larded his discourse, and illustrated his themes, in most vivid and picturesque style.

For thirty-three years he thus shut himself out from the allurements of ambition and devoted himself to the highest and noblest service of the State, for what service is greater than the educating and fitting out of the statesmen, legislators, jurists and divines of a country. This he did, and did well, for a third of a century, and eternity alone can reveal the influence which he thus indirectly exerted upon the intelligence, morals, and general welfare, not only of his native State, but in all that vast region known as the South and Southwest, where his pupils have filled every possible office and position. More famous honors were within his easy reach, had he desired them, and the stimulants of high and generous competition were not wanting to fire ambitious blood. It was the day of great men in North Carolina-Morehead, Graham, Mangum, Badger, Sanders, Moore, Ruffin, Manly, Hawks and Gaston were his cotemporaries and intimate friends. A constellation of great intellects, not outshone by any similar cluster in the American heavens. Amongst even these he could have appeared as a star of the first magnitude. He had already risen, earlier in the time of coming forth and further toward the zenith, than any of them. But he preferred to tread in the quiet paths of obscure beneficence and unheralded goodness, rather than in those of political ambition. There is no evidence whatever that he ever regretted it, or desired at any time to leave the beloved institution which he had brought up from a languishing and feeble existence to a position of the highest prosperity and honor, second in point of popularity and influence to only one other university in the entire South. It was justly regarded by North Carolinians with pride and affection, not only for its own sake, but because it was a precious legacy from our fathers, the founders of our State. Those noble men, as shown elsewhere, in adopting the first

constitution in the very midst of war and suffering in December, 1776, incorporated in that instrument a provision that "all useful learning shall be duly encouraged and promoted in one or more universities." Accordingly, in 1789, the University of North Carolina was incorporated, endowed, as well as the feeble means of that day permitted, and in due time set agoing, amid the prayers and best wishes of a people who mingled a deep-seated love of education with a love of liberty. The spectacle thus exhibited by these brave men in providing in their fundamental law for a high order of education for their sons, in the very throes of a life-and-death struggle, is scarcely excelled by the confidence of the Roman Senate whilst Hannibal was thundering at their city gates. It is scarcely to be wondered at, therefore, that North Carolinians regarded their University with affectionate pride. The sons of our State, when wandering in distant States, carried this pride with them, and almost invariably sent their sons back "home" to be educated. As a consequence the whole southern land was thickly spread with our graduates and pupils, who filled, and now fill, all positions from President of the United States to member of the Legislature. Statesmen, orators, poets, professors, editors, soldiers, jurists and divines, in many a land, owe their better birth to the University of North Carolina, and will smile with pleasing associations at the name of "Old Bunk," as Governor Swain was affectionately called. Whilst, therefore, his devotion to this institution shut him off from fame and notoriety to a considerable extent, it yet gave him a warm place in the affections of our educated people and of his pupils everywhere.

And yet with all his great capacities, like too many others, he has left nothing for posterity to judge. His reputation is confined to his cotemporaries and such traditions as their affections may transmit. He wrote little for publication, and that is fragmentary, much of it anonymous. It is perhaps

probable that he was averse to sustained, systematic labor, and gathered his great stores of information at such times as the work would be pleasing to him, without any definite intention as to its use further than the delight of imparting it to his classes.

He had collected with great industry a very considerable amount of material concerning the early history of North Carolina, and it was hoped and expected to the day of his death that he would leave an elaborate work on that subject as a legacy to his countrymen. But whether such was his intention or not, he died in August, 1868, at the age of sixtyseven, with the task unattempted.

In the proposed disconnected sketches of North Carolina. which I have undertaken to write, I could not refrain from paying this imperfect tribute to the memory of this gentle, patriotic and beneficent character. His life having been mainly spent in the unexciting and uneventful career of president of our principal institution of learning, and having passed away in the midst of the great political agitation that followed. the civil war, his real merits and noble services have not been duly appreciated by our people. It is well that a State should be reminded of her great citizens who lived and died for her, not for themselves; and the study of such lives is a necessary part of every liberal education.

SKETCH OF PROF. MITCHELL.

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As a continuation of the notice of the University, a short sketch of one of its noblest and most useful professors, and his melancholy death, will not be improper or unacceptable.

Elisha Mitchell, D. D., Professor of Chemistry, Mineralogy and Geology in the University, was born in Washington, Connecticut, in 1793. He graduated at Yale College in 1813, in the same class with George E. Badger, Thomas P. Devereux, and other distinguished southern men. In January, 1818, through the influence of Judge Gaston, he was appointed to a professorship in the University, along with Dr. Olmsted, another classmate at Yale. For nearly forty years he served the institution with a zeal, fidelity and ability scarcely surpassed in the history of literary men. His love for the natural sciences soon broke through the books and the walls of his lecture-room, and early led him to study the geology and natural history of the State. His vacations were spent in extensive surveys in every direction. Scarcely a stream, valley, mountain, coal-bed, gold field, or mineral deposits in the State, but was visited and inspected by him. So early as in 1835 he clambered the great mountain heights of the Appalachians, measured their tallest peaks, and classified the rich Canadian fiora of their slopes. He it was who first determined by barometic measurement what had often been conjectured, that the peaks of the Black Mountain were higher than those of the White Mountains in New Hampshire, and his name was affixed to the loftiest summit.

In 1856 a controversy arose between Dr. Mitchell and Hon. T. L. Clingman in regard to this highest peak. The latter