preparation, for he always provided himself with every species of preliminary information which could lead to what he did not possess, in case, at some future day, it might become useful or necessary. His memorandums, therefore, were copious and explicit. Indeed, he became so familiar with the archives of the several States, that from his study in Massachusetts, he could readily, without a fresh journey, command the desired documents, and always indicate the department, and, generally, the shelf, book, or bundle in which the coveted manuscript was to be found by his correspondents. And, so he went on cheerily from state to state and family to family, increasing his national treasures, until, at last, the richest of the American collections was yielded to him by the Washington family and the government. The manuscripts at Mount Vernon--the entire correspondence of Washington and his papers--arranged by him in more than two hundred folio volumes; the state papers of the "old thirteen," and the private papers of many of the civil and military leaders of the Revolution, were opened to his inspection, and some of them actually placed in his possession for ten years, while engaged in the composition of his great work. This would have been anxious labor even for a man of leisure, robust health, and a fortune that secured him from all care for present support or comfort. But Sparks was still poor, and, while engaged in this expensive preliminary task of mere accumulation--a task that might produce profitable results after many years--he was also obliged to provide for the needs of the passing day. His ready talent and economical habits enabled him to do it.[1] Nor did he rest satisfied with what he found in the United States or could gain by correspondence from abroad. He went to Europe to complete his researches; and the national and private archives of France and England, which had hitherto been closed to American students, were soon unlocked for him through the personal solicitations in his favor of Sir James Mackintosh, Mr. Lockhart, Mr. Hamilton, Lord Landsdowne, and Lord Holland, in Great Britain, and of General Lafayette, Monsieur Guizot, and Monsieur de Marbois in France;--another proud achievement by the charity student of 1811. I may add here, at once, that Mr. Sparks paid a second visit to Europe in 1840, in order to examine its archives; on that occasion, discovering, in the French cabinet, the original letter of Franklin and the famous map with our North-eastern boundary delineated by a "red line," which were so much discussed in the subsequent negotiations with Great Britain in regard to our limits in that quarter.