JOHN AMORY LOWELL. 423 
“record of his own intellectual breadth and scope, as well as 
of his large administrative capacity.” Weall know with what 
good judgment, with what liberality, and with what success 
this peculiar trust has been administered, and how on the one 
hand a series of most distinguished men have been attracted 
into its service, while on the other the efforts of younger men 
have been stimulated and rewarded at the period when such 
encouragement was most important to them. Suffice it to 
mention the names of Lyell and Agassiz, — the former early 
and also a second time brought from England for courses of 
lectures at the Lowell Institute, the latter a permanent acqui- 
sition to us and to our country. Through Mr. Lowell’s 
discernment, moreover, the first encouragement to devote his 
life to scientific pursuits was afforded to Jeffries Wyman, by 
the offer of the curatorship of the Institute as well as of a 
lectureship. The intellectual and the financial interests of 
this trust have equally prospered in Mr. Lowell’s hands; for 
while the number of lecture-courses has been doubled, and 
various subsidiary lines of instruction have been developed, 
the principal of the fund has been increased to thrice its 
original amount. 
Mr. Lowell’s fondness for botany developed shortly after he 
left college, and was incited by the botanical intercourse be- 
tween his father and the late Dr. Francis Boott, with whom 
he maintained a lifelong friendship. But it was only in about 
the year 1844 or 1845 that he began the formation of an 
herbarium and botanical library ; and this was actively prose- 
cuted for several years, in evident expectation of comparative 
leisure which he could devote to scientific studies. He sub- 
scribed liberally to the botanical explorations in our newly- 
acquired or newly-opened western territories; and when in 
Europe, in 1850 and 1851, he added largely to his store of 
rare and costly botanical books. But just when he was ready 
to use the choice materials and appliances which had been 
brought together, the financial crisis of 1857 remanded him to 
business. The grave duties and responsibilities which he re- 
sumed he carried up nearly to the age of fourscore — carried 
as it were with the vigor of early manhood and the cheerful 
