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with Boudica, pupplying a napici On the Study of Forensic Eloquence, compiled a volume of National Bank Cases, manuals for supervisors, assessors, town clerks and collectors, a Digest of the first 24 volumes of the American Reports, edited with Mr. Cook six volumes of the Supreme Court Reports of this State, which effected a revolution in our reporting system, and at the time of his death was engaged upon the most important law treatise of his life, which he leaves half finished. He was married in 1872. Such is the outline of his short and busy life.

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was police, in command O1 language was strikingly forcible, affluent and elegant. He did not leave the bar because he doubted his adaptation to the pursuits of the advocate, nor from distaste, but because he preferred to strike out a new path, because his tastes were scholarly rather than argumentative, and because in his chosen walk he thought to meet fewer of the unpleasant incidents and harassing circumstances that infest the vocation of the advocate. He chose wisely for himself and for his beloved profession. He exercised a vast influence and achieved a vast amount of good which have crowned his young life

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In Memory

OF

ISAAC GRANT THOMPSON.

[From the ALBANY LAW JOURNAL, September 6, 1879.]

OBITUARY.

ISAAC GRANT THOMPSON.

ISAAC GRANT THOMPSON, the founder and managing editor of this Journal, died at his country residence at Saratoga Springs, on the 30th ultimo, after an illness of one week, of congestion of the lungs resulting from diphtheria. His death was very sudden and unexpected. He had so far recovered from his original disease as to go out into the street on the 28th and on the 29th, and the congestion from which he died was of only twelve hours' duration. passed away, after a sharp struggle for life, peacefully and in possession of his mental faculties, but without the preparation or the ability to express his last wishes, probably with but a few moments' conviction that his end was at hand, his wife alone of those whom he best loved, at his side, and with no last look upon his three little children, too young to know their loss.

He

This event will be a great shock to that large audience of professional brethren whom Mr. THOMPSON weekly addressed through the columns of this Journal. It is difficult for the writer of these lines, long his co-laborer and the sharer of his counsels, to think or write calmly or impartially of him at this moment; but the readers of this Journal who had never met Mr. THOMPSON may be gratified by an attempt at a portraiture of him.

Mr. THOMPSON was about 39 years of age. He was a native of Rensselaer county, New York, where he had always lived, with the exception of a few years of his early life passed in the west. His education was of the common schools and academies. In his youth he had taught in both departments. He was admitted to the bar of this State in 1865. Having always a predilection for the editorial occupation, he became city editor of the Troy Daily Press about 1869, at the same time compiling some of his minor legal treatises. In 1870 he founded this Journal. In 1871 he commenced the publication of the American Reports. He wrote a treatise on the Law of Highways, a treatise on Provisional Remedies, edited an edition of Warren's Law Studies, supplying a chapter On the Study of Forensic Eloquence, compiled a volume of National Bank Cases, manuals for supervisors, assessors, town clerks and collectors, a Digest of the first 24 volumes of the American Reports, edited with Mr. Cook six volumes of the Supreme Court Reports of this State, which effected a revolution in our reporting system, and at the time of his death was engaged upon the most important law treatise of his life, which he leaves half finished. He was married in 1872. Such is the outline of his short and busy life.

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Mr. THOMPSON was a man of a creative and farreaching legal mind. The ALBANY LAW JOURNAL and the American Reports are two such original enterprises as have rarely been conceived and executed by a man of 30 years. The writer may be pardoned for saying what Mr. THOMPSON never would have said publicly that the ALBANY LAW JOURNAL has made its way all around the world, and is read, copied and cited in every State of this Union, throughout Great Britain and Ireland, in France, Germany and Italy, in China, Australia and New Zealand, without much advertising or canvassing, almost exclusively upon its merits. Mr. THOMPSON was proud of this; he loved to have it so. It was his pet project and hobby; he spared no pains nor expense upon it; he cared not what it cost him; he was continually planning to make it better; he was never satisfied with it. He was conscious of the demands of the great and critical audience which he addressed, he had a high sense of what was due them, and his conscience was always uneasy lest he was not giving them his very best. No amount of praise blinded him. The more its columns were sought as a vehicle of communication on large topics by the great jurists of this country, the more careful he was not to lose sight of the practical. His aim was to traverse the entire orbit of legal interests, and to combine in one journal the philosophical, the practical, the humorous; to champion the right, to denounce the wrong; and all in a spirit of independence and fairness. He strove to make not merely a current digest, but a legal journal, that had opinions and dared to speak them. It is for his readers to say how far he succeeded. It is certain that his aims were the loftiest and the most beneficial, and that in his journalistic capacity he was utterly regardless of "fear or favor, reward or the hope of reward."

