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and he sank with a rapidity that, even to those who watched him closest, seemed startling.”
In one of
Greeley's Letters to
a Lady Friend (published in 1893), he wrote, under date of November 8, 1872, “As to my wife's death, I do not count it. Her sufferings since she returned to me were so terrible that I rather felt relieved when she peacefully slept the long sleep. . . . Nor do I care for defeat, however crushing.
I dread only the malignity with which I am hounded, and the possibility that it may ruin the Tribune.
My enemies mean to kill that; if they would kill me instead I would thank them lovingly.
And so many of my old friends hate me for what I have done that life seems hard to bear.”
His own words tell the story of his death.
“Mr. Greeley,” said Dr. Cuyler in his memorial sermon, “died of a broken heart.”
He had seen the realization of a great ambition within his reach, and had been disappointed.
Had he been elected, the campaign criticisms of old friends who had not followed him in his departure from the Republican ranks would have been forgotten in the mapping out of the policy to which he would have devoted himself, and his paper would have had a new status as the organ of the Federal administration.
