in McClellan's camp on the Peninsula, caught the disease which has finally resulted in his decease. "George Wilkes has been so long absent from editorial connection with The Spirit that his death will not affect it in any way. But, like all strong individualities, he has left a permanent impression upon the paper which he so long conducted. His energetic and splendid style of writing elevated the journalism of sports from the slipslop methods of his predecessors. He attempted to banish slang from every department of The Spirit and he succeeded. In Shakespeare he found a living well of English undefiled and there he sought for strength and purity of diction. After his retirement from practical journalism, he wrote a commentary upon Shakespeare which is remarkable for its original views and theories. But Mr. Wilkes felt that the work of his life had ended with the Civil War and that thereafter he might take such enjoyment as his broken health permitted. He made business arrangements which left him free to live or travel wherever he pleased and independent of all cares and responsibilities. Never afraid of death and boldly facing it a hundred times in the discharge of what he believed to be his duty, he finally died at home, peacefully and fearlessly." Allibone's Dictionary of Authors, Vol. 3, p. 2720, quotes the following: "New York, April 28, 1870.--George Wilkes, the proprietor of the Spirit of the Times, has received from the Emperor of Russia the Grand Cross of the Order of St. Stanislas, as a recognition for the suggestion made to the Russian Government in reference to an overland railway to China and India by way of Russia. This mark of royal favor entitles the holder to have his male children at the Military School of Russia at the expense of the State." This great honor from the Russian Government came to him about a quarter century after he had been made the object of jest and ridicule for a similar suggestion backed by sound argument for a railroad across the United States. Scriptural comment: "A prophet is not without honor save in his own country." The New York Times said of him that when the Civil War broke out Wilkes wrote a series of newspaper and magazine articles on the burning question of the hour that attracted wide attention, and gained him the friendship of many prominent men. Secretary Stanton took a personal interest in him, and gave him a great deal of literary work to do in Washington. His articles were very vigorous, well written, and patriotic. They commanded a wide influence, and besides strengthening the attachment of the author to people who had heretofore been his friends, they had the effect of subduing the belligerence and increasing the caution of his enemies. In April, 1860, Frank Leslie's "Illustrated Newspaper" published a photograph of him and a brief but complimentary note about him.