Mr. THOMPSON put the same conscientious labor into the American Reports and the Digest. The plan of selection, statement, condensation, arrangement, annotation and classification, is peculiarly his own, and the approbation which these publications have met repaid him for all his labor.

These works imply an exceptional mental and physical constitution. Mr. THOMPSON would unquestionably have made his mark at the bar. His mind was acute, incisive, comprehensive and fertile; his self-possession was perfect; his command of language was strikingly forcible, affluent and elegant. He did not leave the bar because he doubted his adaptation to the pursuits of the advocate, nor from distaste, but because he preferred to strike out a new path, because his tastes were scholarly rather than argumentative, and because in his chosen walk he thought to meet fewer of the unpleasant incidents and harassing circumstances that infest the vocation of the advocate. He chose wisely for himself and for his beloved profession. He exercised a vast influence and achieved a vast amount of good which have crowned his young life

with honor and respect from the legal profession of the world, and not only from them but from laymen as well, for few legal publications are so extensively read by laymen and quoted by lay newspapers as the ALBANY LAW JOURNAL.

It is a matter of course that Mr. THOMPSON possessed an immense capacity for labor. He could work day after day, pen in hand, for seven or eight hours, without visible detriment, and although he has occasionally complained of overwork, yet his health never was apparently better than a week before his death. His talent for organization and administration was large. The exactness, precision and tenacity of his memory were wonderful. The smallest details never escaped him, and he insisted on strictest attention to them. Every citation in this Journal and the Ameri can Reports has for years been verified, and if a case is cited by volume and page alone, its title has been added, which has given almost constant occupation to one proof reader, and exposed errors that would astound the public. Many a time he has walked half a mile to ascertain a name or a date of trifling importance, or to solve some doubt of his own creating. He wrote with great facility in a style at once vigorous and graceful. His physique was robust, his temper cheerful, his patience unwearied; in short, he was a born editor.

In person Mr. THOMPSON was rather below the middle height, quite stout and broad chested; his head was large and fine, his forehead full and broad; his complexion was dark and ruddy; his features were regular, his eyes especially brilliant and kind. He was a fine specimen of vigorous and manly beauty. He was rather shy of men, but not shrinking; he rarely made but never repelled advances; his manners were most courteous, even fascinating; his powers of conversation most agreeable. The diction of his everyday speech was exceedingly felicitous and elegant. The greatest lawyers of this country, who continually addressed him letters, found him a poor correspondent. He used to say he would answer them in the LAW JOURNAL. Elected to a prominent club, he paid his initiation fee and his dues, but very seldom attended it. He was happiest among his books and in his labors-law by day, literature at night-and in his dearly-loved family; and while he did not shun nor repel men, his tastes were reserved and secluded. His shyness extended even to his own actions and emotions. None but his intimate friends knew what depth and loyalty, what sensitiveness and romance, what humor, charity and kindness, were concealed in his nature. He never let his left hand know what his right hand did. He was the most unpretentious, modest and simple of men. He was ready to oblige, and knew how to confer an obligation delicately. He was faithful and punctual in the smallest as well as in the largest duties, private as well as public. He was the fondest and firmest of friends. He was an ardent lover of nature and of poetry; his greatest ambition was to possess a farm and be a farmer, and he would on rare occasions surprise the writer of these lines by reciting some love poem which he had garnered up in his memory twenty years ago. While he held his own opinions strongly, and fought for them strenuously, he was considerate of those of others, and scrupulously fair in his treatment of them. He was a good lover and a good hater, but he loved only what was good and hated only what was hateful. He was thoughtful on religious subjects, and was a Christian, but had never professed any sectarian faith. Unam bitious and unspoiled, he replied to this writer a few days before his death, in response to his inquiry, "is life worth living? "Without wife and babies, no." In short, his was a strong, positive, fearless, independent, honest nature, refined by a chivalric tenderness and loyalty, with high and earnest aims, bent on duty

"

and obedient to conscience.

The readers of this Journal will take a mournful interest in perusing the last words ever written by Mr.

