1910.] NATURAL SCIENCES OF PHILADELPHIA. 267 



sparkling witticisms and apt repartee. They are frequently credited 

 by tradition with much more of that sort of achievement than they 

 were really responsible for. In this connection President Lincoln, 

 Emory Storrs, William B. Travers, Sam Ward and Paul B. Goddard 

 will be recalled as worthy successors of Tom Hood, Charles Lamb, 

 Sydney Smith and other historic humorists. In this class Nathaniel 

 Chapman was given a place by his own generation and his fame 

 endures to the present day, not only as an excellent teacher, but also 

 as a man of great personal charm, an exuberant vitality, and an acute 

 sense of humor. These qualities, transmitted to the son, were inherited 

 in full measure by the grandson, coming, indeed, from both father and 

 mother. It would not be hard to quote Dr. Chapman as the author of 

 many a dr 11 story and many a witty saying, always to the point and 

 without malice. These would, without doubt, add greatly to the interest 

 of this essay, but they would manifestly be out of place on the present 

 occasion as being irrelevant. One of his Bar Harbor friends tells 

 of his having once dissected an oyster in his laboratory, several 

 distinguished men of science being interested spectators. With- 

 out looking up, or interrupting the manipulation of his scalpel 

 for an instant, he told a story which was greeted with roars of laughter. 

 This was an experience quite familiar to those associated with Dr. 

 Chapman in his most serious scientific work, the character of which 

 was not, however, damaged by his joyous interludes. It must be 

 fresh in the recollection of many Academicians how the old library hall 

 would ring with hilarity on the occasions of his frequent visits. 



Nothing that was human was foreign to him ; he was on good terms 

 with all types of mankind except the Bore and the Sham. He would, 

 not unlikely, eat an abstemious lunch with Madame Bubble, but he 

 would certainly not devote a minute to the young woman whose name 

 was Dull. He might exchange opinions, if time permitted, with 

 Mr. Worldliwise, but he would frankly tell Mr. Facingbothways how he 

 regarded him, without thinking it worth while to wait for an answer. 

 As has been said of another, "it was his good fortune to be a man of 

 the world without being frivolous, and a man of science, without 

 being pedantic." 



Although Dr. Chapman's mental equipment was entirely devoid 

 of any recognition of authority except that which appealed to his 

 reason within the bounds of what he himself recognized as its limita- 

 tions, he was unalterably attached to the traditions and routine which 

 had, actively or passively, moulded his character, and he was as 

 intolerant as a Covenanter when his prejudices were combatted. In 



