340 EBEN NORTON HORSFORD. 



gave his evidence honorably, agreeably to the facts and scientific 

 precedents. In this his example is worthy of imitation, and suggestive 

 as to whether it would not be an improvement in the present prac- 

 tice if like men should be retained by the court rather than by the 

 contestants. 



In private life Mr. Francis was honest, sympathetic, neighborly, not 

 hasty in forming or giving opinions, but always consistent and decided, 

 liberal, a good citizen and Christian gentleman, contributing largely 

 to the honor and welfare of the city, whose memory will be long and 

 gratefully preserved by its inhabitants. 



1893. W. E. Worthen. 



EBEN NORTON HORSFORD. 



Eben Norton Horsford was born on July 27, 1818, at Moscow, 

 Livingston County, New York. His father, Jerediah Horsford, 

 sprung from an old New England stock, came from Charlotte, Ver- 

 mont, and settled at Moscow as a missionary to the Seneca Indians. 

 His mother, whose maiden name was Charity Maria Norton, came 

 from Goshen, Connecticut, and traced her descent from Thomas 

 Norton of Guildford and John Mason, the famous captain in the 

 Pequot war. She was a woman of strong intellectual tastes, and 

 remarkable for her public spirit, shown by the fact that, after reading 

 her books, she made of them a sort of free circulating library for 

 the benefit of her neighbors in what was then a wild and primitive 

 region. 



Amid such surroundings at home it was not strange that the boy 

 grew up with strong scholarly tastes, and was known to his playmates 

 as a marvel of general information. It is interesting to note that a 

 favorite amusement was collecting the fossils which abounded on his 

 father's farm, as this recreation of his boyhood undoubtedly turned 

 his thoughts toward the natural sciences, to which so large a part of 

 his manhood was devoted, while at the same time his early association 

 with the Seneca Indians, who flocked to his father's house in large 

 numbers, familiarized him with Indian words and pronunciation, and 

 thus paved the way for the philological and archaeological studies of 

 his older years. 



In his education away from home, the most important influence 

 was Mrs. Jared Wilson, the wife of the teacher of the Livingston 

 County School, where he passed the years from thirteen to sixteen, 

 his earlier education having taken place in the schools of the district. 



