245 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 
Wislizenus studied medicine at the University of Jena in 1828, and 
later at Géttingen and Wiirzburg. He was a member of the “ Bursch- 
enschaft,” but escaped arrest when that was broken up by the author- 
ities. He followed his friend and teacher, the great clinician Schoenlein, 
to Ziirich and there joined an expedition to aid Mazzini in his struggle 
against Austrian rule; but the Swiss troops disarmed them on the border 
so he was forced to return to his studies. 
Wislizenus graduated in Ziirich in 1834 and soon sailed for New 
York, where he began to practise his profession in 1835. Here he re- 
mained two years writing constantly for the German papers of the city. 
He then went west in 1837 and joined some of his fellow-exiles who had 
settled in St. Clair County, Illinois. In 1839 he came to St. Louis and 
immediately seized an opportunity to accompany an expedition of the 
St. Louis Fur Company for trading with the Indians. He thus went 
far into the Northwestern country towards the source of the Green 
River in the Wind River Mountains. When the expedition started to 
return he joined a band of Flat-head and Nez Percé Indians. ‘He thus 
crossed the Rocky Mountains to Utah and went as far as Fort Hall, the 
most southern post of the English trading company. Here he could 
find no guide to take him to California, so he returned; crossing the 
Green and the south fork of the Platte, he followed the Arkansas to 
Missouri. During this trip he had no facilities for making scientific 
observations and collections, so it was wholly without any such results. 
On his return to St. Louis in 1840 he resumed his practise of medi- 
cine. He was identified with early efforts towards the establishment of 
an Academy of Science, and aided Dr. Engelmann in his efforts to found 
a botanic garden, and was an earnest worker in the Western Academy 
of Science. He soon gained a lucrative practice, but as soon as the op- 
portunity offered he was again in the field. He joined a trading ex- 
pedition to Mexico, well equipped this time with instruments and ap- 
paratus for scientific work. In Santa Fé they first learned of the war 
between Mexico and the United States, but Wislizenus obtained a pass 
and proceeded to Chihuahua, where he with other Americans was seized 
and imprisoned. He was sent to a small mountain town of the interior 
and there had ample opportunity to carry on his collecting and observa- 
tions in the neighborhood during the winter. Upon the arrival of Col. 
Doniphan’s troops in the spring he was released and accompanied them 
in a professional capacity a their disbanding at New Orleans in 1847, 
when he returned to St. Loui 
Senator Thomas H. ee became interested in him and his ex- 
periences in Mexico, and finally was the cause of his being summoned 
to Washington and being requested to prepare for publication the results 
of his investigations. His resulting “ Memoir of a Tour to Northern 
Mexico in 1846 and 1847 ” was considered important enough so that the 
senate ordered 5,000 copies printed for distribution. This publication 
