isted in consolidating and
sustaining, leaves the capitol of the nation, where for more than thirty
years he had acted the most conspicuous part among the fathers of the
land, to rest in the tomb of its ancestors, amid the venerable shades of
Quincy. How solemn the progress of such a procession. It was indeed, "the
Funeral March of the Dead!" Wherever it passed, the people rose up and
paid the utmost marks of respect to the remains of one who had occupied so
large a space in the history of his country. In towns, in villages, in
cities, as the mournful cortege swept through, business was suspended,
flags were displayed at half mast, bells were tolled, minute guns were
fired, civil and military processions received the sacred remains, and
watched over them by night and by day, and passed them on from State to
State.

"What a progress was it which the dead patriot thus made! From the capitol
of the nation, beneath whose dome, and while at his post of duty, he was
seized by death--within sight almost of that Mount Vernon where repose
the ashes of him, the Father of his Country, who first distinguished,
encouraged and employed the extraordinary capacity of the youthful
Adams--through cities that in his life time have grown up from
villages--passing, at Baltimore, almost beneath the shadow of the monument
which there testifies of the valor of those who fell for country in the
war of 1812--and in Philadelphia halting and reposing within the hall
where his great father; John Adams, had fearlessly stood for Independence,
and where Independence was proclaimed--the dead passed on, everywhere
followed by the reverential gaze and the mourning heart, till, reaching
the great metropolis of New York, where the same father had been sworn in
and taken his seat, as the first Vice President of the United States, with
George Washington for President! Thence away the march was resumed, till
it reached old Faneuil Hall--the cradle of American liberty, the fitting
final restingplace, while yet unburied, of the body of one in whose heart,
at no moment of life, did the love of liberty, imbibed or strengthened in
that hall, suffer the slightest abatement." [Footnote: King's Eulogy.]

Faneuil Hall was clothed in the dark drapery of mourning, fitting to
receive the body of one of the greatest of the many noble sons of the
venerable Bay State. Amid solemn dirges and appropriate ceremonies, the
chairman of the Congressional Committee surrendered to a