Last Work. Final Honors 64*) 



tlic- time Smitli's address was published, Kunkcl's work on the aster 

 yellows was published m the Anicnccoi journdl of Botany, Miss 

 Goldstein's study of tobacco mosaic had appeared in the Bulletin 

 of the Toney Botiiniciil Clnh, and Miss Eckerson had a paper on 

 tomato mosaic in the Botanical Gazette. Smith read each, and 

 inserted a fcx^tnote reference to those, as well as other, studies not 

 mentioned in the main body of his address."'' 



Toward the end of the year 192'>, Dr. Smith had begun to suffer 

 at times from insomnia. More and more he reflected on the 

 possibility that his work might be nearing completion. '" What- 

 ever happens," he wrote, " life is good and I have had a long 

 and interesting stretch of it. In a month I shall be 72 [years of 

 age] and if I could sleep I should go on into the 80's, I believe. 

 How I should like to do it. There are so many interesting problems 

 almost within my grasp but then if I lived another 70 years the 

 same would be true. The arcana of the Universe are endless." ^'^ 

 On New Year's Eve, his thoughts had been retrospective: " For 

 us," he said, " it has been an eventful and happy year. In France, 

 in Germany, in Denmark, in Holland, in England, and then in our 

 home making it over inside and making a garden out of the dis- 

 reputable old side-hill back yard. May we have some joy in it 

 in the new year! " 



The year 1926 did bring far more than he hoped, a correspond- 

 ing membership in the Academy of Natural Sciences of Phila- 

 dephia, among other honors, near its close, an event replete with 

 lasting satisfaction took place. On December 29, at the eighteenth 

 annual meeting of the American Phytopathological Society, a 

 dinner of 195 covers at the Hotel Normandy in Philadelphia was 

 given in his honor. He was presented with a leather-covered 

 brochure, hand-engraved on parchment paper, containing 172 sig- 

 natures of members of the society and visiting pathologists. Its 

 dedicatory statement read: " To Erwin Frink Smith scientist, 

 linguist, poet, friend, who for forty years has devoted his life's 

 service to the broad field of pathology, in grateful appreciation we 

 the members of the American Phytopathological Societ}' dedicate 

 this testimonial." 



Dr. L. R. Jones spoke for the plant pathologists and he extolled 

 Smith 



"" Fifty years of Pathology, op. cit., 36. 

 ""Diary, Dec. 19, 1925. 



