PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 41 



be expected from one who lived a century and a half before Lin- 

 naeus, but if we keep in mind the condition of zoology at that day 

 we can but be pleased with the fullness of his narrative. 



He collected the names of twenty-eight species of mammals, 

 twelve of these, including the black bear, the gray squirrel, the cony 

 or hare, the otter, and the possum and raccoon, {Saquentickot and 

 A/aq/foxuoc) , he saw, beside the civet cat or skunk, which he ob- 

 served by means of another sense. He was the first to distinguish 

 the American from the European deer, stating that the former 

 have longer tails, and the snags of their horns look backward — 

 a brief diagnosis, but one which was not replaced by a better one 

 for nearly two centuries. 



Of birds he collected the names of eighty-six " in the countrie 

 language," and had pictures drawn of twenty-five. He mentions 

 turkevs, stockdoves, partridges, crows, herons, and in winter, 

 great store of swans and geese. 



With aquatic animals he seems to have been well acquainted. 

 He refers to some by English names, and to many others which 

 had no names Wk but in the countrey language." In the plates 

 accompanying the first edition of his book are figured several 

 familiar forms, then for the first time made known in Europe, 

 among them the gar pike {Lepidosteus) ,* and the horse shoe 

 or king crab {Limidus) ,\ " Seekanauk, a kinde of crustie shell 

 fishe which is good meate, about a foot in breadth, having a crus- 

 tie tayle, many legges like a crabbe, and her eyes in her back." 



* Subsequently referred to by Champlain in 1613, and Sagard in 1636, 

 under the name chaousarou, and figured by Champlain on his map of 

 Nouvclle France. Creuxin in his History of Canada, 1664, also men- 

 tions it. 



fit has been generally supposed that Champlain was the first to notice 

 this characteristic American animal, and Slafter, in his notes upon Cham- 

 plain's works, [Publications of the Prince Society, Cham f lain 's Voyages, 

 vol. ii, p 87,] makes a statement to that effect, and is followed by Hig- 

 ginson in his History of the United States. Actually, the French ex- 

 plorer did not observe it until twenty years after Harriott, and his account 

 of it was not printed until 1613. 



