//6/^^ /9^ LIBRARY OF CONGRESS II nil Hill nil 013 785 490 9 E 66A .VA6 WA TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OP EBENEZER ROCKWOOD HOAR, BY €1)0 JHassadjusetts l^istatical ^ocietp. February 14, 1895. BOSTON: PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY. 1895. ,' / / /' ■'• ^anibcrsttg Press: John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A. I I ON. S^ CONTENTS. Remarks by page Charles Francis Adams 5 AValbridge a. Field If) Letter of Jacob D. Cox 27 Remarks by Henry Lee 29 Edward L. Pierce 34 £lpa^jsac]^uisettj2{ l^iistorical ^ociett^ FEBRUARY MEETING, 1895. The stated meeting was held on Thursday, the 14th instant, at three o'clock, p. M. ; the first Vice-President, Charles Francis Adams, in the chair. The record of the January meeting was read and approved ; and the Librarian read the list of donors to the Library dur- ing the last month. Mr. Adams then said : — Nearly all those now present will remember that at the last meeting of the Society a communication was received from one of our most eminent and most valued associates, written from what we knew to be his death-bed and intrusting to the keeping of the Society a relic of unusual historical interest, — a lock of the hair of Abraham Lincoln. To me, at least, there was something oppressive in that occasion, — we seemed to turn from the graves of Mr. Winthrop and Dr. Ellis only to utter a last farewell to Judge Hoar ; and now he also lies buried at Concord, with Hawthorne and Emerson. It was on the 10th of January that we sent him, in response to his letter and gift, a last greeting, and then he was supposed to be dying ; but he lingered on — the candle flickering in the socket — for exactly three weeks longer, until the evening of Thursday the 31st of January, when the last spark of life smouldered away. A bright light was gone out. Born on the 21st of February, 1816, at the time when both in Europe and America the world was just entering on its nineteenth-century existence, — for it was then only eight months after the battle of Waterloo, only thirteen months after the signature of tlie treaty of Ghent, — born thus in 1816, Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar lacked at his death three weeks only of rounding out his seventy-ninth year : nearly b TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF seven years younger than Mr. Winthrop and Dr. Holmes, Dr. Ellis was his senior by thirty months. He was chosen a mem- ber of the Society at the meeting of May 12, 1864, — a date the mention of which carries some of us back into what now seems another existence ; for, as I well remember, it was on that same day that Barlow, at Spottsylvania Court-House, made his assault on the salient in Lee's line. While those scenes were being enacted in Virginia, the members of the Society, meeting here with anxious minds, — thinking rather of what was taking place at the scene of war than in this room, — went through the customary forms, Mr. Winthrop occupying the chair. Thus, thirty-one years ago, lacking three months. Judge Hoar's name first appeared at the foot of our roll : at the time of his death it stood tenth upon it, in seniority ; in eminence, first. As presiding officer of the Society, it would in an}' event to-day have devolved on me to pay official tribute ; but, had this not been so, I should have claimed the privilege. I could not have let the occasion pass in silence. We all know how seldom it is that the death of any person not of our immediate family causes an appreciable sense of difference in our lives. There is a sudden shock; and as our thoughts revert to well- remembered scenes, and the familiar face and form, it seems for the moment as if a great loss had been sustained : but it is only for a moment ; and then life moves on as before, the sun rises and sets just the same, our pleasures and anxieties are as they were, the routine of life is not varied, no empty chair confronts us, and it soon requires almost an effort of imagina- tion to call up again the half-forgotten presence. " Various the roads of life ; in one All terminate, one lonely way. We go ; and ' Is he gone ? ' Is all our best friends say." The average man can probably number on the fingers of his two hands those he has ever known or, outside of his family circle, been associated with, whose departure to join the silent majority had caused him a lasting sense of personal loss, — those of whose going he could truly say that thereafter some- thing was missing, a light had gone out, a voice was silent, a familiar presence ought to be there and was not. Yet it is so to me personally with Judge Hoar. An indi- viduality is gone ; the world is not, will not again be, quite EBENEZER R. HOAR. I what it was, — something has passed from it. And yet I never, or never until quite recently, knew Judge Hoar well. Some twenty months ago, — driven from a home of two hun- dred and fifty years by the steady, irresistible advance of what the world is pleased to call modern improvements, including telegraph poles, asphalt sidewalks, brick blocks, and electric railways, — driven, I say, from an ancestral abiding-place by the encroachments of these unpleasing features of city life, I moved from Quincy to Lincoln ; and as Lincoln adjoins Concord, I there found myself a near neighbor of Judge Hoar's. For nearly forty years I had known him more or less, — hereditary, family friends; I had met him in these rooms, more frequently still at the dinners of the Saturday Club, and now and again public events or discussion would throw us together; but only of late did we come together in Concord and as neighbors. It was, as I have said, less than two years ago, and I can but add that Lincoln and Concord, now that he is dead, are no longer quite the same to me, — a something is gone from them, and I shall miss it all the time. Thus, what I now have to say of Judge Hoar has a personal significance ; it is no mere official and perfunctory utterance. I feel I am speaking of a friend, who was — and is not. And, in the first place, I want to bear my witness to the man. In speaking of Mr. Winthrop here now only two meetings since, I used the expression, which to me means much, that, after all, in weighing in the balance those we have known, we get to realize that in this life it is not so much what a man does as what he is. He may succeed in a worldly way or in a worldly way he may fail, — he may win or lose the game, — but he still will be a man, or not a man, for all that; and for what he is, or was, and not for his skill at the game, at last we take him. Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar was every inch a man. Springing, as I shall presently have occasion to point out, from the oldest and purest English New England stock, Judge Hoar was in body, thought, word, and action a typi- cal New Englander. Shrewd in thought, keen of speech, angular and even rough in aspect and demeanor, whenever and however it was struck, the material of which he was made returned a true ring. He was essentially a Puritan. But just as there are men and men, so there are Puritans and Puritans ; and Rockwood 8 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF Hoar was a Puritan of the most attractive kind. Yet it was curious in observing him to note how easily a slight differ- ence in his composition — in the balance, so to speak, of his make-up — would have wholly changed the result, bring- ing to the front the more repellent as well as familiar attributes of those of whom he was a type, A man of in- tense, deep-rooted convictions, — religious, political, social ; of strong family and local, almost clan, feelings ; seeing things most clearly from his own point of view, and not devoid of prejudices ; conscious of strength, and consequently fearless of contact with opponents ; honest himself and intuitively sen- sitive to dishonesty in others, with an instinct like the scent of a hunting-dog for cant, pretence and sham, and a wit which as with flashes of lightning revealed and not infre- quently scathed what he thus instinctively saw, — Judge Hoar was saved from that Puritan sourness of disposition so often noticed, by a sense of humor and a spirit of kindliness which were worthy of Shakespeare or Montaigne. They redeemed him altogether. Like Mr. Winthrop, I think Judge Hoar must have grown kindlier as he grew older. And yet he too had had his checks and reverses ; to him, as to Mr. Winthrop, of life-long import also. That in 1868 another was preferred over his head, and he was not made Chief Justice of that Supreme Court of Massa- chusetts of which he was then the senior judge, was, as I think all will now agree, a slight upon him as cruel as it was un- merited. Looking back through thirty years, he would, in my judgment, have been justified in resenting it. I am glad that his friends did resent it. So again, when, two years later, President Grant nominated him as a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and the Senate rejected him, — it was the Senate, not he, that stands condemned of record. One winter afternoon, years ago, I remember, we got jesting with him over the table of the Saturday Club upon his sup- posed roughness of manner and sharpness of tongue, while he himself entered into the spirit of our badinage most keenly of all ; and then, without the slightest indication of feeling or irritation, but with strong humor, he repeated the remark of Senator Cameron of Pennsylvania, a personal friend of his, ex- planatory of that Senate rejection, — " What could you