led out. Quay, before following them,
turned to me with his usual emotionless face and said, "Good-by, Mr.
President; this reminds one of the Flight of a Tartar Tribe, doesn't
it?" I answered, "So you're fond of De Quincey, Senator?" to which Quay
responded, "Yes; always liked De Quincey; good-by." And away he went
with the tribesmen, who seemed to have walked out of a remote past.

Quay had become particularly concerned about the Delawares in the Indian
Territory. He felt that the Interior Department did not do them justice.
He also felt that his colleagues of the Senate took no interest in them.
When in the spring of 1904 he lay in his house mortally sick, he sent
me word that he had something important to say to me, and would have
himself carried round to see me. I sent back word not to think of doing
so, and that on my way back from church next Sunday I would stop in
and call on him. This I accordingly did. He was lying in his bed, death
written on his face. He thanked me for coming, and then explained
that, as he was on the point of death and knew he would never return to
Washington--it was late spring and he was about to leave--he wished to
see me to get my personal promise that, after he died, I would myself
look after the interests of the Delaware Indians. He added that he did
not trust the Interior Department--although he knew that I did not share
his views on this point--and that still less did he believe that any of
his colleagues in the Senate would exert themselves in the interests of
the Delawares, and that therefore he wished my personal assurance that I
would personally see that no injustice was done them. I told him I would
do so, and then added, in rather perfunctory fashion, that he must not
take such a gloomy view of himself, that when he got away for the summer
I hoped he would recover and be back all right when Congress opened. A
gleam came into the old fighter's eyes and he answered: "No, I am dying,
and you know it. I don't mind dying; but I do wish it were possible for
me to get off into the great north woods and crawl out on a rock in the
sun and die like a wolf!"

I never saw him again. When he died I sent a telegram of sympathy to his
wife. A paper which constantly preached reform, and which kept up its
circulation by the no less constant practice of slander, a paper which
in theory condemned all public men who violated the eighth commandment,
and in practice subsisted by incessant violation