THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



VOL XVI. 



CHICAGO, OCTOBER, 1901. 



NO. 1 



William Death makes mourners of us 

 McKiniey. a n. There is scarcely an 

 American citizen but has at some 

 period of time, when visiting the 

 cemetery, shed a gentle tear upon 

 the green mound raised over the 

 graves of loved ones gone. Well do 

 we remember when the electric flash 

 brought the sad news that the "God- 

 like" Webster slept beneath the 

 shades atMarshfield; again when in- 

 formed through the same instru- 

 mentality that the clarion voice of 

 Clay was hushed and would no 

 more be heard amid the councils of 

 the nation, that the Great Harry of 

 the West, the ablest Senator of 

 them all, lay cold in death at Ash- 

 land; and again when red-handed 

 treason stalked boldly forth in the 

 land and strong hearts and able 

 minds were needed to pilot the old 

 Ship of State to safety, WH were 

 called to mourn the death of our 

 own loved Douglas, who sleeps by 

 the Lake, made classic by his own 

 munificent hand, left to sing a fit 

 ting requiem to his memory as 

 wafted by the gentle winds of 

 heaven on, on to mid-ocean. 



These were all great losses to 

 our nation there b4ng no one left 

 at the time to take their places 

 yet they were given in answer to 



our heavenly Father's call; and 

 while our loss was great, we could 

 but say amen and go forward with 

 bowed heads and bleeding hearts 

 in the discharge of our duties, as if 

 nothing of the kind had occurred 

 but not so in the present emer- 

 gency. Multiply our grief a thou- 

 sand yes, a thousand times a 

 thousand -fold over the loss of rela- 

 tives, friends and statesmen, called 

 in the regular way, and it will not 

 compare with our loss over the as- 

 sassination of the President of the 

 United States. It is not at the 

 loss of the man we grieve, though 

 great and good he was, but it is 

 the loss of the President of the 

 United States to strike a blow at 

 him sends a thrill of pain to every 

 true American heart. While this 

 is not the first instance of the kind 

 that has befallen us, yet, if pos- 

 sible, it is more painful to our peo- 

 ple and far more dangerous in ten- 

 dency toward the life of the nation. 

 The assassination of President Lin- 

 coln and of General Garfield was 

 the act of the individuals, Booth 

 and Guiteau. There was no polit- 

 ical party or body of people behind 

 either of them; theirs was the work 

 of a morbid, vitiated mind, mad- 

 dened by drink, or a depraved na- 



