the preceding list were written during the thirtyseven years of my residence in Amherst, that is, since the time when I supposed I had nearly finished my earthly labors. For when I came to Amherst, such was my debility, that I honestly thought I could not do much more. Yet since then the great work of my life has been accomplished. All that ever preceded was only the preparation. How wonderful the ways of God, and how different from ours! What encouragement does my case offer to the desponding invalid in the early and middle periods of life. Let him not despair so long as any stamina remains in his constitution, and his maladies are only functional, not organic. God may have wonders in store for him yet."

EDWARD EVERETT.

[Vol. II., pp. 169–178.] One of the chief public employments of Mr. Everett, subsequent to the year 1855, when our previous notice of his writings closed, was his noble service to the memory of Washington, particularly in his successful efforts for the collection of the fund to render Mount Vernon the property of the nation. The story of his exertions in this matter is one of the most striking in the history of popular eloquence. It is one of those rare cases where a simple individual act of a man of letters, separate from political action, has been inwrought with the national life. The tale of the delivery of Mr. Everett's oration on Washington may certainly furnish a very striking and profitable chapter in the history of the country. Though perhaps not directly bearing upon the approaching struggle for national existence, yet its incidental relation to that great event, as a test and indication of the patriotism of the people, may fairly be considered of importance. Nor is it less to be regarded in this light on account of its being brought forward so prominently without conscious intention of any such purpose, beforehand, by the author. In fact, the oration on Washington was prepared by Mr. Everett in the ordinary friendly discharge of those self-imposed obligations to literature, art, and moral welfare which it was the business of his life generally to assume, whenever he could serve any of these important interests. This is the simple story of the affair. In the autumn of 1855, Mr. Everett was invited by the Boston Mercantile Library Association to deliver a lecture in their approaching course. Looking around for a topic at once local and of sufficient general interest, it occurred to him to present at one view the different visits of Washington to Boston-a happy selection of a theme, affording a rare opportunity for the exhibition of those picturesque historical groups always so effective on the canvas, so to speak, of our orator. The twenty-second of February, Washington's birthday, was chosen as a time suitable for the delivery of this discourse. It was thus delivered, and the proceeds were appropriately applied to the purchase, for the institution, of a copy of Stuart's full-length portrait of Washington at Newport. It was about this time that a plan was put in circulation in the newspapers of a Ladies' Association, to procure funds by private subscription for the purchase of the estate of

Mount Vernon, with the design of preserving it forever as a memorial of Washington. The outline of this organization met the eye of Mr. Everett in the National Intelligencer, and happening to receive just then an invitation to address a society in Richmond, Virginia, with his accustomed tact he offered them the oration on Washington, with the condition that the receipts should be given to the "Ladies' Mount Vernon Association." The condition was of course received as a privilege, and thus arose the repetition of this discourse, and its first delivery for this interesting national object. The affair thus commenced, it needed little advertising or recommendation to make it a matter of general concern. Invitations multiplied and thickened. The popularity of the orator, heightened by the welcome familiarity of his topic, and the mingled gallantry and patriotism of the particular design, brought him everywhere in request. The delivery of the oration became a systematic business affair, involving a vast correspondence, a nice adjustment of time and extensive travel, as the orator, in summer and in winter, at every suitable opportunity, for three years, sped on his way over the steamboat routes and railways of the country, the proprietors of which cheerfully assisted his progress-from the Eastern to the Western, through the Middle and a considerable portion of the Southern States, pronouncing the discourse before the most numerous and intelligent audiences. No oration was ever so called for before. It was more than once repeated, always to crowded assemblies, in the large cities-four times in New York, and as often in Philadelphia. Before the anniversary of Washington's birthday in 1859, it had thus been delivered one hundred and nineteen times, producing an aggregate for the fund of nearly fifty-seven thousand dollars.

Nor was this all. In the midst of this engrossing occupation, Mr. Everett found time, hurriedly snatched from the brief intervals of leisure on his journeys, to write a series of fiftythree Essays and Sketches, for the express purpose of adding another important sum to the Mount Vernon Fund. The offer was made to him by Mr. Bonner, the enterprising proprietor of a miscellaneous weekly paper, the New York Ledger, of ten thousand dollars for such contributions. It was the publisher's object to secure a popular writer for his journal, and he shrewdly connected his appeal to the author with a loud call upon his patriotism. The large sum might be given to the cause of Washington. The flattering though somewhat onerous proposal was accepted. Mr. Everett received the entire sum in advance, and gave it to the fund, and for the next year, 1859, not a week was his promised contribution missing in its customary page of the Ledger. In 1860 these sketches and essays were published by Messrs. Appleton in an elegant volume, entitled The Mount Vernon Papers. The topics chosen by Mr. Everett in these contributions frequently relate to less familiar incidents in the life of Washington and his illustrious friends and contemporaries, when new materials came to his hand; occasionally to events of contemporary history or biography, as

