His carriage left the procession at the White House. Later the crowd followed it. All the afternoon of Armistice Day men and women gathered before his home. All told there were thousands of them. They waited, hoping for his greeting. And when he gave it, briefly, they cheered and cheered. But they did not go away. It was dark before that crowd had dispersed.
But this expression of love and loyalty and interest in Woodrow Wilson is no new thing in Washington. For months now, on Sundays and holidays, men, women and children have been walking to his home, standing in groups before it, speaking together in hushed tones as if something solemn and ennobling stirred in them. Curiosity? No. Men chatter and jibe and jostle in curiosity. These people are silent—gentle—orderly. You will see them before the theater, too, when it is known that he is within, quietly waiting for him to come out—one hundred, two hundred, five hundred—even a thousand sometimes, it is said. They cheer him as he passes—and there are chokes in their voices—and always tenderness. Let it be known that he is in his seat in a theater, and the house will rise in homage. Let his face be thrown on a screen, and it will receive a greeting that the face of no other living American will receive. It requires explanation.
The people at least recognized him as belonging to the Conference. And, as a matter of fact, the Conference never was able to escape him. Again and again, he appeared at the table. The noblest words that were said were but echoes of what he had been saying through the long struggle. The President’s great slogan—Less of armaments and none of war—was but another way of putting the thing for which he had given all but his last breath. The best they were to do—their limitation of armaments, their substitute to make it possible, were but following in the path that he had cut. The difficulties and hindrances which they were to meet and which were to hamper both program and final settlements were but the difficulties and hindrances which he had met and which hampered his work at Paris. From the start to the finish of the Conference on the Limitation of Armament, the onlooker recognized both the spirit and the hand of Woodrow Wilson as the crowd recognized him on Armistice Day.