Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 June 1891 — ARNOLD'S LAST DAYS. [ARTICLE]

ARNOLD'S LAST DAYS.

She Traitor’* LIT* on th* Other AM* to tha Ooaan. All < o family tradition goes to show that the last years of Benedict Arnold In London ware years of bitter remorse and self-reproach. The great name which he had so gallantly won and so wretchedly lost left him no repose by night or day The iron frame, which had withstood the fatigue of so many trying battle fields and still more trying marches through the wilderness, broke down at last under the slow torture of lost friendships and merited disgrace. In the last sad day 9 in London, in June, 1801, the family tradition says that Arnold’s mind kept reverting to his old friendship with Washington. He had always carefully preserved the American uniform which he wore on the day when he made hi# escape to the Vulture; and now as, broken in spirit and weary of life, he felt the last moments coming, he called for this uniform and put it on, and decorated himself with tbe epaulettes and sword-knot which Washington had given him after the victory of Saratoga. “Let me die," said he, “in this old uniform in which I fought my battles. May God forgive me for ever putting on any other. ” Into the story of Arnold there enters that element of awe and pity which, as Aristotle pointed out, is an essential part of real tragedy. That Arnold had been very shabbily treated, long before any thought of treason entered his mind, is not to be denied. That he may honestly have come to consider the American •torn hopeless, that he may re: Uy have lost his interest In It because of the Fwmqh alliance—all this Is quite possible, Such considerations might have Justified him in resigning his commis•ton; or even, had he openly and frankly Bone over to the enemy, much as we Mould have deplored such a step, some parsons would always have been found to Judge him leniently, and accord him fee audit of acting upon principle. But the dark and crooked er one which he ud pboose left open no alternative but tmriUof unqualified condemns' ion.