74 PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA. 



the politics, and the society of the capital, and the telling of 

 the incidents is made more attractive by the writer's always 

 lively humour. 



The lines of Dr. Mitchill's work in Congress are indicated by 

 various notes in his letters and in the record which he has left 

 of Memorable Events and Occurrences in his life. During his 

 first term he was a member of committees of the House on 

 Commerce and Manufactures, the Naturalization Laws, the 

 protection of American seamen and commerce against the 

 Tripolitan corsairs, Naval Affairs, memorials concerning per- 

 petual motion, patent rights, the Mint, and French spoliations. 

 He laboured in the Senate for the adoption of improved 

 quarantine laws, " and was strenuous," says Dr. Francis, " to 

 lessen the duty on the importation of rags, in order to render 

 the manufacture of paper cheaper, the better to aid the diffu- 

 sion of knowledge by printing." In December, 181 1, he brought 

 up for adoption by the House of Representatives a report 

 favourable to the " nascent nations " of Spanish America, and 

 " full of good wishes toward them in their exertions to be- 

 come free and independent." In connection with the War of 

 1812 he acted as a commissioner under the Navy Department 

 in constructing a floating battery or heavy vessel of war, to 

 defend the seacoast and harbours of the United States ; and in 

 1814 he was found labouring jointly with his patriotic neigh- 

 bours, " with mattock and shovel, in the trenches for several 

 days, to erect fortifications against the enemy." 



National and social matters did not absorb Dr. Mitchill's 

 attention in Washington to the exclusion of his interest in 

 scientific inquiries. Curious speculations and remarks appear 

 in his letters about phenomena which came under his obser- 

 vation. In one letter, he wishes his wife to inform him 

 exactly at what hour a certain storm began. " I wish to 

 know," he said, " exactly when the storm began in New York, 

 as it is connected with other facts tending to a theory of the 

 atmospheric motions in winter." Another letter, forwarding a 

 specimen of the Mitchella repens, explains why no plant had 

 been named after him. Prof. Willdenow, of Berlin, had in- 

 tended to give his name to some plant, but found it already 

 appropriated by this partridge berry, which was named by 

 Linnaeus in honour of John Mitchell, of Virginia. He was 

 more fortunate, according to Dr. Francis, in the matter of 



