150 PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMY 



Fellow of this Academy. His election to it was among the very first 

 of that long succession of honors which the scholarly and scientific 

 associations of both hemispheres bestowed upon him ; feeling that they 

 needed the lustre of his sure fame, as much as he needed the patronage 

 of their applause. When I look around me now upon this circle of 

 gentlemen who represent so much of the higher intellectual culture of 

 our time, in all departments of thought, research, and genius, and when 

 my eye falls upon more than one who by age and intimacy has claims 

 far beyond my own to introduce this memorial tribute, I cannot but 

 shrink from what I have assented to undertake. But some grateful 

 motions for many, very many favors and kindnesses from our departed 

 friend, encourage me. They even constrain me. There is a relief for 

 sad feelings in the expression of grateful feelings, when they lie side 

 by side in the heart as engaged toward the same object. If, by speak- 

 ing my few sincei'e words in this presence, I can pay something of my 

 debt to the dead, I will do so. 



" But one day more than a week has passed since — amid an assem- 

 bly composed of such as no other occasion would have grouped togeth- 

 er, and moved as by the sympathy of a very deep sorrow — we saw all 

 that was mortal of that cherished and eminent man, resting for a few 

 moments before the Christian altar where he had been wont to worship. 

 And then some of us saw the casket of the clay deposited in the last 

 repose, beside the dust of those revered parents who had remained with 

 him in life long enough to know his fame, and had gone before him not 

 so long as to be widely severed in the spaces of higher life. Some of 

 us associated here in the interests of the broadest range of literature, 

 science, and art, have already, in a circle more restricted in its object, 

 as devoted to his own special pursuit of history, united in a tribute to 

 the character and the splendid achievements of Mr. Prescott.* Nor will 

 those of us who thought, and felt, and listened there, soon forget the 

 spell from the tongues that spoke then the promptings of touched hearts. 

 A rare but most fitting succession of utterances ! His nearest friend in 

 the confidence of daily intercourse, and the most competent of all wit- 

 nesses as to matters of scholarship in Spanish literature ; next, the best 

 known and the longest in service of our American historians ; next, the 

 reverend President of the College, as his classmate ; then one who had 



* The Massachusetts Historical Society. 



