XXVI MEMOIR. 



occasion for enthusiasm, and it seemed the climax of his life 

 when he found for the first time, on August 5, 1840, the 

 larvae of the southern butterfly, Papilio Philenor, on a shrub 

 in the Botanic Garden. 1 He had previously written of it to 

 Hentz (Feb. 18, 1838), "this insect must belong to a type 

 of which there is no other in the United States." I very 

 well remember that he gave me one of his few specimens, 

 and when I deposited the lovely butterfly in the cabinet of 

 the Harvard Natural History Society, I felt as if I had 

 founded a professorship. 



But the zeal of Dr. Harris was not confined to entomol- 

 ogy it extended to all branches of zoology and to botany 

 too. Indeed this was his favorite study next to that of in- 

 sects, and he left in manuscript an elaborate monograph of 

 the natural order Cucurbitacese. I remember the perennial 

 eagerness with which he urged upon us, each spring, to re- 

 discover the Corallorhiza verna in a certain field near the 

 Observatory. It had been found there once, and once only, 

 by my classmate, Dr. Woodward. It had certainly been found 

 and yet it seemed improbable that it should have been 

 found, and it never was found again and Dr. Harris's eyes 

 would always kindle when the little flower was mentioned, 

 and he would ponder, and debate, and state over and over 

 again the probabilities and improbabilities, and discuss the 

 possibility of some error in the precise location, and draw 

 little plans of that field and the adjoining fields, and urge 

 us on to the pursuit or cheer us when drooping and defeated, 

 until it seemed as if the quest after the Holy Grail was a 



1 See p. 147 following. 