expect for a man who had snubbed seventy Senators!" — seventy then being the full chamber. That way of putting it un- EBENEZER R. HOAR. 9 doubtedl}' had a basis, and no little basis, of truth. Judge Hoar at the time, — and, be it also remembered, it was the time of the so-called reconstruction of the subdued South, — Judge Hoar was tlien, I say, head of the Department of Jus- tice. As such he had a large patronage to distribute, and was brought in close contact with many eager applicants and their senatorial patrons. His sense of humor on such occa- sions did not always have time to come to his rescue, and it was commonly alleged of him that, in political parlance, " he could not see things " ; the real fact being that with his rugged honest}" and keen eye for pretence and jobbery he saw things only too clearly. And so, fiist and last, he '' snubbed seventy Senators," — all the Senators there were ; and they, after their kind, in due time " got even with him," as some among them doubtless expressed it. Then it was, under this undeserved stigma, twice repeated, — first in the State House at Boston, next in the Capitol at Washington, — then it was that the metal of the man's nature returned its true ring. He wore defeat as 't were a laurel crown. I knew him well, — I am vain enough to say that in these latter and better days I knew him almost inti- mately, — and never by look or word did I see in him indica- tion of malice, unkindness, or harshness of memory. Two men, and two men only, among his leading cotemporaries with whom he had been brought in sharp personal collision, have I heard him criticise, and criticise witli that incisiveness of thought reflected in speech of which he was the consum- mate master; but in the case of those two his words were colored by contempt for what he felt was rancor and mean- ness rather than by any sense of injury received. But, turning from this aspect of the man, I would say a few words of him as we saw him here. Though a constant attend- ant at our meetings, — sitting always in the place towards which we sliall hereafter not rarely turn, flunking instinctively there to see him again, — a close listener and keen observer, like Cassius, looking " quite through the deeds of men," Judge Hoar took little active part in our proceedings. Rarely did he join in our discussions ; still more rarely did he contribute to our record. In fact, I do not think Judge Hoar's taste turned to literar}^ effort. With a singular felicity of language and power of expression, — coining a phrase now and again 10 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OP as no one but himself could coin it, — sustained effort with the pen seemed irksome to liim. His opinions as a judge were always tersel}^ put, nor was he at all given to elaborate speeches, much less rhetorical tours de force. And yet, alone among the prominent members of the bar that I have known. Judge Hoar and Richard H. Dana — those two — had a distinctly literary element in their composition. In the case of each it was there ; and, what was more, literary men instinctively recog- nized that it was there. This was most apparent at the Satur- day Club. The angle of contact in the two was different, and well worthy of notice. They were both remarkable men, — among the most so that it has been my good fortune to meet, — they would have distinguished themselves anywhere or at any time. Shakespeare, Moliere, Edmund Burke, Samuel Johnson, Walter Scott, or Goethe would have delighted in their company ; and blind Milton's countenance would have lighted up, if upon a Sunday afternoon he could have looked forward to an hour's call from his friend, and brother Puritan, Rockwood Hoar. But while Dana found his point of contact with the literary man in his wealth of imagination and his con- versational power, that of Hoar lay in his shrewd common- sense perception, his keen wit, and his genuine, homely sense of humor. So Emerson loved him ; Hawthorne studied him ; Lowell paid tribute to him ; George William Curtis quoted him. All of them profoundly respected him. He walked with them in their peculiar province as their equal. And now he has left us and again joined them. It was, and is, a choice companionship. Yet one word. I feel that I am of late taking up more than my share of your time in referring to those of us who ai'e gone ; but in the present case I have a dying injunction to obey, almost a duty to perform. I have referred to Judge Hoar's ances- try, to that honest pride of descent which was so strongly, so characteristically an element of his rugged individuality. I have also said that as a neighbor my relations with him had of late assumed the shape almost of intimacy. We were far- away cousins, so far away that I shall not endeavor to trace or state the degree ; but I belonged to the clan, and with him blood was indeed thicker than water. As he grew more and more infirm, but never less cheerful and ever more kindly, it was my custom from time to time, as my afternoon rides car- EBENEZER R. HOAR. 11 ried me by his door, to stop, and, if I could not see him, at least to inquire for him. When I was so fortunate as to find him, his face, naturally harsh in outline and now ashen with age and increasing infirmity, would light up and become instinct with expression and kindliness, so that it seemed to me as if no one I had ever met had so charming and ingratiat- ing a manner. That he should ever have been regarded as rough and repellent was not to be imagined ! But, of late, I did not often see him. He was confined to his room. The last of these occasions was on Sunday the 30th of Decemljer, the month before his death. He was then a stricken, con- sciously dying man. Hearing my voice below, — at any rate, knowing I was there, — he presently sent for me to come to his chamber, and I saw him for what both he and I knew to be the last time. For me at least there was something infinitely touch- ing in the interview, — I was conscious that it froze me up. I could not even attempt to express by act, much less by word, what I felt. The contrast was too great. Fresh from the sad- dle and swift motion in the strong winter air, I sat by his side in the death-laden twilight atmosphere of the sick-room ; but though he labored for breath, his voice was strong and his cheerfulness and humor unabated. Taking my hand, still cold from the frosty air, he began at once by humorously charging me with having proceeded to administer on his estate in anticipation of his death, in an allusion I had made, in some published remarks of mine, at a dinner given the evening before to our associate Mr. Pierce, the biographer of Sumner ; ^ 1 The following is the allusion referred to. It has a certain historical inter- est of its own as well as a connection with Judge Hoar, so that it is here quoted in full from the published record of the Pierce-Sumner dinner : — "One more incident, — an incident which brings upon the stage my friend Mr. Pierce, as well as other memorable characters. The scene shifts to England ; and the time last summer onlj-. I was in the cathedral of Peterborough, when I saw Mr. Pierce's name written in the visitors' book directly above my own. I went through the noble edifice until I found him, and we walked together up and down the grand Norman nave and transept. He spoke of his book and of Sum- ner, and tlien suddenly said, ' By the wa}', a curious thing ; I wonder if you can throw light upon it. When your grandfather died, in 1848, your father sent to Mr. Sumner " a slight token," as he described it, as a remembrance of your grand- father, not saying what it was. I found his note among Mr. Sumner's papers, but. have never succeeded in getting any trace of the article. You wrote me some years ago that it was a silver ring, which, to correct the tremulousness of his hand, your grandfather wore to stead}' his pen in writing. Have you any idea what became of that ring after Sumner's death ? ' ' Yes,' I replied at once, ' I 12- TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OP and then, in reply to my inquiries, he began to discourse on the necessity, as he expressed it, of a new humane society. We have, said he, all sorts of societies for the prevention of cruelty to children and to animals ; " but what we most need now," he added, " as it seems to me, is a society to promote ease of dying in old people." I had been cautioned not to remain with him long, as his strength was unequal to conver- sation ; so presently I rose to leave, and we joined hands for the last time. To me at least such occasions are terrible. You long to say that which words may not express, and the utter inability to do so causes an appearance of reserve against which one strives in vain. You feel — you are — powerless. It was so with me then ; but just as I had left the room, sad- dened, self-abashed, and even humiliated, I heard his voice can tell yoii exactly what became of it. In the first place it was not a ring at all. I was mistaken. I knew that my father at that time sent such a ring to Dr. Palfrey ; and my strong impression was that he had sent a companion ring to Mr. Sumner. I so wrote to you. But since then Judge E. R. Hoar lias inci- dentally told me that, when Sumner died, his sister sent to him (Judge Hoar) two silver sleeve-buttons which my grandfather was wearing at the time of his death in the Capitol at Washington, and which my father had then sent to her brother.' That was tlie ' slight token ' ; and was it not singular that our friend, Mr. Pierce, after seeking high and low for