290 Naturalist at Large 



who is doing so to this day.^ He, I think, take it by and 

 large, is the most erudite person I have ever known. Lat- 

 terly my connection with the Fairchild Tropical Garden 

 in Florida has been a joy. It not only gave me the oppor- 

 tunity to visit David and Marian Fairchild for long periods 

 of time, to install the Palm Products Museum at the Gar- 

 den, but to add Bob and Nell Montgomery to the list of 

 well beloved. Their superb collection of palms and other 

 plants in southern Florida I have been proud to add to in 

 a little way from time to time; a trifling recompense for 

 the hospitality they have offered me. 



To this record I want to add the importance to me and 

 to the Museum of the wise council and generous assistance 

 of my colleagues George Agassiz and George Shattuck, 

 members of the Museum's Governing Board. And let me 

 add this observation here right now and say that it is dif- 

 ficult for me to describe the sensations almost of triumph 

 which I have felt when each one of George Nelson's su- 

 perbly mounted fossils has been added to what formerly 

 was one of the most insignificant collections in the 

 Museum. 



Two keys I have had which have opened the doors to 

 more happiness than most of those on my bulky key ring. 

 One opened the doors of 800 i6th Street in Washington, 

 where Mrs. Hay and later Jim and Alice Wadsworth made 

 many trips to the Capital, which would have otherwise 

 been dreary chores, pure delights, the memories of which 

 still remain fresh and clear. The same may be said of the 

 key to 1720 I Street, where my wife's cousins, Wendell and 



^He died after these lines were written February 28, 1943. 



