is always delusive and often dangerous, but the life of Mr. Brooks tells what the common elements of our nature can do, what industry, honesty, steadfastness of purpose, courage and independence can accomplish, and his example will be at once an inspiration and guide to all the young men who knew him. And we older men, we who knew him well and worked by his side, though too late to change our character or the settled habits of a lifetime, can we not read a useful lesson in his manly independence of thought and action? Did the country ever more need honesty of conviction, and courage in action than now? We are not too old to learn, and we have much before us to do, and many of his associates in life and work have their most effective years yet to come, and while life lasts we should do as he did, work and grow. I beg to conclude by quoting the words of the great American poet, who so often clothed wisdom in beauty: "But why you ask me should this tale be told? To men grown old, or who are growing old: It is too late. O nothing is too late Till the tired heart shall cease to palpitate. Cato learned Greek at eighty; Sophocles wrote his grand Edipus, and Simonides bore off the prize of verse from his compeers, When each had numbered more than four score years. Had but begun his Characters of Men; At sixty wrote the Canterberry tales. These are indeed exceptions; but they show How far the gulf streams of our youth may flow Into the arctic regions of our lives. Where little else than life itself survives." JOHN FASSETT FOLLETT. BY HON. JUDSON HARMON. John F. Follett was the first lawyer I ever saw in action. While I was at college in Granville, during the civil war, he came there to try a magistrate case. Such events were not common in that peaceful New England town transplanted to Ohio, so there was a large attendance and I went to see what the practice of law was like. I have forgotten the parties, the cåse and the result, but not Mr. Follett's appearance, voice, manner and conduct of the trial. A boy's mind always translates the abstract into the concrete, and the first translation is the most enduring. So the idea of a judicial trial always brought to mind John Follett and that case until later experiences put them into a numerous company. A few years later, 1868, Mr. Follett removed to Cincinnati, where he was in full practice until his sudden death, April 15, 1902. It was not my good fortune to see much of him during his earlier years there. His firm, which included first Durbin Ward and then J. D. Cox and H. L. Burnett, was largely employed in revenue, steamboat and insurance cases, the like of which I had only in dreams. But he took at once a high position which he always kept and which led me to observe him as a young lawyer does his elders and betters. In later years fortune was more kind; and having him with me, against me and before me made me know him well. And what knowledge of man by men compares with lawyers' knowledge of each other? They may be misjudged, for better or worse, but seldom or never by each other. So that the esteem and affection of one's associates at the bar are not to be gained unworthily and, to the discerning mind, are the crown of the lawyer's laborious career and all too short lived fame. Mr. Follett was a lawyer and nothing but a lawyer, from the beginning to the end. Early in his practice he twice represented Licking county in the General Assembly, and was Speaker of the House when he removed to Cincinnati, resigning for that reason. In 1882 he was induced to run for Congress against the late Benj. Butterworth, and was elected after a brilliant canvass. It was a case of two Greeks. The other Greek won in the memorable, and in Cincinnati unprecedented, campaign of 1884, when Mr. Follett ran again, much against his will, because he had found, as active lawyers always do, that Mistress Law brooks no rivals. In 1898 he lent his name to a hopeless race for Congress. He was once the real and almost the actual choice of his party for Governor. And few men were heard oftener or more gladly in advocacy of the political beliefs he cherished. But all these were incidents of his professional life rather than departures from it. In the convention, on the stump, in the halls of legislation, he was the lawyer still, standing for his cause with the same ability, courage, devotion, honesty, candor and courtesy which distinguished him at the bar. And his place in his generation, as we today inscribe it on the annals of this body for those who will gather here when we are gone, was fixed by his forty-four years in the practice of the law. The Follett family were early settlers in Vermont. They went with the Connecticut men to the Wyoming Valley before the Revolution. John's great grandfather perished in the great massacre there, and the family returned to Vermont, where John was born, at Richford, February 18, 1831. His father came thence in 1836 and settled near Johnstown, Licking County, Ohio. The youngest, but one of a large family which depended on the farm for subsistence, the story of Mr. Follett's early life tells itself. But if in these easier days there be some who need be told, let them turn to the life of almost any man of his generation or select almost at random from the memorials of this Association, changing only dates, geography and minor details. Daily toil in the fields, except during the few hours of the brief terms in the log school house; then the strain of the family resources for the meager beginning of a broader education at the Granville Academy; then by his own earnings in vacation and a little aid, all administered with severe economy, a college course at Marietta; then a year or two of teaching to pay his debts incurred for education, studying meanwhile for the law; then a year in the office of his brother Charles at Newark, and at last, in 1858, admission to the bar, followed by the small beginnings and slowly broadening career of the practitioner. Men who have trod this arduous path seek easier ones for their sons; but none have yet been found which lead, with certainty, to the same heights of sturdy character, resourceful capacity and earnest purpose. Mr. Follett had in full measure the qualities required to get and successfully conduct a large general practice. His neverneglected duties as citizen and neighbor gave opportunities for acquaintance which his lovable though manly disposition and his manners, simple and unassuming without lack of proper dignity, did not fail to improve. The clients he got he kept. He never abused their confidence or practiced on their fears or credulity. He put forth his best efforts in their behalf, with their interests always fore most and not his own. The practice of law was with him a profession and not a business, and it hurt him more to lose a case he believed just than to lose the fee. He would hardly be classed among the very learned, though his degree of Doctor of Laws conferred by his college in 1879 was by no means an empty compliment, nor among the great creative or constructive men of the profession. But his combination of moral and mental qualities made him more generally and effectively useful than men of great learning and genius sometimes are. He had a broad and true grasp of the principles of the law. He knew their origin and purpose. He had the true instincts of their application-what we call the practical faculty. His industry was persistent and intelligent. His preparation of fact and law was thorough. His sense of justice true and dominant. And his courage was high and undaunted. Among many instances of this was the great case of U. S. v. Chaffee. Two verdicts for over $200,000 each and judgment for that amount were given against his client, but he gained a reversal in the Supreme Court of the United States, and finally succeeded in saving both the reputation and the fortune he defended. His name is conspicuous in the reports among those of the lawyers whose industry, discernment and powers of thought and expression aided the courts of his state and nation to sound and just conclusions. To his brethren he was a model of all a lawyer ought to be. He was considerate of his associates and willing always to share fairly the credit for success and the responsibility for failure. He was courteous to his opponents. He could contend without quarreling and never sought or permitted an unfair advantage. He had strong convictions, great earnestness and uncommon zeal and power of advocacy; yet it can truly be said of him, after |