The Benefactors 245 



therefore, gave away his entire estate, amounting to about 

 half a milHon dollars, to various public institutions. 



His funeral was unostentatious, as he requested it should 

 be, only his intimate friends attending. Among these I was 

 numbered ; for while I felt it an official duty to represent this 

 Institution at the funeral of one to whom it owed so much, I 

 was there also from a feeling of real friendship and regard to 

 an old man whose singular powers, whose lonely life, and 

 whose — perhaps often unmet — affection had drawn me to 

 him as to a personal friend.^ 



In 1894 a bequest was received from Robert Stanton Avery, 

 consisting of almost all of his small estate, to establish "the 

 fund constituted by Robert S. Avery and his wife Lydia T. 

 Avery for the extension of the sciences." 



Robert Stanton Avery was born near Preston, Connecti- 

 cut, May I, 1808; and died in Washington City, September 

 12, 1894. After spending nearly fifteen years in teaching 

 and studying, he entered Harvard Divinity School and was 

 graduated in 1846. Failing health prevented his acceptance 

 of a pastoral charge, and while settling up his father's estate 

 he began the study of the mathematics and their application to 



1 The Secretary of the Smithsonian Insti- in her left hand, and in her right a scroll em- 



tution issued a circular on March 31, 1893, blematic of knowledge and the words "Per 



announcing a series of prizes for contribu- Orbe/n" while the reverse is adapted from the 



tions to knowledge in regard to the nature seal of the Institution as designed by Augus- 



or properties of atmospheric air. The same tus St. Gaudens, the map of the world being 



circular announced the establishment of a replaced by the words "Hodgkins Medal." 



meiial to be known as " The Hodgkins Medal No impression of the Hodgkins medal in 



of the Smithsonian Institution," to be awarded gold has as yet been awarded, but four im- 



"for important contributions to our know- pressions in silver and eight in bronze were 



ledge of the nature and properties of atmo- awarded to successful competitors for the 



spheric air or for practical applications of our Hodgkins prizes. In future the medal will 



existing knowledge of them to the welfare be awarded from time to time as some grand 



of mankind." The medal itself — the ob- scientific discovery is made that is worthy of 



verse and reverse of which are shown in the such recognition. The medals were struck 



accompanying illustration — was designed by at the French Mint in Paris, and are seven 



Monsieur J. C. Chaplain, of Paris, a member and a half centimeters in diameter (about 



of tlie French Academy and one of the most three inches), and the gold medal was to 



eminent medalists in the world. It bears on have had a bullion value of $240 to $300. 

 its obverse a female figure carrying a torch 



