Author Description

Excerpt from A Tribute to the Memory of Hon. William Willis, LL. D., Of Portland, Maine: Read Before the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society of Philadelphia, at Its Stated Meeting Thursday Evening March 3, 1870 <p>This sketch, ormore properly memorandum of facts, which has been thrown together in great haste, will amply prove that our late member well earned the deference paid him by this Society when it chose him to the office which death has made vacant. He died of pure physical exhaustion induced by unceasing activity of brain, without the slightest abate ment in the clearness of his intellectual powers: thus the wish expressed by him a few days before his death was fulfilled. My hope is, said Mr. Willis, that I may not outlive my intellectual strength. I cannot bring this notice to a close in a more appropriate manner, than by citing an extract from a letter received a few days since from our corresponding member, Hubbard W. Bryant, Esq., a warm personal friend of the deceased. He writes: Our State and city sustain a great loss in his death, and it will be long ere his place IS even partly filled. I knew him quite intimately, and can testify to his superior erudition and memory, which did not fail him to the last. His manners were very modest and uh assuming, and he was always pleased to give information to those who sought it. He had a strong interest in our Public Library enterprise from its earliest conception, and much of the success it has attained is owing to him. A large portion of his private library is left by his will to the Public Library. He dropped away suddenly and quite unexpectedly to his family and friends, being confined to his bed but half a day. The services at his funeral took place at the First Parish Church on Saturday, the 19th, and were attended by a large gathering of his fellow-citizens, including the members of the city government in a body, who followed his remains to Evergreen Cemetery where they were interred, there to await the fin