My brother Albert was graduated at Dartmouth College in 1834, and was reputed one of the most talented, close, and thorough scholars ever connected with that institution. For two or three years he read law at Hillsborough, in the office of Franklin Pierce, afterwards President of the United States; but later Albert spent a year in the office of the Hon. Richard Fletcher of Boston. He was consequently admitted to the bar in two States, Massachusetts and New Hampshire. In 1837 he succeeded to the law-office which Mr. Pierce had occupied, and was soon elected to the Legislature of his native State, where he served the public interests faithfully for two consecutive years. Among other important bills which were carried through the Legislature by his persistent energy was one for the abolition of imprisonment for debt. In 1841 he received further political preferment, by nomination to Congress on a majority vote of seven thousand,--it was the largest vote of the State; but he passed away at the age of thirty-one, after a short illness, before his election. His noble political antagonist, the Hon. Isaac Hill, of Concord, wrote of my brother as follows:-- Albert Baker was a young man of uncommon promise. Gifted with the highest order of intellectual powers, he trained and schooled them by intense and almost incessant study throughout his short life. He was fond of investigating abstruse and metaphysical principles, and he never forsook them until he had explored their every nook and corner, however hidden and remote. Had life and health been spared to him, he would have made himself one of the most distinguished men in the country. As a lawyer he was able and learned, and in the successful practice of a very large business. He was noted for his boldness and firmness, and for his powerful advocacy of the side he deemed right. His death will be deplored, with the most poignant grief, by a large number of friends, who expected no more than they realized from his talents and acquirements. This sad event will not be soon forgotten. It blights too many hopes; it carries with it too much of sorrow and loss. It is a public calamity. VOICES NOT OUR OWN Many peculiar circumstances and events connected with my childhood throng the chambers of memory. For some twelve months, when I was about eight years old, I repeatedly heard a voice, calling me distinctly by name, three times, in an ascending scale. I thought this was my mother's voice, and sometimes went to her, beseeching her to tell me what she wanted. Her answer was always, "Nothing, child! What do you mean?" Then I would say, "Mother, who _did_ call me? I heard somebody call _Mary_, three times!" This continued until I grew discouraged, and my mother was perplexed and anxious.