where every traveller just throws ceremonious civility and passes on.

down his toll of We had begun

to feel so harmonious and united, that it was provoking to have our circle broken by the loss of any of its parts. It was like taking a keystone from an arch, which has been nicely adjusted and cemented, and introducing another, that it is ten chances to one can never be made to suit the place. However, we go on very smoothly as yet, and I am glad to find that -will be

the firm advocate of vigorous measures."*

In a letter which I lately received from the Rev. Dr. Nichols, he says:

"My recollections and impressions concerning Mr. Frisbie, as a member of that social circle in which you first met him at Cambridge, are similar, I am persuaded, to your own. I deem it a great privilege to have been so long in the society of one, who possessed such resources for the entertainment and instruction of his friends in the native fertility of his mind. He was usually ready for all subjects; if not in every instance with a thorough knowledge of them, yet with great acuteness and strength of mind, and with that habitual good sense and freedom from sophistry, without which I apprehend that it were hardly possible that intelligent men should

* As an officer of the College government.

be long gratified with the mere display of intellectual powers. It were difficult to say too much of his talents in conversation, especially his habitual clearness, fluency and elegance of expression."

During the period of which I have been speaking, Mr. Frisbie wrote the following lines in the form of an epitaph upon himself. They have never been published; but were circulated among his friends, who thought them a spirited and amusing, though very extravagant caricature. The Postscript was written by him in the character of his friend, Professor Farrar.

Here lies an odd fellow as ever was seen,
A compound of folly, of sense, and of spleen;
Dogmatical, positive, ne'er at a stand,

The affairs of the state, he'd decide out of hand :
Nice points in the schools he would settle at once;
Who his reasons saw not, was put down for a dunce.
Yet, ofttimes, the veriest trifle about,

He would doubt and consider, consider and doubt;
And at last, having acted, would fret for an hour,
That to change but once more, was now out of his power.
In company too, if he ever came there,

Now polite as a lord, now uncouth as a bear;

Now his compliments flew, very fine and well hit,
Yet 'twas not to please others, but shew his own wit:
Sometimes he was pleasant and cheerful enough;

Then for hours he did nothing but scowl and take snuff.

Now he talked you to death, with high spirits half mad; Then mute as a fish, he sat moping and sad;

If sitting it might be, for still at the best,

He would sprawl himself out over three chairs at least.
Though eccentric in all things, yet like a mill-horse,
It made him quite sick to go out of his course.
All strangers alike were his utter aversion;
Because they compelled him to make an exertion.
And though all their censures, in truth, he despised,
There was nothing on earth like praise that he prized.
If it seemed but sincere, though 'twas never so gross,
His vanity such, he would swallow the dose.

Then to crown all his folly, and let the world know it,
He took in his head to set up for a poet:

Conundrums and ditties he jingled in rhyme;

A

And when love fired his muse, he was quite the sublime.
So tender his heart, if the truth I must speak,
He would fall in love four or five times in a week:

Yet, it being so soft, very slight was the pain,
For the wound, soon as made, closed together again.

In short, Sir, his fancy was folly disjointed;

His feeling, mere gloom, grown from pride disappointed; His talk through extravagance loomed into sense,

As an ant seems an elephant, seen through a lens.

You have heard he was frank; no mistake can be greater; He had something of impudence mixed with ill-nature.

He made for his friends so much trouble while here,

I'm afraid now he's gone, they will scarce shed a tear.

d

POSTSCRIPT.

But 'tis possible still, that there yet may be one,
Who will say with a sigh, as he leans o'er this stone;
It is true he had faults, but he ne'er would defend them,
And what is still better, at least wished to mend them.
He rarely meant wrong, if he rarely did right;

But what sprung from caprice, was oft set down to spite.
"Dogmatical, positive":true, I must own it;
But then he'd acknowledge an error, when shown it.
"In company," though he was rather uneven,
Yet there too his ratio was full four to seven;

His spirits amused, and to give him his due,

When we laughed at his follies, he laughed at them too.
But to lounge at his ease, oh! how truly he loved;
My books and my glasses full often have proved.
If to strangers averse, yet his friends were all dear;
For his heart was as warm, as his tongue was sincere.
I confess he loved praise, yet " his vanity such!"—
This epitaph-maker, no doubt, had as much.

As to fancy, I'm certain of that he'd enough,
For half of his notions were made of her stuff.
"His feelings," alas! they might gloomy appear:
Once his prospects were bright, his horizon was clear:
If his eye, here and there, a thin cloud might behold,
Hope played on its edges, and tinged them with gold:
But darker they grew, and still wider they spread,
Till hope sunk to earth, and the prospect all fled.
No more shall I hear him come tumbling up stairs;
Or see him stretched out over three or four chairs:
When
my crackers and apples all roll o'er the floor,
Or my maps rattle down, I shall scold him no more.

Though he grieved me much here, still I wish him here yet,
And, now he is gone, all his faults I forget.
When I sit all alone, and the night is so still,
He crosses my mind, let me do what I will.
I lean on my hand, and I half heave a sigh,
And I feel a tear starting to moisten my eye.

From 1805 to 1811, Mr. Frisbie discharged the duties of Latin tutor. He was then appointed Professor of the Latin language; his duties, however, continuing nearly the same. The latter office he retained till 1817.

As an officer of the college, he habitually felt the importance of strict and steady discipline, as essential to its respectability and usefulness. At our colleges, a large number of young men are brought together at the most hazardous period of life. They are trusted very much to themselves, at a time when the habits are unformed; and when the passions, "the glory and disgrace of youth," are putting forth their strength, and most need direction and control. They have just been released from the restraints of a school, and the immediate personal superintendence of parents and masters. A great pressure has been taken off, and the operation of new and strong motives must be brought to bear upon the mind in order to supply its place. They are commonly at an age, when