Excerpt from Nathaniel Parker Willis The materials for a life of Willis are rich enough to be embarrassing. Most of his writ ings are, in a greater or less degree, autobio graphical; and it would be possible to make a very tolerable life of him, by arranging passages from these in the right order, and linking them together with a few paragraphs of cold facts. Then, he lived very much in the world's eye, and was constantly talked and written about, so that there is abundant mention of him in newspaper files, and in volumes of Recollec tions, etc., by his contemporaries. In addition to these printed sources, I have been furnished, by the kindness of Mrs. N. P. Willis, Miss J u lia Willis, and Mrs. Imogen Willis Eddy, with private letters, journals, and other ms. Memo randa by Willis, which extend from his school days at Andover down to a few weeks before. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.