or who had occupied his talent to better
advantage.'"

We give the substance of some leading points of a notice of Professor
Smith, in the "Memoirs of Wheelock."

"In 1809 the college experienced an immense loss, in the death of Dr.
Smith. He had devoted his life chiefly to the study of languages. No
other professor in any college of the continent, had so long sustained
the office of instructor; none had been more happy, useful, or
diligent. Though indefatigable in his studies, he was always social
and pleasant with his friends, entirely free from that reserve and
melancholy, not infrequent with men of letters. At an early age he
obtained the honors of this seminary, and even while a young man was
appointed professor of the Oriental Languages. These were the smallest
moiety of his merit and his fame. Without that intuitive genius, which
catches the relation of things at a glance, by diligence, by laborious
study, by invincible perseverance, which set all difficulties at
defiance, he rose in his professorship with unrivaled lustre. He, like
a marble pillar, supported this seminary of learning. This fact is
worth a thousand volumes of speculation, to prove the happy and noble
fruits of well-directed diligence in study. But the best portrait of
Dr. Smith is drawn by President Wheelock, in his eulogium on his
friend, from which we make the following extract.

"'Early in life, so soon as his mind was susceptible of rational
improvement, his father entered him at Dummer school, under the
instruction of Mr. Samuel Moody. It is unnecessary to take notice of
the development of his juvenile mind, his attention to literature, and
especially his delight in the study of the ancient, Oriental
Languages. That distinguished master contemplated the height, to which
he would rise in this department; and his remark on him, when leaving
the school to enter this institution, was equal to a volume of eulogy.

"'His mind was not wholly isolated in one particular branch.
Philosophy, geography, criticism, and other parts of philology, held
respectable rank in his acquirements; but these yielded to a
prevailing bias: the investigations of language unceasingly continued
his favorite object. The knowledge of the Hebrew with his propensity
led him to the study of Theology. He filled the office of tutor in the
college, when an invitation was made to him from Connecticut to settle
in the ministry.

"'At this period, in the year 1778, the way wa