from the German and frequent verses to his friends.

ISAAC G. STRAIN.

This gallant officer of the navy, whose early death was greatly deplored by the friends of science, was a native of Pennsylvania. He was born about the year 1820, entered the navy of the United States, and rose to the rank of lieutenant. He was an accomplished officer, and acquired several modern languages, particularly interesting himself in the study of the Eastern countries which he visited, their geography and ethnology. His single published volume was a book of travels, Sketches of a Journey in Chili and the Argentine Provinces in 1849, the result of permission which he obtained to leave his ship on the Pacific for the sake of making the overland journey from Valparaiso to Rio de Janeiro, with the intention of rejoining the vessel when she should she should accomplish her voyage round Cape Horn. The book, published in New York in 1853, showed Lieutenant Strain to be an intelligent observer, and brought him in contact with the scientific men of the country. He was made a member of the American Ethnological Society, and was welcomed by its members in New York. Previously to his journey in South America he had explored the peninsula of Lower California. He was subsequently engaged in the Boundary Commission for running the dividing line between the United States and Mexico. In 1854 he was

placed in charge of the Government expedition sent to survey the Isthmus of Darien. The extremities to which his party were reduced in that affair, and the heroism with which he sustained his command under extraordinary difficulties, brought him prominently to the notice of the public. His observations were embodied in a report to the Secretary of the Navy, and a paper read before the Geographical Society at New York. An interesting account of his journey, from his notes and original materials, was also prepared by Mr. J. T. Headley; and published in several numbers of Harpers' Magazine, in 1855. In the summer of 1856, he sailed in company with Captain Berryman, in the Arctic, on her voyage to ascertain by soundings in the North Atlantic the possibility of an ocean telegraph between America and England. Returning to New York after the successful performance of this duty, he passed the winter in the city in broken health, the result of his exposures on the Isthmus of Darien. In the spring he sailed to overtake his vessel, the Cyane, in Southern waters, but he lived only to reach Aspinwall, dying at that place the night of his arrival, May 15, 1857, in his thirtyseventh year.

CORTLANDT VAN RENSSELAER,

entered Yale College, and graduated in course in 1827. His first application of his powers was to the law, a study which he pursued in the office at Albany of the late Abraham Van Vechten. He was admitted to practice in 1830, but his thoughts were already directed to the claims of divinity. Giving the preference to the latter profession, he studied at the Theological Seminary at Princeton and at the Union Seminary in Prince Edward County, Virginia. In 1833 he received his license to preach from the Presbytery of West Hanover, in the latter State, and began his ministry by an earnest course of labor as a preacher to the slaves in Virginia. Uniting several plantations in this work, he dedicated a chapel in their midst. His devotion to this kind work was, however, interrupted by

unwarrantable suspicions," growing out of his Northern relations and opinions, and he was compelled to abandon his favorite field of exertion. In 1836 he became engaged in the formation of the First Presbyterian Church in Burlington, New Jersey, and ministered faithfully in its pulpit for four years. He afterward preached at Washinton, D. C., and in 1846 became Corresponding Secretary of the Board of Education of the Presbyterian Church. He devoted the remainder of his life to this important work with great assiduity. labors included the organization and support of parochial schools, Presbyterian academies, and synodical colleges, with incessant occupation of his pen as editor of a monthly magazine, and the preparation of various addresses and dis

His

courses. In the midst of these toils he fell into Burlington, on the 25th of July, 1860. a decline, and ended his days at his residence at

son.

A volume of his Miscellaneous Sermons, Essays, and Addresses has been published, edited by his It contains various theological papers, ing, in reply to the Rev. Dr. George D. among others a series of articles on SlaveholdArmstrong, of Virginia, in which he combats institution, regarding the ultimate dissolution of the alleged pro-slavery Biblical defence of the the relation as a moral duty, from the general spirit and principles of the word of God." The

volume also includes funeral orations on Daniel

Webster and Bishop Doane, in whose character, with praiseworthy independence, he found much to admire, though he was so widely separated from him in church relations; and two historical discourses, at the centennial celebration of the battle of Lake George, and a similar commemoration of the capture of Ticonderoga.

