The afternoon was of unusual brilliancy, and the full-orbed sun gilded with mellow light the funereal stones through which I wound my way, as I sought the grave of another friend, the first colleague of the departed Judge in the duties of the Law School,--Professor Ashmun. After a life crowded with usefulness, he laid down the burden of disease which he had long borne, at the early age of thirty-three. I remember listening, in 1833, to the flowing discourse which Story pronounced, in the College Chapel, over the departed; nor can I forget his deep emotion, as we stood together at the foot of the grave, while the earth fell, dust to dust, upon the coffin of his friend. Wandering through this silent city of the dead, I called to mind those words of Beaumont on the Tombs in Westminster Abbey:-- "Here's an acre sown indeed With the richest, royal'st seed That the earth did e'er suck in Since the first man died for sin; Here are sands, ignoble things Dropt from the ruined sides of kings." A richer royalty is sown at Mount Auburn. The kings that slumber there were anointed by more than earthly hand. Turning again to the newest grave, I found no one but the humble gardeners, smoothing the sod over the fresh earth. It was late in the afternoon, and the upper branches of the stately trees that wave over the sacred spot, after glistening for a while in the golden rays of the setting sun, were left in the gloom which had already settled on the grass beneath. Hurrying away, I reached the gate as the porter's curfew was tolling to forgetful musers like myself the warning to leave. Moving away from the consecrated field, I thought of the pilgrims that would come from afar, through successions of generations, to look upon the last home of the great Jurist. From all parts of our own country, from all the lands where law is taught as a science, and where justice prevails, they will come to seek the grave of their master. Let us guard, then, this precious dust. Let us be happy, that, though his works and his example belong to the world, his remains are placed in our peculiar care. To us, also, who saw him face to face, in the performance of his various duties, and who sustain a loss so irreparable, is the melancholy pleasure of dwelling with household affection upon his surpassing excellences.