Melanethon Whelpley, of New-York, subsequently pastor of the Presbyterian church in Wall-street, by whom he was prepared for college. He was admitted to the Sophomore class of Columbia College, in October, 1812, after a private examination. At this institution, where the dead languages are taught with an exactness not common in the American schools, he continued to pursue with zeal and success, the study of the authors of antiquity, especially the poets, whom he read with a true and strong relish of their beauties. Hence, in classical learning, he did not become a mere anceps syllabarum, although in the department of philology he was by no means deficient, but early learned to apply to the works of the ancients the rules of a liberal and comprehensive criticism. Perhaps it should be mentioned as somewhat remarkable, that he mastered the various branches of mathematics, taught at Columbia College, with the same ease and the same readiness of comprehension as his favorite classics. He never, however, it is believed, recurred to these studies, and the success with which he has pursued them, is a proof rather of a capacity than an inclination for acquiring them.
About a year after his matriculation, he set on foot, in 1814, in conjunction with his friend, the late Rev. James W. Eastburn, and others, a literary periodical, entitled "The Moralist," of which one number only was published. In February of the next year, a similar work was undertaken by the same association, with better success. It was entitled "Academic Recreations," and continued in existence as long as many very respectable magazines have done in this country, namely, to the end of the year. To this work Mr. Sands was a large contributor, both in prose and verse. He was always fond of the occupation, or rather the pastime of composition, for such it was to him. He wrote with incredible facility; his pen was as fluent, and hesitated as little, as the tongue of the most accomplished debater, and he possessed a variety and an affluence of allusion, that gave to his unpremeditated essays the air of being the fruit of special study for the occasion.
He was graduated in 1815, and soon after entered his name as a student at law in the office of David B. Ogden, Esq., of New-York. It might naturally be supposed, that one so much addicted to the pursuit of elegant literature, would find little attraction in the study of our jurisprudence. The fact, however, seems to have been different. Mr. Sands delighted, as a mental exercise, in fathoming the abstruse doctrines and fol-