a solution of that little American biosrapliical puzzle, dating back more than twenty years, should suddenly find it as he paced up and down in the dim light of the ancient cathedral of Peterborougli ! "A few days afterwards we both returned to America, and I shortly, being now a near neighbor of his, called on my old friend, Judge Hoar. He is not here to-night. Of all living men he should be liere ; but the end cometh, and the places which knew him will soon know him no more forever. But, as I was saying, soon after my return I called to see him at his home ; nor shall I soon forget the look of genuine pleasure which liglited up that rugged, familiar face, and the exclamation, ' Why ! Charley boy ! ' wliich broke out, as he welcomed me back. Rarely liave look and invohmtary exclamation given me keener and more lasting pleasure, — from that source it was a compliment, than wliich none greater. "Then, as we sat on his porcli, looking out on the quiet tree-shaded Concord road, and chatted in the pleasant October afternoon, I mentioned among other things the incident of tlie 'little token' and Peterborough cathedral, and how singular it was that our friend liere should at last have found trace of it when and as he did. Judge Hoar agreed; and then, referring to those sleeve-buttons, he suddenly turned and said, ' Do you know, I 've been thinking I ought to leave those to you!' I do not know or greatly care whether he really does it; but I do know how gratified I felt when he said it. That ' little token ' has a genealogy; it is a verital)le transmitte.ndum, — John Quincy Adams in 1848, Charles Sumner in 1874, Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar in 1895: it is a goodly parent- age ! If the ' little token ' should now, indeed, pass on to me, I shall be but a trustee. Wlio next ? " EBENEZER R. HOAR. 13 calling me to come back. I did so, and, looking up at me, he said, "Take care of Joanna Hoar." They were the last words he ever spoke to me. I obey the injunction. I have already referred to the remote kinship between Judge Hoar and myself. Joanna Hoar was our common ancestress, — perhaps I might say that we were both of "the tribe of Joanna,"^ — and of Joanna Hoar I now pro- pose to speak. The widow of Charles Hoar, for a time, during the reign of one of the earlier English Stuarts, sheriff of Gloucester, Joanna Hoar came to New England in 1640, bringing with her five children. But her story, as will presently appear, has been best told, and that very re- cently, by another. Suffice it now to say that one daughter of Joanna Hoar, called after her mother, married in due time Edmund Quincy, second of the name in New Eng- land, and familiar to us in the pages of Sewall as " Unckle Quinsey," that "true New England man." They had a son, Daniel, to whom, in 1689, was born a son, John. This John Quincy lived until 1765, and then dying, bequeathed his name to a great-grandson, just born, the child of his granddaughter, Abigail Smith, who a year previous had married the young Braintree law3'er, John Adams. While Judge Hoar there- fore was descended in the seventh generation from the original Joanna in the direct male line, the descent of the family of which I am a member was through a succession of females, — Joanna Quincy, Elizabeth Smith, and Abigail Adams. Never- theless, we were offshoots of a common stock ; and for Joanna Hoar, the widow with five children who came to New England in 1640, Judge Hoar felt a deep and abiding reverence truly characteristic of the man. Of this he recently gave proof in connection with that College of which the son of Joanna Hoar was the third President. Though in no degree wealthy, Judge Hoar was a liberal, freely giving man ; in proportion to means, few more so. He had, too, a strong feeling for his Alma Mater, — a devotion. His liberality and this devotion bore fruits in full measure to 1 I have elsewhere (Tliree Episodes of Massaolmsetts History, pp. G03, 704-706) had occasion to point out how curiously prolific of noticeable men " tlie tribe of Joanna " has proved. To tliis earlier reference of mine the injunction of Judge Hoar was probably attributable. 14 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF the College on one important occasion. President Eliot is my authority for the anecdote. Once, when at some dinner I found myself next to Mr. Eliot, — in the course of conversa- tion I referred to the large subscription by its alumni after the great Boston fire of 1872, to make good the losses Harvard College then sustained. I spoke with genuine admiration of it as a stroke of genius on his part, that then, while Boston was still smoking in ruins, before the extent of its loss was measured, while its sons knew not what, if anything, might still remain to them, — even then, hardly yet in the morrow of calamity, realizing the truth that when men are most deeply moved they most freely give, he, as representing the College, had had the audacity as well as the true insight to call for free-will offerings at once, to make good the losses Har- vard had sustained. The result of the call many here doubt- less remember. The alumni seemed to open their purses as never before ; money flowed from them like water. Harvard College rose like a phoenix from the smoking ashes of Boston. The President listened to my comments on this, as I jest- ingly termed it to him, Napoleonic stroke of mendicancy, and then proceeded to explain how it came about. It was all very natural. He told me that a day or two after the fire he, the Treasurer of the College, and I think one other member of the Corporation, were seated in the Treasurer's office, computing as well as they then could the extent of the calamity, and look- ing each other in the face in blank dismay. The disaster seemed fairly irretrievable. Footsteps, he said, were then heard on the stairs outside, and, opening the door. Judge Hoar came in. He had in his hand a bond, railroad or otherwise, just taken apparently from his box, and with as deep a feeling as he ever allowed himself to show, he proceeded to say that he considered he owed everything to Harvard College, — a debt nothing he could do or give would ever repay; that he saw she had been one of the heaviest losers by the fire, and now stood in need of help ; and so, as one of her children, he had brought in his contribution now ; and, so saying, he handed the bond to the Treasurer. Some one else, I do not remember who, presently appeared that day on the same errand ; and, added the President, it then occurred to me that if these two felt thus, others probably felt the same wa)^, and an immediate public appeal for aid was decided upon. The blow thus struck EBENEZER R. HOAR. 16 was timed exactly. Within sixty days more tliaii 8180,000 poured in upon the astonished Treasurer. But it was at a later day, indeed only recently, that Judge Hoar's combined veneration for Joanna Hoar and his love for the College found most characteristic expression in a similar generous way. The Harvard Annex, as it was called, last year developed into Radcliffe College. Shortly after my return from a trip to Europe, nearly six months ago, Judge Hoar drove over to my house in Lincoln one bright September Sunday, and after some ])leasant talk drew from his pocket a paper which he proceeded to read to me. Dated from Quincy, where Joanna Hoar lies buried in the ancient graveyard by the side of her son Leonard,^ it was a supposed communication from her, written in the quaint olden style and addressed to Mrs. Agassiz, the President of Radcliffe, conveying a gift of S5000 to endow a scholarship to assist in the education of girls at the College, "preference always to be given to natives, or daughters of citizens of Concord," and to bear as an endow- ment the name of " The Widow Joanna Hoar." The whole correspondence as it took place has since been printed in the first annual report (1894) of the President of 1 Our associate George Frisbie Hoar has recently caused a fresh tablet to be placed over the spot where Joanna Hoar, and the widow of her son, Leonard Hoar, are buried : it bears the following inscriptions : — BRIDGET WIDOW OF PRESIDENT LEONARD HOAR, DIED MAY 25, 1723. DAUGHTER OF JOHN LORD LISLE, PRESIDENT OF THE HIGH COURT OF JUSTICE, LORD COMMISSIONER OF THE GREAT SEAL, WHO DREW THE INDICTMENT AND SENTENCE OF KING CHARLES I., AND WAS MURDERED AT LAUSANNE, AUG. 11^^^ 1664. AND OF LADY ALICIA LISLE, WHO AVAS BEHEADED BY THE BRUTAL JUDGMENT OF JEFFRIES IN 1685 ; SHE WAS NEARLY AKIN BY MARRIAGE TO LORD WILLIAM RUSSELL. JOANNA HOAR DIED IN BRAINTREE, DECEMBER 21^^^ 1661. SHE WAS WIDOW OF CHARLES HOAR SHERIFF OF GLOUCESTER, ENGLAND, WHO DIED 1638. SHE CAME TO NEW ENGLAND, WITH FIVE CHILDREN ABOUT 1640. 