34 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. 84 



which he had not access. A good insight into his character, methods 

 of work and way of thinking is to l)e gained, not only from his classic 

 vohmie, but especially from his collected entomological correspon- 

 dence which was edited by S. H. Scudder and published as a volume 

 by the Boston Society of Natural History in 1869. From many of 

 his letters one gathers a good idea of his great attention to detail 

 and of his remarkable knowledge of the structure of the insects he 

 studied. His correspondence with the English entomologist Edward 

 Doubleday of the British Museum of Natural History, which started 

 in 1839 after a visit Doul)leday had made to the United States and 

 lasted for ten years, is of especial interest. 



There is no doubt that his " Treatise on Insects Injurious to 

 Vegetation " helped many farmers and gardeners and that it helped 

 many entomologists. More than that, I feel sure that it made many 

 entomologists. I shall never forget my delight when on Christmas 

 Day, 1 87 1, I was given a copy of the new edition with the wonderful 

 illustrations by Sonrel and Burckhardt. They were the best illustra- 

 tions of insects that had been published, and nothing that has been 

 issued since is better than some of them. 



Harris was a learned scholar, a man of good birtb and sound breed- 

 ing, a lover of nature, and one of the best examples of a high type 

 that New England produced a hundred years or more ago. Quite the 

 most beautiful appreciation of his character and of his work that has 

 been published was done by A. R. Grote in his paper entitled " The 

 Rise of Practical Entomology in America," published in the Twen- 

 tieth Annual Report of the Entomological Society of Ontario in 

 1899. It is so beautiful a bit of writing that it deserves a place in 

 literature, and it is so high an appreciation of Harris that it should 

 be read by every entomologist. The Memoir- of Harris, by Colonel 

 Thomas Wentworth Higginson, which prefaces Scudder's " Ento- 

 mological Correspondence of Thaddeus William Harris, M. D." 

 should be read in connection with Grote's charming paper. No one 

 who reads these two paj^ers will ever think of Harris except with 

 admiration, deep respect, and alit'ection. 



From Colonel Higginson's account it appears that, while ])erform- 

 ing the Librarian's duties at Cambridge. Harris formed a ])rivalc 

 class in entomology which met on one evening in every week ; and 

 it appears also that he had apparently expected and hojied to be made 

 full professor of natural history in the College. These hopes, however, 

 were not fulfilled, and Dr. Asa Gray was chosen for the post in 1842. 

 Of course, Gray's claims were very high, and it was necessary, appar- 

 ently, to appoint a botanist of the highest attainments who should 



