different from those wretched hulks which are now sent staggering across the seas, to convey a diseased, half-naked, and enfeebled multitude to the promised land!

Penn's letter to the Indians, transmitted by one of the earlier ships, is a masterpiece of what worldlings call policy, but which is simply justice and right feeling. This letter preceded his visit, and was well calculated to excite the confidence and curiosity of the Red-men, who must have felt deeply anxious to see the " Pale-face" who addressed them, and was disposed to treat them as brethren.

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He at length sailed for the new colony in the ship "Welcome," and was there greeted by his future subjects, consisting of English, Irish, Dutch, and Swedes, then in number about three thousand. He had people of many creeds and many lands to deal with, as well as an unseen and almost unknown nation; but he commenced with so noble an act of justice, in paying the Indians for the lands already given him in payment by the king of England, that "Pale-faces" and "Red-skins" were alike convinced of his certain honesty of purpose. With what an upright gait and open brow must William Penn have met the tribes at Coaquannoc-the Indian name for the place where Philadelphia now stands-foremost of a handful of Quakers, without weapon, undefended, except by that true protector which the Almighty has stamped on every honest brow.

Here the peace-loving law-maker awaited the pouring out of the dusky tribes.

Amid the woods, as far as the eye could reach, dark masses of wild uncouth creatures, some with paint and feathers, and rude, but deadly weapons, advanced slowly and in good order; grave, stern chiefs, and strong-armed "braves" gathering to meet a few unarmed strangers, their future friends, not masters! There was neither spear nor pistol, sword nor rifle, scourge nor fetter, open or concealed, among these white men; the trystingplace was an elm-tree of prodigious growth at Shackamaxon, the present Kensington of Philadelphia. Toward this tree the leaders of both tribes drew near, approaching each other under its widely-spreading branches; front to front, eye to eye, neither having a dishonest or dishonorable thought toward his fellow-man-comprehending each other by means of that great interpreter-Truth! It must have been a sight of exceeding glory when Penn, whose only personal distinction was a netted sash of sky-blue silk, cast his eyes over the mighty and strange multitude, who observed him with an undefined interest, while his followers displayed to the tribes various articles of merchandise, and he advanced steadily toward the great Sachem, chief of them all, who, as Penn drew near, placed a horned chaplet on his head, which gave his people intimation that the sacredness of peace was over all.

With one consent the tribes threw down their bows and arrows, crouched around their chiefs, forming a huge half-moon on the ground, while their great chief told William Penn, by his interpreter, that the "nations were ready to hear him."

After arranging all matters as to the future city, well might William Penn write home," In fine, here is what Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob would be well contented with and service enough for God, for the fields are here white with harvest. O how sweet is the quiet of these parts! freed from the anxious and troublesome perplexities of woeful Europe!"

But much as the law giver eulogized the "quiet" of his new colony, he was not content to remain there. His mind

was anxious; his affections were divided between the two hemispheres; his ardent, restless nature, longed to act wherever action was needed. If the English government had hoped to get rid of him when they sold him the land for an inheritance, they were mistaken; several of those he loved were in sorrow and imprisonment; the Stuarts gave liberty of conscience one day and withdrew it the next; he therefore returned to England. Charles II. was trembling on the verge of the grave, which soon closed over him, leaving nothing for immortality but the fame of weakness even in vice. William Penn records James telling him, soon after his accession, that now he meant to "go to mass above board:" upon which the Quaker

replied quaintly and promptly, "that he hoped his majesty would grant to others the liberty he so loved himself, and let all go where they pleased." His renewed intimacy with James strengthened the old reproach of " time-serving" and "trimming," and William Penn was frequently called Jesuitical. Those who so reproached him had forgotten the long friendship which had subsisted between the king and himself, and the fact that never had his influence in high places been used except for right and righteous purposes.

Penn outlived evil report and persecution. After a lapse of seventeen years he again sailed with his family to Pennsylvania; again was received by "white and red" as their father and friend; dispelled many differences, healed many sores, saw

the city he had planned rising rapidly on every side. These seventeen years seemed to have done the work of seventy, and the prosperity of Pennsylvania was secured. He had still abundant vexations to endure. His circumstances had become embarrassed. He returned with his family to England, an aged man, though more aged by the unceasing anxiety and activity of his life than by years.

There are traditions of his dwelling at Kensington and Knightsbridge; but it is known that he possessed himself of a handsome mansion at Rushcombe, near Twyford, in Berkshire. Here a stroke of apoplexy numbed his active brain, and rendered him unfit for business. That such "strokes" were repeated, until he finally sank beneath them, is also certain;

but those who visited him between the periods of their infliction, bore testimony to his faith, and hope, and trust in the Lord, and of his unfailing loving-kindness and gentleness to those around him. Thus, through much faintness and weakness, he had but little actual suffering, though there was a gradual pacing toward eternity during six years; and on the 30th day of July, 1718, in the seventy-fourth year of his age, he put off the mortal coil which he had worn, even to the wearing out, and joined in heaven those he had loved on earth. There was an immediate and mighty gathering of his friends and admirers, who attended his remains to the burying-ground of Jordans. It must have been a thrilling sight; the silent and solemn people wending their way through the embowered lanes leading from Rushcombe into Buckinghamshire, that hallowed land of Hampden, consecrated by so many memories, of which Penn, if not chiefest, is now among the chief!

The sun had begun to make long shadows on the grass, and the bright stems of the birch threw up, as it were, the foliage of heavier trees, before we came in sight of the quaint solitary place of silence and of graves. The narrow road leading to the Quakers' meeting-house was not often disturbed by the echo of carriage-wheels, and before we alighted an aged woman had looked out with a perplexed yet kindly

countenance, and then gone back and sent forth her little grand-daughter, who met us with a self-possessed and quiet air, which showed that if not "a Friend," she had dwelt among Friends.

