SKETCH OF JOSEPH LEIDY. 687 



special duty was to report on the more important post-mortem exami- 

 nations made, and several of these reports, with beautiful illustrative 

 drawings, are published in the " Medical and Surgical History of the 

 War." 



In 1871 he was appointed Professor of Natural History in Swarth- 

 more College, a position which his natural aptitude for imparting sci- 

 entific information makes pleasant to him. 



Apart from the record of his intellectual activity there is but little 

 more to be stated regarding Dr. Leidy, for we are of the opinion that 

 in an article of this kind a eulogium would be out of place, although 

 in the present instance there is every temptation to write a warm one. 

 Since his election to his professorship in the University of Pennsyl- 

 vania, Dr. Leidy's life has been the placid one of the student. At the 

 earliest possible moment he had resolved to depend wholly on his own 

 efforts for a livelihood. The struggle had been severe, the work inces- 

 sant, and the success achieved at the early age of thirty years was due, 

 not at all to social or family influence, but solely to personal merit. 

 Since 1853 his published works have been his " footprints on the sands 

 of time," and it only remains to allude briefly to the more important 

 of these, and to his connection with an institution which in no small 

 degree has been instrumental in enabling him to secure his present 

 enviable position in the scientific world. 



In 1844 Dr. Amos Binney, who then contemplated the publication 

 of his superb work on the terrestrial air-breathing mollusks of the 

 United States, was desirous of employing an anatomist who was also 

 an artist, to dissect and draw the internal organs of the species to be 

 described. On the recommendation of Dr. Goddard, Dr. Leidy was 

 selected to take charge of the work. The result was the production of 

 sixteen plates, giving the anatomy of thirty-eight species of native 

 mollusks with a beauty of finish and accuracy of detail which have 

 never been excelled. Dr. Leidy afterward wrote the chapter of the 

 introduction entitled " Special Anatomy of the Terrestrial Mollusks of 

 the United States." 



Dr. Binney's intention, after the work had progressed sufficiently 

 to demonstrate the ability of the artist to render much higher service 

 than that of a mere draughtsman, was that Dr. Leidy should give a 

 complete anatomical and physiological description of the terrestrial gas- 

 teropoda of the United States, including the special and general anat- 

 omy, with the embryology of the several genera. Before the special 

 anatomy was completed, however, the death of Dr. Binney put a stop 

 to the work. Referring to Dr. Leidy's dissections and drawings, Dr. 

 Binney very justly remarks in his preface, " They constitute the most 

 novel and important accession to science contained in the work, and 

 are an honorable evidence of a skill and industry which entitle him to 

 a high rank among philosophical zoologists." 



Dr. Leidy's studies of the terrestrial gasteropods excited the atten- 



