308 ALEXIS CASWELL. 



exception of the time wlien he visited Europe, in 18G0-61, he dis- 

 charged the laborious duties of this office for thirty-five years, to the 

 complete satisfaction of the government and the pupils of the institu- 

 tion. Engaging in its instruction soon after Dr. VVayland's accession 

 to the presidency, he was his strong support throughout an able and 

 vigorous administration. In many respects, one was the fitting com- 

 plement of the other, and respect and confidence were felt equally on 

 each side. In 1840, while Dr. AVayland was absent in Europe, Pro- 

 fessor Caswell discharged the duties of President ; and, dui'ing the last 

 three years of President Wayland's otfii-ial term, Professor Caswell, 

 under the title of Regent, relieved him from all tlie anxieties of disci- 

 pline, bringing to this delicate duty qualities of mind and heart which 

 secured good order without alienating the affection of the students. 



When Dr. Caswell resigned his professorship in 1863, he was sixty- 

 four years of age ; and had fairly earned the leisure and the retire- 

 ment which are the reward and the luxury of old age. But he was 

 still young in the best sense of the word; young in his feelings, in his 

 habits of industry, in his intellectual faculties, in the good constitution 

 which he had inherited fi-om his father (who died in 1851 at the 

 advanced age of ninety-one), and young in his passion to serve his day 

 and generation to the end. Accordingly, he engaged in active affairs 

 with a vigor and success which younger men might well have envied. 

 Kefreslied by five years, not of repose, but of a change in his intellec- 

 tual diet, he again obeyed jhe voice of his Alma Mater, which called 

 him, in 18G8, to the Presidency of Brown University ; Dr. Sears, his 

 predecessor, having been summoned to an urgent and difficult service 

 by the strong voice of patriotism and humanity. Although Dr. Cas- 

 well had been moving for a few years outside of the University 

 domain, his heart was always there. He knew, better probably than 

 any one else, the wants, the resources, and the aims of the institution ; 

 and, notwithstanding that he stood on the brink of threescore years 

 and ten, he brouglit to his high position the vigor, the freshness, and 

 the hope of youth. Among the various needs of the University 

 which he pressed upon the attention of the corporation, in his anninil 

 reports, was the establishment of an astronomical observatory, suffi- 

 cient for the purposes of instruction if not of research. 



Soon after leaving the office of president, in 1872, Dr. Caswell was 

 elected into the Board of Trustees, and, in 1875, he was chosen a 

 Fellow of the Corporation. In 1841, he received the degree of 

 D.D., and, in 1865, that of LL.D. ; both from his own university. 

 For nearly fifty years, he had been associated with it, either as student, 



