FRANCIS IHMI'IIHKYS STOKKH. 117 



In 1S()9, Cliarlcs AV. Kliot hccamo President of IIiir\ar(l l^iiivcrsity, 

 and one of the iir.st subjects to wliicli lie gave attention was the innne- 

 diate establisliment of the Bussey Institution, for wliieli larj^e funds 

 had been accunudating for several years in possession of the ITniver- 

 sity. These funds were invested chiefly in mercantile Iniihhngs in 

 the heart of Boston, the income from which was satisfactory, and 

 looked secure. The fine estate of over two hundred acres in West 

 Roxbury, which Mr. Benjamin Bussey had left to the University, was 

 in good order and ready for the service of the Bussey Institution as 

 ]\Ir. Bussey contemplated it. Accordingly, in 1870, a building was 

 planned and put up containing the laboratories, lecture-rooms, library 

 and offices of the Institution, and the work of creating a small Faculty 

 for the Institution was begun. The professorship of Agricultural 

 Chemistry was offered to Professor Storer, and was accepted by him 

 in 1870. A year later he was made Dean of the Bussey Institution, 

 an office which he held, with his professorship, till his retirement in 

 1907. Here the main work of Professor Storer's life was done. It 

 began under the most favorable conditions, with adequate laboratories, 

 including glass-houses, good experimental fields, and a sufficient 

 income to cover not only teaching, but research. In June, 1871, he 

 married Catharine Atkins Eliot, a sister of President Eliot, and the 

 married pair occupied a house near the main building of the Institu- 

 tion. 



In November, 1872, the great Boston fire occurred; and in that 

 conflagration several of the best buildings in which the Bussey Fund 

 was invested were destroyed, anfl the insurance on them was lost in 

 part through the failure of the insuring companies. A large subscrip- 

 tion was raised by the alumni and friends of Harvard University to 

 make good its losses in this fire; but the Corporation of that day 

 thought it best to use the whole of that fund to make good other losses 

 which the University had suffered, and to give the Bussey Institution 

 no advantage from it. Hence the cash income of the Institution was 

 seriously and permanently reduced; and in consequence Professor 

 Storer's department and the general activities of the Institution of 

 which he was Dean were seriously crippled. This loss altered the 

 subsequent tenor of Professor Storer's life. He continued to teach 

 and study with enthusiasm; but his pupils were few in number, and 

 his research work was painfully restricted. Nevertheless, he pro- 

 duced under these untoward circumstances his principal book, two 

 volumes on " Agriculture in Some of its Relations with Chemistry," 

 constructed out of his lectures during twent\'-fi\e \ears, and first 



