OP ARTS AND SCIENCES. 529 



min Peirce and Joseph Lovering, he became accomplished in the 

 mathematics and in physics. Doctor Beck taught him Latin enough 

 for his purposes. Felton and Sophocles strove with him as to Greek, 

 and with Doctor Walker his relations were peculiarly intimate. He 

 long continued to look up to President Walker as to a counsellor and 

 guide. In the matter of rhetoric, he had the inestimable advantage 

 of Professor Chauning's drill. He was in contact also, to a certain 

 extent, with such teachers as Asa Gray, Jeffries Wyman, and Long- 

 fellow. . Incidentally, he obtained a good working knowledge of 

 French and German. 



It was by his mathematical studies more particularly that Cooke 

 acquired that habit of thinking clearly and reasoning closely which 

 distinguished him through life. To his academic training I attribute 

 also much of that power of stating his thoughts clearly and forcibly, 

 which made him one of the best teachers of his time. No matter 

 what objection a purely literary person may be moved to urge against 

 the use of the word " scholarship " as here applied, or what criticisms 

 may occur to any one as to the style or manner of the man, it will 

 still remain true that Professor Cooke's knowledge was ample and 

 assured. In many respects it was profound ! His reasoning was 

 always cogent and his language plain. 



I remember well the very favorable impression made by an address 

 which he delivered at the opening of the Harvard Medical School? 

 immediately after his appointment to a chair at that institution. 

 There had been murmurings in the land that one so young and so 

 inexperienced should have received the appointment. But they were 

 silenced then and there, absolutely and forever. 



There is, indeed, a certain note of distinction in many of Cooke's 

 writiuiTS, such as is all too rare in scientific literature. Several of his 

 memoirs might well be set before the laboratory student as models of 

 clear presentation of a subject, in the same sense that, at an earlier 

 time, we turned for such illustration to the writings of Gay-Lussac 

 and Thenard, of Dumas, Boussingault, and Berzelius. 



On looking beyond this immediate locality or centre, it will be seen 

 that there have been thus far, here in America, four great chemical 

 teachers ; the elder Silliman, Hare at Philadelphia, Draper in New 

 York, and Cooke at Cambridge ; and of these four Cooke undoubt- 

 edly deserves to be placed first and foremost, in view of the fact that 

 working and teaching chemists, trained by him, are scattered through- 

 out the land. Were it not for this circumstance, it might perhaps 

 justly be claimed that Draper's name should take precedence, because 



VOL. XXX. (n. S. XXII.) 34 



