530 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



and Brigliouse, in England ; then passing to the Continent, studied 

 the Alps and their glaciers. 



Being invited by Prof. E. L. Youmans to contribute to the 

 first volume of the Popular Science Monthly, he wrote for 

 it, after a special study on the spot, the article on The Past 

 and Future of Niagara. This was followed by two other 

 papers Have Plants a Pedigree ? and Progression and Retro- 

 gression. 



As side incidents of Prof. Gunning's career, we may mention 

 an experiment at orange cultivation in Florida, which, proving 

 unprofitable, lasted but a short time ; and services he rendered as 

 a mining expert in the Western Territories. 



As his religious views developed they became more and more 

 radical. The independence of thought which he showed in youth 

 when the subject of joining the church was mentioned was never 

 relaxed ; neither did the fervor of his religious feeling diminish. 

 He appears through his whole career as a devout believer in the 

 Creator and the spiritual life. He was much interested in the phe- 

 nomena of spiritualism and impressed by them, wrote much upon 

 the subject, and corresponded sympathetically with spiritualists. 

 He was a member of the Free Religious Association and a valued 

 contributor to The Index when Mr. Abbott and Mr. Underwood 

 were its editors, and afterward to The Open Court, and a paper 

 written by him in 1889 is believed to embody the earliest scientific 

 treatment of the phenomena of that category. In 1887 he deliv- 

 ered a course of Sunday lectures to the Unitarian Society of 

 Keokuk, Iowa. The military body of the city made him their 

 chaplain. An Ethical Society was organized there, of which he 

 served as pastor till January, 1888, when he removed to Greeley, 

 Colorado, hoping to find relief there from frequently recurring 

 attacks of bronchitis. He made an engagement with a Unitarian 

 Society in Greeley, but two addresses A Study of the Book of 

 Job, and The Whirling Flag, Dante's Inferno were all he was 

 able to make in fulfillment of it. His health had long been deli- 

 cate. A friend had warned him, in connection with his lectures 

 in Cincinnati, in the winter of 188G, that he was " mad " to continue 

 his labors in the existing condition of his health and in such 

 weather. Yet he stopped, on his way from Keokuk to Greeley 

 only two months before he succumbed to his disease to deliver a 

 course of lectures in Quincy, 111., which proved as acceptable as 

 any of the long series. Of Prof. Gunning's amiable personal 

 qualities all his friends speak in terms of warm enthusiasm. He 

 was conscious, self-reliant, and tranquil to the last. 