the chapters on Italian Nationality, Metternich, and The Illustrious Dead of 1859; and often to reminiscences of foreign travel, when the writer, in his youth, was brought into contact with the various political and literary celebrities of Europe. Certain passages of a tour in Switzerland, and an interesting account of two visits to Abbotsford, were of this class. A sketch of An Excursion into the Empire State, descriptive of one of the author's tours in his Washington oration progress, suggests the value of a complete account, as a picture of manners and social life, of Mr. Everett's various journeys with this object. The interest of such a record would increase with every year, and surely be welcomed by posterity,

Nor is the story of these few years of an orator's life-a brief episode in the life of a statesman-yet exhausted. To the plea of patriotism was added that of charity. The financial distress of 1857 threw many of the laboring class out of employment, and it became Mr. Everett's privilege to minister to their necessities. The delivery of his eloquent address on Charity and Charitable Institutions, a lay sermon of great brilliancy and fervor, fifteen times repeated, reaped the rich harvest for benevolent purposes of thirteen thousand five hundred dollars. Another oration, on The Early Days of Franklin, has in like manner replenished the treasuries of various literary and other beneficial social institutions. The entire sum thus raised by Mr. Everett in three years for charitable and patriotic objects reached the enormous aggregate of ninety thousand dollars. The history of literature has no nobler or more pleasing record than this.

It was Mr. Everett's lot, in 1860, again to connect his name with the memory of Washington. The late Lord Macaulay having generously undertaken to supply several lives to the Encyclopædia Britannica, published by his friends, Messrs. Black, of Edinburgh, they applied to him for an article on Washington. Unable to comply with this request at the time, Lord Macaulay, in a complimentary manner, suggested Mr. Everett as a desirable contributor of this important paper. The application was made, accepted, and the biography prepared accordingly. It has appeared in the Encyclopadia, and also been published in a volume in New York, by Messrs. Sheldon & Co. Necessarily brief, it is a remarkably neat narrative of the personal career of Washington, which can never be adequately related separately from the contemporary history of his country. The book is thus, in addition to its just eulogium of its subject, a valuable outline of the revolution and early constitutional period. A third volume of Mr. Everett's Orations and Speeches was published in 1859. Excluding the author's speeches in the Senate of the United States, it contains two orations on the battle of Bunker Hill; various agricultural, historical, and other anniversary addresses; obituary notices of Abbott Lawrence and Thomas Dowse; a memoir of Peter Chardon Brooks, and the eloquent discourse on The Uses of Astronomy, delivered at Albany, New York, on occasion of the inauguration of the Dudley Observatory in that city, in

He

The political events which followed, culminating in the great rebellion, again drew Mr. Everett from retirement. He met the crisis with his accustomed spirit of patriotism, and devotion of his time and energies to the public service. In the important political campaign of 1860, he was nominated by a so-called "Union " party, representing a certain moderate national conservatism, as a candidate for the Vice-Presidency, on the ticket with John Bell, of Tennessee, for President. In accepting this nomination, Mr. Everett could have had little hope of success in face of the more marked political organizations of the Democratic and Republican parties. His ticket, however, received a respectable support, outnumbering that of the other candidates in Virginia and Kentucky, and was handsomely maintained in Georgia, North Carolina, and Louisiana. The Bell and Everett ticket received nearly six hundred thousand votes, about oneeighth of the aggregate popular vote, the rest being unequally divided between the Breckinridge, Douglas, and Lincoln tickets. The election of Mr. Lincoln was the signal for the defection of the Southern States, and the commencement of war upon the nation, in the attack upon Fort Sumter. Mr. Everett, having done all that he could for conciliation and peace, was prompt to recognize and accept the new issue. encouraged the raising of troops in Massachusetts for the national service in the first months of the war, and on the 4th of July, 1861, re-, sponded to an invitation of the citizens of New York to deliver before them an address on the causes of the struggle, and the great issues before the country. This oration, replete with political wisdom, and the practical knowledge of the statesman, is a masterly exhibition of the principles at stake, and the motives in carrying on the war for the Union. It was followed from time to time by other popular addresses of Mr. Everett, in Massachusetts, during the progress of the struggle, as the exigencies of the time required; and when a memorable national occasion arose, in the consecration, in November, 1863, of the cemetery on the battle-field of Gettysburg, he was called upon, at the invitation of the Governor of Pennsylvania, seconded by the Governors of eighteen other loyal States of the Union, to deliver the oration in the ceremonies of the day. Recalling the national custom of the Athenians, immortal in the oration of Pericles, on similar events, he detailed at length the incidents of the great battle that day commemorated, and again reminded his countrymen of the principles of the vast struggle for national existence in which they were engaged. In public services like these, extended to a wide popular circle by his continued presentation of patriotic themes, in contributions of articles to the New York Ledger, Mr. Everett literally ended his days; his last appearance in public, a few days only before his death, being at a public meeting at Faneuil Hall, Boston, at which he pleaded for a work of charity and reconciliation in sending provisions to the needy citizens of Savannali, which had just been captured by the

