36 BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. 



ville brought to its shores this sturdy company of pioneers, who, 

 by their sojourn on this side of the Atlantic, prepared the way for 

 the great armies of immigrants who were to follow. 



It was also the anniversary of an important event in the history 

 of science, for among the colonists was THOMAS HARRIOTT 

 — the first English man of science who crossed the Atlantic. His 

 name is familiar to few, save those who love the time-browned 

 pages and quaint narrations of Hakluyt, Purchas, and Pinkerton ; 

 yet Harriott was foremost among the scholars of his time — the 

 Huxley or the Stokes of his day — a man of wide culture, a skillful 

 astronomer, a profound mathematician, the author of a standard 

 treatise upon algebra, and a botanist, zoologist, and anthropolo- 

 gist withal. "He had been the mathematical instructor of Ra- 

 leigh, and in obeying this summons to go forth upon the present 

 expedition, gave to it." says Anderson, "the most valuable aid 

 which could be derived from human strength." * 



This eminent man deserves more than a passing notice on this 

 occasion, and I have taken pains to bring together all that is known 

 about him. He was born at Oxford in 1560, or as old Anthony 

 Wood quaintly expresses it. "he tumbled out of his mother's 

 womb into the lap of the Oxonian muses." and. at an early age, 

 was entered as a scholar in St. Mary's Hall, receiving his bache- 

 lor's degree in 1579. He was soon received into Raleigh's family 

 as his instructor in mathematics, and, at the age of twenty-five, 

 made his voyage to America. 



After his return he was introduced by Raleigh to Henry Percy, 

 Earl of Northumberland, one of the most munificent patrons of 

 science of that day, who allowed him a pension of £120 a year. 

 "About the same time." we are told, "Hues, well known 

 by his 'Treatise upon the Globes, 't and Walter Warner, who is 

 said to have given Harvey the first hint concerning the circu- 

 lation of the blood, being both of them mathematicians, received 



* Anderson: History of the Church of England in the Colonies, p. So. 

 f Tractatus de Globis, etc., 1611 . 