THOMAS STARR KING.

Thomas Starr King was born December 17, 1824, in the city of New York, where his mother was then on a visit to her family. His father, Thomas Farrington King, was a distinguished Universalist clergyman of New England. In 1828 he became settled at Portsmouth, N. H., where his son Starr, as he was always called by his friends, was taught at a private school not only the elements of an English education, but acquired before the age of ten a considerable acquaintance with French and Latin. His father, in 1835, removed to Charlestown,

that now produce such beneficent harmony, would drift towards wreck and ruin. The physical order, stability, and beneficence we behold, are not the result of a few glaring and easily comprehended arrangements, but the products of a myriad indirect contributions and intricate influences, which deep and patient study discloses to the scientific mind.

In the structure of society, also, the most powerful agents for good are indirect, and seldom consciously recognized. What a complex thing is that which we call civilization! Of how many delicate and different influences is it compounded! There are times when we are able to see, for an instant, what terrible passions smoulder in the bosom of our Christian society, and what savage feelings can be started beneath the placid order of common life, and how coarse the temper and moral sensibility of large portions of our community really are. And yet all this is generally restrained from destructive fury by subtile influences which are intertwined so skilfully, that the whole strength and pressure of them are no more seen than we see the power and momentum of the wind. The fierce elements of human nature are controlled by civilization, as a lion is entrapped by a net, each line of which is but a straw in comparison with his strength, but whose knots and meshes bind every muscle, and entangle his feet, and distract his energy, so that his vigor is soon exhausted, and he is no longer a dangerous foe. The best government is that which seems to govern least; whose power and motives and control reach us indirectly, and press upon us steadily and unconsciously as, the weight of the air.

That which we call the power of conservatism in society, and which gives permanence and force to all institutions to many that are bad-is an indirect power. All institutions and customs have many and wide relations with the feelings, habits, and hearts of the people among whom they exist. They throw out fine tendrils into the soil of the sentiments, which we do not like to have disturbed. And hence it is that, after the upper leaves of some great institution have begun to die, and its trunk has rotted, and it is seen by the sharpest eyes to be a cumberer of the ground --and even after the storm has madly despoiled it, and the hot bolt of intellectual indignation has smitten and shivered it, it will stand in some semblance of worth and majesty, because of the unseen and indirect support that is yet afforded from the tap-roots that strike down into the subsoil of feeling, and the fibres that are twisted in some corners of the social heart.

So much for the broad law, and the general manifestations of it. Let us notice, next, some of the indirect influences which, as individuals. we are continually receiving from society, and from our companions and friends. We cannot tell how much we derive in this way. A great part of what we know and of what we learn of our opinions and general views the tone of our judgments, etc.

voluntary absorption, but through all the pores of our spiritual nature.

“

Past ages have an indirect effect upon us, through the institutions they have bequeathed and the general spirit of the civilization they have helped to form. The author of Euthanasy" and "Martyria" has finely and truly said, In my character there are the effects of Paul's journey to Damascus, and of the meeting of King John and the barons at Runnymede. There is in my soul the seriousness of the many conflicts, famines, and pestilences of early English times. And of my enthusiasm, some of the warmth is from fiery words which my forefathers thrilled to, in the times of the Commonwealth and of the Reformation. There is in me what has come of the tenderness with which mothers nursed their children, ages ago; and there is that in me which is holy, and which began from a forty days' fast in a wilderness in Judea, now eighteen hundred years since.' Every man we meet, every emergency in which we are thrown, leaves its impress, slight or palpable, upon the soul. Just as every particle of food we take, and every breath we inhale, contributes something to the nourishment or injury of the frame; just as we are unconscious of the play of the lungs, the flow of the blood, and of the operation of the forces that digest and assimilate our food; so our characters derive some elements for healthy or unhealthy growth from each of the occasions of life; and all these are digested and worked into our spiritual substance by forces that play without our knowledge, and independent on the control of our will.

