cemetery is annually enriched
by the ashes of her chosen sons.

Before us is the broad and beautiful river, separating two of the
original thirteen States, which a late President, a man of determined
purpose and inflexible will, but patriotic heart, desired to span with
arches of ever-enduring granite, symbolical of the firmly cemented union
of the North and the South. That President was General Jackson.

On its banks repose the ashes of the Father of his Country, and at our
side, by a singular felicity of position, overlooking the city which he
designed, and which bears his name, rises to his memory the marble
column, sublime in its simple grandeur, and fitly intended to reach a
loftier height than any similar structure on the surface of the whole
earth.

Let the votive offerings of his grateful countrymen be freely
contributed to carry this monument higher and still higher. May I say,
as on another occasion, "Let it rise; let it rise till it meet the sun
in his coming; let the earliest light of the morning gild it, and
parting day linger and play on its summit!"

Fellow-citizens, what contemplations are awakened in our minds as we
assemble here to re-enact a scene like that performed by Washington!
Methinks I see his venerable form now before me, as presented in the
glorious statue by Houdon, now in the Capitol of Virginia. He is
dignified and grave; but concern and anxiety seem to soften the
lineaments of his countenance. The government over which he presides is
yet in the crisis of experiment. Not free from troubles at home, he sees
the world in commotion and in arms all around him. He sees that imposing
foreign powers are half disposed to try the strength of the recently
established American government. We perceive that mighty thoughts,
mingled with fears as well as with hopes, are struggling within him. He
heads a short procession over these then naked fields; he crosses yonder
stream on a fallen tree; he ascends to the top of this eminence, whose
original oaks of the forest stand as thick around him as if the spot had
been devoted to Druidical worship, and here he performs the appointed
duty of the day.

And now, fellow-citizens, if this vision were a reality; if Washington
actually were now amongst us, and if he could draw around him the shades
of the great public men of his own day, patriots and warriors, orators
and statesmen, and were to address us in their presence, would he not
say to us: "Ye men of t