DANIEL GIRAUD ELLIOT — BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 
bany; and in all the cities and within the 
boundaries of our great state, there was but 
one working ornithologist, George Newbold 
Lawrence, a man greatly older than my- 
self, whose sons were my friends and com- 
panions, but who had not inherited their 
father’s scientific tastes. Lawrence’s collec- 
tions seemed larger and more wonderful to 
my youthful eyes than any I have since seen 
in all the museums of the world. 
The condition in New York was pretty 
much repeated in other parts of the country. 
In Massachusetts there were no ornitholo- 
gists. Neither Allen nor Brewster had ap- 
peared and their predecessor, Brewer, had 
hardly been heard 
from. In Wash- 
ington the work 
was represented 
by Baird, who had 
just come to the 
Smithsonian In- 
stitution. There 
was no other natu- 
ralist in Washing- 
ton. Gillasa boy 
had begun his 
work on _ fishes, 
but the young 
naturalists, Coues 
and Ridgway had 
not yet been heard 
from 
Philadelphia 
was much better 
off however. Its 
ornithology was 
represented by 
George Cassin, 
one of the most 
erudite and com- 
petent ornitholo- 
gists this country 
has ever produced 
and the only one 
at that time famil- 
iar with exotic 
forms.! 
The city had its 
Academy and li- 
brary donated 
mainly by Dr. 
Thomas B. Wil- 
son. Also Leidy 
was at the height 
of his career. I 
135 
used to work a good deal in the old building 
on the corner of Broad and Sansom streets, 
my companion often Cope, then starting on 
his career, his alcoholic snakes and lizards 
contesting table space with my birds. 
In all the length and breadth of the land 
there was not a periodical devoted to the ways 
of birds, and it was hard sledging for any 
young ornithologist. The vast majority of 
1A few years later through the publication of 
his Monographs, Elliot was brought into rather 
intimate relationship with Cassin, owing to the 
fact that the latter was the head of the firm of 
Bowen and Company (who served 
sO many years). 
Audubon for 
Dr. Elliot in 1897, when curator of zodlogy at Field Museum, Chicago 
