20 The Late Chief Justice Roger B. Taney. 



tors were among the early emigrants to that state ; Roman 

 Catholics seeking refuge from the severe penal laws of 

 England. His father, Michael Taney, was educated in the 

 Jesuits' college at St. Omers; he returned home and was 

 married to Monica Brooke, daughter of a neighboring 

 planter or farmer, a little while before the commencement 

 of the American Revolution. The Brookes were an 

 English family, of the same faith, and among the early 

 emigrants to the Catholic colony of Lord Baltimore; they 

 appear to have settled first on the banks of the Patuxent, 

 and were a family of a large estate in lands. The mother 

 of the future chief justice was a very pious woman, of ex- 

 cellent judgment, and great gentleness. Her influence 

 upon the character of her son, appears to have been deep 

 and lasting ; it shows itself long afterwards, in the wish 

 expressed by him, that he might at last be buried by her 

 side near the little Catholic Church in Frederick city. 



His father owned a good landed estate, and slaves. 

 Though not rich, his property was sufficient to enable him 

 to live comfortably and educate his children. He loved 

 the amusements of the country, and he was fond of fox 

 hunting ; a sport in which the circumstances of the country 

 enabled him to indulge with great freedom. 



The son was prepared for college, mainly, by the aid of 

 private tutors ; he entered Dickinson college at Carlisle, 

 in Pennsylvania, in 1792, a little more than fifteen years 

 of age, and graduated three years after. He returned 

 home but twice during his college course, walking on both 

 occasions from Carlisle to Baltimore, about eighty miles. 

 From his own account of his college life, his studies were 

 prosecuted with reasonable diligence. Dr. Nesbit, the pre- 

 sident of the college, a Scotch Presbyterian, appears to 

 have been a favorite with the class; under him our stu- 

 dent was trained in Ethics, Logic, Metaphysics and Criti- 

 cism. He was a close student, of an active habit, and, as 