48

army of General Sherman. This meeting took place on the 9th of January, 1865. A day or two after, Mr. Everett was taken with a cold, which excited no serious apprehensions. On the morning of Sunday, the 15th, he suffered an attack of apoplexy, which resulted in his immediate death. News of the event was speedily telegraphed to Washington, when an official announcement was made to the country by Secretary Seward, in the name of President Lincoln, in a few words setting forth "the learning and eloquence, and unsurpassed and disinterested labors of patriotism at a period of political disorder," of the deceased, and ordering appropriate honors to be rendered to his memory "at home and abroad, wherever the national name and authority are recognized."

JAMES GATES PERCIVAL.

[Vol. II., pp. 212-215.]

Dr. Percival died in his seventy-first year, at Hazelgreen, Illinois, May 2, 1856. He was employed in his last years as State Geologist of Wisconsin, traversing vast regions of the West, in an occupation which gave him abundant opportunity to pursue his favorite natural history and scientific studies, and even occasionally to add to his store of languages something of the speech of the native Indian tribes whom he encountered on his journeys. The Poetical Works of Percival have been published since the author's death, by Messrs. Ticknor & Fields, at Boston. The volumes recall the early admiration for the author, and place his reputation on a lasting basis. The collection contains the early poems published with the title "Clio," the Prometheus," instinct with classic imagery and modern feeling, and the poem on "The Mind," read in 1825 before the Connecticut Alpha of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, a passionate blending of the longings of the soul with visions of art and nature. The volume, The Dream of a Day, and Other Poems, first published in 1843, is also included with a series of Classic Melodies; another of Songs for National Airs; and a few Posthumous Poems. These collections exhibit more than one hundred and fifty different forms or modifications of stanza, an exercise of skill in which the author tells us he was greatly indebted to the German. There is, however, one spirit running through them all. Whether the theme be the domestic affections, social festivity, the emotions of nature, or the call of patriotism, Percival's quick, impulsive, passionate genius is paramount. Learned as he was, he was never trammelled by rules or pedantry. His fiery Pegasus, in whatever armor or dress the rider might be clad, bore him rapidly onward, "with full resounding march."

The recent collection of Percival's Poems is prefaced by a biographical sketch, partly prepared by a friend of the author, the late Erasmus D. North, M. D., and on his death completed by Mr. L. W. Fitch. It contains, besides an outline of Percival's career, some interesting passages of his correspondence, showing to what straits of penury this man of genius was sometimes reduced, with several notices of his rare talents by those who had been intimate with him.

The private library of Percival, a vast collec

tion of learned, scientific, and miscellaneous lots, was sold by Messrs. Leonard & Co., at works, numbering nearly thirty-seven hundred Boston, in April, 1860.

GEORGE BUSH.

[Vol. II., p. 226.]

Professor George Bush died at Rochester, New York, September 19, 1859. During the last few years of his life his health was much broken, and he was compelled by the progress of disease, a consumptive decline, to leave his residence in society of the New Jerusalem Church, for a new Brooklyn, New York, where he preached to a home in the interior of the State. A farm of sixteen acres at Rochester, with a well-built cottage, was kindly placed at his disposal by his cousin, Captain Harding, and there, in the enjoyment of its natural beauties, his last summer was spent.

In addition to the literary and theological mentioned, he published, in 1855, a volume of works from his pen which we have already New Church Miscellanies, or, Essays, Ecclesiasticles which he had written for the New Church tical, Doctrinal, and Ethical, a collection of arRepository. In 1857 appeared his work entitled Priesthood and Clergy unknown to Christianity, or, the Church a Community of Co-equal Brethren, by Compaginator, which his biographer pronounces "the most radical and unpopular work the professor ever published." His latest literary work was An Exposition of the Four folded by Swedenborg and classified and arranged Gospels according to the Internal Sense, as unby Rev. John Clowes; with additional notes and illustrations, critical and explanatory. three only were issued when the author was publication was commenced in numbers, but compelled by ill health to relinquish it. His last sermon was preached in the city of New which he died, on occasion of the dedication of York, in the month of February of the year in the New Jerusalem house of worship in Thirtyfifth street.

The

Dr. Samuel Gilman Brown, has been published, with a collection of Mr. Choate's writings, in Boston.

