4 SKETCH OF PROF. JOHN LE CONTE. 



an accomplished zoologist, often gave up liis New York home in 

 winter for the jnirpose of spending the colder months on the 

 Southern plantation. The scientific proclivities of both father 

 and uncle insensibly made all the children students of natural 

 history and collectors of specimens. Thus they gradually imbibed 

 knowledge on such subjects, and acquired powers of discrimina- 

 tion that are ordinarily attained only by years of study in maturer 

 life. Their mother died in 1826, leaving the father in charge of 

 six children. Deprived of maternal care at so early a period of 

 life, all of them, and especially the boys, were thrown largely 

 upon their own resources at a tender age. 



In those days and in that country neighborhood, forty miles 

 from the nearest city, Savannah, it was necessary to do without 

 the school accommodations that are now abundant in every vil- 

 lage of our land. An isolated wooden-framed house, with no 

 plastering, a single door for its single room, abundant ventilation 

 through the crevices of the floor and walls, fully supplemented 

 by the draught through an ample clay chimney — such was the 

 scliool-house in which the children were gathered daily from 

 plantations varying in distance from one to half a dozen miles or 

 more. The teacher was rarely ever of the best. One there was 

 who took charge of this road-side seminary for two years, became 

 the intimate friend of Mr. Le Conte, and exerted over his boys an 

 influence that became life-long. Alexander H. Stephens, the fu- 

 ture statesman and historian) was then a young graduate who 

 sought in teaching the pecuniary support that was necessary 

 while he was preparing for admission to the bar. His fine classi- 

 cal taste and clear, logical mind jproduced a lasting impression 

 upon John Le Conte, who received thus his training for college^ 

 and entered Franklin College, now the University at Athens, Ga., 

 with distinguished success in January, 1835. 



As a student, young Le Conte soon became noted for his clear- 

 ness of conception and his scrupulous accuracy in work. The 

 curriculum of study was the same for all, irresi^ective of native 

 bias or prospective aim in life. He was fully appreciative of all 

 the classical culture that was there afforded, but his tastes natu- 

 rally led him into spending on mathematics and its applications 

 a larger share of attention than Latin and Greek could attract. 

 " Give him the cosine of A and he will prove anything," was the 

 criticism expressed by an admiring fellow-student, and concurred 

 in by the rest. The formal teaching of physics and chemistry 

 involved mere text-book recitation, and attendance upon illus- 

 trated lectures of the most elementary character, which were 

 delivered with oracular authority. It was more than whispered 

 among the students that on these topics John Le Conte knew a£ 

 much as or more than tlie professor himself. 



vol. XXXVI. — 8 



