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Douglas is Dead.

The tongue of the eloquent orator is silent in death; the heart of the true patriot has ceased to beat. A nation mourns his loss. Our heart is too overwhelmed with grief for verbal expression of sorrow. While, in common with the people of the land, we lament the loss of the statesman to whom the eyes of all were turned for guidance and direction in this most trying time of our country's history, we also have to mourn the loss of our long tried, dearly loved friend — the friend of our boyhood, our youth, and our manhood — our constant friend. Overpowering grief fills our heart with unspeakable sorrow — sorrow too deep to admit of our writing any eulogistic obituary. Eulogy! the unfeigned mourning of a whole people at their loss is the most eloquent tribute to the greatness and the lofty patriotism of the departed.

With what anxious solicitude have all the people watched for tidings in relation to his health! All, all looked to him as if, under God, the hope of the nation for deliverance from its present troubles centered in his life, in his counsels, in his wisdom. But he is dead — dead when to human vision it seemed his life, of all others, was most needed. Douglas is dead. We bow in submission to the will of Him whose ways, though inscrutable, are all ordered in wisdom.

To his wife — his family — we tender our heart-felt sympathies — the sympathy of unfeigned friendship. We mourn with no ordinary grief; we mourn with them. We can write no more.