SAMUEL FIN LEY B REESE MORSE. 239 



God in making so many varied forms of life and 

 color to please our eyes. In his later years he 

 became deeply interested in the microscope, and 

 purchased one of great excellence and power. For 

 whole hours, all the afternoon or evening, he would 

 sit over it, examining flowers, or the animalcula in 

 different fluids. Then he would gather his children 

 about him, and give us a sort of extempore lecture 

 on the wonders of creation, invisible to the naked 

 eye, but so clearly brought to view by the magni- 

 fying power of the microscope. 



" He was very fond of animals, cats and birds in 

 particular. He tamed a little flying-squirrel, and it 

 became so fond of him that it would sit on his 

 shoulder while he was at his studies, and would eat 

 out of his hand, and sleep in his pocket. To this 

 little animal he became so much attached that we 

 took it with us to Europe, where it came to an 

 untimely end, in Paris, by running into an open fire." 



In New York he bought a large house, No. 5 

 West Twenty-second Street, for his winter resi- 

 dence, and, on a vacant lot adjoining, erected an 

 elegant building for his library and study. What 

 a contrast between this and the time when " Porte 

 Crayon" gave him ten dollars, which Morse said 

 would save his life ! 



Honors now poured in upon him. In 1835 he 

 had been elected a member of the Historical Insti- 

 tute of France. 



In 1837, a member of the Eoyal Academy of 

 Fine Arts of Belgium. 



