t he
won the love of all, while many a poor fellow in disgrace felt quite
inclined to bless a rod which fell in such sweet mercy.[2]

For three years, the successor of Kirkland, Quincy, and Everett held
the responsible Presidency; nor, in all that period of watchfulness,
did he ever forget or neglect the striving, indigent students, who
required a helping hand in the days of their adversity. His works had
made him independent in fortune, so that, wherever assistance was
needed, his was an open but judicious hand. "In the days of his
prosperity," it is said by one who knew him well, "he returned to his
original benefactors not only the money he had received from them, but
more than the interest." On resigning the Presidency of Harvard he
retired to the property he owned in Cambridge, where, in the enjoyment
of society, of favorite studies, and of a large correspondence and
intercourse with friends and distinguished strangers, he passed the
remaining years of a tranquil life, which ended, after a short and
painless malady, on the 14th of March, 1866, in the seventy-seventh
year of his age. The summons to eternity was sudden; but the faith and
the life of the veteran sustained him to the close. As he was
consciously approaching it, "I think," said he, feebly, "I shall not
recover, _but I am happy_." And when asked whether he was rightly
understood as saying he was "_happy_," his answer was, "_certainly!_"

Mr. Sparks was twice married; first, in 1832, to Frances Anne Allen, of
Hyde Park, New York, who died in 1835; and again, in 1839, to Mary C.
Silsbee, daughter of Nathaniel Silsbee, a wealthy and honored merchant
of Salem, for many years a Senator of the United States from
Massachusetts, as colleague of Daniel Webster. Four children, a son and
three daughters, all the offspring of the second marriage, survive,
with their mother, to rejoice in the memory of their illustrious
father.

The amount of Mr. Sparks's literary labor and its popular estimation,
maybe judged from the fact that more than six hundred thousand volumes
of his various publications have been published and disposed of.

In personal appearance Mr. Sparks had a noble presence, a firm, bold,
massive head, which, as age crept on, sometimes seemed careworn and
impassive; but never lost its intellectual power. His portraits show
that in his prime his face was remarkable for dignified, manly beauty.
His manners were winning; and, though undemonstrative and r