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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



occurred. Although, knowing perfectly what lay before him, the 

 young man kept unflinchingly onward. Wrapped up in his loved 

 science and toiling like a strong man in the service of the acad- 

 emy which had won his boy-heart, he kept happily and whole- 

 somely busy to the very end. His labor in a loved cause no doubt 



prolonged his life, but at last, 

 December 10, 1881, the long- 

 expected summons came. The 

 monument of that young life 

 consists of a series of papers, 

 chiefly entomological, of no mean 

 merit and the academy. In 1872 

 Duncan Putnam found his first 

 specimen of Galeodes. This be- 

 longs to the family Solpugidce,, 

 a curious group related to the 

 spiders and scorpions. From that 

 date on his interest centered up- 

 on this little-known and curious 

 group. To so good profit did he 

 labor that even now in our latest 

 general authoritative work on 

 insects Prof. Comstock names 

 Putnam as the chief authority. 

 The results of his study were not 

 fully ready for publication at 

 the time of his death, but Prof. Herbert Osborne put them in 

 shape for the printer. They comprise one brief paper Notes on 

 Solpugidse, an important Bibliography, and data for a Mono- 

 graph upon the American Galeodidae. All of this material, beau- 

 tifully illustrated by the author's own drawings, was published 

 in the memorial volume of the Proceedings. Besides the material 

 upon the Solpugidce, Mr. Putnam's work includes a score of im- 

 portant papers which were printed in the Proceedings, Popular 

 Science Monthly, United States Government reports, etc. The 

 whole motive in J. Duncan Putnam's work was to do what ought 

 to be done. As he himself once said, " If others are unwilling to do 

 what ought to be done, I must." No one outside his family knew 

 him better than Dr. Parry, who said of him : " Though over thirty 

 years his senior in the broad field of Nature, we occupied the 

 same level. Always respectful to my personal wishes or sugges- 

 tions, never flinching from any imposed duty, always cheerful, 

 hopeful, and zealous, he proved a companion worthy of the high- 

 est regard, which he never forfeited either by word or deed." By 

 his activity in field work Mr. Putnam gathered a collection of 

 twenty-five thousand specimens, representing more than eight 



Fio. 7. CAPTAIN WILFRED P. HALL. 