The most precious parts of education are those which men do not derive from books, and which they cannot tell how they acquired. Take that practical wisdom which we say comes from experience, and how is it acquired? or take that faculty which we term a shrewd and solid common sense, and how is it developed? Not by books, academies, and the apparatus of study, so much as by intercourse with society, and the training of every-day life, the indirect culture and discipline which the street, the exchange, the market, the church, and constant communion with the many-sided world, pour sideways, as it were, into the intellect and heart.

GEORGE LIVERMORE.

George Livermore was born in Cambridge, Mass., 10th July, 1809. He received his education principally from the public schools of that place, and at a suitable age was placed in a

store," to fit him for a mercantile life. After some business experience on his own account, in different places, he entered into the wool commission business, in Boston; at first with an older brother, then in other connections. For many years, and at the time of his death, he was one of the prominent merchants in this line of business in ably known as a merchant. Boston. He took pride to the last in being favor

Mr. Livermore very early had a great taste for

fond of historical and antiquarian pursuits, but the special subject of his studies was the Bible and biblical literature, concerning which he had collected, with perhaps one exception, the finest private library in the country. He was eminent as a bibliographer, and was especially curious in collecting books to illustrate the history of print

ing. His library was also rich in large-paper copies and elegant illustrated editions; indeed, containing some of the finest specimens of whatever is recherché connected with the arts of book-print- | ing or book-binding.

Mr. Livermore often wrote for the newspapers and reviews. His style was pure and vigorous; and whatever came from his pen of an historical nature, bore the marks of great thoroughness of research. In 1849, he wrote a series of articles in the Cambridge Chronicle, on the New England Primer, which were afterward collected into a volume, of which twelve copies only were printed for private distribution. In that year he also wrote an article for the Christian Examiner, on Strickland's History of the American Bible Society. The next year he contributed a paper to the North American Review on Public Libraries. In 1855, he wrote and printed, for private distribution, A Tribute to the Memory of James Johnson, a Merchant of the Old School. In 1862, he prepared and printed, at his own expense, an important paper-making a volume of 215 pageswhich he entitled, An Historical Research respecting the Opinions of the Founders of the Republic on Negroes as Slaves, as Citizens, and as Soldiers-read before the Massachusetts Historical Society, 14th August, 1862. There were five editions of this work printed, including the edition printed in the Historical Society's proceedings. These were all on superior paper. The last edition was on superb large paper. In 1864, he wrote the annual report of the council of the Antiquarian Society, which he read at the meeting in October, at Worcester. In this he paid an admirable tribute to his venerable friend, the late Josiah Quincy-who had died during the year -and gave a discriminating analysis of his writings.

In 1849, Mr. Livermore was elected to the Massachusetts Historical Society, of which he was an efficient member. In 1850, Harvard College conferred on him the honorary degree of master of arts, and about that time he was elected a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, and also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He was for many years a trustee of the Boston Athenæum, and was their vice-president at the time of his death.

Mr. Livermore not only claimed our respect as an honorable merchant and a scholar, but he won the love of all who had the privilege of knowing him, by the beautiful simplicity of his manners, the kindness of his heart, and, indeed, for all those qualities which constitute the Christian gentleman. He was eminently patriotic, and during the late rebellion gave liberally of his time, strength, and money to the cause of the Union and to the support of the Government. He died 30th August, 1865, after an illness of about three months, and was buried at Mount Auburn.

