SKETCH OF CHARLES A. LE SUEUR. 549 



only as a reason for printing the most valuable of original docu- 

 ments concerning Le Sueur. This is a personal letter from the 

 late Prof. Richard Owen, whose early life was spent at New Har- 

 mony, and who was my predecessor in the chair of Biology in the 

 University of Indiana. 



Prof. Owen writes as follows under date of December 14, 188G : 



"Charles A. Le Sueur was, when I knew him in 1828, about 

 fifty to fifty-five years of age, tall, rather spare in muscle, but 

 hardy and enduring. He permitted his beard to grow, which at. 

 that time was quite unusual ; hence he sometimes platted it and 

 tucked it almost out of sight when he went from home. In New 

 Harmony he usually went barenecked, often bareheaded, and in 

 summer occasionally barefooted, or at least without socks. His 

 hair had been dark, but was sprinkled (as well as his beard) with 

 gray. His manner and movements were quick ; his fondness for 

 natural history (as it was then called) led him to hunt and fish a 

 good deal. 



" In summer he was fond of swimming in the Wabash, and I 

 frequently accompanied him. He instructed me how to feel with 

 my feet for Unios and other shells as we waded sometimes up to 

 our necks in the river or ponds, searching to add to our collec- 

 tions. When he went fishing with others he always exchanged 

 his fine common fishes for the smallest and to them most indiffer- 

 ent-looking, when he recognized some new species or even variety. 

 This item I have from Mr. Sampson, who is well acquainted with 

 the fish of the Wabash, but who confesses he could see no differ- 

 ence in many caught until Mr. Le Sueur, who at once detected 

 that difference, had pointed it out. 



" He was temperate and active in all his habits, smoking being 

 the only objectionable habit in which he indulged. His temper 

 was quick and used to call out an occasional " God bless my soul ! " 

 the only approach to anything like irritation that he evinced ; he 

 was very kind-hearted. 



" In conversation with Agassiz about Mr. Le Sueur, the great 

 Swiss ichthyologist paid a high compliment to Le Sueur's acquire- 

 ments in that department, considering him then (as I inferred) 

 the next best to himself at that time in the United States. He 

 was, however, I judge, remarkably conversant with other branches 

 of biology, inasmuch as nearly all the magnificent drawings he 

 had made when left in New Holland (as it was then called) were 

 mammals, chiefly the ornithorhynchus, echidna, and other rare 

 animals. In showing his drawings he generally offered a lens, 

 that you might see every hair distinctly delineated. 



" He was a magnificent artist, good alike in drawing and color- 

 ing. I have some of his sketches yet, in which, when I was taking 

 drawing lessons from him, he showed me how to outline, for in- 



