, his home, in Fairfax County, on the 15th day of October, 1891.

Thus, Mr. President, disappears one singularly endowed with the qualities that win the confidence and affections of mankind. His noble, honest face, beaming with intelligence and benevolence, was a true index to his nature. Strength of character and sweetness of disposition made him a man of mark and influence in all the relations of society. His life was full of noble uses. Respect for the rights and tenderness for the feelings of others stamped his conduct on every occasion. He fulfilled Sidney's definition of a gentleman, "high thoughts seated in a heart of courtesy," and I know of no better legacy that a father could leave his household or a patriot leave his country than such a record as he has left to attest his virtues.

I will not penetrate the sanctity of the home bereaved by his death. The fond and noble wife and the sons who miss the husband and father, who was representative to them of life's dearest boons, have in his memory whatever earth can give them of consolation, and they learned from none more than from him to look above in sorrow and affliction.

As a Representative in Congress Gen. LEE was diligent in the service of his constituents and in behalf of policies which commended themselves to his favor. He seldom spoke, but it was not because he could not speak well and forcibly. He was not noted as the peculiar champion of any of the great measures before Congress, but it was not because he did not comprehend them nor take great interest in them, and I doubt if there be many Representatives who have had a more wholesome or further-reaching influence.

His fine character and engaging manner made friends for him and for his people. His excellent judgment had great weight in council, his political ideas were eminently liberal, and his tact and attention reached results where perhaps more aggressive qualities would have been ineffectual. On one occasion that I recall he was urging the passage of the bill to pay for use and occupation of the Theological Seminary near Alexandria during the war. He became the mark, in doing so, of inquiry and badinage, and some one, meaning to disparage the claim by intimation that the clerical professors of the institution had been enemies of the Government, called out to him, "How did they pray?" He answered instantly, "For all sinners." His ready pleasantry put everybody in good humor and the bill was passed.

Gen. LEE was a representative man in a larger sense than that of official designation. He was a representative country gentleman, and the flavor of his native soil was in his character. He was born in the country, at beautiful Arlington, with the woods and fields and streams and mountain vistas around him. He lived in the country all his life, and died in the country, at his home in Fairfax County, an owner of land, loving the land; his home, a fine old country seat of colonial pattern, the scene of domestic peace and love and hospitality; his voice, that of the good people of his vicinage; his life, daily tasks, intermingled with daily studies and contemplation; his aims, those of the patriot and Christian, his country, God, and truth.

Gen. LEE was a representative American of broad gauge and vision. Many of us—and I have felt myself amongst them—are quite provincial. We know our own neighborhoods and their people, and we grow slowly into knowledge of other sections and their people. Local caste, prejudice, interest, and bias warp us and minify our usefulness. Gen. LEE was not of this kind. There was no sectionalism in his caste, no bigotry in his creeds. His strong local attachments, natural to a true nature, neither dwarfed his opinions, soured his reflections, nor darkened his vision. His was a ripe mind and his a generous nature. He understood men, because he understood mankind. He had respect for all men, because he respected manhood. He dealt considerately and justly with all men of all races, creeds, opinions, and aspirations, because he respected men and because he had a good man's sympathy, with the hopes of his race, his country, and humanity.

I would not speak of him as a brilliant man. He was more. He was a wise and good and true man. Gen. LEE was a representative of our racial history. The story of his family began when his remote ancestor rode with the Norman knights at Hastings. Another led a company of English volunteers with Coeur de Lion on the third crusade to the Holy Land, and was made the Earl of Litchfield. Still another was that Richard Lee who, intense loyalist as he was, became a commissioner from Virginia and urged Charles II to fly for refuge to the Old Dominion when his throne was trembling under him. Quarrel and fight as we may and as our fathers did before us, the continuity of race achievement is unbroken.

The growth of race ascendency and the expanse of race domination are unceasing. The picture is unique and the nation one, however the theater enlarges, however the scenes shift, however the actors differ in the drama. Gen. LEE was a representative democrat or republican, for I use the words in their generic sense. His grandfather was that young American Capt. Henry Lee, the ardent youth of nineteen, who at the head of his company of Virginia horse reported to Washington for duty when the first army of Continentals were ranging themselves upon the plains of Boston. He was the first to break the record of his line for loyalty to the Crown of England in espousing the cause of American independence, the first to draw his sword for the new king proclaimed at Philadelphia—the sovereign people.

As "Light-Horse Harry" Lee he goes down to history and renown; distinguished in general orders of the army and in promotion from Congress for one exploit, and for another with the thanks of Congress and a gold medal. In statesmanship as in soldiership, he was the friend and follower of Washington. In the Virginia legislature, when the resolutions of 1798 were debated, he took sides against them, and in his speech you may find nearly all the arguments which are used in favor of the Federal construction of the Constitution. When Washington died he was a member of Congress, and pronounced upon him the memorable words, "First in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his fellow-citizens." He was one of those virile men who could write, speak, and fight.

