Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 6.djvu/275

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THE BAR SUPPER.
249

he still was, his strength was severely taxed; but he worked on with his old-time faithfulness, and when the course of instruction was finished, he was worn out. He now retired to his old home in Durham, and though he struggled bravely against the disease that was firmly fixed upon him, on the 9th of May, 1871, the struggle ended, and he was laid to rest on the pleasant hill-side where his boyish feet had strayed, and in sight of the river which he loved.

It were a fruitless task to endeavor to estimate at its true value a life like his, so full of beneficent labors. For the college, which he dearly loved, he labored with rare fidelity and devotion, giving to it his best endeavors, dying worn out in its service. By his will he left to the Chandler Scientific Department the sum of $20,000, subject to a life-annuity of $500 for the benefit of his widow, the income to be used when the principal should reach $30,000. This will doubtless form the foundation for the Woodman Professorship of Civil Engineering. Though toiling no longer among us with hand and brain, he has thus provided that the work in which he was engaged shall go on so long as the college shall stand. What more fitting and enduring monument could he have erected for himself? His name, linked with that of Chandler, will thus be perpetuated; and as generation after generation of students shall enjoy the fruits of his labors, men shall rise up and call him blessed. To his many pupils, scattered widely as they are, he can never die; and as oft-times, in the hush of din and turmoil, from some bright oasis of success, their thoughts turn to the old Dartmouth days, there comes up before them a grand, majestic figure, a hero of modern days, the loving friend, the wise counselor, the sure guide; and such he will ever remain, and so long as one of our number is left, shall he be held in loving and grateful remembrance.




THE BAR SUPPER.


BY GEORGE W. NESMITH, LL. D.


The first term of the Superior Court of Judicature, in Merrimack county, was held in January, A. D. 1824. Chief- Justice William M. Richardson presided. It was the first time that Concord had enjoyed the presence of a duly established Court of Law. The county had been created by the legislature of 1823, and from the towns originally belonging to the western part of Rockingham, and the northern part of Hillsborough county. The members of the bar resident in the towns composing Merrimack county came together at this term, at Concord, and were duly organized as the Merrimack County Bar. We were not permitted to join it until September, A. D. 1825. But we had the pleasure of witnessing the proceedings of the court and bar, as an interested spectator, during most of the aforesaid January term. Very recently we saw the old Court-House, which then was occupied by the court and bar, smoking in ruins by reason of fire.

Now, after the lapse of more than fifty-nine years, all the members of that court and bar, save George Kent, Esq., of Washington city, have quit this mortal sphere of action, and passed off into the unseen world,—many of them leaving behind the fragrance of good deeds done here, and, as we trust, to receive "the rewards of the just made perfect, in that land where the weary are at rest."

The partiality of surviving friends has already furnished to the public interesting biographical sketches of most