THOMPSON, contained in a letter of the 26th ultimo, and strongly characteristic of the writer: "I have had three confoundedly uncomfortable days and nights, with very good prospect of several more in the near future. A good sharp attack of diphtheria, with your tongue swollen so large as to leave very little room in the mouth and throat, and with a thousand little imps sticking daggers into you every time you try to swallow and you always are trying to swallow-with your family and friends excluded, always save the good, kind wife; with a rousing head-ache and earache and neck-ache; dozing between swallows all day, and all night gazing at the light, trying to remember what consummate old humbug it was who said that a minute had but sixty seconds; oh, I can assure you it is simply ''orrible.' Good-bye. I hope to see you in the flesh soon. Here we get his whole minor nature -patient, cheerful, humorous, affectionate, hopeful. Death is nearly always untimely. It generally strikes us just as we are learning how to live. Our departed friend was not expecting, still he was not unprepared, to die. In his delirious moments his constant moan was that he had not done his work. How few men, how few in our exacting profession, have done theirs so faithfully, so intelligently! He has now ceased to be a teacher, and begun to be a learner. We shall love to think of him in the boundless hereafter, freed from the environments of his mortal nature, and learning, at the feet of that beneficent Being whom he trusted, that eternal and immutable Law whose seat is in the bosom of God, whose voice is the harmony of the world. I. B.

It is the purpose of the acting editor of this JOURNAL to collect in a supplement, at a day in the near future, whatever has been or may be written or said of Mr. THOMPSON, that the subscribers to his JOURNAL may preserve a printed memorial of him. With this view, any communications which his subscribers, friends and correspondents, may choose to send to this office, will be gratefully received.

[Proceedings of the Rensselaer County Bar.]

AT a meeting of the Rensselaer County Bar, held at the court-house in the city of Troy, N. Y., on the 6th day of December, 1879, to take action relative to the death of ISAAC GRANT THOMPSON, Hon. Martin I. Townsend was chosen chairman and William Shaw secretary.

On motion the chair appointed E. L Fursman, Wm. H. Hollister, Jr., and Charles I. Baker, a committee to draft suitable resolutions, expressive of the sense of the meeting.

Said committee, through E. L. Fursman, chairman, presented the following memorial, which was unanimously adopted:

In the death of ISAAC GRANT THOMPSON, at the age of 39 years, the Bar of Rensselaer county has sustained an untimely and unexpected loss, and in a truer sense than that in which such words are usually employed, a loss which time cannot make good. Mr. THOMPSON was born, and passed most of his life, in our county, and for many years has conferred a peculiar honor and lustre upon this bar. Although possessed of talents and attainments which must have won for him a high standing at any bar, and by no means despondent of adequate success in the common practice of the profession, he relinquished the calling of the attorney and advocate at the age of 29, and struck out for himself a new and original path, in which he attained a world-wide eminence, and conferred upon his loved profession such useful and permanent obligations as entitle him to the singular affection, esteem and admiration, in which he was held by lawyers wherever the English language is spoken. In the establishment of the ALBANY LAW JOURNAL and the American Reports, and in the preparation of his numerous legal

treatises, he found his true vocation, and in devoting his life to legal authorship, reporting and journalism, he made himself a great power for good in the affairs of our profession. It is a source of pride to us, his surviving friends and brethren, to be able to say, as we think we may most truthfully say, that he established, and until his death, successfully conducted the best legal journal and the best series of legal reports ever known in this country and second to none in the world. It is also true that his text-books on "Provisional Remedies" and "Highways" are the most excellent of their kind. Mr. THOMPSON's position as editor of the ALBANY LAW JOURNAL brought him into correspondence and intercourse with the greatest minds of our profession, by whom his advice and co-operation were constantly sought, and who were warmly attached to him by ties of common intellectual gifts and common useful purposes. Mr. THOMPSON was thus, although young in years, a most distinguished and broadly influential lawyer, eminent in a field which he made his own by discovery, if not by conquest; a teacher of the great and learned profession, of which he unaffectedly regarded himself a very humble and unimportant member.

Removed as he thus was from common and familiar association with this Bar, some of us had still learned to know him intimately and love him for his shining virtues and amenities. We do not speak in phrases of conventional grief when we say that he was a man to be loved as much as to be admired. Scholarly and greedy of knowledge, he delved among his books; conscientious and faithful in labor, he discharged the arduous but secluded duties of his editorial occupation; shy and averse to public haunts, he spent his leisure in the circle of his fond family. But those who sought him, and to whom he unbosomed himself, found him the most genial and fascinating of companions, witty and eloquent of discourse, full of chivalrous and delicate consideration, his heart open to melting charity, his soul full of lofty and engaging ideas. His heart was as large as his brain. His nature was positive and uncompromising; his likes and dislikes were equally strong; but truly, he had charity for all, malice toward none. He must have had faults, being human, but it is difficult for those who knew him to recall them, and it may be said in all sincerity and moderation that his nature had no serious fault, his character no grave defect. His person was one of remarkable manly beauty, a fit casket for his brilliant intellect and his loyal soul.

