418 FRANCIS HUMPHREYS STORER. 



published in 1897. This is a treatise of large permanent value, al- 

 though agricultural science has developed rapidly during the twenty 

 years since the book appeared. The scientific farmer of to-day may 

 find in it innumerable facts and much reasoning of great value to him. 

 The two volumes are affectionately inscribed to his father, of whom 

 the son says, " To whose zealous example and constant encouragement 

 are to be attributed whatever of scientific purpose may be found in 

 them." In the last paragraph of the preface the author urges upon 

 his reader, as he had been accustomed to urge upon his pupils, the 

 great importance of studying two books by Professor Samuel William 

 Johnson of Yale University, entitled "How Crops Grow" and "How 

 Crops Feed," and remarks " Not a few points have here (that is, in 

 Professor Storer's book) been lightly touched upon or even wholly 

 omitted, simply because full explanations concerning them may be 

 found in one or another of Johnson's books." Such remarks are 

 distinctly unusual in the preface of one author about the publications 

 of another on a similar subject. In this case the two authors were 

 very unlike persons in temperament and habit of mind ; but they were 

 one in scientific spirit and desire to be ser\iceable. 



During his long career as a chemist Professor Storer wrote nmnerous 

 scientific communications for learned societies and contributions to the 

 " Bulletin of the Bussey Institution." He also published two works 

 which were the product of great industry and exactness in compiling 

 all the accessible information on the subjects dealt with. The first 

 of these publications appeared wdiile he was a practicing commercial 

 chemist in Boston under the title " Dictionary of the Solubilities of 

 Chemical Substances." It was a work of great learning and great 

 industry, which perfectly illustrates Storer's capacity for the patient 

 labors of compiler and editor. A second publication of this sort 

 appeared later in the " Cyclopaedia of Quantitati^•e Chemical Analy- 

 sis." Both these were works that could be carried on incidentally and 

 without consecutive attention, in hours which other persons might 

 have considered leisure hours. Professor Storer had no leisure. He 

 relied for the preservation of his mental freshness and his bodily 

 health on change of work, and a persistent habit of onmi\orous reading. 



After his wife died in 1882 he returned to Boston to live with un- 

 married sisters, to whom he was tenderly attaclied. An increasing 

 deafness caused his withdrawal from most of his scientific fellowship 

 and social intercourse during the last ten years of his life. He died 

 30 July, 1914, in the eighty-third year of his age. 



Charles W. Kliot. 



Cambridge, 27 May, 1918. 



