ELISHA MITCHELL SCIENTIFIC SOCIETY. 21 



metry of fungus spores. Few were the botanists with whom he 

 could compare specimens and interchange notes. He pursued this 

 specialty without the stimulus offered now by special societies, and 

 for the greater part of his career absolutely without an audience. 

 It is certain, therefore, that nothing but the intensest love of his 

 studies led him up to the highest station occupied by any American 

 botanist. I have heard him say, " Nothing surprised me more than 

 to be called a botanist at first. Although I had accomplished the 

 survey of the phenogamous plants of the State, I still felt that I was 

 comparatively not a botanist." But this modesty was habitual with 

 him. It was a modesty, however, not begotten of uncertainty, for 

 in all his work Dr. Curtis was accurate. If he spoke at all it was 

 always with the authority of the master. 



Shortly after Dr. Hawks' History of North Carolina appeared, Dr. 

 Curtis published in the University Magazine, (1860), "J. Commen- 

 tary on the Natural History of Dr. Hawks' History of North Caro- 

 lina.'''' This paper demonstrated the thorough knowledge Dr. Curtis 

 had obtained of the botany of the old travelers and explorers. Dr. 

 Hawks had drawn with too free a hand the wonders of our truly 

 wonderful forests and fields, and had been led away quite uncon- 

 sciously by the florid accounts of Hariot, and Amadas & Barlowe, 

 and Lawson. The analysis which Dr. Curtis made left but little of 

 the fabulous statement of the early chroniclers disproved, and 

 proved Dr. Hawks to have been but slightly informed about natural 

 history. This paper is an almost complete key to Lawson's History, 

 as far as the natural history items are concerned, although it is not 

 a continuous narrative. The circulation which the University Mag- 

 az ne had at the time was not large enough to overtake the natural 

 history errors of Hawks' History, and many of them are extant to 

 this day as traditions among the common people. 



It was during the war 1861—1865, that Dr. Curtis conceived the 

 idea of preparing a work on the Edible Fungi. The events which 

 led up to this .scientific essay, it may be well to narrate. Although 

 he was well acquainted botanically with fungi, he was not an avowed 

 mycophagist until somewhere about 1855. Before this he expressed 

 himself to Mr. Berkeley as being afraid of them, as he had grown 

 up with the common prejudices against them entertained by most 

 people in this country. Having occasionally read of fearful acci- 

 dents from their use, and there being abundance of other and 

 wholesome food obtainable, he felt no inclination to run any risks 

 in needlessly enlarging his bill of fare, and so he passed middle life 

 without having once even tasted a mushroom. But as his confidence 



