Z PROCEEDINGS OF THE 



He early developed a great interest in natural history, especi- 

 ally ornithology, and frequented the Academy of Natural 

 Sciences then occu]>ying a .small building at Twelfth and .San- 

 som streets. Here he made the acquaintance of Thomas 

 Nuttall, John K. Townsend, Dr. George Leib, Dr. Sanjuel G. 

 Morton, Dr. Paul Goddard and other active members of the 

 Society and in 1840 assisted in the transference of the collections 

 to the building at Broad and Sansom which was the home of 

 the Academy for the next thirty-five years. 



Deciding to become a farmer, Woodhouse went to live with 

 John Worth, a well-known agriculturalist, of Che.'^ter county, 

 Penna., and later with bis brother occuj)ied a farm j)urchased 

 by their father in the Springtown Manor tract in the same 

 county, situated on the Prandywine. Here the study of birds 

 kept pace with the activities of the farm until, after suffering a 

 severe attack of sickne.ss, Woodhouse decided to enter upon the 

 study of medicine. He matriculated at the University of Penn- 

 sylvania as a student of Dr. Robert A. Given, then resident 

 physician of the State Penitentiary, and became himself apothe- 

 cary of that institution. He graduated in 1847 and was ap- 

 pointed assistant resident physician at the Philadelphia hospital, 

 remaining there over a year. 



In the meanwhile Col. J. J. Ahert, Chief of the U. S. Topo- 

 graphical Engineer Corps, applied to Dr. Morton of the Academy 

 for a young doctor to accompany the Creek and Cherokee 

 boundary survey as surgeon and naturalist. Dr. Woodhouse 

 was recommended and was not slow to accept the jiosition, 

 it being evidently much more to his liking than the sedentary 

 life of a hospital physician. He reported in Washington in 

 April, 1849, and was soon en route for the frontier. The manu- 

 script journals of this expedition, which I have had the pleasure 

 of examining, are full of interest. His route lay down the Ohio 

 and thence by way of the Mississippi and Arkansas to Fort 

 Gibson in Indian Territory where the party, under the leader- 

 ship of Lieut. Sitgreaves, took the field. In 1850 the work was 

 continued under Lieut. Woodruff and on this survey the inter- 

 esting daguerreotype accompaning this article was taken, show- 

 ing the party encanipetl on the prairie, June, 18.50. 