When the grave closed on ISAAC GRANT THOMPSON, it shut from our sight, but not forever, we trust, a noble brother, whose benefactions survive him; whose life may be cited as an example of right endeavor and achievement; and whose memory we shall preserve with mingled joy and tears. Over most of his compeers he had this advantage, that his name was not writ in water. He achieved an honorable and lasting reputation among an exacting and critical profession, who will long remember his enlightening labors in their behalf. If it is for us who knew him well and lived face to face with him to declare that he possessed that better gift than intellect, that gift without which all men are small in the sight of their Creator, the gift of a pure, warm and generous heart, the heart of a little child, that leavened his thoughts, his passions, his delights, that made him loved among men and will present him blameless before God.

A communication was received from Hon. CHARLES R. INGALLS, one of the associate justices of the General Term of the Supreme Court, for the First Department of this State, as follows:

MR. CHAIRMAN - We regret that sickness prevents our attending the meeting of the members of the Bar of Rensselaer county, and there uniting with them in a tribute of respect to the memory of ISAAC GRANT THOMPSON, who has been so suddenly removed from us by death. He had just reached the meridian of

life. As we recall so many of our number whose
heads have grown white, their visages furrowed, and
their strength abated, by reason of the severe and long-
continued life struggle, the inquiry is naturally sug-
gested, why are these spared, and the young and stal-
wart called away? We should repress such specula-
tion, and accept these providences with the assurance
that God doeth all things well. ISAAC GRANT THOMP-
SON was a native of Rensselaer county - here he
studied and practiced law-and here originated and
matured those plans the execution of which has se-
cured to him, as an author and publisher, a world-
wide reputation. He was endowed by nature with
talents of a high order, and possessed a keen relish for
purely literary pursuits, which he voluntarily relin-
quished, in a great degree, for the sterner and more
practical duties of life. He was conscious of a power
within him, which, under proper culture, would
achieve results calculated to confer distinction upon
himself, and benefit mankind, and with an energy
rising almost to enthusiasm, he entered upon the ac-
complishment of such work. We recall his efforts in
preparing and presenting to the public his earlier
legal productions. We then had frequent interviews in
which he explained and discussed the subjects he was
engaged in examining, and the schemes he had de-
vised for the future, and which he subsequently so
successfully accomplished. We mention as an evi-
dence of his friendship, that he voluntarily honored
us, by inscribing in our name, his book entitled "Pro-
visional Remedies," which is one of the most useful
and reliable works which has been produced upon
that branch of the law. In his intercourse with
friends and the public, he was honest and honorable,
and never dissembled, nor did he indulge in fulsome
flattery, but his frank and kindly expression of coun-
tenance inspired confidence in the sincerity of his pro-
fessions of friendship and regard. In all the rela-
tions of life, as son, husband, parent, friend and citi-
zen, he was true to the instincts of a noble nature,
affectionate, generous, just and loyal. In life, he pro-
fessed unfaltering trust in Christ, and died in the con-
fident hope of a happy immortality. When we con-
template all that he accomplished, the books of which
he was the author, the law reports which he prepared
and published, and the crowning work of his life, the
ALBANY LAW JOURNAL, which he originated, and
conducted to complete success, and which has ex-
tended his name and fame to every land, where law
is recognized as a science, we feel a consciousness
that such results can only be attributed to a superior
intellect, supplemented by indomitable energy and
The Bar of Rensselaer county may
perseverance.
justly claim, with conscious pride, that he was their
own THOMPSON.

Remarks of R. A. PARMENTER, Esq.
Mr. CHAIRMAN -

The occasion which has brought together the members of the Rensselaer Bar to-day is but a repetition of the sorrowful events over which we have been called to mourn time and again. Death invades our little fraternity when least expected; and oft-times selects its victims apparently with a ruthless hand. Now the venerable practitioner full of years and crowned with professional honors is summoned to pass the terrible ordeal, and in quick succession, the strong man, lured with ambition and inspired with hope, must bow to the inexorable fiat; and still again, the young lawyer with a bright and prosperous career before him is suddenly stricken down, and he too passes to that "bourne whence no traveller returns." But here and now we are confronted with a double affliction. ISAAC GRANT THOMPSON and CHARLES W. PERKINS are numbered with the dead. Their manly forms and cultured minds are recollections of the past. We may revere, as doubtless we all do, their memory, but we cannot restore them to life again. "Dust to dust" is the epitaph which awaits each one

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