his thirst for knowledge, and his laborious application to . his business, it was impossible for him to get up.

No man more thoroughly despised trickery in trade, and he used to remark-" No trade can be sound that is not beneficial to both parties; to the buyer as well as to the seller. A man may obtain a temporary advantage by selling an article for more than it is worth; but the very effect of such operations must recoil on him, in the shape of bad debts and increased risks." A person with whom he had some transactions, once boasted to him that he had, on one occasion, obtained an advantage over such a neighbor, and upon another occasion, over another neighbor; "and to-day," said he, "I have obtained one over you." "Well," said Mr. Lee, "that may be; but if you will promise never to enter my office again, I will give you that bundle of goat skins." The man made the promise, and took them. Fifteen years afterward, he walked into Mr. Lee's office. At the instant, on seeing him, he exclaimed: "You have violated your word; pay me for the goat-skins!" "Oh !" said the man, "I am quite poor, and have been very unfortunate since I saw you." "Yes," said Mr. Lee," and you always will be poor; that miserable desire for overreaching others, must ever keep you so."

Mr. Lee, for many years, resided at his country-seat in Bloomingdale. In the rage for speculations in real estate, he was importuned to sell his place; he named a price for it to a friend, who immediately purchased it; the sum was not the half of what he readily could have obtained. He was much annoyed by the remarks of gentlemen, who spoke to him on the subject. "I asked," said he, "for it, what it has cost me; it is all that the place is intrinsically worth, and I am satisfied. I have acquired what property I possess, in fair legitimate trade; I have no desire hereafter to be reproached with having participated in the speculations now going on. Some one must lose money by

them; it shall never be said any of it went into my pocket. In ten years time, and perhaps less, it will fall back to the price I have obtained for it."

In the year 1834, the memorable panic year, a report was put in circulation that his house had failed. In allusion to the report, he remarked: "I commenced business, when poor, on credit. I thrived by credit; and I hold it to be my duty to sacrifice my property down to twenty shillings in the pound, before that credit shall be dishonored. I have carried the lapstone, and I can do it again; but I will never suffer a promise of mine to be broken, while I have a shilling left that I can call my own."

Mr. Lee's devotion to business did not spring from the love of wealth; he had no ambition to be called a rich man. He set a proper and just estimate on the value of money, and desired it as a means, not as an end. His purse, even when he could but ill afford it, was ever open to the well-authenticated calls of charity; and to institutions intended to advance the progress of mind or morals of the people, he never turned a deaf ear. Few men in the community have extended to young men so liberal and sustaining a hand, or who have established so many in businessno petty jealousies in his trade-frequently remarking, "the more that can be supported by it, the better." He took great interest in collecting statistics, in bringing to bear upon his business the "science of trade," the experiments and investigations of philosophy. Political economy was his favorite study, and in all his operations he took large and comprehensive views, and in his deductions and conclusions looked rather to principles, the condition of the nation, its measure of value, its consumption and productive abilities; and by his circulars and lectures, disseminating the fruits of his experience, his studies, and speculations. Whatever he deemed worthy of reading, was well read; his books are filled with annotations and marginal

remarks; and he possessed that happy faculty of abstracting his mind from every other consideration, and bending all its energies to the subject which for the time engaged his attention. He seemed to have acquired a complete mastery in this particular, and without the least apparent effort could change it from one subject to another with the utmost facility. His perseverance in accomplishing whatever he undertook to perform, was most remarkable: no labor of detail or tediousness of research balked or stopped him, and he rarely failed in arriving at the result he wished. Much of his success flowed from the pertinacity with which he prosecuted his plans; his order, system, division of time, and allotment of labor and exercise. Each day's work, as far as practicable, was planned the preceding one. In fact, he made "life a business," every hour having its appropriate duties; and he so lived that each night found him with the business of the day finished. His correspondents were punctually answered, his papers regularly filed, and his accounts (even with the day laborers on his estate) posted up to the evening preceding his last illness, every article in its proper place, and a place for every thing. Without this system and regularity, indeed, he could have accomplished but a tithe of his projects.

Another feature which marked Mr. Lee's character, was punctuality in his attendance at the time and place. For many years he rarely failed arriving at his office at the appointed instant, and departing from it also at the appointed instant; and in his engagements with others, they never found him either absent or behind the time. An hour lost was prodigality.

In his dying charge to his sons, he enjoined them always to "fill up the measure of time." "Be," said he, "always employed profitably in doing good, in building up; aim to promote the good of yourselves and of society; no one can

do much good without doing some harm, but you will do less harm by striving to do good; be industrious, be honest." These were the last intelligible words he uttered, and were as characteristic as they were worthy of him.

Of one who thus lived, it will create no surprise to be informed that he was prepared to die. Death did not find him a reluctant or unwilling voyager to his dark domains. At his beckoning he laid down his plans and cares with cheerfulness and pious resignation to the Divine will, and sank with calm dignity to his last repose, with a grateful heart for all the blessings and mercies he had experienced. "Mountains," said he, with expressive energy, "mountains of mercy have been piled on me." And in reply to the question, "Are you willing to go?" "Yes," said he, "yes: I should like to stay with you a little longer, to finish some work begun; but if it is the pleasure of God that I should die now, I am ready to go." He died full of faith and hope in the promises of his Redeemer.

The lamp of life of such men can not be extinguished without casting around a gloom; their absence from society creates a void that must be ever felt. They may leave no blazing reputation to dazzle or astonish, but they leave one that distributes its warning and invigorating influences wherever virtue has a friend, or philanthropy an advocate.

WALTER RESTORED JONES.

THE business of Marine Insurance in this country, and especially in the city of New York, as to its utility and value, and the great profits consequent upon its able administration, has been pretty thoroughly tested for the last quarter of a century, in the history and great success of the Atlantic Mutual Insurance Company. Confessedly at the head of all associations of the kind in this country, and owing very much of its past good fortune to the able direction and management of its late president, it seems but fitting, that as its former head-almost its creator-and as identified with it from the start-its history being comprised in that of Mr. Jones-some permanent record should be preserved of the life, labors, and character of so valuable and public-spirited an officer.

Immediately consequent upon his decease, it is true, warm and appreciative notices appeared in the various journals, and eulogistic while at the same time discriminating resolutions were adopted by all the important public bodies of trade and finance in Wall-street-as, for example, by the Board of Underwriters, at a meeting of the merchants in the Exchange, and the Chamber of Commerce. Two meetings connected with the company, the one of the clerks, and the other especially of the trustees, ought not to be omitted; for at the latter, among the resolutions, occurs one drawn up by one who knew Mr. Jones well, and judged him accurately, which we are happy to quote as the justest character of the deceased which we have read:

"Resolved, That, by his careful adherence to the modes