rst
professorship, had been preceded by a year as assistant in the library
at Brown University; then he became tutor, and later a student of civil
engineering in the office of the city engineer of Boston. In fact, he
spent this period to such advantage that later, upon his return from
Europe, he was given the choice of a professorship either in civil
engineering or modern languages, an evidence of the wide range of his
interests. He finally chose modern languages as his subject, and entered
upon his career as a teacher, where he developed the highest
qualifications. He remained at Brown for seven years.

Many articles and reviews published in the _Providence Journal_
justified his selection in 1860 as the editor of that paper, a position
which he held throughout the Civil War with singular distinction.

In 1866, Dr. Angell was offered the Presidency of the University of
Vermont, and he accepted it. He took charge of the University when its
fortunes were at a low ebb, and the future was not bright. It was due
to the administrative ability of the new President as well as to his
ripe experience and culture that the day was saved and Vermont
prospered, intellectually and financially, during the five years of his
administration.

Of his decision to come to Michigan, Dr. Angell said twenty-five years
later: "While, with much embarrassment, I was debating the question in
my own mind whether I should come here, I fell in with a friend who had
very large business interests, and he made this very suggestive remark
to me: 'Given the long lever, it is no harder to lift a big load than it
is with a shorter one to lift a smaller load.' I decided to try the end
of the longer lever."

James Burrill Angell was inaugurated President of the University of
Michigan in June, 1871. From that time his life was the life of the
University except for interludes of diplomatic service in China, Turkey,
and upon various commissions. His diplomatic career, though only
incidental to his life work as an educator, showed that he possessed the
necessary qualifications for what might well have been a very
distinguished career in other fields. At the time of his appointment to
China as Minister Plenipotentiary, diplomatic relations in the East were
decidedly indirect and characteristically Oriental. It had just taken
Germany two years to conclude a rather unimportant commercial treaty,
and upon his arrival at Peking his colleagues in the diplomatic ser