On the following Sunday a tribute was paid to his memory by the Rev. Mr. Hale, in a discourse on "The public service of a private man,

"from the pulpit of the South Congregational Church at Cambridge; and at a meeting the following month of the Massachusetts Historical Society at Boston, addresses on occasion of his death were made by the Hon. Robert

773

C. Winthrop, the president of the society, and by Mr. Charles Deane. Both spoke warmly of his manly virtues and of his love of letters, the latter giving various particulars of the formation of his biblical library, of his studies, of his acquaintance with Dibdin on a visit to England, of his intimacy with Mr. Dowse, whose valuable library he was the means of securing to the society, and of other incidents of his relation to literature.

SAMUEL IRENEUS PRIME

Was born in Ballston, Saratoga County, New York, November 4, 1812. He graduated at Williams College, Massachusetts, in 1829, studied at the Princeton Theological Seminary, and became a minister of the Presbyterian Church. In 1840, being induced by ill health, he retired from the ministry, and has since been engaged in the editorship of the New York Observer. He has published Travels in Europe and the East, the result of his observations on a foreign tour (1855); Letters from Switzerland, another record of travel (1860); and several works of a devotional character, among which may be mentioned Thoughts on the Death of Little Children, The Power of Prayer, a sketch of the Fulton Street (New York) prayer-meeting; Walking with God, and Life Hid with Christ in God. The Alhambra and the Kremlin, appeared in 1873.

WILLIAM COWPER PRIME,

A brother of the preceding, was born in Cambridge, Washington County, New York, October 31, 1825. He was educated at the College of New Jersey, at Princeton, studied law, was admitted to the bar, and has since pursued the rofession in the city of New York. His writings are numerous, including the Owl Creek Letters, a series of papers contributed to the New York Journal of Commerce; The Old House by the River, a volume of tales and sketches, published in 1853; and Later Years (1854). Mr. Prime's more recent works, by which he is chiefly known, relate to his travels in the East in 1855-6. He has published Boat Life in Egypt and Nubia, and Tent Life in the Holy Land. He has also lectured before the New York Historical Society on subjects of Egyptian antiquities. In 1860 he edited an illustrated work on Coins, Medals, and Seals, subjects on which he has bestowed much attention.

Mr. Prime's next publication was a small volume entitled, O Mother Dear, Jerusalem; The Old Hymn, its Origin and Genealogy. In this a venerable hymn, derived from the Apocalypse, and many an invocation of subsequent Christian writers, is presented in the version of David Dickson, a Scottish clergyman of the seventeenth century, supported by various poems of the Latin Church, of similar import. The au thor in the preface expresses his indebtedness in the work to the Rev. Dr. Bonar, of Scotland, who has edited the hymn in a volume of curious research, published in Edinburgh in 1852. In 1868 he edited the Passio Christi of Albert Durer. I Go-A-Fishing appeared in 1873.

R. T. S. LOWELL.

Robert Traill Spence Lowell, an elder brother of James Russell Lowell, was born in Boston,

October 8, 1816. He passed his schoolboy days at the celebrated establishment at Round Hill, Northampton, and was graduated at Harvard in 1833. After studying medicine, he changed his plan of life for theology, and was ordained a minister of the Church of England by the Bishop of Newfoundland and Bermuda. He was first stationed at the last-named group of islands as the bishop's chaplain. He He next removed to Newfoundland, where he became rector of the village of Bay Roberts. Here he remained until, in consequence of overwork as a commissioner for the distribution of food, during a season of famine, he was forced to remove to a more genial elime, and, returning to the United States, became rector of Christ's Church, Newark. His next parochial charge was at Duanesburg, N.Y.; and he has since held the IIead Mastership of a large classical school.

Mr. Lowell published in 1858, at Boston, a novel in two volumes, bearing the title, The New Priest in Conception Bay. It is an original work, forcible in style, philosophical, picturesque, and humorous. The few lines of prelude or preface indicate its temper and quality: "Religious novels there are many: this is not one of them. These Figures, of gentle, simple, sad and merry, were drawn (not in a Day) upon the Walls of a House of Exile. Will the great World care for them?"

