SETH CARLO CHANDLER. 



481 



He was very fond of good music of the old school, Beethoven, 

 Gounod, and Verdi being among his favorites. He did not care for the 

 modern composers, and never listened to their work if he could avoid 

 it. A forced hearing of Debussy or Brahms, it is said, was sure to 

 bring forth some humorous but scathing criticism at the finish. His 

 contention was that music was for the pleasure of the senses only, and 

 attempts to make it appeal to the intellect were disastrous. He read 

 almost everything except the modern novel. This he was apt to class 

 as " cheap stuff." Relaxing from his scientific work, he would become 

 absorbed in some other subject, for instance the American Civil War, 

 and read volume after volume about it. In French, Dumas was a 

 favorite author. In such periods of reading Kenan's Life of Christ, 

 Saint Paul, and the Bible would come in close succession. Tales of 

 adventure, detective stories, history, and biography as related to 

 history appealed to him. 



Dr. Chandler was devoted to his family and their interests. Al- 

 though the family dinner table was a large one and he might be much 

 preoccupied, having been called several times before responding, it is 

 said that he never failed to notice instantly the absence of any mem- 

 ber of the family group. He found much satisfaction in restoring his 

 grandfather's homestead at Strafford, Vermont, where he enjoyed the 

 long summer vacations with his family. The writer, who spent a 

 summer some years ago at Strafl'ord, remembers the delightful way 

 Dr. Chandler entered into the community life. His daughters with 

 others had become interested in dramatics, and he took great pleasure 

 in conveying the "band of strolling players" as he called them, over 

 to neighboring villages to give performances. 



He was fond of driving, preferring horses to an automol)ile. " Not 

 to own a machine" he said, " from l)eing a proof of aristocracy had now 

 become a mark of respectability." He enjoyed books on magic and 

 gave sleight of hand exhibitions at Strafford. The " Old City Wizard" 

 was a title bestowed upon him in those days. It was a pastime of his 

 at Strafford to design, make, and sail beautiful little yachts, two or 

 three feet in length. He used to say that he was sailing the exact 

 model of one of the "Cup Defenders" years before she was launched. 

 To a clever local mechanic who assisted him in some parts of the 

 construction, it was a wonder that the models should have the exact 

 displacement predicted by their designer. Such was his life at Straf- 



