316 LIFE OF BENJAMIN SILLIMAN. 



voted, and equally quick and skilful with his pen, quick 

 also in apprehension, and judicious and prompt in execu- 

 tion. The affairs of his father and family, and his own 

 interests, took him from me within one year after Mr. 

 Andrews left me ; but I have long had the pleasure of 

 seeing him in the first rank at the New York Bar, and 

 beloved and admired for his winning manners, his talents, 



and generous and noble social qualities Mr. 



Silliman has, very wisely, avoided being drawn into the 

 turbulent maelstrom of politics, from which very few es- 

 cape unharmed. He has pursued quietly his professional 

 coarse, with the exception of being once a member of 

 the Legislature at Albany ; and, like his early friend, 

 Mr. Andrews, avoiding political life, he has acquired both 

 honor and emolument in his professional course. He 

 very reluctantly yielded, a few years since, to the urgent 

 solicitations of his fellow-citizens in the district in which 

 he resided, to be nominated for an election to Congress, 

 and I took occasion to congratulate him upon his defeat, 

 as, had he succeeded, it would have been a serious in- 

 jury to his professional business ; for in Congress it is 

 rare that any one saves much money, or gains in reputa- 

 tion. 



Dr. Burr Noyes was also of my family, his father being 

 my eldest half brother. He was of the same graduating 

 class with Mr. B. D. Silliman, and had been engaged in the 

 study of medicine, at or near his native home, Norfield and 

 Saugatuck in Fail-field County. He was intelligent, faith- 

 ful, and studious ; and as chemistry had a favorable bearing 

 on his professional studies, I offered him the place of as- 

 sistant, when Mr. Silliman resigned. He retained it only 

 long enough to make me regret losing him so soon. He 

 passed but one winter with me, and he would have become 

 a still more useful assistant, had his experience been equal 

 to his fidelity. In the spring of 1826, after the chemical 

 lectures were ended, he received temporary overtures for 





