Miscellaneous. 419 



may hereby be added to nomenclature ; but this independent course 

 is the only one to be pursued under existing circumstances." — Ex- 

 tract of a Letter from Dr. T. W. Harris of Harvard University, to 

 Mr. E. Doubleday. 



OBITUARY. 



On the 23rd of November, at the Cavalry Barracks, Leeds, at the 

 early age of 25, Daniel Cooper, Esq., Assistant- Surgeon to the 17th 

 Lancers, (which regiment he had only joined about two months,) of 

 a sudden attack of phlebitis (inflammation of the veins). Although 

 death is the heir-loom of mortality, and the terminus of all earthly 

 beings, yet such is the frailty and short-sightedness of our nature, 

 that we are apt to view its effects in some cases with more commi- 

 seration than in others, and conclude that the period of bereavement 

 is most distant, -when it is within a few short hours of arriving. We 

 see individuals in mature life, and aged labourers in the field of 

 science, removed from amongst us with a sort of feeling that such 

 is the ordinary course of nature ; but when those in the spring-time 

 of their existence, whose fondest hopes and anxious expectations ap- 

 pear just upon the point of being realized, — whose early labours and 

 projected investigations to ensure honourable distinctions at future 

 periods are so suddenly blighted and snatched away, — we feel ut- 

 terly unable to comprehend the inscrutable dispensations of Provi- 

 dence, though so constantly reminded of the mutability of everything 

 human, and are left to console ourselves with the cherished hope 

 that the labours of the wise and good will not be in vain, nor their 

 example without influence ; but as they depart hence others of like 

 mind will step into their place, and the cause of science and know- 

 ledge continue to advance, notwithstanding the successive removals 

 of its ardent and lamented supporters. The decease of our contri- 

 butor and friend Mr. Cooper forcibly illustrates these observations : 

 from his earliest years he had been zealously devoted to scientific 

 investigations, but cultivated more especially botany and concho- 

 logy; soon after the formation of the Microscopical Society of 

 London, he originated and conducted the Microscopic Journal, in 

 which he was latterly joined by Mr. Busk, of the Hospital Ship, 

 Dreadnought. Mr. Cooper was a Member of the Royal College of 

 Surgeons, of the Microscopical and Botanical Societies of London, 

 and Associate of the Linnsean Society ; formerly Assistant in the 

 Zoological Department of the British Museum ; Lecturer on Botany 

 at the Theatre of Anatomy and Medicine, Webb Street, Borough ; 

 Curator of the Botanical Society ; author of the ' Flora Metropoli- 

 tan/ &c. His amiable disposition, gentlemanly deportment, and 

 readiness to afford assistance to any one engaged in practical investi- 

 gations, endeared him to all who had the pleasure of his acquaint- 

 ance, and most to those who knew him best. He attended a review 

 on the 18th, was a corpse on the 23rd, and was interred with mili- 

 tary honours on the 28th inst. 



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