And now I toss the "Last Leaf" on my probably over-large accumulation of printed pages. What I have set down is in no way an autobiography. It is simply the presentment of the panorama of nearly fourscore momentous years as unrolled before one pair of eyes. Whether the eyes have served their owner well or ill the gentle reader will judge. I hope I have not obtruded myself unduly, and that I may be pardoned as I close, if I am for a moment personal. My eyes have given me notice that they have done work enough and I do not blame them for insisting upon rest. As to organs in general I have scarcely known that I had any. They have maintained such peace among themselves, and been so quiet and deferential as they have performed their functions that I have taken no note of them, having rarely experienced serious illness. Had Aesop possessed my anatomy, he would have had small data for inditing his fable as to the discord between the "Members" and their commissariat, and the long generations might have lacked that famous incentive to harmony and co-operation. I venture to say this in explanation of my stubborn optimism, which is due much less to any tranquil philosophy I may have imbibed than to my inveterate eupepsia. My optimism has not decreased as I have grown old, and I record here as the last word, my faith that the world grows better. I recall with vividness nineteen Presidential campaigns, and believe that in no one has the outlook been so hopeful as now. Never have the leaders at the fore in all parties been more able and high-minded. I have purposed in this book to speak of the dead and not the living. Were it in place for me to speak of men who are still strivers, I could give good reason, derived from personal touch, for the faith I put in men whose names now resound. However the nation moves, strong and good hands will receive it, and it will survive and make its way. Agitation, the meeting of crises, the anxious application of expedients to threatening dangers,—these we are in the midst of, we always have been and always shall be. Turmoil is a condition of life, beneficently so, for through turmoil comes the education that leads man on and up. We encounter shocks that will seem seismic. But it will only be the settling of society to firmer bases of justice. In our confusions England is our fellow, but a better world is shaping there, though in the earthquake crash of old strata so much seems to totter. And farther east in France, Germany, and Russia are better things, and signs of still better. Levant and Orient rock with violence, but they are rocking to happier and humaner order. What greater miracle than the coming to the front among nations of Japan! Will her people perhaps distance their western teachers and models. Shall we reverse the poet's line to read "Better fifty years of China than a cycle of the West?" Society proceeds toward betterment, and not catastrophe, as individuals may proceed on stepping-stones of their dead selves to higher things. The troubles of the child, the broken toy, the slight from a friend, the failure of an expected holiday, are mole-hills to be sure, but in his circumscribed horizon they take an Alpine magnitude. His strength for climbing is in the gristle, nor has he philosophy to console him when blocked by the inevitable. When the child becomes a man his troubles are larger, but to surmount them he has an increment of spiritual vigour, which should swell with passing years. He lives in vain who fails to learn to bear and forbear serenely. For human society, and for the individuals that compose it, the happy time lies not behind but before, and I invite the gentle reader to accept with me the wise and kind thought of Rabbi Ben Ezra, now growing trite on the lips of men because we feel it to be true:

"Grow old along with me. The best is yet to be,— The last of life for which the first was made. Our times are in His hand Who saith a whole is planned. Youth shows but half. Trust God; see all; Nor be afraid."



INDEX

A

Agassiz, Alexander, in college, 287; leads to the adoption of crimson as the Harvard colour, 289; as captain of industry, 289; as scientist, 290; as philanthropist, 293 Agassiz, Louis, in 1851, 283; as scientist and teacher, 284; his strength and limitations, 287 Alcott, A. Bronson, at Concord, 249 Alcott, Louisa M., in young womanhood, 237; as writer for children, 238 Andrew, John A., Governor of Massachusetts, 22; his speech to the selectmen, 24 Antioch College, in the sixties, 67; dramatics at, 71

B

Bancroft, George, at Berlin, 162; his love for roses, 165; at Washington, 166; as a historical path-breaker, 167 Banks, N.P., a pathetic figure, his rise and fall, 38 Barlow, Francis C., in college, 57; as a soldier, 61; after the war, 65 Bartlett, W.P., as a soldier, 54 Battle-fields, as places of interest, 316 Berlin, in 1870, 110 Brooks, Phillips, as a youth, 255; in comic opera, 257; at the Harvard Commemoration, 260; his breadth of spirit, 261; at Lowell's funeral, 262 Bryce, James, his home in London, 194 Buffalo, in 1840, 1 Bunsen, the chemist, at Heidelberg, 266 Butler, B.F., at New Orleans, 41

C

Churchill, Lord Randolph, 198 Churchill, Winston, 200 Clark, James B., of Mississippi, 54 Concord, the town of, 233 Cox, Jacob D., 34 Curtius, Ernst, at Berlin, 206

D

Dancer, the, at the Koenigs-See, 310; at Salzburg, 313 Douglas, Stephen A., in his prime, 6; supports Lincoln in 1861, 8 Dramatics, at Antioch College, 71; in the schools of England, 80 in the schools of France, 76; in the schools of Germany, 72

