Page:Appreciations of Horace Howard Furness.djvu/42

 34 his indebtedness to his father, to 'the hand whose cunning ninety years have not abated.' In the preface to the revised edition of Macbeth, published in 1903, he recorded his indebtedness to his son, to the younger hand which had been intrusted with the work, and had accomplished it so deftly. When Dr. Furness died in August, his last volume, Cymbeline, was fast approaching completion. It will be published in mid-winter, just as he left it, the fifteenth play of his editing; and with it will appear Julius Cæsar, the third play edited by Mr. Horace Howard Furness, Jr. A monument of scholarship, a verdict, final for many years to come, a rich mine for possible successors.

For Dr. Furness always maintained that he would have many followers in the field of Shakespearean research, that, in the future, other students would do his work over again, and do it differently. He was content to be a step of the ladder, and he knew better than most men that 'the labour we delight in physics pain.' The beauty of his surroundings, the magnitude and perfection of his library, the honors done him by English and American universities, the close companionship of his third son, Dr. William Henry Furness, intrepid traveler and explorer,—these things lent dignity and relish to his life. He lived it bravely and mirthfully; he stood ready to lay it down without regret.

Six weeks before his death, being then in