REPORT OF THE COUNCIL. 



Since the Annual Meeting of the 10th of May, 1893, the 

 Academy has lost by death eleven members ; — five Fellows, 

 Moses Gerry Farmer, Hermann August Hagen, Henry War- 

 ren Paine, Francis Parkman, and Henry Warren Torrey ; and 

 six Foreign Honorary Members, Pierre Joseph Van Beneden, 

 Charles Edward Brown-Sequard, Benjamin Jowett, Jean 

 Charles Galinard de Marign&c, Charles Merivale, and Sir 

 James Fitz James Stephen. 



RESIDENT FELLOWS. 



MOSES GERRISH FARMER. 



Moses Gerrish Farmer was born in Boscawen,New Hampshire, 

 in 1820. In his youth he had strong predilections towards scientific 

 matters, and displayed some ability as a mathematician and as a musi- 

 cian, being able to play with skill upon the organ and some other instru- 

 ments. In 1837 he was sent to Phillips Academy, where it seems he 

 did as so many others having marked ability are reported to have done 

 at school, namely, chosen to do something else than what was required 

 of them, and here he was admonished that he was " disappointing the 

 best hopes of his friends." He contrived, however, to enter Dartmouth 

 College in 1840, but left before completing the college course. He 

 began teaching at Elliot, Maine, and soon after had charge of the Bel- 

 knap School in Dover, New Hampshire, where he remained until 1847. 

 He became interested in electrical phenomena in 1845, and from that 

 time on he devoted himself to enlarging the sphere of electrical indus- 

 tries, and in perfecting the apparatus employed. It is to be remembered 

 that the first telegraphic line was built and operated in 1844, and on 

 its success being demonstrated its development was very rapid, and 

 Farmer became an operator and inspector in 1847, moving to South 



