Page:Luther S. Livingston (Parker).djvu/31

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L·S·L

in such a manner as to bring out their importance to the history of literature, and his skill in making a readable presentation of such minutiae. These characteristics, the marks of genuine scholarship, developed rapidly during the ensuing decade. Self-educated, and always a student, he wrote carefully, as to expression as well as facts, and his style, as he came to write more easily, reflected the accuracy of his instincts, lightened by the buoyancy of his nature.

The satisfactory appearance of Livingston's last, and most important, publication gladdened the final month of his life. This volume grew out of a plan to write a description of a single volume belonging to one of his best friends. Under the incentive of a request from the publication committee of the Grolier Club, of New York, it was expanded into an exhaustive study of 'Franklin and his Press at Passy.' His instinct for the meaning of the half-hidden evidence of the physical makeup of a pamphlet, worked just as surely when applied to the interpretation of written documents. His ingrained habit of refusing to form an opinion or to state his conclusions as long as the evidence seemed incomplete, maintained his interest in researches long after