“It is poignantly difficult, even to-day, years after what was to so many of us a very real tragedy,” says Reed, “to accept the fact that Marshall Newell is dead.  The ache is still as keen as on that Christmas morning when the brief news dispatches told us that he had been killed in a snowstorm on a railroad track at Springfield.  It requires no great summoning of the imagination to picture this fine figure of a man, in heart and body so like his beloved Berkshire oaks, bending forward, head down, and driving into the storm in the path of the everyday duty that led to his death.  It was, as the world goes, a short life, but a fruitful one—­a life given over simply and without questioning to whatever work or whatever play was at hand.

[Illustration:  MARSHALL NEWELL]

“To the vast crowds of lovers of football who journeyed to Springfield to see this superman of sport in action in defense of his Alma Mater he will always remain as the personification of sportsmanship combined with the hard, clean, honest effort that marks your true football player.  To a great many others who enjoyed the privilege of adventuring afield with him, the memory will be that of a man strong enough to be gentle, of magnetic personality, and yet withal, with a certain reserve that is found only in men whose character is growing steadily under the urge of quiet introspection.  Yet, for a man so self-contained, he had much to give to those about him, whether these were men already enjoying place and power or merely boys just on the horizon of a real man’s life.  It was not so much the mere joy and exuberance of living, as the wonder and appreciation of living that were the springs of Marshall Newell’s being.

“It was this that made him the richest poor man it was ever my fortune to know.

“The world about him was to Newell rich in expression of things beautiful, things mysterious, things that struck in great measure awe and reverence into his soul.  A man with so much light within could not fail to shine upon others.  He had no heart for the city or the life of the city, and for him, too, the quest of money had no attraction.  Even before he went to school at Phillips Exeter, the character of this sturdy boy had begun to develop in the surroundings he loved throughout his life.  Is it any wonder, then, that from the moment he arrived at school he became a favorite with his associates, indeed, at a very early stage, something of an idol to the other boys?  He expressed an ideal in his very presence—­an ideal that was instantly recognizable as true and just—­an ideal unspoken, but an ideal lived.  Just what that ideal was may perhaps be best understood if I quote a word or two from that little diary of his, never intended for other eyes but privileged now, a quotation that has its own little, delicate touch of humor in conjunction with the finer phrases: 

“’There is a fine selection from Carmen to whistle on a load of logs when driving over frozen ground; every jolt gives a delightful emphasis to the notes, and the musician is carried along by the dictatorial leader as it were.  What a strength there is in the air!  It may be rough at times, but it is true and does not lie.  What would the world be if all were open and frank as the day or the sunshine?’