The Jackson Standard

How a Dead President Looks.

President Madison died in 1836, and was buried in Montpelier, Orange County, Virginia. The neglect in attending his worth by a suitable monument attracted attention, and some few years since a number of gentlemen of Orange County set about the task of procuring one. Having procured it, they conveyed it to Montpelier the other day and placed it in its position. In digging for the foundation it became necessary to go below the coffin, which was consequently exposed to view. Thus was an opportunity offered of examining a dead President, after he had been in the ground twenty-one years. A Richmond reporter says:

The boards placed above the coffin had decayed, but no earth had fallen in upon it, and everything appeared to be as when the coffin was deposited there, except that the cover was slightly moved, allowing a partial view of the interior. As there was no fastenings to prevent, the part of the lid covering the superior portion of the body was raised, and the several gentlemen present looked in upon the remains of the Virginian. The coffin itself, of black walnut was in perfect preservation, and the interior was nearly filled with a species of moss, which adhered pertinaciously to the wood. Beneath this, and partially hidden by it, were few of the larger and harder bones. The flesh had fallen away, the bones of the and the ribs were gone, and the only of the skeleton which remained were the skull and portions of the cheek bones; vertebral of the neck, the spine and large bones of the arms. All else of the upper part of the body had returned to the dust from whence it was taken, and in a few years more every trace of the body will disappear, the trump of canals resurrection shall re- scattered cher particles. The body interred just twenty-one years