MEMOIR. XIX 



and even measurements, to the fraction of an inch. Then 

 there are three manuscript volumes containing an index to 

 the four volumes of Cramer's " Papillons Exotiques "; one 

 dev.oted to Stoll's " Supplement," and two to Hiibner's " Ex- 

 otische Schmetterlinge." For Drury's " Illustrations of Nat- 

 ural History" there are two of these elaborate indices, made 

 at different periods ; one based on the original edition in 

 1770-3, and the other on Westwood's reprint of 1837. So 

 beautifully executed is all this laborious work, that it is still 

 as easily accessible as print, though the earlier sheets are 

 yellow and torn. The Natural History Society thus possesses 

 not merely the results of Dr. Harris's researches, but the 

 very tools which he himself forged for their prosecution. 



This immense preliminary labor always brings with it some 

 compensation to the isolated explorer, in the thorough drill 

 it implies. " Writing maketh an exact man." But the per- 

 son who will undertake such labor is generally exact by 

 nature, and Dr. Harris, at any rate, needed no such drudg- 

 ery to fit him for the higher work of science. Yet there is 

 an inestimable moral in his labor for our younger generation 

 of savans, and the saying of Rivarol that " genius is only 

 great patience," had never a better illustration. 



In this destitution of books and cabinets, there was an- 

 other compensation which gave to Dr. Harris a more prac- 

 tical satisfaction. The conditions of a new country, implying 

 these drawbacks, imply also a great wealth of material. In 

 older countries it is rare to discover a new species ; it is 

 somethina; to detect even a new habitat. But these lonelv 

 American entomologists seem, as one reads their correspond- 

 ence, like so many scientific Robinson Crusoes, each with 