When Gen. Winfield Scott led the American Army to Mexico there rode by his side Capt. Robert E. Lee, the son of Henry Lee, an officer of engineers upon his staff. He was four times brevetted for gallant conduct and came back famous. When Gen. Albert Sidney Johnston led the Utah expedition in 1858 there marched on foot in his columns Lieut. WILLIAM HENRY FITZHUGH LEE, the son of Robert E. Lee. He was not a soldier by education, but by instinct. A graduate of Harvard College and the stroke oar of his class, he was well prepared for military life, and the third of his line to bear arms for the United States. But no war ensued; the canker of a long peace was settling on military aspirations.

Lieut. LEE resigned, married, and settled on his farm, the White House, on the Pamunkey. With the prattle of little children around his knees and pastoral scenes before him, his prospects were those of domestic tranquillity and joy.

What a rush was there to the standards when war broke out in 1861! Americans acted like Americans. They divided in conviction. They did not differ as to the method of dealing with conviction. To divide was the propulsion of conditions, to fight the law of blood. Not one of the Lees had provoked war, but not one stood back. The whole family of Lees became representative soldiers of their people; Gen. Robert E. Lee commanded the greatest of the Southern armies and his brother became an admiral of the Southern navy. His sons and nephews were soldiers and sailors.

The nephew of Northern identity kept place with the North. The more numerous class of Southern identity kept place with the South; the boy, a private in the ranks or cadet on shipboard, the young men leading companies and regiments and winning brigades and divisions, the sire and chief commanding all. Their names are interwoven with war's dread story and splendid deed. Not one had any reproach; not one struck a blow below the belt. The woman, the child, the captive found a fortress in the hand of Lee, the foeman met his peer. The history of two continents and many centuries was written over again on fields of blood.

WILLIAM H.F. LEE raised a company of cavalry at the beginning of the war and surrendered as a major-general of cavalry at Appomattox. He fought his way to his rank and suffered all of war's vicissitudes save death. His men believed in him and followed him. He was wounded; he was twice a prisoner; he was held as a hostage in solitary confinement with death impending. His wife and his children died while he lay wounded and in prison. Whatever man may suffer he suffered to the uttermost. Amongst his first acts when he emerged from prison was to visit, shake hands with and congratulate the Federal officer for whom he had been held as hostage. He was a representative Christian, void of vindictiveness and uncomplaining; he made no outcry of pain; he sealed his lips to reproach.

I knew him well, respected him profoundly, and loved him dearly. I have often heard him speak at gatherings of old soldiers and on a variety of occasions; sometimes those of turbulence. I have marveled at his self-poise and reserved power. Never once did I hear him say ill of any man, nor allude to his own sufferings or deeds, nor utter words of bitterness. He took his lot as it came to him, as a man who does the best he can and leaves the rest to the Disposer of events. His conscience and his human sympathy, like his soldiership, were instincts, and his Christian creed was the sum of his intuitions. Gen. LEE was a representative of the times in which he lived, eccentric in no opinion, even-tempered, wise, cautious, prudent, steadfast, and gentle; he sought to be useful rather than to shine. He took deep and active interest in all that concerned his State.

As a State senator he could be relied upon to support liberal and progressive measures; as president of the State Agricultural Society he did much to excite interest and develop improvements; as a trustee or visitor to educational institutions he rendered valuable practical service to the cause of popular enlightenment. In political life he had sharp contests; friend was surprised and opponent discouraged when emergency brought forth the reserve forces of his character and ability. If modesty cloaked his powers in retirement, opposition elicited them; and the fluency, tact, and ability with which he discussed issues and met exigencies were remarkable in one whose experiences of early life had separated him from civil pursuits and training.

If I have spoken of Gen. LEE's ancestral distinctions, it was not because either he or his people have ever presumed upon them. On the contrary, no people whom I have ever known have rested less of claim upon their antecedents or less sought to substitute reminiscences for achievements. The independent, honest, and simple Republicans and Democrats of our country justly despise a pretender who boasts the shadow of a name; but that of which the individual may not boast becomes his country's pride; and I count it great glory to our country that its institutions have nourished and the highest characteristic of our race that it has produced successive generations of men who preserve the continuity of sterling virtues. I count also as the star of hope for this grand Republic that a distinguished soldier of a lost cause becomes the beloved statesman of the cause that won, and finds around him the old-time comrades and old-time foes, all his friends and each other's friends united in the service of our common country.

No nobler words have been spoken of the late Gen. LEE than by soldiers who fought against him, and I respond to them with honor and praise. The production of men who may maintain the rights their fathers won, and ever grow in liberal thought, noble character, and worthy achievement is the highest mission of republican institutions. From Hastings, A.D. 1066, to Boston in 1776, the name of Lee was blended with the glories of our fatherland. But from Boston to Appomattox it grew the more illustrious with grander opportunities. Victorious through a track of eight hundred years to the 9th of April, 1865, it has been still more victorious since—rising to the height of harder trials and sterner tasks and grander duties than those of leading embattled lines. The glorious nation of which he was a type and the glorious band of which he was the son come forth from ruin and desolation on one side, moved by gracious institutions and magnanimous sentiments upon the other, taking their place in the reunited columns of parted friendship, cementing anew by adaptive virtues the broken ties, marching again with the mutual magnanimities of companionship at the head of column.

THE END