AUTUMN. BY NATHANIEL Á. HAVEN. I LOVE the dews of night, I love the howling wind; I love to hear the tempests sweep For nature's saddest scenes delight Autumn! I love thy bower, With faded garlands drest; Autumn! I love thee well; And clouds roll wildly round the skies, Autumn! thy fading flowers Droop but to bloom again; So man, though doomed to grief awhile, To hang on Fortune's fickle smile, Shall glow in heaven with nobler powers, SKETCH OF CHIEF JUSTICE RICHARDSON. BY JOEL PARKER, LL. D. How often, apparently, is the world indebted to accident for the benefits received from some of the most distinguished men! The casting of a book in the way of slumbering intellect incites it to overcome all obstacles in the pursuit of knowledge. A beautiful harangue or a successful argument is sometimes the spark that lights the flame of ambition in the breast of one before destined to other pursuits, and he burns with the desire of emulation, and strikes out for himself a more brilliant, if not a more happy career. Accidental injuries in the workshop and in the field, incapacitating the party, for a greater or less period, from manual labor, have given to science some of her most persevering and successful votaries. "We call it chance -but there is a Divinity That shapes our ends, rough-hew them how we will." An instance is before us. WILLIAM MERCHANT RICHARDSON was born at Pelham, in this State, January 4, 1774, and labored upon his father's farm until he was about fifteen years of age, when an injury to his hand for a time incapacitated him for active exertions. During the period of leisure thus forced upon him, he indulged a taste for study, and determined to procure for himself a collegiate education. This he accomplished, and graduated at Cambridge University in 1797. In the course of his collegiate studies, and during the time he officiated as an instructer, he became thoroughly imbued with a taste for poetry, and classical and general literature, as is in some degree indicated by his appointment to deliver a poem upon the occasion of his graduation; and his love for such studies and pursuits continued unabated to the close of his life. The law is generally accounted a stern mistress, requiring of her followers an untiring devotion at her shrine, and it is rare that her servants find leisure for eminence in any other pursuit; but with him literary acquisition was pastime was recreation; and long after he had taken his seat upon the bench he studied the French, Italian and Spanish languages without assistance, and could read the two former with considerable facility. The work of some Italian poet was often his companion upon the circuit, and was perused with the eagerness of youthful ardor. With the Latin classics he was familiar, and read them often; and he urged upon others the importance of recurring to their classical studies, as the best means of acquiring and preserving a pure taste and a good style. But it was not to foreign authors alone that he was attached. The study of the English classics was a favorite pursuit. The grave disquisitions of Milton, the sound philosophy of Bacon, and the varied richness of Shakspeare, furnished materials upon which he delighted to dwell. was the lighter literature of the day proscribed. Works abounding with anecdote and humor afforded favorite sources of relaxation amid the fatigues of abstruse investigation. Nor Studies and amusements of this character, however, were not permitted to interfere with professional labors and official duties. The study and practice and administration of the law was the great business of his life; and to this he brought all the energies of a vigorous mind. He loved it as a science, and pursued it with delight as well as with diligence. A life of professional labor furnishes but few occurrences which to the great mass of the people would seem worthy of record. There are no startling events to excite wonder. There is nothing of "pomp and circumstance" to attract SKETCH OF JUDGE RICHARDSON. 67 admiration. But if, on the one hand, there are no passages of arms to be celebrated and no victories to be sung, on the other the trophies are not stained with blood, and the notes of wailing and wo mingle not in the chorus. The qualities required for successful exertion in the learned professions may perhaps not be inferior to those which enable their possessor to set a squadron in the field, or to direct the array of a battle; and Chief Justice Richardson exhibited them in a high degree of perfection. To an unspotted integrity and conscientious faithfulness was added great patience a most important qualification for such a station; and a long administration attested that he possessed it in a remarkable degree. Urbane towards the gentlemen of the bar, courteous to witnesses, and extending to litigants an impartiality which often left in doubt his opinion upon contested questions of fact; a suspicion of attempted fraud, or probability of injustice, roused him to take a decided stand in favor of that side which appeared in danger of suffering wrong; and while cautious to impress upon a jury the principle that fraud and bad faith were not to be presumed, the tones of indignation with which he denounced them were the consequence of a deep love of justice, and desire that the right should prevail. But while he was thus firm in resisting whatever seemed to savor of injustice, the individual arraigned as a criminal was usually a subject of compassion, and his administration of that branch of judicature was based upon the humane principle, that it is better that many guilty should escape than that one innocent person should suffer. Notwithstanding all the divisions of parties and sects, he commanded general confidence, and his judicial character was summed up in a single short sentence, by a highly respectable citizen, when he exclaimed, after musing upon the intelligence of his death" Well, the good old Judge has gone!" How full of eulogy are these few words! His had been a long judicial life. He had held the office of chief justice nearly twenty-two years. He had lived to witness nearly two entire changes of all his associates, and he was also approaching that period "three score years and ten" which almost marks the limit of human activity, and with us absolutely terminates judicial labor. He might well be spoken of in connexion with the lapse of time. He was aged in the public service. And after such a period of devotion to the labors of a judicial station after exerting the best energies of the meridian of existence in the service of his fellow men when he is at last called upon to surrender up the trust committed to him on earth, what could any incumbent of the bench desire from those he leaves behind, more than the character of "the good judge?” How much is included in it! Learning, integrity, impartiality, firmness, industry, faithfulness, patience - these are all necessary to the character of the good judge. Nay, what is not "Well done, good necessary what is not included in it? and faithful servant." There needs nothing more of commendation. |