Harvard School of Geology 



under discussion. I could not do much in that line, 

 but I was more skillful than my rustic rivals at 

 pitching a ball which would readily turn out a 

 "pop fly" that is, a short hit into the air. As I 

 remember, our teams lost none of the four or five 

 games we played. 



My part in the School of Geology was to give 

 instruction in the local flora to thirty young ge- 

 ologists, many of them of marked ability. And to 

 mention this pleasant experience is inevitably to 

 recall our leader's extraordinarily charming person- 

 ality, his overflowing humor, brilliant simplicity, and 

 absolute naturalness in dealing with everything and 

 everybody. At Harvard any great noise used to be 

 ascribed to student applause at "one of Shaler's 

 jokes," even a clap of thunder being thus accounted 

 for occasionally. 



Our encampment on the mountain shelf awakened The 



mountain 



great interest and some alarm among the native 



i 11- i cam ? 



population, one man recalling that just previous to 



the outbreak of the Civil War fifteen years before, 

 he had seen men in tents there with the flag flying 

 above them at the summit. He was therefore con- 

 vinced that our presence was a warning and that 

 the people should be prepared. Another incident 

 which contributed to the general gayety occurred 

 when a Harvard student attempted to mount his 

 pony from the right side. The animal, a true son of 

 the South, resented the outrage and left its perpe- 

 trator where Brer Rabbit of Georgia was "born and 

 bred" that is, in the brier patch. 



During my stay at Cumberland Gap I was elected 

 without warning to the professorship of Biology in 

 the Northwestern Christian University, already being 



C 139 3 