16 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF Radcliffe. Though it can there be found, it is so charmingly and humorously expressed, it is so thoroughly, so kindly char- acteristic of Judge Hoar in his riper days, and withal of such genuine historical interest, that I ask permission to reproduce it here in full, so giving to it such permanence of re(3ord as may come from its incorporation into the published Proceed- ings of this Society. At the close of his last contribution to the correspondence. Judge Hoar, still keeping up an air of supposed mystery, and ignoring his own connection with the gift, says that he has stated the case to his brother, our asso- ciate, Senator Hoar, and to myself, as two of Joanna Hoar's descendants of the present time, and adds : " They look intelli- gent, but promise nothing ; though both are members of the Historical Society, and perhaps know more than they choose to tell." Altogether it was a delightful bit of fanciful correspondence, kindly as well as reverentially conceived, and most charmingly carried out ; and our old friend enjoyed it keenly. It appealed to his sense of humor. .He chose to give with an unseen hand, and to build his memorial to his first New England ancestor in his own peculiar way. He is dead now ; and I feel that I commit no breach of confidence in thus obeying his last injunc- tion to me, though, in so doing, I no longer merely look intelli- gent, but here openly tell all I know. The extract from the report of the President of Radcliffe College referred to in Mr. Adams's remarks is as follows : — In conclusion, let me add that the new aspect of our institution has already awakened a fresh interest in Radcliffe College, and we have received in consequence private donations as well as bequests and scholar- ships. Details respecting these gifts will be found in the Treasurer's Report. I wish, however, to make special mention of one recently endowed scholarship, because the manner of the gift brings it into a cer- tain ideal relation with the scholarship presented by Ann Radcliffe to Harvard College some two hundred and fifty years ago. The story which suggests this association is so charmingly told by the true donor (the gift remaining, however, strictly anonymous) that I think I cannot fail to gratify my readers by incorporating it in this report. Elizabeth C. Agassiz. At the time that the following letter was received in Cambridge, a gift of two thousand dollars, without name of giver, was received by the Treasurer in Boston. A subsequent anonymous gift raised the sum to five thousand dollars. EBENEZEK R. HOAR. 17 QciNCV, Sept. 12, 1894. To Mistress Louis Agassiz, President of Radcliffe College, Cambridge, Massachusetts. Honored and Gkacious Lady, — This epistle is addres.sed to you from Quincy, because in the part of Braintree which now bears that name, in the burial place by the meeting-house, all that was mortal of me was laid to rest more than two centuries ago, and the gravestone stands which bears ni^' name, and marks the spot where my dust reposes. It may cau.se you surprise to be thus addressed, and that tlie work which you are pursuing with such constancy and success is of interest to one who so long ago passed from the mortal sight of men. But you may i-ecall that wise philosophers have believed and taught that those who have striven to do tlieir Lord's will here below do not, when transfeired to his house ou high, thereby become wholly regardless of what may befall those who come after them, — " nee, hnec coelestia spectanles, ista terrestria con- temnunt.''^ It is a comforting faith that those who have "gone forth weeping, bearing precious seed," shall be permitted to see and share the joys of tlie harvest with their successors who gather it. I was a contemporary of the pious and bountiful Lady Radcliffe, for whom your College is named. My honored husband, Charles Iloar, Sheriff of Gloucester in England, by his death in 1638, left me a widow with six children. We were of the people called by their revilers Puritans, to whom civil liberty, sound learning, and religion were very dear. The times were troublous in England, and the hands of princes and prelates were heavy upon God's people. j\Iy thoughts were turned to the new England where precious Mr. John Harvard had just lighted that little candle which has since thi-own its beams so far, where there seemed a providential refuge for those who desired a church without a Bishop, and a state without a King. I did not, therefore, like the worshii)ful Lady Radcliffe, send a contribu- tion in money ; but I came hither myself, bringing the five youngest of my children witli me, and arrived at Braintree in the year 1640. From that day Harvard College has been much in my mind ; and I humbly trust that my coming has not been without some furtherance to its well being. My lamented husband in his will directed that our youngest son, Leonard, siiould be " caref ullie kept at Schoole, and when hee is fitt for itt to be carefullie placed at Oxford, and if ye Lord shall see fitt, to make him a Minister unto his people." As the nearest practicable conformity to this direction, I placed him carefully at Harvard College, to such purpose that he graduated therefrom in 16.30, became a faithful minister to God's people, a capable physician to heal their bodily diseases, and became the third President of the College, and the first who was a graduate from it, in 1672. My daughters became the wives of the Rev. Henry Flint, the minister of Braintree, and Col. Ednmnd Quincy of the same town: and it is recorded that from their descendants another President has since been raised up to the College, Josiah Quincy (tam carum caput), and a Pro- fessor of Rhetoric and Oratory, John Quincy Adams, who as well as his sons and grandsons have given much aid to the College, as members of one 3 18 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF or the other of its governing boards, beside attaining other distinctions less to my present purpose. The elder of my three sons who came with me to America, John Hoar, settled in the extreme western frontier town of English settlement in New England, called Concord: to which that exemplary Christian man, the Reverend Peter Bulkeley, had brought his flock in 1635. In Mr. Bulkeley's ponderous theological treatise, called " The Gospel Covenant," of which two editions were published in London (but whether it be so generally and constantly perused and studied at the present day as it was in my time, I know not), — in the preface thereto, he says it was written " at the end of the earth." There my son and his posterity have dwelt and multiplied, and the love and service of the College which I should approve have not been wholly wanting among them. In so remote a place there must be urgent need of instruction, though the report seems to be well founded that settlements farther westward have since been made, and that some even of my own posterity have penetrated the continent to the shores of the Pacific Sea. Among the descendants of John Hoar have been that worthy Professor John Farrar, whose beautiful face in marble is among the precious possessions of the College; that dear and faithful woman who gave the whole of her humble fortune to establish a scholar- ship therein, Levina Hoar; and others who as Fellows or Overseers have done what they could for its prosperity and growth. Pardon my prolixity, but the story I have told is but a prelude to my request of your kindness. There is no authentic mode in which departed souls can impart their wishes to those who succeed them in this world but these, the record or memory of their thoughts and deeds while on earth ; or the reappearance of their qualities of mind and character in their lineal descendants. In this first year of Radcliffe College, — when, so far as seems practicable and w ise, the advantages which our dear Harvard College, " the defiance of the Puritan to the savage and the wilderness," has so long bestowed upon her sons, are through your means to be shared by the sisters and daughters of our people, — if it should so befall that funds for a scholar- ship to assist in the education of girls at Radcliffe College, who need assistance, with preference always to be given to natives, or daughters of citizens of Concord, Massachusetts, should be placed in the hands of your Treasurer, you might well suppose that memory of me had induced some of my descendants to spare so much from their necessities for such a modest memorial : and I would humbly ask that the scholarship may bear the name of The Widow Joaxna Hoar. And may God establish the good work you have in charge ! In reply, this letter was addressed to one of the descendants of Joanna Hoar : — QoiNCY St., Cambridge, Oct. 11, 1894. Dear Sir, — Very recently I received the most gracious communication from the far past, written with the mingled dignity and grace which we are wont to associate with our ladies of the olden time, yet not without a EBENEZER R. HOAR. 19 certain modernness which showed that she still keeps in touch with wliat is valuable in our day and generation. Through me she sends greeting to the young Radcliffe College, and a most generous gift to aid in the work for the education of women in which that institution is engaged. A doubt as to the best way of acknowledging tiie gift and the sympathy it represents has kept me silent till now. But a friend suggests that you might put us in the way of reaching that gentle Joanna Hoar who speaks across the lapse of time so cordially and sweetly. In that case will you express, if not to her, to some of her living descendants, the thanks of Radcliffe College for the scholarship which she has so generously endowed ? Perhaps I may be allowed to add my own respectful gratitude for her valued letter to me. With great regard, most cordially yours, Elizabeth C. Agassiz. Letter from a Descendant of the Widoiv Joanna Hoar. Concord, Massachusetts, Oct. 15, 1894. Dear Mrs. Agassiz, — I am honored by the receipt of your courteous letter. If, as 1 suppose, the Joanna Hoar to whom you refer is a lady from whom I am descended, I know no means of communicating with her. Even the messenger entrusted by the Post Office with a " special delivery " letter might decline to risk the chances of getting back, if he were to undertake the delivery in person. So I adopted the other