The burying-ground might be termed a little meadow, for the long green grass waved over, while it in a great degree concealed, the several undulations which showed where many sleep; but when observed more closely, checkered though it was by increasing shadows, the very undulations gave an appearance of green waves to the verdure as it swept above the slightly-raised mounds. The young girl knew the "lawgiver's" grave. She pointed it out, between the graves of his two wives. Some pilgrim to the shrine had planted a little branch, a mere twig, which had sprouted and sent forth leaves, just at the head of the mound of earth,-an effort at distinction that seemed somewhat to displease the old woman, who had come forth looking well satisfied at what she called the " quiet place" being so noticed. "All who came," she said, "knew the grave of William Penn; there was no need of any distinction; there it was, every one knew it; yes, many came,

especially Americans. Ladies now and then plucked a little root of the grass, and took it away as a treasure; and no wonder, every one said he was a man of peace, -a GOOD MAN!"

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and is therefore now in his fifty-second year. In looking for the agencies which form and develop the character of the son, the father always stands prominent. General Jonas Clark, who, in his day, was one of the first lawyers in Rutland county, if not in the state, belonged to the class denominated self-made men. chanic until after he had attained his majority, he brought to the study of his profession a vigorous constitution, and a clear, calm, strong, and common-sense mind. The result was that the well-bred gentleman soon became the accomplished lawyer. Being remarkable himself for doing everything he undertook, and doing it thoroughly and well, he seems early to have stamped this trait upon his son-so much so that he may, with truth, be said to know no other way. His practice was to make his son, almost from earliest boyhood, a confidential adviser. This could

make him acquainted with subjects which generally come to the knowledge of boys at a somewhat later period. This, of course, was a great advantage to him, as the reader will soon learn. We respectfully submit this system to the consideration of parents.

Merritt pursued his studies preparatory to college mostly at Granville, N. Y., under the instruction of the venerable Salem Town, and graduated at Middlebury College in 1824.

Mr. Clark is next found a student at law in the office of his father. Here again he came under the influence of one who, preparing a mirror in which himself was to be reflected and perpetuated, had every reason for polishing it well. After pursuing the study of law two years, failing health obliged him to abandon it, and, turning his attention to mercantile pursuits, he continued in trade until 1841.

In this department he exhibited that clearsighted and far-seeing sagacity which secured success, and indicated the future distinction which he attained. He rose rapidly in the esteem of the community, as a man of great business capacity and reliable integrity. H was therefore elected cashier of the Bank of Poultney, which office he continues to fill with great ability.

Foreknowledge absolute is an attribute of God only; and yet, in the economy of both nature and providence, like causes produce like results; and that man who has carefully noted events, past and present, and, in the midst of active forces, has so discriminated as to ascertain those essential ones of which these events are the resultant, can cast his mind forward, and with a good degree of probability at least, predict the revealings of the future. The mass of men live on none the wiser, at the close of each succeeding day, for all they have seen and suffered. Past occurrences have all about the same prominence in the landscape of their memory, and they look upon them very much as they look upon a distant forest, where all the trees appear of the same height and dimensions. They may walk upon the yielding crust of a volcano, and be unconscious of the fires that rage beneath them; and events for which they ought to have been prepared, startle them like a peal of thunder in a cloudless sky. Not so the subject of this sketch. His close and careful observation, attended by a nice discrimination of the real from the fictitious, the essential from the contingent, has developed his prescience to such an extent as to render it one of his marked characteristics.

The critical is not always the accurate, neither is the accurate always the critical. The critical implies a nicety and scrutiny in the examination of individual features of a subject. Accuracy implies a keen perception of agreement or disagreement between individual subjects, or features of the same subject when brought together in comparison. Hence, although the mind may be critical in its scrutiny of particulars, the judgment will not necessarily be accurate without a power of comparison, and a keen perception of likeness and unlikeness; hence, also, the judgment may be generally accurate by virtue of a so-called intuitive perception without ever

entering at all into a critical scrutiny of particulars. With Mr. Clark, no item of his complex and expanded business seems too minute for his scrutiny, and no combination too far-reaching for his perception, or too intricate for his analysis. Consequently his judgments have been so generally verified by subsequent facts, that wherever he is known, his opinion is received with almost the respect due to an oracle.

By the relation of cause and effect, subjects are extensively connected, some more and some less intimately. Ordinary minds comprehend only a few of these relations, and these few are the most obvious. To them events appear for the most part isolated and independent; or if related at all, it is only to their immediate antecedents and consequents. The ability to take a stand-point, and therefrom tracing all the relations and bearings of a subject without having the mental vision distorted at all, or wholly absorbed by a few, to the neglect of all the rest, and then to change the point of observation so as to get a distinct perception of all the phases which the subject can present, is characteristic of a great mind. Whether financiering for a banking corporation or a railroad; whether calculating for the fluctuations in trade, or arranging his own domestic affairs, Mr. Clark has always evinced this comprehensiveness of view and accuracy of detail.

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Rashness and timidity, each characteristic of inferior minds, and each alike abortive of great and good ends, though not equally innocent of evil doing, are opposite extremes, toward one or the other of which most men are constantly tending. One class never see danger even when danger threatens most, and, making no prudent calculation for obstacles that must unavoidably be encountered, reap the reward of their rashness in frequent disaster and disappointment; the other always see a "lion in the way," difficulties arising where there are none, and those that do exist fearfully magnified, and having, perhaps, a head to conceive but no heart to dare, imagine that either God or destiny has designed somebody else for all great achievements. Therefore they merely vegetate for a season, and then go

"Down to the vile dust from whence they sprung, Unwept, unhonored, and unsung."