LUCRETIA RUDOLPH, born in Hiram, Ohio, married James Abram Garfield in 1868, soon after he became President of Hiram College, where both studied. The marriage was ideal, his wife's intelligent sympathy and co-operative ability aiding greatly in his advancement to his high office. Through the terrible ordeal of his assassination, painful illness and death, Mrs. Garfield was vastly sustained by her power of selfcontrol. Her short stay at the White House proved her tactful and cordial in dispensing public and private hospitality, gaining for her the nation's love and sympathy in her sorrow. President Garfield's was the first mother of a President to reside at the Executive Mansion, although others had seen their sons thus honored. A fund of over three hundred and fifty thousand dollars was partially raised for the Garfield family before the President's death, and the knowledge of this fact was a great comfort to him in his dying moments. GARFIELD In one of his speeches delivered in the National House of Representatives in 1866, Garfield said: "To all our means of culture is added the powerful incentive to personal ambition which springs from the genius of our Government. The pathway to honorable distinction lies open to all. No post of honor is so high but the poorest may hope to reach it. It is the pride of every American that many distinguished names at whose mention our hearts beat with a quicker bound were worn by the sons of poverty, who conquered obscurity and became fixed stars in our firmament." These words, uttered at a time when Garfield's splendid career was not yet in its opening stages, impart a forcible intimation of one of the marked characteristics of his earnest and determined nature, namely, his clear conception of the opportunities afforded to young men of the present time by our republican form of government and the guaranty it gives of equal rights to all. By these words he evidenced the fact that he had grasped the possibilities of individual attainment, and was imbued with the spirit of our institutions. He knew the possibilities of his own life, and possessed a serene confidence that his country would offer opportunities for their realization. He never underestimated, and was always quick to see the value of an opportunity. Whatever he set out to do he did with his might. He did not believe in luck. His estimate of a man was based upon his capacity for hard work. Every effort of life, whether public or private, was to him an opportunity for the emulation of a lofty ideal. On entering Congress he was immediately recognized as a political force. His first utterance secured the attention of every member. Not possessing the tricks of oratory, he had what is better, the profoundness of logic. Sweeping aside the misty film which shrouded a subject under discussion, he made plain and bare the intricate matter it contained, and in terse, eloquent sentences he forced his conclusions. When he had finished, the discussion was ended. He was a recognized leader. He was master of all subjects. While he adorned every discussion with his eloquence, he enforced his views with incontrovertible argument. He saw and improved opportunities as they came, and day after day he grew in intellectual vigor and political strength until his reputation became national and his ability commanded universal confidence and respect. In reaching this eminence he never crawled an inch. He moved upward as the eagle goes to the mountain top. Dignified, but not ostentatious, frank but not blunt, reserved but not austere, patient and laborious, he conquered all conditions, surmounted all obstacles and survived all |