alternative which you suggest, and stated the case to two of her most conspicuous descendants of our time. Senator George F. Hoar, of Worcester, and Mr. Charles F. Adams, who has recently removed from Quincy to a house in Lincoln, just on the borders of Concord. They look intelligent, but promise nothing ; though both are members of the Historical Society, and perhaps know more than they choose to tell. I am glad, however, that the old lady contrived a way to send Radcliffe a gift with her greeting. Very faithfully yours, Mrs. Elizabeth Agassiz. The Hon. Walbridge A. Field, having been called on, said : — There are many men here who knew Judge Hoar longer and better than I, and who could better express the esteem in which he was held by the members of this Society and by the community. I first knew Judge Hoar by sight when he was appointed a judge of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, and after 1869 I knew him well. Of his life before his appointment to that bench I know only what everybody knows, — his admission to the bar, his appoint- ment to the bench of the Court of Common Pleas, his resigna- 20 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF tion from that bench, and his practice of law in Boston until he became a judge of the Supreme Judicial Court. Of his political life before that time I know only that he was a strong antislavery man who had been a Whig, and that he had taken part in an attempted organization of a Free Soil party. His published opinions while a judge on our Supreme Court, where he continued for nearly ten years, are the best evidence of the kind of judge he was. Those opinions, as a rule, are not long ; tliey begin directly with the discussion of the questions of law involved ; they are exceedingly clear ; the analysis of the case is perfect ; authorities are cited when necessary, but there is no great display of authorities ; and the opinion ends when the argument ends, and there is robust good sense manifest throughout. There is no attempt at dis- play, and very little discussion of subjects that might be inter- esting but are not strictly necessary to the decision. The reporter informs me that his opinions were always carefully written out in his own handwriting, ready for the printer, that he never corrected them after they were filed, did not care to see the printed proofs, and that apparently he dis- missed them from his mind when they had been approved. I am informed that he rarel}' made more than one draught ; that he formulated what he had to say in his mind befoie he wrote anything, and that he made very few changes in the revision. I think he had never been in the habit of dictating to a ste- nographer until he was Attorney-General, but he then dictated long opinions which were sent to the other departments often without the change of a word. I tried a few cases before him, as well when he was sitting at riisi prius as on the bench ; and it was impossible not to notice the quickness of his perceptions, the keenness of his logic, and his dislike of any conduct in a cause which was not directly pertinent to the issues and did not throw light upon the tiial. He had the impatience natural to very quick minds at the slow pro- cesses of duller men, and he especially disliked any indirec- tion, any arguments that missed the point of the case, and any pretensions and affectations of thought or feeling that were intended or were likely to mislead. I think no jury ever left their seats under his instructions without having clearly and forcibly presented to them the exact issues to be determined. EBENEZER R. HOAR. 21 While be remained upon the bench, Chief Justice Bigelow resigned. Governor Bullock nominated Ex-Judc^e Thomas to that office, but he was rejected by the Council, and Judge Chapman was appointed. Judge Thomas had been appointed a justice in 1853, and had resigned in 1859 to practise law in Boston, and Judge -Hoar had been appointed a justice in his place. It was felt by the friends of Judge Hoar at that time, and I think by tlie bar generally, then and since, that Judge Hoar ought to have been appointed. This was in 1868. How much or how little this incident had to do with Judge Hoar's acceptance of the appointment of Attorney-General in March, 1869, by President Grant, I do not know. It seems to me not unlikely that if he had then been ajipointed chief justice, he would have remained upon the bench of our Supreme Court until he died. When Chief Justice Chapman died. Governor Washburn offered the appointment to Judge Hoar, but he declined it. He was appointed Attorney-General by President Grant, and he qualified on the 10th day of March, 1869, and held the office until his resignation in the latter part of June, 1870. I was invited by him to be the Assistant Attorney- General assigned to his office, and from the latter part of April, 1869, until his resignation, I held that office. Part of the time I roomed in the same house with him, and sat at the same table. I then became very well acquainted with him, and came to have great regard for him. The condition of affairs when General Grant became Presi- dent it may be well enough to recall. All the seceding States had not been readmitted to representation in Congress. Vir- ginia, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas were still governed as military districts. The State governments in many of the seceding States which had been reorganized were not such as to command much respect. President Johnson had not been the wisest of presidents, and his appointments to the civil ser- vice had often been bad. The Fifteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States had not yet been ratified ; there was some doubt of the ability of the United States to pay its debt ; and the financial laws necessary to uphold the credit of the United States, and ultimately to insure the resump- tion of specie payment had not been passed. The Johnson- Clarendon treaty between the United States and Great Britain had been rejected by the Senate. Mr. Sumner had 22. TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OP delivered in the Senate what I consider a very intemperate speech against it which had been made public, and the chances for successful negotiation with Great Britain were not favor- able. There was an insurrection in Cuba, and the President was urged by many men in public life to acknowledge the bel- ligerent rights of the insurgents, with a view of making Cuba independent of Spain and ultimately annexing her to the United States. Before the war the acquisition of Cuba had been a part of the policy of the Democratic party. President Buchanan, both before and after he became President, had urged the acquisition of Cuba by purchase, with the intima- tion that if it could not be bought it might be necessary to take it by force, and Spain was very suspicious of the inten- tions of the United States. It became necessary for Judge Hoar as Attorney-General immediately to take part in the consideration of political questions of the gravest character ; and it has, I think, always been considered that he acquitted himself with distinction. His opinion as Attorney-General in the case of James Weaver, upon the jurisdiction of a military commission sitting in Texas in the year 1868 to try and to sentence to death a person not in the military or naval service, is an example of the unusual character of some of the matters with which he had to deal. The statutes passed during the war were being brought before the Supreme Court of the United States for the purpose of testing their constitutionality, and as Attorney-General he argued all the important cases which were argued during his term of office. Hepburn v. Griswold, the first case involving the constitutionality of the legal tender acts, was decided while he held the office, but it was argued by his predecessor, and the subsequent legal ten- der cases were argued after he left the office, so that he took no part in the arguments upon the constitutionality of the legal tender acts ; but he argued, for example, Veazie Bank v. Fenno, The Justices v. Murray, and the cases involving the constitutionality of the confiscation acts, although these were afterward reargued, and his name does not appear in the reports. It was during his term of office that nine circuit judges were appointed and two justices of the Supreme Court of the United States. The Attorney-General's office was not changed into the Department of Justice until after he left it. That EBENEZER R. HOAR. 23 change increased the clerical force of the office, and cre- ated the office of Solicitor-General ; but in Judge Hoar's time the office had hardly the clerical force necessary to the efficient performance of its work. Taken suddenly, without warning, from the bench of the Supreme Judicial Court, into such an office as that, with all its political business and appointments in addition to what may be called its strictly law work, he found it a very great change ; but he was more than equal to it. The first thing that struck me was the remarkable quickness with which he saw through intricate and involved cases. I have never known anjdjody, I tliink, whose insight was quicker, more penetrating, or surer. I have known a few men who were as profound lawyers as he ; one or two, perhaps, who would consider a case with a wider com- prehension of all its bearings, but none who could see so much at the first glance. His aspect was somewhat stern, and he made a remark now and then that seemed ungracious, but on the whole