acquaintance with the Biblical studies of the previous year, especially Hebrew, and to his Tamil; but the more marked characteristic of his taste was the extent of his general reading. He seemed to devour books, reading with great rapidity, too fast as he knew for mental digestion, and extending his inquiries in many directions. It is, of course, no criterion of a man's scholarship how many books he reads. Attention is drawn to this phase of his mental growth, as indicating how rapidly he had outgrown the earlier stage of indifferentism toward a student's occupation, for even up to graduation from college, active life had received his first attention. It was his missionary purpose which had started his mind; the same purpose governed the growth. At first, under the conviction that a liberal education was essential to the efficiency of a missionary, he had begun to read upon subjects of which he was ignorant; now, without any careful calculation of the value of his reading for the special end first proposed, he was led by interest in his pursuits to a far more varied course of reading than ever he would have been likely to pursue, unprompted at the outset by some such special end. One would have said in his boyhood, and even in his college days, that the last character in which he would appear would be that of a bookish man, and yet he had now become so much of a book-lover as to be touched with the fever of making a perfect library in his special department of India; so much of a bookfancier, indeed, as to treat his books as playmates, take them from the shelves to dandle and to feast his eyes upon their forms and dress.

Two writers may be singled out, from the many whose acquaintance he now made or continued, as

especially his favorites, Thomas Arnold and Isaac Taylor. He knew Arnold, as he is known to most Americans, chiefly through the medium of Stanley's admirable Life. So far as he was conversant with the accidents of Arnold's position, with the movement in the Church of England, its action upon Arnold's mind, and the reaction of his earnest spirit upon it, he could. appreciate more perfectly the character thus revealed; but an interest in the man himself existed, and always may exist apart from a full comprehension of the man's surroundings. Such an interest David felt in Arnold; it was in fact what he would have felt in himself, could he have been separable from himself, for he was attracted by just such a character as his friends discovered in him. It has been noted that in earlier days he had read John Foster; the difference between these two men indicates to some extent the difference in David's spiritual affinities at the two stages of his growth. Then, in the maze of his self-inquiry, led astray into gloomy introspection, he was drawn to the meditative seriousness which characterizes Foster; such words of sombre thought as met him gave voice to his own unspoken emotions, and he even began to covet the life of a recluse. Now, escaped from the entanglement of a disordered conscience, and yet honest in his dealings with his own heart, hasting to the fulfilment of the great work which enlarged his soul, he found in the earnestness of Arnold a counterpart of his own ideal excellence. Just these two classes, the serious and the earnest, seem to divide thoughtful men, and we have to thank Arnold for making current the word earnest, and for stamping the coin with his own image.

The writings of Isaac Taylor had a somewhat similar

charm for him, since they corresponded with his own natural treatment of religious topics. The catholicity of his mind induced an exercise of charity toward all forms of belief and disinclined him to prejudgment, while his habits as a student led him to a search for fundamental principles in any system. This temper had been confirmed under the admirable tuition of Dr. Hopkins, who, charged by some with an over-cautiousness of mind, showed the real nature of his caution in dismissing class after class; impressed with his habit of careful examination, but not impressed with his private opinions upon the subjects to be examined. David found in Taylor a method of inquiry, agreeing with his own less ambitious method, and he turned to the writings of that author for a completion of the lines of thought upon which he had begun, but which his youth and lack of erudition forbade him to follow to great lengths. He had a confidence in Taylor's writings, which was no doubt in great measure the result of their agreeing so totally, both in subject and manner of treatment, with all that he had himself applied his mind to finding out. Hence he read with pleasure anything that he could lay hold of, and used to show an enthusiastic delight as he discovered one after another half-forgotten work of that voluminous writer, too careless of his own reputation.

Though more of a student, he kept his old love for Nature, and daily took his excursions out of town or about the city. He revisited old haunts. "Roxbury Neck was my walk," he writes, "where I brought up on Tommy's Rocks. Such a time as I did have! How old Nep came back! Remember that pond on Akron Street, just before you enter St. James from Warren,

with steep rocks on one side? and how Nep one day ran right down their face? I do. And don't you remember how there used to be springs on the sidewalk, opposite the Warren House on the right as you go up the street? they bubble still! and that pump which used to be chained? chained still! and the reservoir on the Rocks with a ball on top? there still!" He explored Boston, with a companion if possible, but generally alone. He loved the old place which had grown so familiar to him; he never could fairly live in a place without carrying off in his memory the very shapes of houses and shops, of sign-boards and street-turnings. "You must always be ready to give me street-gossip,' he writes from India. "Are any new buildings going up? How does the block in Winthrop Place look? It was half done when we left."

6

He closed this year of intermission by a summer jaunt in Connecticut, and went as usual to the farm in Wethersfield where he had worked so enthusiastically just before entering college. He resumed his old employment, but now he writes: "Finishing our home lot' is quite an affair, though it may look small on paper. They began the day I came, and have been at it ever since. Next week we begin on the meadow hay, which will be finished in about two weeks. By that time I shall throw up my hat and shoes, used up decidedly, and give three cheers for Wethersfield, but nine most hearty ones for good old Boston and for home. After all I was n't made to be a farmer. I have had as pleasant a time as I could ask for here, but

I am glad I was not called to this life, but to another."

CHAPTER VI.

COMPLETION OF THEOLOGICAL STUDY.

[1857-1859.]

IN September 1857 he returned to Andover, resuming his studies where he had left off a year before. Two years remained for the completion of systematic study, and he entered on his work with increased enthusiasm, for India seemed to be only waiting for these two years to be finished. I am indebted to Rev. Charles Ray Palmer, of Salem, Mass., for an account of David's life during this time, an account which is more valuable since it comes from one previously unacquainted with him, and able to note afresh the characteristics which marked him. It is not always easy to know how far one's estimate of a brother's character or attainments is free from a too partial consideration, and I gladly avail myself of this friendly testimony to fill out the sketch of David's life:

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My acquaintance with your brother commenced in September, 1857. He at that date joined my class in Andover Theological Seminary, which was then beginning its Middle Year. We had known one another by name before, through mutual friends, and were soon familiarly associated, I believe with mutual regard. Nothing ever happened to disturb the relations so established between us, and my satisfaction with him as a friend, as a fellow-student, and as a Christian brother,