MEMOIR. XV 



study of insects." " My leisure moments," he adds, " are 

 principally employed in collecting and preserving such as I 

 can discover, in order to replenish my cabinet of duplicates." 

 For this reason, and from pecuniary anxieties, it is evident 

 that he was quite ready to contemplate a change of resi- 

 dence. For instance, when Prof. Hentz was about taking a 

 professorship in an Alabama university, Dr. Harris was 

 evidently not indisposed to go with him. He wrote March 

 25, 1829: 



" As to the intimation respecting a professor's chair, I can but repeat 

 what I once mentioned, that my qualifications are not adequate; but if 

 the climate should admit, I could prepare myself for the department of 

 obstetrics or materia medica. Some experience for ten years in the 

 former, and my knowledge of botany, and necessary acquaintance with 

 the manipulation of drugs, would not render it difficult to attain, in a 

 short time, a tolerable knowledge of either of these branches." 



Two months later (June 5, 1829) he wrote to the same 

 friend : 



" I am very desirous to learn the issue of your contemplated change of 

 place. Such are the embarrassments and anxieties of my present situa- 

 tion, that your hints in regard to myself would receive serious consid- 

 eration; especially if the climate, the professional department and the 

 emolument should coincide with my wishes. You may not know that 

 my friends endeavored, some time ago, to procure for me an appoint- 

 ment as librarian at Harvard University, a situation which would have 

 suited me exactly ; but unfortunately the place was pre-engaged." 



This refers, doubtless, to the appointment of Mr. Ben- 

 jamin Peirce to the librarianship in 1826. It would appear 

 from this that Dr. Harris had for some time looked with 