he was as satisfactory a man to serve under as I ever worked with. I found him to be a very kind-hearted man. He was reall}'^ very considerate to all the clerks in the office, although his manner at first frightened them. He turned nobody out, although there were one or two that I found rather trying. Some time after Judge Hoar resigned he was appointed one of the commissioners for the negotiation of the treaty of Wasli- ington, and was associated with Mr, Fish, the Secretary of State, General Schenck, our minister plenipotentiary to Great Britain, Judge Nelson, of the Supreme Court, and Mr. Williams, afterwards Attorney-General of the United States. The whole subject of our relations with Great Britain was often discussed at cabinet meetings while Judge Hoar was Attorney-General, and liis views were well known to the President. I have reason to believe that the President had a strong liking for him and great confidence in his judgment. I think that it was somewhat annoying to Judge Hoar that in these discussions and the subsequent ones that resulted in the treaty he could receive little or no aid from the senior Senator of Massachusetts. President Grant throughout, as it hap- pened, maintained a strict non-interference with the affairs of Cuba, and enforced the neutrality laws; and in this he was supported very urgently by Judge Hoar. It is well known 24 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF that President Grant thought we should have some possessions in the West India Islands, and, while preserving strict neu- trality about Cuba, was eager to acquire San Domingo. This policy was begun while Judge Hoar was Attorney-General, but it was more clearly shown by occurrences well known to the public which happened after Judge Hoar left office. Al- though I have no positive knowledge of Judge Hoar's position on the subject, I believe that he did not favor this policy of the President. It was during his term of office that he was nominated by the President as Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and was rejected by the Senate. This rejection did not involve any reflections upon the ability or character of Judge Hoar, but I shall not attempt to give a full account of it. For one thing, I have not sufficient knowledge. It may be said, however, that in carrying out his ideas of the proper manner of performing the duties of his office in mak- ing appointments he had thwarted a good many of the wishes of the public men in Washington. His manners were com- plained of, too ; and it is true, I think, that his manner of speech had sometimes given offence. Coming from the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, where the traditional man- ners then were somewhat brusque, and transported into an entirely different sphere, he certainly did not always show that graciousness of speech which robs a refusal of a great part of its sting. He never seemed to me to lack tact in the management of grave affairs, where the persons inter- ested were more intent upon things than upon forms, and personal considerations were not important ; but he cer- tainly had not the art of influencing men by conciliating or flattering them. The truth is, that at that tiuie a propo- sition to do something which he thought ought not to be done struck him at first with surprise and indignation. If he could restrain his speech long enough to see the humor of the thing, he got along well enough ; but if he spoke at once wliat he thought, it was apt to be severe. It is useless to speculate upon what would have been his life if he had been confirmed as Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. His natural place v/as to be a judge ; he had the character and ability requisite for a great judge. If he had been made a justice on that bench, he probably would not have been assigned to the first circuit, certainly EBENEZER R. HOAR. 25 not while Judge Clifford lived. He probably would liave been assigned to some Southern circuit, which would have removed him from Concord a great part of the time. How long he could have lived out of New England, or how much he would have enjo3'ed it, and what would have been the eifect upon his opinions and character of long-continued contact with new men and new forms of society, can only be conjectured. After he came back from Washington he resumed the practice of law in Boston, and except when acting in the negotiation of the treaty of Washington and serving in the House of Representatives at Washington during one term, he continued to practise law until a few months before he died. He occasionally tried cases before a jury, but most of his cases were before the court. I have heard him address a jury, and he was an effective advocate. Beside the power of clear and forcible statement he had strong feelings, and could by short pathetic appeals excite the emotions of a jury where it was appropriate to the case. Still his arguments were mainly before the court, and they were like his opinions, — not long, very clear, remarkably strong in the analysis of the exact points involved in them, and persuasive in their sound sense. His style always clearly and sharply expressed his thought. I do not think he was a very laborious man. I doubt whether he ever in his life sat down and said to himself, " This is a great cause, and I will write the very best opinion or make the very best argument I can, and take all the time necessary for preparation." He did not like the manual labor of writing, and he was wholly averse to that elaboration of rhe- torical statement which was perhaps the prevailing fashion in Massachusetts when he was in college. He liked directness, simplicity, and, except for the wit with which he pointed or enlivened the argument, he left it bald of decorations. I think you can find nothing of his which has been published in which you can see that he took great pains with the form of it, otherwise than to make as clear as possible what he thought and felt. There are some lawyers who think it great piaise that they have never held public office, and have confined themselves strictly to their profession. Judge Hoar desired no such praise. He had the old New England notion that it was a man's duty, and a commendable ambition in any one, to 4 26 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF take such part in public affairs as came to him. He remained in Concord, the home of his father, but wherever he might have settled he would have taken the same interest in town affairs. He took an active interest in politics always, although the only elective political offices he ever held were those of Senator in the State Senate, of Representative in Congress for a single term, and of Presidential Elector. But he was inter- ested not alone in politics ; he was a devoted friend of his col- lege, and served her faithfully. He was interested in everything human. Although an antislavery man from the beginning, and a Unitarian in religion, I think he must be regarded on the whole as a conservative man in his general character. I do not remember that he ever broached any scheme of philan- thropy or of politics which he thought was a panacea for our social or political ills. He alwa3's seemed to me anxious to preserve the best institutions and the best habits of New England life, and to make the most of them. After he came back to Boston he had, I think, all the law practice he wanted ; it was of the best kind, and took all of his time that he wished to give to his profession. I do not think he would have enjoyed an overwhelmingly large practice. He wished time for seeing his friends, and for meditating upon many things, and for enjoying many things, and for reading what he chose. He was always famous for his wit. He had as pronounced an individuality as Benjamin Franklin or John Adams or Charles Lamb or Thomas Carlyle. I remember when in Washington a gentleman said to me, " Some of the most eminent public men in Washington from New England do not seem to me to be what I had supposed the Yankee to be"; and he mentioned Mr. Webster and Mr. Choate. I said that Mr. Webster was a good enough New Englander, although he might have been born anywhere of English parents ; Mr. Choate, I admitted, had not many New England characteris- tics. Judge Hoar could not be mistaken. His whole con- versation and manner showed the soil from which he sprang. He had the shrewd judgment of the New Englander, and the faculty of characterizing a man or a cause b}' an epithet or a phrase, in a strictly Yankee way. It was the nimbleness of his wit as well as the sincerity of his character that endeared him so much to that bright set of literary men whose com- panion he was. In a running conversation his wit appeared EBENEZER R. HOAR. 27 constantl}'. It was unpremeditated, sudden, and every way his own. I am told tliat he kept no memoranda of fine say- ino;s, but lie had a remarkable memory for anything striking or felicitous in speech which he had ever heard or read, — and he had read much, but I think in rather a desultory way. He read what he liked to read. He delighted to gratify his mind. Judge Hoar as I knew him was an aggressive man in his opinions, and had some of the defects of his qualities. I have seen men more tolerant than he, and of more catholic judg- ments. He was unflinching in the maintenance of any cause which he had much at heart, and he could hardly forgive per- sons who he thought deliberately acted in violation of their own sense of right. He grew more tolerant as he grew older, but still he always preserved