"While principal of the school at Salem he, for several years, was the editor-in-chief of the 'Massachusetts Teacher,' performing gratuitous labors which were highly appreciated by the teachers of Massachusetts and of other States.
"Having traveled through the Southern States, that he might gain a better knowledge of his own country before he went abroad, he became deeply impressed with the iniquities of slavery, and dropped readily into the ranks of the abolitionists. He was intensely interested in all the discussions and phases of freedom, from Adams's 'Right of Petition' crusade down to the day of his death. His patriotism during the war was full and glowing. The political disquisitions in his 'Right Way,' which he edited for a year, upon the question of reconstruction, were keen and convincing. He also published a series of elementary lessons for teaching the freed-men of the South to read.
"During all these years, after leaving his professorship, he was building other educational books besides his Greek Grammar--'Xenophon's Anabasis,' 'Eclogæ Latinæ,' 'Lessons in Geometry,' a 'Greek Lexicon' for his Anabasis, and, last, 'Explanatory Notes to the Anabasis,' which he had nearly ready for the press when death closed his labors.
"The heart of Professor Crosby was full of love for everybody and every creature of God. He drank deeply at every spring whence flowed charity, benevolence, freedom, and patriotism. He remained to his death a member of an orthodox church, but, during the last years of his life, he worshipped with Christians of other denominations, having softened his early faith by a more liberal trust in the boundless love and mercy of God, his Heavenly Father.
"In his association with teachers of every class, he showed himself a friend to all. His geniality of manner, his pleasant words, his sympathizing spirit, his overflowing desire to make others happy, his seemingly inexhaustible knowledge, and his intelligent and ever-courteous discussion of controverted questions in education, morals, and religion, secured for him the warm affection and deep respect of all who were privileged to know him."
Mr. Collar, of the Roxbury Latin School, says:
"Professor Crosby belonged not to Massachusetts alone, but to all New England--to the whole land. Our country is poorer by the loss of an eminent scholar, one of that small band of classical scholars in America who are known and honored at foreign seats of learning. In the latest, freshest, and most original Greek grammar that I am acquainted with, that by Professor Clyde, of Edinburgh, the author acknowledges his obligations to four distinguished scholars, three Europeans, and one American, and the American is Professor Crosby."