514 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Scientific aptitudes have to my knowledge appeared among the negroes 

 not infrequently. Among negroes who have actually achieved a degree of emi- 

 nence in scientific research are the late L. A. Willson, of Cleveland, Ohio; T. 

 McC. Stewart, Jr., of New York city; Frederick Hemmings, of Boston; and 

 Dr. S. C. Fuller, of Westboro', Mass. Dr. W. E. B. DuBois, of Atlanta Uni- 

 versity, has made two solid contributions to descriptive sociology, ' The Supres- 

 sion of the Slave Trade ' and ' The Philadelphia Negro.' Dr. Kelly Miller, of 

 Howard University, has made important mathematical researches. Professor 

 Hugh M. Browne, of Baltimore, is an eminent physicist. Professor George A. 

 Towns, of Atlanta, has written a valuable theory of aesthetics; Professor Ferris, 

 of Cambridge, is now engaged in writing a book on metaphysics. Our Professor 

 Carver, of Tuskegee, has done something in biology. There is frequently notice- 

 able among our students at Tuskegee the scientific attitude and spirit. (Litt., 

 April 6, 1902.) 



It should be added that Professor C. H. Turner has done important 

 work on fresh-water Crustacea. 



Of course the custom of classing as 'colored' all those who have any 

 negro blood makes it difficult to ascertain the possibilities of talent resi- 

 dent in the negro blood itself. I suppose that most of those above 

 mentioned are of mixed blood, but I have no exact information. 



Eeturning to our birth-statistics of zoologists, we may proceed to dis- 

 cuss the native-born. These people are the descendants of early immi- 

 grants who showed little or no scientific ability, doubtless for such rea- 

 sons as we have already discussed. The tremendous increase of intellec- 

 tual activity in Europe and America during the last century and 

 a half shows what possibilities may lie unsuspected in a people; for no 

 biologist can suppose that the stock itself has greatly changed in so 

 short a period. The same may be said concerning the recent intellectual 

 awakening of the Japanese, though no doubt these people formerly em- 

 ployed their minds in ways overlooked because unintelligible to Euro- 

 peans. It seems wonderful to us to-day to receive monthly an entomo- 

 logical journal printed in Japanese and to find some of the best work 

 in biology coming from natives of that country. Who knows but that 

 we ourselves, great as has been our progress, are capable like the Japa- 

 nese of yet other new births, into fields of intellectual activity hardly 

 yet suspected to exist ? 



I have classified the native-born zoologists by the states of their birth. 

 New York is easily in the lead, with Massachusetts a good second, Illi- 

 nois third, Ohio fourth, Connecticut fifth. The more prominent names 

 are as follows: 



New York. Beecher, Bigelow, Birge, Call, Casey, J. M. Clarke, 

 0. F. Cook, B. Dean, J. Dwight, Dyar, Elliot, Gill, B. S. Jordan, 

 Mearns, Merriam, G. S. Miller, Miss Eathbun, Shufeldt, Slingerland, 

 J. B. Smith, Walcott, Ward, Whitfield, Winchell, J. B. Woodworth. 



Massachusetts. J. A. Allen, Beal, Brewster, Dall, Felt, Hitchcock, 

 Lucas, C. D. Marsh, Minot, Scudder, Thayer, Thorndike, Williston. 

 How few of these are to-day identified with Massachusetts ! 