fidelity to his own con- victions, cost what it might. The men who knew him best liked him best, and he was a delightful companion. It was only on acquaintance that you could find out how tender- hearted he was, how generous he was, how considerate he was to those whom he thought deserving. He had the habit of repressing any exhibition of feeling, which we all know was one characteristic of the old New Englander, and he took great satisfaction in doing good by stealth. He meant to live his own life. He was about the best specimen we had of a witty, wise, courageous, public-spirited, God- fearing New England lawyer. The Recording Secretary then read the following letter which had been received from the Hon. Jacob D. Cox, of Ohio, a Corresponding Member : — Cincinnati, 4 February, 1895. Hon. C. F. Adams, President of the Massachusetts Historical Society. My dear Sir, — Learning from Mr. E. L. Pierce that the approach- ing meeting of the Society will probably be a commemorative one, when the death of our fellow-member the Hon. E. Rockwood Hoar will be fitly noticed, I venture to make some mention of my personal and intimate relations to him in 1869-70, and of my estimate of his character. We met in "Washington about the 6th of March at the beginning of General Grant's first term as President. He had been appointed Attorney- General and I Secretary of the Interior, and I believe that neither of us had the slightest warning of the appointment till it waa 28 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF publicly announced that our names had been sent to the Senate. Sum- moned thus unexpectedly to public duty, we were not prepared to transfer our households to the capital at once, and I was very glad to accept the invitation of Mr. Hoar to join him in a temporary occupa- tion of the house of Mr. Twitchell, a member of the House from INIas- sachusetts, which would be unoccupied during the spring and summer. The house was in charge of a young married pair from New England, the husband being a teacher in the Freedmen's Bureau Schools, and we were thus able to step at once into a home-like and comfortable establishment. It had for me, however, the far more fortunate and important result, that I was thus thrown at once into the closest personal association with Judge Hoar, both in our duties in the Cabinet and in our leisure hours. The house was near the Capitol ; and Mr. ELvarts (who, as you know, is a cousin of Judge Hoar) was often the Judge's guest when his business with the Supreme Court called him to Washington. It goes without saying that whoever was permitted to be of the party when such men met under such circumstances enjoyed nodes am- hrosiance equal to any that Kit North described. The common impression that Judge Hoar had a wit that was too tart to be genial, has always seemed to me very like the other notion quite prevalent forty or fifty years ago that Thackeray was a cynical writer, — an error in which the responsibility for the misjudgment must be laid at the door of those who lacked the ear to catch tlie subtle tone of sympathy vibrating from the very heart, or the eye to see the merry twinkle which accompanied the words which glittered with so keen an edge. A truer and more unselfish friendship, a heartier accord with all that is right and true, a warmer sympathy with whatever makes for prog- ress and tends to level men upward, was never seen. The playfully mocking air covered pity and kindness of the most thorough sort. The humorous or sarcastic turn of a phrase covered a heart that was thoroughly earnest, and full of most steady and fixed purpose. In official consultations he made a public labor as attractive as a social feast, whilst his opinions were as weighty and his judgment as solid and as helpful as if no flash of wit ever illumined his thoi;ght. The wild-apple " tang," as Thoreau calls it, which gave his thoughts and words a native character of their own, made him an unfailing source of joy to all who knew him well, whilst his solid powers and bis thorough cultivation of every faculty of mind made him wisely instructive, and intellectually powerful in every sphere of action. As a judge, his racy wit gave new aptness to the sound application of old principles. As a Cabinet officer, he touched the very marrow of the question under discussion. As a member of an important diplomatic EBENEZER R. HOAR. 29 commission, be knew how to cut sheer through the most tangled logic in a way to amuse and delight even those who found their sophistries scattered to the winds. Massachusetts has reason to be proud of the memory of a noble list of men who have kept good the promise of the great characters of their colonial ancestors, and Judge Hoar's place is a safe one among them. For traits of native quality, improved but not lost in the re- finements of modern education ; for hearty love of right and for sturdy and unflinching support of it ; for readiness to help every good cause and a strong mind and will to make his help valuable ; for purity of heart and sincere reverence for all that is divinely taught, — he was a man for his country to be proud of, and for his friends to model their own lives upon. Faithfully yours, J. D. Cox. Mr. Henry Lee said : — " Behold there come seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt : and there shall arise after them seven years of famine." At our last meeting but one Dr. Ellis was speaking words of lament at the loss of Mr. Winthrop ; a month later, stunned by the news of his sudden death, we came together to mourn him. This loss upon loss makes us poor indeed. A few years ago we had the pleasure of beholding among us Emerson, Deane, Lowell, Parkraan, Holmes, Winthrop, and Ellis, — these were our years of great plenty ; now the last of them has gone, and the years of famine have come upon us. When such men are withdrawn, the sadness of personal bereavement is followed by dismay over our deferred inten- tions, our lost opportunities. We can never know, we cannot estimate, we can only conjecture, what garnered secrets of the past have been buried with them, which might have been revealed had their lives been prolonged, or extorted by us had we been more vigilant. Now we vainly regret that we had not, like Joseph, gathered up the food of the seven years of plenty. For while there are many untiring scholars flashing their searchlights upon obscure passages in our history and illumi- nating them for us, they have never seen the unsullied, unin- vaded New England pictured by Emerson in his historical discourse at Concord and in his memoir of Dr. Ezra Ripley, 30 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF by Holmes and Lowell in divers places, and loved and studied and set before us by Winthrop and Deane and Ellis. They were the representatives of a vanished age ; in their brief life- time the transformation of centuries has been accomplished : the peaceful, farming, maritime New England has passed away, only to be conjured up by realizing their descriptions, and shutting eyes and ears to the unwelcome intrusion of the bustling, heterogeneous present. To-day we are called upon to grieve over the departure of a true Puritan. Leaving to others an estimate of his rare ability, of his professional eminence, of his patriotic public service, I dwell on certain salient traits which have perhaps masked more fundamental elements of his character. Gazing into the grave of an old friend, one may get a blurred image; so I recur, on this occasion, to a portrait drawn by me twenty years ago, when he was candidate for the United States Senate : — " At the Republican conference Tuesday evening, Mr. Shortle of Provincetown said that no man who could only be approached by those within certain walks of life, who represented not the Republican party, but only a peculiar shade of blood, a few families on Beacon Street, would get his vote. Now, if Mr. Shortle knows Judge Hoar at all, even by hearsay, he must have been aware he was talking non- sense. As to Beacon Street, living there is a presumption of wealth, nothing more ; in some cases inherited, in most earned, — by some hon- estly, by others dishonestly, — and spent wisely or unwisely, frugally or lavishly, according to the disposition of the holder. Of over four hun- dred householders only five live in the houses in which they were born. The blood is pretty much what it is throughout Massachusetts, — that of the early settlers filtered through several generations of varied fortunes and occupations, of good and evil report. " But whatever the merits or demerits of the dwellers in Beacon Street, who are only distinguished by that success in money-getting which Mr. Shortle and the majority of men strive for. Judge Hoar will be amused to learn that he is their representative. I have known him well for forty-two years, and I have often qualified my praise of him by charging him with an undue severity on city men and city waj^s, an almost aggressive simplicity and disregard of the little graces. " If one wants to see Puritan principles carried into practice, let him visit Concord and witness the noble frugality and quiet dignity of that small circle of highly endowed and highly educated men and women to which Judge Hoar belongs, and which is characterized by those virtues eas}' to admire, hard to practise, even by Mr. Shortle." EBENEZER R. HOAR. 31 After this lapse of time the record stands approved ; liis undue severity on city men and city ways, his aggressive sim- plicity and disregard of the little graces, as well as his plain living