MEMOIR. 



hope to this appointment, wliich he finally received in 1801, 

 on the death of Mr. Peirce. It would also appear that he 

 found the librarianship attractive for its own sake, and not 

 (as it was perhaps viewed by some of his friends) as a step- 

 ping-stone toward a professorship of Natural History. Be 

 this as it may, he accepted the post, and held it during the 

 remaining twenty-five years of his life. 



No doubt he looked forward with delio-ht to the chancre. 

 The librarian's salary was low, but the dignity and perma- 

 nence of the new post must have appeared in agreeable 

 contrast to the struggle for life of a country physician, 

 whose very acquirements as a naturalist may have impeded 

 his professional career. Then the methodical and accurate 

 habits of Dr. Harris promised to make the daily routine of 

 duty agreeable ; he had a genuine love of antiquarian re- 

 search, though always kept under by the greater attractions 

 of natural science ; and he might reasonably hope for many 

 books and some leisure. In both he was disappointed ; of 

 leisure he had almost none, and of books no liberal supply. 

 The library at the time of his accession numbered but about 

 thirty thousand volumes, though he left it swelled to sixty- 

 five thousand. Its means of increase were then, as now, 

 very small, and the great cost of works on natural history 

 precluded much investment in that direction. 



Dr. Harris was appointed ere long to a quasi-scientific post 

 in the college, in addition to his librarianship. The profes- 

 sorship of Natural History was at this time vacant for want 

 of funds, and Dr. A. A. Gould gave, until 18-)7, an annual 

 course of lectures on this subject to the senior class. On his 

 resignation. Dr. Harris took his place, and had charge of that 



