on of that career was after he had passed the age of
fifty! Instead of that age being, as to many others, a "dead line," it
was to him an intellectual _birth line_. He returned from Europe--after
a year of entire rest--and then, like "a giant refreshed by sleep,"
began to produce his most masterly discourses and orations. His first
striking performance was that wonderful address at the twenty-fifth
anniversary of Henry Ward Beecher's pastorate in Plymouth Church, at the
close of which Mr. Beecher gave him a grateful kiss before the
applauding audience. Not long after that Dr. Storrs delivered those two
wonderful lectures on the "Muscovite and the Ottoman." The Academy of
Music was packed to listen to them; and for two hours the great orator
poured out a flood of history and gorgeous description without a scrap
of manuscript before him! He recalled names and dates without a moment's
hesitation! Like Lord Macaulay, Dr. Storrs had a marvelous memory; and
at the close of those two orations I said to myself, "How Macaulay would
have enjoyed all this!" His extraordinary memory was an immense source
of power to Dr. Storrs; and, although he had a rare gift of fluency, yet
I have no doubt that some of his fine efforts, which were supposed to be
extemporaneous, were really prepared beforehand and lodged in his
tenacious memory.

Dean Stanley, on the day before he returned to England, said to me: "The
man who has impressed me most is your Dr. Storrs." When I urged the
pastor of the "Pilgrims" to go over to the great International Council
of Congregationalists in London and show the English people a specimen
of American preaching, his characteristic reply was, "Oh, I am tired of
these _show occasions_," But he never grew tired of preaching Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. The Bible his old father loved was the book of
books that he loved, and no blasts of revolutionary biblical criticism
ever ruffled a feather on the strong wing with which he soared
heavenward. A more orthodox minister has not maintained the faith once
delivered to the saints in our time than he for whom Brooklyn's flags
were all hung at half-mast on the day of his death.

All the world knew that Richard S. Storrs possessed wonderful brain
power, culture and scholarship; but only those who were closest to him
knew what a big loving heart he had. Some of the sweetest and tenderest
private letters that I ever received came from his ready pen. I was
looking over some