$02 Buwgraplical Notice of Dr. Bruce. 
were eminently active, and by their united exertion and perse- 
verance, (opposed hy much professional talent) they obtained 
a charter from the Regents. In this new institution, as profes- 
sor of the materia medica, and of his favorite pursuit, mine- 
ralogy, he exhibited the fruits of arduous study, with a dignity 
of character, and urbanity of manner, which commanded the 
respect of the profession, and the regard-of the students. - 
The ruling passion in Dr. Bruce’s mind, was a love of natu- 
ral science, and especially of mineralogy. ‘Towards the stady of 
this science he produced in his own country a strong impulse, 
and he gave it no small degree of eclat. His cabinet composed 
of very select and well characterized specimens; purch by 
himself, or collected in his own pedestrian and other tours in Eu- 
rope, or, in many instances, presented to him by distinguished 
mineralogists abroad; and both in its extent, and in relation to 
the then state of this country, very.valuable, soon became an ob- 
ject of much attention. That of the late B. D. Perkins, which, 
at about the same time, had been formed by Mr. Perkins in Ea- 
rope, and imported by him into this country, was also placed in 
New-York, and both cabinets (for both were freely shown to the 
curious, by their liberal and courteous proprietors) contributed 
more thab any causes had ever done before, to excite in the pub- 
lic mind an active interest in the science of mineralogy.*  « 
Dr. Bruce, while abroad, had been personally and intimately 
conversant with the Hon. Mr. Greville, of Paddington Green, 
near London, a descendant of the noble house of Warwick, the 
possessor of one of the finest private cabinets in Europe, and 
a zealous cultivator of mineralogy. Count Bournon, one’ of 
those loyal French exiles, who found a home in England, du- 
ring the storm of the French revolution, was almost domesti- 
cated vat Mr. Greville’s, and was hardly second to any mail ip 
mineralogical, and particularly in crystallographical knowledge- 
* The collection of Mr. Perkins became in 1807, (partly by the liberality af 
its possessor, and partly by purchase,) the property of Yale College, and is now 
in the cabinet of that institution. It is believed that few cabinets of equa! 
extent, ever contained more instructive and beautiful specimens, with less that 
is unmeaning of superfluous, The’ cabinet of Dr. Bruce has, since his death, 
been purchased by a gentlemen in N ew- York, for 5000 dollars. —ditor- 