and high thinking, have still characterized him. I once addressed him as the incarnation of the State of Massachusetts in general, and Middlesex County in particular; and so he was. Born in Concord, the wilderness town, consecrated by the piety and generosity of its well-born founder, the Rev. Peter Bulkeley ; made picturesque by the brotherly reconciliation of the gentle Winthrop and stern old Dudley; and illustrated, not only by the "shot heard round the world," but also by the character of its people, — by such citizens as the patriotic Chap- lain Emerson ; by good old Dr. Ripley, who ruled so long as Parson and Autocrat, one of the rearguard of the army of the Puritans ; by Emerson and his brothers, and by Mrs. Samuel Ripley, the most learned, brilliant, and modest woman of " Our First Century," who made it classic ground ; and, last not least, by his own father, the Hon. Samuel Hoar, a modest, dignified, frugal, generous, wise man, whose word was law ; — born and bred in this happy town, which " stints its expense in small matters, that it may spend freely on great duties," and so inculcates frugality and public spirit; listening year by year to the story of the 19th April, or better still to the reminiscences of the survivors of the fight, — no wonder that he imbibed the belief that Concord, not Boston, was the hub of the universe, and that what was not done in Concord was not worth doing. His faith in his town, his State, his church, his College, his class, his political party, was absolute ; so profound were his convictions, so strong his attachments, that he seemed to mis- trust the sanity or sincerity of those who questioned their superiority. This claim, and his denunciations, private and public, of all dissenters, were calculated to affront those who were without the pale ; the assumption was naturall}' offensive to those of other nativities, or to those who had conscientiously arrived at other conclusions on matters, religious, social, or political, and was taken too literally by those who were devoid of a sense of humor, or not well acquainted with his complexities. For while it was difficult to trace the boundary line between 32 TRIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF his settled convictions and his cherislied illusions, to distin- guish between the sallies of his wit and the utterances of his righteous indignation, those who had known him best allowed for the mixture. They smiled at his local claims ; they respected his rugged simplicity ; they allowed for his excess, or what they deemed his perversion, of loyalty to his political party, for a certain astigmatism in looking at his associates and his opponents ; they pardoned asperities of which he seemed unconscious, remembering the many tokens he had given of his deep under- lying affection. I can give a specimen of this deep undercur- rent, of this amiable inconsistency. Writing to me, whose political debasement he had often deplored, about two common friends and kinsmen equally debased, he says, — " What I knew of G. leads me to think he deserved the eulogy you give. But I was very fond of W., who always was a trump ; and sickness and deprivation made him a hero, and as near a saint as it is good for anybody to be. " What a curious study it is to look back upon these finished lives, of men whom we have known from youth to old age, and how hard it is to believe that there can ever be any more like them ! " Again, in another letter, — " I never expect to find anybody in this world who is always right ; indeed (with the possible exception of one whom modesty forbids me to mention), I have never yet found one. " And as I grow old, I am more and more disposed to content myself with the admirable qualities of my numerous and excellent friends, and am caring less for their short-comings." This was his creed : nobody had ever been so blessed in his home, his friends, his surroundings ; they were incomparable, and his heart beat with gratitude and love. If he had ever said anything at variance with this sentiment, why, like his neighbor, Mr. Emerson, he refused to be hampered by consistency. Like other descendants of Roger Sherman, his wit flashed as brilliantly and continuously as heat lightning on a summer's evening ; he said as many good things as Abraham Lincoln, EBENEZER R. HOAR. 33 and he shared his tenderness as well as his humor, so that the victims of his satire, the subjects of his condemnation, felt that while he condemned the sin, he loved the sinner. Following in the footsteps of his Roman father, he, seconded by his devoted wife, became the guide and benefactor of his historic birthplace ; his Spartan simplicity, his sage counsels, his witty reproofs, and watchful benevolence will long be cherished by his bereaved townsfolk. He was the guardian, the benefactor of his class ; his loyalty and bounty to them were unstinted ; he was the keystone which locked them all together. Next to or abreast with his love of Concord, was his love of his Alma Mater, manifested by his unvarying attendance at her festivities, by his thirty years' service as Fellow or Over- seer, by donations on many occasions. While Treasurer of the Fund for Memorial Hall, I was struck with how he sought to express his love to the College as well as his homage to her noble sons, by bringing, first his own subscription, then one for a son, by and by for another son ; and lately his gift to Radcliffe College in the name of his ancestor, Joanna Hoar, and his legacy to the College proper, are further manifestations of the same yearning. I rejoice that some of the alumni, touched by his affection for the College and its children, testified their appreciation years ago by requesting a portrait to be hung in some Harvard Hall as a token to future generations. Writing to him in November last, besides other things I said, " As I near the precipice, I am getting scared " ; to which he replied, — " Fear ends with death ; bej-ond I nothing see but God," and added these lines of Parnell's, — " Stretch the glad wing, and soar away To mingle with eternal day ! " and with this feeling in his heart, if not on his lips, he wel- comed death. I cannot better sum up his excellences than by requoting what I said in his lifetime, — " If one wants to see Puritan principles carried into practice, let him visit Concord and witness the noble frugality and quiet dignity of that 5 34 TllIBUTES TO THE MEMORY OF small circle of highly endowed and highly educated men and women to which Judge Hoar belongs, and which is characterized by those virtues easy to admire, hard to practise." Mr. Edward L. Pierce spoke as follows : — It is not for me to repeat in this presence the testimony which has come from others having a longer or closer connec- tion than mine with Judge Hoar ; but I crave the privilege of sharing in this day's tribute to his ever-to-be-cherished memory. It is a long career which we contemplate, begun with promise, and continuing to the end without an incident which calls for apology or explanation. He developed in youth capacity for the highest places in his profession. He had absolute clearness of intellect, which, after a keen sense of justice, is the first quality of a jurist. There was never for a moment obscurity in his mental vision. He held political offices only briefly and at long intervals, and these were but episodes of his life. It is a public loss that his service of this kind was so limited. But for forty years politicians who were plotting to suppress moral ques- tions or to advance their own selfish schemes had to take him into account. They knew that there was in Concord a man with whom they would have to reckon, — one whose intelligence they could not blind, whose moral sense they could not tamper with. Once, when others slunk away in fear and trembling from an encounter with the most audacious demagogue of the age, he faced undaunted a storm of calumny and abuse, with a self-consecration of which there is hardly a sublimer instance in ancient or modern story. Mr. Webster said on a memorial occasion, " One may live as a conqueror or a king or a magistrate, but he must die as a man." With that sentiment in our hearts, we shall not often recall the well-earned honors of our departed associate, or the robes of office which he wore so worthily : but we shall keep fresh in mind, so long as memory shall serve us, the wit which sparkled in every word ; the conscience which governed every act ; the civic courage which never quailed before authority, or the civium ardor prava jubentium ; the affection for friends which, outlasting differences of opinion, was faithful unto death ; the devotion to liberty which glowed as a perj)etual EBENEZER R. HOAR. 35 fire from youth to age ; the simplicity in habits and ways which became one whose daily walks and drives were on those roads once trod by the embattled farmers of Concord and Lexington ; and the patriotism pure from ambition and self-seeking, which, inherited from his ancestors, he has trans- mitted to his descendants. Standing as it were before his open grave, I may be permitted to pronounce, with lips less worthy than his, the words of benediction, hallowed by the ages, which came from him as he held the hand of the dead Sumner, not yet cold : " Well done, good and faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." Mr. Clement Hugh Hill was appointed to write the memoir of Judge Hoar for publication in the Proceedings. LIBRfiRY OF CONGRESS iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiniiiiiiiiiiii 013 785 490 9^ .