TASHA CUELES. 199 
ey Cer. 
CAMBRIDGE, MASS., APRIL 1881. 
Communications, exchanges and editors’ copies 
should be addressed to Epirors OF PsyCHE, Cam- 
bridge, Mass. Communications for publication in 
PsycuE must be properly authenticated, and no anony- 
mous articles will be published. 
Editors and contributors are only responsible for 
the statements made tn their own communications. 
Works on subjects not related to entomology will not 
be reviewed tn PSYCHE. 
For rates of subscription and of advertising, see 
advertising columns. 
GEORGE DOLE SMITH. 
Born 4 Sept. 1833, in Biddeford, Maine. 
Died 6 July 1880, in Cambridge, Mass. 
Mr. Smith was by trade a watchmaker and 
jeweller. After carrying on his business in 
Maine, Virginia, Illinois, and Missouri, he 
entered the establishment of Palmer, Bach- 
elder and Co., in Boston, Mass., where he 
acted as salesman in the watch department 
for about nineteen years, and was for the last 
thirteen years a member of the firm. By his 
kind manners, accommodating spirit and 
thorough knowledge of his business he won 
many friends and increased in no small de- 
gree the patronage of the establishment. 
But devoted as he was to the interests of the 
firm, his heart was elsewhere. 
He was a member of the Cambridge En- 
tomological Club, and of the Boston Society 
of Natural History, though not a frequent 
attendant upon the meetings of either society. 
He was an enthusiastic student of coleoptera 
and for more than twenty years gave all his 
leisure time to the collection, arrangement 
and study of these insects. Indeed, so assid- 
uous was his devotion to his collection, that 
few persons had an opportunity of making 
his acquaintance out of business hours, un- 
less they visited him in his studio. In his 
earlier years he established the foundation 
of his collection by his own exertions, but 
later, being unable to travel extensively, and 
finding rather barren fields in his vicinity, he 
resorted largely to purchase and exchange. 
His aim was to obtain both sexes of every 
species existing in North America, and, hav- 
ing ample means, he spared hardly any 
expense in pursuance of this purpose. More- 
over, the liberality with which he granted 
the use of his cabinet to other students 
secured for him their good will and coopera- 
tion, and through them he received immense 
additions to his cabinet.- So thoroughly had 
the field been explored for him that for a long 
time before his death he was rarely able to 
add any new species except the very minute 
ones, and possessed nearly all that were 
known as occurring in North America. The 
extent and wonderfully perfect state of pre- 
servation of his collection attracted the 
attention of the leading students of his spec- 
ialty in the country, and from them he re- 
ceived many visits. It was his practice to 
relax and remount every specimen which he 
placed in his cabinet, and it is rare to find a 
limb or a joint missing, while all these parts 
are set in the attitudes of the living individ- 
uals. Very few specimens had ever been in 
alcohol, hence they possessed the brilliancy 
of life. The whole North American collec- 
tion is most neatly labelled and arranged in 
more than two hundred boxes made in form 
of large octavo books, and covered with black 
cloth. These boxes are ranged upon 
shelves in cabinets with glass doors. 
In addition to his North American collec- 
tion Mr. Smith had a quite extensive collec- 
tion of South American coleoptera, mostly 
donations from various friends. He had 
spent much labor upon the arrangement of 
these in about forty wooden storing boxes, 
and except by comparison this collection in 
itself would be considered a monument of 
industry and devotion. 
Mr. Smith was not simply a collector of in- 
sects. He possessed a very good entomolog- 
ical library, and was well read in the science. 
He owned also a fine and well-equipped binoc- 
ular microscope, and was contemplating the 
performance of extensive work with this 
instrument when death puta stop to all his 
plans. —[Abstract of a memoir read by J: 
Orne, jr., before the Boston Society of Nat- 
ural History. | B: P. M. 