The scene of The New Priest is placed in a fishing village on the coast of Newfoundland. The main interest of the story turns on the abduction of a young girl by some over-zealous Roman Catholics, and her subsequent recovery. The New Priest is a,convert from the Church of England, who had, before the commencement of the book, abandoned his wife to take up the ministry of his new faith. Coming to Peterport in the exercise of his vocation, he finds his wife living in retirement, and is so influenced by her arguments, and by his disgust at the double-dealing of his associates in the conduct of the abduction, that he finally returns to the Anglican communion. He leaves for the mainland to make a public recantation to the bishop of the diocese, and on his return has to make an overland journey in the depth of winter. The time of his expected arrival having passed, his friends, accompanied by his wife, go out in search, and find him, near his journey's end, frozen to death. The generally grave character of the narrative is relieved by the introduction of a comic character, Mr. Bangs, of the United States, an impertinent Yankee.

In 1861, Mr. Lowell published a small volume of poems, with the fanciful title, Fresh Hearts that Failed Three Thousand Years ago; with Other Things. Many are suggested by incidents in the author's career, and all are in a serious. reflective vein. The poems are vigorous in thought, harmonious, and suggestive. A later edition of these poems, with additions, appeared in 1864, entitled, The Poems of Robert Lowell.

THE RELIEF OF LUCKNOW.

Are there not many that remember (who can forget?) that scene in the Sikh war,-also in India,-when the distant gleam of arms and flash of friendly uniform were descried by a little exhausted army among the hills, and the Scotch pipes struck

up "Oh! but ye were lang a-comi»!” (Lachrymamne teneatis, amici? None of us, that have much Scottish blood, can keep our eyes from moistening.) The incident in the present case may not be historical, but it is true to nature, and intrinsi

cally probable, which is all that poetry needs, in that respect.
Oh! that last day in Lucknow fort!
We knew that it was the last;

That the enemy's mines had crept surely in,
And the end was coming fast.

To yield to that foe was worse than death;
And the men and we all worked on:

It was one day more, of smoke and roar,
And then it would all be done.

There was one of us, a Corporal's wife,
A fair, young, gentle thing,
Wasted with fever in the siege,
And her mind was wandering.

She lay on the ground, in her Scottish plaid,
And I took her head on my knee;

When my father comes hame frae the pleugh," she said,

"Oh! please then waken me.”

She slept like a child on her father's floor,
In the flecking of woodbine-shade,

When the house-dog sprawls by the half-open door,

And the mother's wheel is stayed.

It was smoke and roar and powder-stench,
And hopeless waiting for death;

But the soldier's wife, like a full-tired child,
Seemed scarce to draw her breath.

I sank to s'eep, and I had my dream
Of an English village-lane,
And wall and garden; but a wild scream
Brought me back to the roar again.

There Jessie Brown stood listening,
Until sudden gladness broke

All over her face, and she took my hand
And drew me near and spoke:

"The Highlanders! Oh! dinna ye hear?
The slogan far awa?
The McGregor's?

Ah! I ken it weel;
It's the grandest o' them a'.

"God bless thae bonny Highlanders!
We're saved! We're saved!" she cried;
And fell on her knees, and thanks to God
Poured forth, like a full flood-tide.

Along the battery-line her cry
Had fallen among the men:

And they started; for they were there to die;
Was life so near them, then?

They listened, for life; and the rattling fire
Far off, and the far-off roar
Were all;

and the Colonel shook his head,
And they turned to their guns once more.
Then Jessie said, "That slogan's dune;
But can ye no hear them, noo,

The Campbell's are comin'? It's no a dream; Our succors hae broken through!"

We heard the roar and the rattle afar,

But the pipes we could not hear;

So the men plied their work of hopeless war,

And knew that the end was near.

It was not long ere it must be heard;

A shrilling, ceaseless sound;

It was no noise of the strife afar,
Or the sappers underground.