108 THE NATURALIST OF THE ST. CROIX 



to his heart's comfort and content, for the momentary parting 

 with it at such a juncture would have been like speaking a final 

 farewell to his dearest and most intimate companions and friends. 



What a happy relief it must hare been to his mind to have this 

 collection so opportunely and desirably disposed of. Not less wall 

 his New Brunswick friends Uelight to do him honor. My own 

 choice would have selected Fredericton next to Calais as his 

 beneficiary. And Canadians are warm hearted, honest, faithful 

 and unpretentious people, as I have alw^ays found them. Almost 

 every week I receive epistolary testimony from some of them to 

 this efiect. 



Perhaps it is better that Calais did not receive the gift. Years 

 ago Mr. Boardman gave me his confidence, to a certain extent, as 

 to the want of appreciation of his home people ("a prophet is not 

 without honor except in his own country*'), the municipality 

 declining his repeated overtures, first, on the plea that the city 

 had no suitable building for the collection, and afterwards declin- 

 ing to erect one. And it serves the corporation right to be left 

 out, though the body of the tow'n's people will sympathize with 

 us all in the regret that the home site and the center of his life 

 work could not have been selected and appropriated for this dis- 

 tinguished monument of his labors. It is a grand donation ! It 

 represents so much, not only of the local fauna of that interesting 

 region, but so much persevering study, devotion and effort of 

 pursuit. 



I have not been able to obtain a classified memorandum of the 

 G. A. Boardman collection, but I have been told by the proprietor 

 that there were more than 3,000 birds and perhaps half that number 

 of mammals and miscellaneous subjects, including many marine 

 curiosities. The world of science cannot well spare such con- 

 tributors as George A. Boardman and George X. Lawrence ; both 

 of them gone within a decade. 



The city of Fredericton, the home of the Boardman 

 collection, is the capital of New Brunsuack and is 

 situated on a beautiful intervale on the west side of the 

 St. John river, about eighty miles from its mouth, and 