THEODORE SEDGWICK.

[Vol. II., p. 292.]

Mr. Theodore Sedgwick died at his family residence at Stockbridge, Mass., December 8, 1859, in his forty-eighth year. He was in early life attached to the legation of the Hon. Edward Livingston at Paris, and became thoroughly conversant with modern European literature and society. On his return from Paris he established himself in New York as a lawyer, and pursued the profession with eminent success. In 1858 he was called to the office of United States district attorney at New York, and held the position at the time of his death, though for several months he had been unable to attend to its duties by serious illness.

In addition to the literary works of Mr. Sedgwick already spoken of, we may mention the series of political papers of the Democratic creed which he contributed to the New York Evening Post, under the signature "Veto," "papers, says that journal, in its obituary of the author, "remarkable for their noble and independent spirit, their soundness of judgment, and their clearness and vigor of style." The first volume of Harper's Weekly contains also numerous leading articles from Mr. Sedgwick's pen, on public and social topics, marked by their acute analysis and freedom and clearness of statement. A sketch of European travel, which he published in Harper's Magazine for January, 1856, also attracted much attention. It is entitled "English Wigs and Gowns, by a Barrister without Wig or Gown," and gives a pleasant and instructive picture of the writer's observation of the practice of the courts of the summer circuit.

In October, 1858, Mr. Sedgwick delivered the annual address before the Columbia College Alumni Association, taking for his topic "The true relations of the educated American to his city and to his country." It discusses with great candor the political features of the times, and calls loudly upon the educated classes to devote themselves to the preservation of a sound nationality in consonance with the healthy development of the country. Mr. Sedgwick's extensive legal and miscellaneous library, including many important works in history, voyages and travels, biography, &c., was sold at auction in New York, in May, 1860.

HENRY CARY.

[Vol. II., pp. 297-299.]

Mr. Cary died at Florence, in Italy, while on a foreign tour, in the spring of 1858. His death was suffered to pass with little notice, save an article or two of literary reminiscence, in memory of its old contributor, "John Waters," in the Knickerbocker Magazine.* These recalled the genial powers of an author of nice discrimination and of rare humor and pathos. His playful sketches of character and sentimental essays, touched by the hand of a gentleman and a scholar, are certainly worthy of collection

April and May, 1858.

from the fugitive leaves of periodicals in which they are scattered. Of his essays, in the school of "Elia," we have already given specimens. His poems are less known. They were sometimes of a humorous cast, but oftener, we believe, he chose this form of expression for the utterance of religious emotion.

SAMUEL GRISWOLD GOODRICH.

[Vol. II., pp. 311-313.]

Having returned to America from France, and having made New York his residence, Mr. Goodrich, in 1856, published a book, which, probably more than any of his numerous writings, will preserve his name in remembrance. It is a species of autobiography, entitled, Recollections of a Lifetime, or Men and Things I have Seen in a series of familiar letters to a friend, historical, biographical, anecdotical, and descriptive. In an easy colloquial narrative the author narrates the experiences of his boyhood in his New England home, a simple, at times quaint and humorous story, which as a picture of manners possesses much of that kind of interest which Mrs. Grant of Laggan threw over an earlier period of history at Albany. Still, though removed from the present day by only half a century, the manners of Connecticut, in the youth of the writer, present many curious details of a simplicity which has almost passed away. As he proceeds, various New England personages of consequence are brought upon the scene, and we have some valuable notices of the war with England of 1812. literary men of that time, the Hartford wits, the poets, Percival and Brainard, are introduced. Then comes the author's first journey to England, and his acquaintance with various celebrities among men of letters. His active literary career at home succeeds, followed by his consulship at Paris, which included the period of the revolution of 1848.

The

"I

In the appendix to this work, Mr. Goodrich enumerated the books of which he was the editor or author. The bare recital of the titles occupies six closely printed pages. They are chiefly school-books, and the various series of the Peter Parley Tales and Miscellanies. stand before the public," wrote Mr. Goodrich, "as the author and editor of about one hundred and seventy volumes—one hundred and sixteen bearing the name of Peter Parley. Of all these about seven millions of volumes have been sold; about three hundred thousand volumes are now sold annually." Mr. Goodrich's latest production was an Illustrated Natural History, completed in 1859.

The appearance of Mr. Goodrich was singularly vigorous and youthful for one of his years, and his friends were surprised to hear of his sudden death. He was in the midst of his arrangements for removal from the city to a residence which he had provided for his family in Connecticut, when he was seized with an acute attack of heart disease, which almost immediately proved fatal. He died at New York, in his sixty-seventh year, May 9, 1860.

FRANK BOOT GOODRICH, a son of the late Samuel G. Goodrich, was born in Boston in 1826. He first came into notice as a writer by