CAMBRIDGE SKETCHES

[Illustration: CHARLES SUMNER]

CAMBRIDGE SKETCHES

BY

FRANK PRESTON STEARNS

AUTHOR OF "TRUE REPUBLICANISM," "LIFE OF PRINCE OTTO VON BISMARCK,"
"SKETCHES FROM CONCORD AND APPLEDORE," ETC.

1905



PREFACE

It has never been my practice to introduce myself to distinguished
persons, or to attempt in any way to attract their attention, and I now
regret that I did not embrace some opportunities which occurred to me in
early life for doing so; but at the time I knew the men whom I have
described in the present volume I had no expectation that I should ever
write about them. My acquaintance with them, however, has served to give
me a more elevated idea of human nature than I otherwise might have
acquired in the ordinary course of mundane affairs, and it is with the
hope of transmitting this impression to my readers that I publish the
present account. Some of them have a world-wide celebrity, and others who
were distinguished in their own time seem likely now to be forgotten; but