ghtful genius for that fault.

In the last years of his service in the Senate he had a very
serious affliction of the eyes, which rendered it impossible
for him to use them for reading or study, or to recognize
by sight any but the most familiar human figures. He bore
the calamity with unfailing cheerfulness. I believe it was
caused by overwork in the preparation of a case. The first
I knew of it, he asked me to meet him at Concord, where he
was about to make a visit. He told me what had happened,
and that his physicians in Washington and New York thought
there was a possibility that they congestion of the veins
surrounding the optic nerve might be absorbed. But they thought
the case very doubtful, and advised him to go to Europe for
the benefit of the journey, and for the possible advantage
of advice there. He wanted me to undertake the duties devolving
on him in the Committee of which he was Chairman, and to attend
to some other public matters in his absence. His physician
in Paris told him there was not the slightest hope. He thought
that the darkness would certainly, though gradually, shut
down upon him. He received this sentence with composure.
But he said that he had long wished to see Raphael's famous
Virgin at Dresden, and that he would go to Dresden to see
it before the night set in. This he did. So the faces of
the beautiful Virgin and the awful children were, I have no
doubt, a great consolation to him in his darkened hours.

John Sherman was Secretary of the Treasury. I sat next to
him in the Senate for several years. I came to know him quite
intimately. I suppose few men knew him more intimately, although
I fancy he did not give his inmost confidence to anybody,
unless to his brother the General, or to a few persons of
his own family or household. I paid the following tribute
to him the day after his death:

"It is rarely more than once or twice in a generation that
a great figure passes from the earth who seems the very embodiment
of the character and temper of his time. Such men are not
always those who have held the highest places or been famous
for great genius or even enjoyed great popularity. They rather
are men who represent the limitations as well as the accomplishments
of the people around them. They know what the people will
bear. They utter the best thought which their countrymen
in their time are able to reach. They are by no means mere
thermometers. They do not ris