150 PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA. 



No matter how violent or bitter our assailant may be, doubt- 

 less he will be more so in proportion to his ignorance of geol- 

 ogy and to the strength of his prejudices." 



Mrs. Silliman died in January, 1850, and Prof. Silliman 

 was married a second time, in the following year, to Mrs. 

 Sarah I. Webb, of Woodstock, Connecticut. He had nine chil- 

 dren, of whom one son and four daughters lived to adult age. 

 The son was Prof. Benjamin Silliman, the younger, and the 

 daughters were Maria Trumbull, who married John B. Church ; 

 Faith Wadsworth, who married Prof. O. P. Hubbard ; Henrietta 

 Frances, the wife of Prof. James D. Dana; and Julia, who mar- 

 ried Rev. Edward W. Oilman. Prof. Silliman's death was sup- 

 posed to be due to an affection of the heart, apparently in- 

 duced by a neuralgic attack which he incurred from attending 

 a meeting on behalf of the Sanitary Commission, on the i3th 

 of November, 1864. He was confined to the house for several 

 days, but seemed afterward to recover, and made several calls 

 in the neighbourhood ; but on the 24th Thanksgiving day 

 he died, instantly and without a struggle, just as he had re- 

 marked that he might perhaps go out to church. 



Prof. Silliman, says Prof. Fisher, would have been the last 

 to claim that he had that rare insight of genius which divines 

 the secrets of Nature. His whole turn was more prac- 

 tical than speculative. " His perceptions were quick, his 

 judgment sound, and all his mental operations were marked 

 by good sense." His qualities "well fitted him for his pecul- 

 iar work, and that was to collect and diffuse scientific truth. 

 . . . Nor is he without merit as an investigator, although his 

 distinction does not lie here. He was never very careful to 

 claim for himself the credit of scientific discovery. At the 

 same time, he took delight in bringing honour to the discov- 

 eries of others." He prepared an edition of Henry's Chemis- 

 try, which appeared in 1808, with the modest announcement, 

 " To which are added notes by a professor in this country." 

 While this work was going through the press, a remarkable 

 meteor passed over New England (December, 1807), and ex- 

 ploded over Weston, Connecticut, where several stones fell to 

 the ground. He visited the scene, and, besides publishing a 

 popular account of the facts in the Connecticut Herald, made 

 them the subject of a scientific examination and report before 

 the Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, which was afterward 



