EZRA CORNELL-1864-1874 299 



and five hundred thousand dollars as an addition to the 

 land-grant endowment, instead of three hundred thousand, 

 as I proposed at Rochester. " 



As may well be imagined, I hailed this proposal joy- 

 fully, and soon sketched out a bill embodying his purpose 

 so far as education was concerned. But here I wish to say 

 that, while Mr. Cornell urged Ithaca as the site of the pro- 

 posed institution, he never showed any wish to give his 

 own name to it. The suggestion to that effect was mine. 

 He at first doubted the policy of it ; but, on my insisting 

 that it was in accordance with time-honored American 

 usage, as shown by the names of Harvard, Yale, Dart- 

 mouth, Amherst, Bowdoin, Brown, Williams, and the like, 

 he yielded. 



We now held frequent conferences as to the leading 

 features of the institution to be created. In these I was 

 more and more impressed by his sagacity and largeness 

 of view ; and, when the sketch of the bill was fully devel- 

 oped, its financial features by him, and its educational 

 features by me, it was put into shape by Charles J. Fol- 

 ger of Geneva, then chairman of the judiciary committee of 

 the Senate, afterward chief judge of the Court of Appeals, 

 and finally Secretary of the Treasury of the United States. 

 The provision forbidding any sectarian or partizan pre- 

 dominance in the board of trustees or faculty was proposed 

 by me, heartily acquiesced in by Mr. Cornell, and put into 

 shape by Judge Folger. The State-scholarship feature 

 and the system of alumni representation on the board of 

 trustees were also accepted by Mr. Cornell at my sug- 

 gestion. 



I refer to these things especially because they show one 

 striking characteristic of the man namely, his readiness 

 to be advised largely by others in matters which he felt 

 to be outside his own province, and his willingness to give 

 the largest measure of confidence when he gave any con- 

 fidence at all. 



On the other hand, the whole provision for the endow- 

 ment, the part relating to the land grant, and, above all, 



