In July, 1852, the Rev. Thomas J. Sawyer, D.D., was elected president of the College. But he declined to accept the office on the terms prescribed, and in May, 1853, the Rev. Hosea Ballou, 2d, D.D., was chosen to the office, which he filled until his death in May, 1861. In July following his election the corner-stone of the main College hall was laid by Dr. Ballou. The event was one of great interest and significance, and drew together a large company of people from different sections of the country. A year was spent by the president in visiting the most prominent institutions of learning at home and abroad, preparatory to organizing the new College, and laying out its course of study. In the work of organization, Dr. Ballou received important and valuable assistance from John P. Marshall, the present senior professor and dean of the College of letters. The College was first regularly opened for the admission of students in August, 1855, though a few students had been residing at the College and receiving instruction from the president and Professor Marshall during the previous year. In the beginning the success of the institution was as marked as its friends could reasonably expect. But the great anxiety attending the beginning and development of so important an undertaking seriously affected the health of Dr. Ballou, and he was cut down before the College could avail itself of the transcendent abilities which he brought to the discharge of his duties, and before he could witness the almost unexampled material prosperity awaiting it. President Eliot generously said not long since that the remarkable growth of Harvard University in these later years is largely the fruit of the efforts of James Walker, a fit contemporary and fellow-worker in the cause of education with Dr. Ballou. Truly, other men labor and we enter into their labors. In an important sense the College was the creature of Dr. Ballou's brain. He had so clear a conception of the nature and scope of an institution of learning of the highest grade suited to this latitude and these times, and he was so successful in producing a conviction of its possibilities in the minds of rich men, that they were ready to devote to it their all. But he died before the fruits of his labors had begun to appear. [Illustration: INTERIOR OF CHAPEL.]