E

Eliot, President C.W., as an oarsman, 223 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, in his prime, 246; his hospitality, 248; and Walt Whitman, 250; in old age, 253 Eupeptic musings, 332 Everett, Edward, his conservatism, 16; as an off-hand speaker, 17

F

Fillmore, Millard, as a friend, 2; signs the Fugitive Slave Bill, 3; effects of the measure, 3; his home-life, 4; with Lincoln at church, 5 Fiske, John, in youth, 168 and Mary Hemenway, 169; the "Extension of Infancy," 170; his love for music, 174; in social life, 175; at Petersham, 178 France, in war-time, 151 Francis Joseph, the Emperor, 141 Franciscan, the, at Salzburg, 307 Frederick, the Emperor, 139 Frederick the Great, his statue, 110; his sepulchre, 131 Freeman, Edward A., in America, 185; at Somerleaze, 186

G

Gardiner, Samuel R., in London, 181; at Bromley, 183 Garnett, Sir Richard, at the British Museum, 179 Germany, in 1870, 108 Gladstone, W.E., in 1886, 200 Goethe and Schiller, their graves, 129 Grant, U.S., his greatest conquest, 28 Gray, Asa, in the Botanic Garden, 278; in the class-room, 279; as a lecturer, 281; his services to science, 282 Grenadier, the young, of Potsdam, 144; of Weimar, 145 Grey, Mr. William, see Stamford. Grimm, the brothers, their graves, 128 Grimm, Hermann, at Berlin, 212

H

Harrison, W.H., the campaign of 1840,1 Hawthorne, Nathaniel, at Concord, 239; at Brook Farm, 240; as a ghost-seer, 242; as literary artist, 243 Heidelberg, in 1870, 204 Helmholtz, the scientist, at Heidelberg, 268 Hohenzollern, the line of, 132 Hollis, 8; at Harvard, 161 Holmes, O.W., as an oarsman, 223; his versatility and wit, 224; his deeper moods, 226 Home-life, in Germany in 1870, 124 Howard, O.O., at Gettysburg, 47

K

Kirchoff, the physicist, at Heidelberg, 265

L

Lepsius, the Egyptologist, 209 Lexington, Va., graves of R.E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson at, 325 Lincoln, Abraham, at church, 5 Longfellow, H.W., in 1851, 218; the incubation of Hiawatha, 225; memorial service for, 221 Lowell, Charles R., as a soldier, 55 Lowell, James Russell, in his prime, 227; his Yankee story, 227; his Commemoration Ode, 229; his funeral, 232 Ludwig, King of Bavaria, 143 Luther, Martin, his grave at Wittenberg, 130

M

Mann, Horace, as an inspirer, 67 Meade, George G., at the Harvard Commemoration, 29 Militarism, in Germany, 111 Mommsen, Theodor, at Berlin, 209 Munich, in 1870, 148 Museum, the Royal, at Berlin, 121

N

New Wrinkle at Sweetbrier, 71 Newcomb, Simon, as a youth, 271; his parentage, 272; as an astronomer, 274; his last years, 276 Norman, Sir Henry, 197

P

Paris, in war-time, 152 Parliament, in 1886, 195 Pope, John, a pathetic figure, 42

R

Ranke, Leopold von, 207

S

Saxton, Rufus, at Port Royal, S.C., 48 Schenkel, Daniel, 211 Schools, in Russia, 116 Sedan, The debacle at, 159 Seward, William H., his Plymouth oration, 13; his too careless cigar, 14; the Alaska purchase, 15 Sheridan, Philip H., 28 Sherman, T.W., at Port Royal, S.C., 50 Sherman, W.T., in private life, 30; at dinner with, 31; and John Fiske, 32; his funeral, 34 Slocum, Henry W., and Samuel J. May, 45 Smith, Goldwin, at Niagara, 191; his memorial stone at Cornell, 192 Stamford, the Earl of, encountered on the Mississippi, 296; as a household guest, 301; a high-born philanthropist, 304 Stevens, Isaac I., 52 Sumner, Charles, his fine presence, 18; as a youth, 19; a conversation with, 21; and John A. Andrew, 24; his strength and weakness, 26 Switzerland, in 1870, 150

T

Taft, W.H., in boyhood, 34 Thoreau, Henry D., in his early time, 235 "Tippecanoe and Tyler too," 2 Treitschke, von, at Heidelberg, 205

U

Uhlan, the young, of Erfurt, 145 Union, value of its triumph in the Civil War, 327 Universities, of Germany, in 1870, 119

V

Victoria, Crown Princess of Prussia, 139

W

Webster, Daniel, his last speech in Faneuil Hall, 10; his "big way," 11; his "Liberty and Union, now and forever," 12 Weimar, the young grenadier of, 145 West Pointers and civilians in the Civil War, 33 Whitman, Walt, and Emerson, 250 Wilhelm der Grosse, Kaiser, 138 Wilhelm II., Kaiser, 139 Wilson, James H., 49 Winsor, Justin, as youth and man, 167 Winthrop, Robert C., his ability and conservatism, 17; as master of the feast, 18 Wright, H.G., 57

THE END