158 The Smithsonian Institution 



tion to such matters in his later busy life, there is still in ex- 

 istence an elaborate "genealogical tree," prepared by himself 

 at the age of sixteen, by the aid of which it has been practi- 

 cable to identify his ancestors up to and including all those of 

 the fifth degree, thirty in number, and in many lines far beyond. 



His grandparents were all the children of colonial Pennsyl- 

 vanians. He was emphatically an American, for over eighty 

 per centum of his progenitors in the sixth degree were living 

 in the colonies during the seventeenth century. Out of the 

 total number of thirty-two, one, or perhaps two, were of 

 Swedish blood; one a Huguenot, and one or two others from 

 the Palatinate — companions of Pastorius in the founding of 

 the first German community in America. The others were 

 either natives of Great Britain or their descendants estab- 

 lished in the American colonies. Of these there were several 

 of Scotch, Irish, or Scotch-Irish blood, and one or two from 

 Wales. 



Although in one sense only agencies in the concentration 

 and transmission of the various traits derived from previous 

 generations, his immediate ancestors — with their personal 

 traits, the results of education and environment — were those 

 who had the most direct influence upon his character. 



His father, Samuel Baird (i 786-1833), was a lawyer, a 

 man of fine culture, an independent and original thinker, and 

 a lover of nature and of outdoor sports. 



His mother, Lydia McFunn Biddle (i 797-1861), who sur- 

 vived her husband nearly forty years, was a woman of fine 

 executive powers, fascinating manners, and of a sunny and 

 equable temperament. 



His father's father, Samuel Baird, served as a quartermas- 

 ter in the Revolutionary Army ; he was a surveyor, and was 

 interested in the opening of coal-mines in eastern Pennsyl- 

 vania, in association with his cousin, Colonel Thomas Potts, 



