George Ticknor, Life, letters and journals of George Ticknor
George Hillard, Ed.

[360] action of public opinion than such a body could produce. It was, also, what was foreseen as probable at the meeting at Dr. Ware's, and what Mr. Norton had long thought desirable. The committee, therefore, was appointed at the regular meeting of the Overseers, held the next day, July 24, 1823. . . . . A committee of the Corporation, consisting of the President, Mr. Prescott, and Mr. Otis, was appointed, July 25, to confer with this committee of the Overseers, as had been requested by the vote of the Overseers. . . . . They had many meetings, some which lasted a whole day. If ever a subject was thoroughly discussed, they discussed this one thoroughly. When Judge Story had drawn up his report, he sent it to the President, with whom it remained above two months, and who returned it without desiring any alteration, or suggesting any from any other person.

This report was discussed June 1, 1824, and another committee appointed (J. Lowell, Chairman) to inquire, and report further details, as the Overseers were evidently not sufficiently informed about the state of the College. . . . . . The result of the whole was, that the resident teachers again declared themselves against all but very trifling changes. The Overseers, however, after a very long discussion, passed the greater changes unanimously, and these greater changes, having been digested into the shape of laws by the Corporation, are now the basis on which the College rests, and which I undertook to explain and defend in my review, or pamphlet¹. . . . That the opinion of a majority of the resident teachers has not been followed, is true; that they have not been kindly and respectfully consulted at every step, in making up the final result, is obviously a mistake; but that any one, except the teachers, or rather a part of the teachers, at Cambridge, thinks this result wrong or unwise, I have not yet heard. The general opinion, indeed, has seldom been so unanimous on any important point, that had been so much discussed, and, taking the whole body of instructors,—resident and non-resident,—there is a majority strongly the same way.

Mr. Ticknor, and those who acted with him, had thus far addressed themselves only to the responsible official bodies having charge of the interests of the College; but when, in June, 1825, the changes they desired received the sanction of both the