heir place at the head of the
class in the beginning. Two of them held the same place when
they graduated. Short was outstripped by Edwin Moses Bigelow,
who is now living, a lawyer, in Boston. He entered college
from the country not so well fitted when he entered as most
of the class. But he made his way by an indefatigable diligence
until he graduated with great distinction, the third scholar,
going a little above Short.

Child was a man of great genius. He seems to me now, as I
look back upon him, to have been as great a man at seventeen
when he entered college, as he was when he died. He was the
best writer, the best speaker and the best mathematician,
the most accomplished person in his knowledge of general literature
in the class,--indeed, I suppose, in college,--in his day.
He was probably equalled, and I dare say more lately excelled,
by Lane as a Latin scholar, and by Short as a Greek scholar.
He was a great favorite with the class. He spent his life
in the service of the College. He was tutor for a short time
and soon succeeded Channing as Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory.
He became one of the most eminent scholars in the country
in early English literature and language. He edited a collection
of ballads, Little & Brown's edition of the British Poets,
and was a thorough student of Shakespeare and Chaucer. To
the elucidation of the text of Chaucer he made some admirable
contributions. He was shy and diffident, full of kindness
toward persons whom he knew and to children, and of sympathy
with persons who were in sorrow, but whimsical, grotesque,
and apt to take strong prejudices against persons whom he
did not know. I suppose some of the best of our American
men of letters of late years would have submitted their productions
to the criticism of Child as to a master.

Next to him stood Lane, the learned Latin scholar. I do
not believe that anybody ever went through Harvard College
who performed four years of such constant and strenuous labor.
What he did in his vacations I do not know, but there was
no minute lost in the term time. It is said that he never
missed attendance on morning and evening prayers but once.
The class were determined that Lane should not go through
college without missing prayers once. So one night a cord
was fastened to the handle of his door and attached to the
rail of the staircase. But Lane succeeded in wrenching open
the door and got to morning prayers in time. H